page background

Bagdad Library: A Year in Review

2013-2014

Bagdad Library:A Year in Review2013-2014

It's been a fantastic year!

Bagdad Library was quite the hub of activity, which was one of my goals this year. I wanted to build excitement in the library, and make it THE PLACE that the 607 students wanted to visit. To achieve this, I set forth to create some sort of event or activity each month that either took place in the library or highlighted the library's materials. Some of these events occurred during the 34 classes I saw each week, while others were scheduled outside of the student's normal library time. All in all, I feel these activities were a success, and fun was had by students and faculty alike!
zoom_out_map

September & October: Monster Book Event

After hearing the story, The Monstore by Tara Lazar, students created their very own monster using different 2-D shapes that they were learning about in class.
zoom_out_map

October: Storybook Pumpkin Patch

The entire school was invited to create their favorite storybook character out of a pumpkin in our first annual Storybook Pumpkin Patch. All pumpkins were displayed in the library right up to Halloween.
zoom_out_map

November: Reading Oasis Bookfair

Bagdad Elementary broke all previous records in our Fall Scholastic Book Fair! The $2000 we made in profits went towards purchasing additional books for our collection based on student/teacher recommendations.
zoom_out_map

December: Holiday Tree

Decorating our Bagdad Holiday Tree is always a favorite for everyone! It also helps get the library ready for Cookies with Santa!
zoom_out_map

January: Relax and Read Week

Exploring all the new books that arrived and setting reading goals for the new year is how we celebrate January!
zoom_out_map

February: Author Jefferson Knapps Visits Bagdad

We loved hearing Jefferson Knapp, the author of the series "The Kingdom at the End of the Driveway", talk about how he developed his stories. The students really enjoyed signing his snake, Farangis!
zoom_out_map

February/March: Battle of the Bluebonnets

Our "Battle of the Bluebonnets" team did a fantastic job representing the students of Bagdad Elementary!
zoom_out_map

April: Poetry Celebration Stations

Students celebrated the power of poetry by exploring various Poetry Stations.
zoom_out_map

May: Book Fair Luau

Once again, Bagdad surpassed all previous sales during our Spring Scholastic Book Fair. The $2100 in profits from this fair went towards purchasing ebooks and interactive books for our students for the upcoming year!

Evaluating Our Data

Budgets May Be Down, but Enthusiasm is High!

Even though our budget for 2013-2014 decreased by $2051 from last year, we were able to collect an additional $4692 from our Scholastic Book Fairs! These funds helped to support the growth of our print and digital book collections. It's exciting to see how much these new materials helped to increase the number of books checked out by students! Our interest is indeed high!

Technology and Research

While the use of some of our databases went down, several databases skyrocketed. (Way to go World Book Online!) Students continued to explore ebooks through Overdrive, and have even begun to check out our newest round of ebooks through Capstone Interactive! Our biggest success, however, is in our library LibGuide. We were 2nd in the entire DISTRICT last year with 45,207 sessions, and our school increased to 46,314 sessions this year! Yeah Bagdad Bobcats!

Next Year's

I'm excited about the many changes that are in store for us next year at the Bagdad Library, especially being able to have longer classes now that we are a part of the Specials rotations! I will have more time to do book talks with students , go more in depth on information literacy skills such as digital citizenship and online safety, and integrate technology even more across all grade levels. I will continue to expand the creative centers that I've already started this year, but will also include Makerspaces. All of our learning and creating, mistakes and all, will be promoted through our library's LibGuide, Twitter, and our school's Facebook page. Get ready for another amazing year, Bagdad Bobcats!