Halloween is not really a big holiday here in South Africa. The kids hear of it mostly through US television channels, like Disney. The younger kids I chatted to had been trick-or-treating to each other's houses and knew all about dressing up and costumes. The older ones were less clear on the holiday. Regardless, all ages were very happy to colour in 30+ bats to help me decorate the library.
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| Batty About Books! |
The black fabric is felt, it was considerably expensive but will last forever. The Library Elves and I had to cut it to get to fit to the board- normally, if a piece of fabric is too long we just fold it up behind, but the felt was too thick. Due to this, we also have some back-up felt for future projects. Up close, the felt is very pitch dark and has a great texture.
I saved up a bunch of our spooky/mystery books and displayed them below the display. I've also kept some books in reserve, to stock the display up when it runs low. I'm pleased to say that the first day that I had students come into the library, about 6 books have already been taken out: books that otherwise would have probably never gone off the shelves. In this way, I'd already consider the display a success.
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| Some of our happy bats hanging from the rafters. |
The refurbishing of the displays has brought in some great, often hilarious, comments from the students on how much they like the library 'now'. Many girls instantly notice and remark on the decor, while others walk on past and take a bit of time to actually 'discover' what has changed.
There are a number of sites online where you can get word searches and crosswords made. I tend to use this one for word searches: http://tools.atozteacherstuff.com/word-search-maker/
ReplyDeleteAs for crosswords, there's a great one I use. You download the file and run it on your computer. It's called eclipsecrossword.
Good to see you've got students taking out books. I recently read Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes. I made about fifty cranes and put them up in the classroom of my old class. They're in grade 2 now (class 2). I went in there and spoke to them about the book, showing them how to make cranes and telling them the library had twenty-something copies. Within a week only five copies remained in the library.
Their teacher came to thank me. Apparently they've also been taking out other books, meaning that they are engaging in reading. It's times like these, more than anything else, that make teaching worth it.