FernFolio

I believe that -
• Through reading, readers learn about the world around them.
• By reading, readers become better listeners and speakers, better readers and writers, that, by reading, they actually become smarter.
• Reading helps readers make sense of their lives and those of others, and that they become better humans through reading.I affirm my commitment to helping children become life-long readers.
• I pledge myself to finding that ‘home run’ book that will transform a child into a reader.
• I commit to championing the cause of Free Voluntary Reading among staff and parents.
I believe that every child can become a reader.
• I will actively listen to and observe readers so that I may better know them and understand their reading needs and interests.
• I will reach out to those who love reading, and particularly to those who don’t.
• I will honour readers’ reading choices because in so doing, I honour them.
• I know that I cannot help a reader whose choices I do not respect.
I will strive to ensure that the reading resources in my library reflect and anticipate the interests and needs of my readers
• I will buy the books that children want to read, even comic books, graphic novels, and Captain Underpants.
• I will actively solicit suggestions from readers and follow up on those suggestions.
I affirm the principle that every reader will have free access to every resource.
• Readers will be free to choose materials that meet their reading needs and interests, regardless of their reading skills.
• Books on the New Books shelf, in the display case, and in the Reading Resource Room, and I will make time to fetch these books for readers.
I will encourage readers to sign out library resources.
• Readers will be encouraged to sign out more than one book at a time.
• As long as a reader is enjoying a book and needs more time to finish, I will renew it, and cheerfully.
• When a reader finds that a book is not holding her attention, I will encourage her to return it unfinished.
I will strive to create a warm and welcoming environment for readers.
• There is a reading area that entices readers to read.
• I read aloud to readers, and encourage teachers, parents and children to do so, too.
• There are places where readers can discuss their reading.
I will ensure that books and other reading materials are easy to find.
• There are book displays.
I believe that readers need to be able to take books to wherever they need to go - to the classroom, home, over the holidays and on vacation.
I acknowledge that readers, and particularly readers-in-training, often need help to find their way to the library.
• Every class needs a regularly scheduled book time.
• Outside school hours, computers and the opportunity to socialize get readers through the door.
I affirm that all readers need free access to the library.
• Scheduled times often do not correspond the in-between-good-book times.
• Readers who have completed their class work and those who have not.
I will be a facilitator of reading and readers.
• I will talk about books with every child I meet.
• I will promote reading and readers through school-wide literacy programs.
I will lead by example.

I believe that -
• Through reading, readers learn about the world around them.
We read to learn. Even in an age of audio-visual media, reading remains one of the prime means by which students and adults gain knowledge and understanding, both for academic and personal purposes. Unless children develop a habit of reading, they may well fail to develop the necessary reading comprehension skills to succeed in school, and, consequently, in their lives beyond school. Dr. Stephen Krashen states, “children become better readers by reading…. children who [aren’t readers] have an extremely tough time developing the language and literacy competencies necessary to succeed in today’s world.” 1.
• By reading, readers become better listeners and speakers, better readers and writers, and that, by reading, they actually become smarter.
The value of reading cannot be underestimated. According to Dr. Krashen, readers possess superior oral/aural language skills: they better understand what they hear and are more effective in communicating oral messages. They have a better oral-language vocabulary than their non-reading peers. Their reading comprehension, grammar, spelling, and writing skills are better. And, since reading promotes knowledge and understanding, they do better in math and science, and actually perform more successfully on IQ tests than their non-reading peers. 2. The importance of a sound reading habit in the development of general literacy skills is clearly stated in the Ontario Ministry of Education’s Language Curriculum: “By reading widely, students will develop a richer vocabulary and become more attuned to the conventions of written language. Reading various kinds of texts in all areas of the curriculum will also help students to discover what interests them most and to pursue and develop their interests and abilities.” 3.
• Reading helps readers make sense of their lives and those of others, and that they become better humans through reading.
Reading about other people allows us to walk in their shoes and see the world through their eyes. It gives us a window into the experiences of others, and fosters understanding of and empathy for them. Madeleine L’Engle, author of A Wrinkle in Time, wrote, “Stories make us more alive, more human, more courageous, more loving.” 4.
In an era of increasing curriculum expectations and accountability, it is easy to forget the importance of reading for pleasure, particularly when children choose works of fiction and especially when those works fail to live up to our standards for good literature. But pleasure reading is essential, and not only to the development of sound language skills. It can play a critical role in nurturing a child’s social and affective growth. Linda Hart-Hewins and Jan Wells, express this as follows - “Literature is not simply a means of entertaining and amusing children. It is essential nourishment for their imaginations, their hearts, and their minds. It contributes to their personal growth by widening their horizons, giving them experiences of people and places out of time and out of space; long ago and far away; or here and now, but different from themselves. It gives them experiences of personal confirmation when the child in the book is a child with thoughts and fears, adventures and misadventures like their own. It gives them experiences of profound emotional and psychological power. It helps them make sense of their own experience and the experiences of others. People who enjoy reading may not be better human beings, but they are aware that they have access to a range of feelings and experiences that would not otherwise be available to them.” 5.

I affirm my commitment to helping children become life-long readers.
• I pledge myself to finding that ‘home run’ book that will transform a child into a reader.
I remember the book that made me a reader. It was Joan Aiken’s The Wolves of Willoughby Chase. I was riveted by the desperate plight of Bonnie and Sylvia, and despaired of them ever escaping the clutches of the evil Miss Slighcarp. I recall finishing this book by the light of the hall fixture, since, though it was long past my bedtime, I could not put down the book until it was finished. I went onto read all of the books of Joan Aiken, and then moved onto Madeleine L’Engle and C.S. Lewis. Joan Aiken made me an instant and permanent addict of reading.
While Krashen refers to that single very positive reading experience as the ‘home run book’ 6., Aidan Chambers proposes “ using, if you’re like the French critic Roland Barthes, the partly sexual word jouissance (joy, bliss, ecstasy) for the greatest reading pleasure of all.” 7. I want for every child to experience the same intense ecstasy that I feel when I read a wonderful book.
• I commit to championing the cause of Free Voluntary Reading among staff and parents.
I am passionate about Free Voluntary Reading. Both as a reader and a teacher, I believe that, to foster readers, we must allow them to choose what they read and then give them the time and space in which to read. Readers become readers by reading. Krashen is the chief proponent of FVR, and, in his book, The Power of Reading, he champions the cause far more eloquently than I ever could. However, others are equally clear about the importance of free voluntary reading; Mayra Daniels, in an article entitled Helping Linguistic Minorities Read Independently, states that, “Readers read for either aesthetic or efferent purposes. A child who confronts reading for efferent purposes reads because it is an assignment. This is the learner who may grow to despise reading. On the other hand, children who choose to read for aesthetic purposes do so because they want to. For these learners there is pleasure in reading.” 8.

I believe that every child can become a reader.
It seems to me that making readers is a kind of magic. I heard once that, in their first week at medical school, young doctors-in-training are given white lab coats and stethoscopes and sent into hospitals to practice saying, “I’m Dr. So-and-So,” because you can’t begin to learn the skills necessary to become a doctor until you see yourself as one. In my one attempt at teaching grade one, I recalled those young medical students and resolved to find lab coats and stethoscopes for my young readers. Reading is a very complex business, far more so than the supporters of Dick and Jane seem to realize. As a reader who cannot make much sense of phonics and who failed her Grade 12 English exam on the basis of her spelling, I know only too well that reading is a kind of alchemy that often defies explanation.
Speaking from my own experience, as one of the Monkeys reading group, when the Fairies was the place to be, I know the importance of developing a child’s reading culture, that understanding of and appreciation for literature and the written word, while he or she works on the mechanics of decoding the text. I learned to read, and so did my father and my son, who share my learning impairments. If we three can become readers, then every child can be a reader.
• I will actively listen to and observe readers so that I may better know them and understand their reading needs and interests.
I spend a lot of time watching my readers. I watch how they wander the shelves and displays, I note where they stop and what seems to cause them to do so. I have developed a keen sense about how long a reader generally needs to find a good book, and I worry just as much about the kid who grabs the first book that comes to hand as I do about the kid who drifts aimlessly from shelf to shelf. Like any good shopkeeper, I judge the opportune moment and then move in to make a sale. My first question is, “What’s the last book you read that you enjoyed?” I’ll ask other questions if that one doesn’t help me to know my reader better. “Do you like sports?” “Did you read Harry Potter?” “Do you like to laugh?” “How do you feel about science fiction?’ I also tend to ask readers to let me know if they enjoy the book. For the most part, they are good about reporting in - “It dragged. I couldn’t get into it.” “It was okay. Do you have the sequel?”
One of my most prized moments as a TL was when a grade 8 student came in to tell me all about the book I had recommended and, when warned by her friend that the bell had rung and they were going to be late for class, retorted, “But I have to finish! She wants to know!”
• I will reach out to those who love reading, and particularly to those who don’t.
Readers, committed readers, possess an inherent passion for reading that compels them to find what they need to feed their reading habit. Certainly, we want to be sure to learn about their reading interests and lay in plenty of fuel to help those interests burn, but their desire to read will keep them coming to the library and talking to TLs until their reading needs are met.
It is on the reluctant and struggling readers that we must concentrate our efforts. We have not succeeded until every child becomes a reader. In the quest to make readers on all children, we must deal with all of the baggage they bring to reading. We must employ every stratagem to lure them to reading, and help them to identify and value their attainment of reader status.
I have run a reading initiative at my school for the past four years. I almost abandoned it after the first year because the program had been slow to catch on. It was a comment made to me by a parent that kept the program going; she told me that the Get Caught Reading program, with its Hall of Fame and weekly reading prizes had transformed her learning disabled daughter into a reader. I decided that even one more reader was worth all the effort.
• I will honour readers’ reading choices because in so doing, I honour them.
Researchers such as Ron Jobe have identified different categories of reluctant readers, and have written at length about their learning issues and how to best address them. Jobe and Dayton-Sakari have also addressed a subset of reluctant readers they call InfoKids who are mainly boys and who are interested almost exclusively in non-fiction text.
If we are going to connect with reluctant and struggling readers, then we have to go with their interests and use every trick we know to bring them into contact with books and reading. That ‘home run book’ may be a read-aloud, or it may be Sports Illustrated for Kids, Captain Underpants or, even a favourite web site. For many boys, in particular, it’s going to be a Guinness Book of World Records or the DK Eyewitness series (who doesn’t love their eye-catching photos and cool snippets of information?)
A couple of years ago a reluctant reader in Grade 5 turned up with a stack of old Archie comic books someone had given him. He parked himself on the sofa and read those
comics every recess and every lunch hour for four or five months. His parents were so anxious about his ‘reading rut’ that they came in to talk to me about it. I recommended that we just let him get on with it. He moved out of the Archies into age appropriate novels, especially science fiction and fantasy, and is now reading beyond grade level.
• I know that I cannot help a reader whose choices I do not respect.
Teachers, and TLs, have a less than stellar record when it comes to respecting young readers’ choices. Perhaps because many of us thrived in the educational system and, therefore, don’t have a vested interest in challenging its ‘idées reçues’, we accept a traditional - and narrow - view of what constitutes acceptable reading material. Since we were made to read The Incredible Journey, Romeo and Juliet, and Great Expectations, then many of us conclude that today’s young readers should read them, too.
By requiring them to read the texts of our youth, by ignoring the wealth of wonderful new fiction, much of it Canadian, and the explosion of terrific and visually gorgeous information texts made possible by advances in printing due to computer technology, we rob children of the opportunity to discover text that is relevant to their interests and concerns, and that reflects their world, as well as, more importantly, the chance to make that personal connection with text that transforms a child into a reader.
As teachers, we are often drawn to literature that helps to promote the Three Rs of reading: retell, relate and reflect. But many of the books we select are not the books that our readers would choose. By consistently picking books that do not respond to their reading tastes, we risk sending the message to these readers that their choices are not valid, an altogether excellent way of turning them off reading. Writing about boys and reading, Michael Sullivan states, “If most boy-friendly books never show up when you’re discussing ‘good’ books, boys will notice the omission. And they’ll recognize the implication: books that are funny or action packed or fantasylike aren’t any good. In other words, boys are attracted to substandard materials, and, therefore, reading is not for them.” 9.

I will strive to ensure that the reading resources in my library reflect and anticipate the interests and needs of my readers.
As TLs we are gardeners, nurturing the plants - resources - in the space that is our public garden for the delight of our visitors. Yes, we hold the keys to the gates, and seed and water and weed, but our choice of bedding plants, shrubs, grasses, trees - the picture storybooks and novels and magazines and information texts that occupy the shelves of our garden - must attract the flitting bees and butterflies and hummingbirds that are our young readers. Any good gardener knows that, without pollination there is no fruit; the same holds true for books without readers.
• I will buy the books that children want to read, even comic books, graphic novels, and Captain Underpants.
Sure, we all love a reader who reads a book we adore, and comes in looking for other recommendations for good literature. We seem to forget the trash we read; Nancy Drew, Trixie Belden, The Famous Five, Judy Blume, we read them and loved every word. We read trash and yet managed to develop a more discriminating palate for literature, young readers will do the same. As Aidan Chambers states, “The child must learn to discriminate for himself. If a pupil is allowed to accept or reject, he himself will demand higher standards in reading materials far sooner than if his teacher attempts to tell him what is good and what is bad.” 10.
Stephen Krashen writes that, “Perhaps the most powerful way of encouraging children to read is to expose them to light reading, the kind of reading that schools pretend does not exist…” 11. He goes onto state that comics, and other forms of light reading, can serve as a conduit to heavier, more educationally acceptable reading. 12.
• I will actively solicit suggestions from readers and follow up on those suggestions.
The Board allocates $20 per student, and not per teacher or TL or administrator. In effect, the books belong to the students and are purchased for their use. Who better than them to choose what occupies the library shelves? Besides, as Chambers points out, students need to contribute to the book acquisition process in order to feel that their needs and interests are valued. 13. Readers are more inclined to make active use of a collection in which they feel a sense of ownership.
I keep a duotang by the circulation desk where readers can record the titles of books they want me to buy, and I take that duotang with me when I go shopping. I tell students who recommend books that I’ll buy anything, as long as it isn’t dangerous.
The only books I hesitate over are those few whose audience is likely to be so limited that they are destined to languish on the shelves after the reader who requests them has finished enjoying them. Fortunately, the closest branch of the Toronto Public Library is only half a block away, and its library catalogue is even closer, linked to our school library web site. I’ve shown more than one student how to peruse the public library collection and place holds on items they want or need.

I affirm the principle that every reader will have free access to every resource.
• Readers will be free to choose materials that meet their reading needs and interests, regardless of their reading skills.
On a couple of occasions, in the nearly six years I have been in a school library, someone has taken me to task over my policy of allowing readers to choose books that reflect their interests and not necessarily their independent reading levels.
Students in the TDSB may borrow up to four items. I tell students that if they choose to borrow one book to practice their independent reading skills, then that means they can borrow a further three books to satisfy their other reading needs - resources for that project, a novel for their parent to read aloud to them, a picture storybook, etc.
“Being a reader means reading for yourself,” 14. By emphasizing decoding skills and borrowing only materials at their reading level, we risk leading “learning readers to believe they haven’t succeeded until they are able to decipher all the printed words in a book. Whereas, of course, they are succeeding from the moment they pick up a book and pay attention to it.” 15.
• Books on the New Books shelf, in the display case, and in the Reading Resource Room next to the library are meant to be read, and I will make time to fetch these books for readers.
This seems obvious, doesn’t it? But so many readers have asked if these books are for borrowing that I must conclude that in some school library somewhere, they have been informed that the books were for display purposes only, or were reserved for some specific group of readers, or could only be checked out after some predefined date.
When I first entered the library and, after talking to other TLs, I placed the Red Maple and Silver Birch books on a special shelf and informed prospective readers that, before checking out these books, they needed to join the appropriate club. Lucky for me, and my young readers, I rapidly recognized the error in my ways. Now, all readers are welcome to
borrow the Forest books, whether they plan to read all of the nominated titles, or simply want to tackle a single book. I no longer care how many readers finish enough books to vote; I now focus on how many of them have read one title, or even had one read to them.
I will get the keys to the display case, which generally holds books for which there are no catalogue records in Horizon and are, therefore, going to languish a while before entering general circulation, and get any book that has sparked a reader’s interest. I simply write down the names of borrower and book and ask the former to remind me that the latter need to go back into the display case upon its return.
Next to the library is a tiny room which I call the Reading Resource Room. It where novels sets are stored. These books are intended for use by teachers in novel studies and literature circles, but I don’t hesitate to fetch any book that is requested. Readers particularly enjoy accompanying me when I go to the Reading Resource Room, since it is one of several odd and semi-secret spaces in our elderly building.

I will encourage readers to sign out library resources.
We can throw up all kinds of barriers to book borrowing, enough that many prospective readers can be turned off the process. One secondary school TL was alarmed to discover that numbers of books being borrowed were declining, despite a school-wide initiative to foster reading. For her, a simple change in check out procedures helped to solve the problem. “I stopped requiring forgetful middle school students to have their student card with them when they checked out. They simply had to be able to tell me their ID number.”16.
We need to critically examine our borrowing procedures for policies, either stated or implied, that deter readers from reading.
• Readers will be encouraged to sign out more than one book at a time.
Although the TDSB has set student check outs to four items, I know of many TLs who restrict readers to one and two books at a time. Such restrictions hinder children’s development as readers, because it fails to respond to their need to read for a wide variety of purposes, both personal and academic. Even Kindergarten children, when given the opportunity to do so, will often choose to borrow more than one book, and, when asked, can articulate the many purposes for reading that their selections represent.
While the TDSB default check out limit is set to four items, Horizon includes an override button. Sometimes readers do need more than four books, either because they are voracious readers or because they have a big research assignment due. Putting resources in the hands of students helps to make them readers; engendering good will with those readers makes it all the more likely they will return to borrow more books in the future.
• As long as a reader is enjoying a book and needs more time to finish, I will renew it, and cheerfully.
Becoming a reader takes time. We need to recognize that the speed at which readers interact with text varies widely. Yes, readers borrow books for the standard two-week period, and can renew items once, but two weeks, or even four, might not be sufficient. We need to view due dates with as open a mind as possible. If no one needs the book and you know that the reader continues to read, then why fuss over rather arbitrary due dates? When asked, I always recommend that readers keep books they are reading until they have finished. To my way of thinking, it makes no sense for readers to read half a book. It tends to contribute to an impression that reading is an activity with strict time requirements.
• When a reader finds that a book is not holding her attention, I will encourage her to return it unfinished.
Every year, during the Forest of Reading programs, I am secretly perplexed by some of
the comments of my TL colleagues. These communications have to do with the creation of questions to test whether students who purport to have read a book have, in fact, done so. I think that, if we respect readers’ rights to stop reading a book if it fails to hold their attention, then rarely will we place them - and ourselves - in the situation where they are pretending to have read a book and we are pretending to believe them. In his work on the subject of Free Voluntary Reading, Krashen supports young readers’ rights to put down a book they don’t like, pointing out this “is the kind of reading highly literate people do all the time.” 17.

I will strive to create a warm and welcoming environment for readers.
Libraries need to be places that readers, and readers-in-training, want to visit. They need to be warm and welcoming, and provide enough interest in the way of displays and activities and books, of course, that readers choose to come there in preference to the many other venues that might attract them. But good libraries are more than entertainment arcades. They set an atmosphere conducive to reading and learning.
Interestingly enough, several librarians and teacher-librarians, have drawn parallels between churches, and other religious places, and libraries. Like places of worship, libraries lend themselves to both solitary contemplation and social interaction. In them we venerate not the creator but learning. At their best, libraries are temples to knowledge and culture.
“[Renee Olson] suspect[s] that kids come to libraries, both school and public, because libraries exert a powerful pull on their psyches. What other institution in our society manages to provide a public gathering place while simultaneously catering to the solitary, interior life: the imagination, the curiosity, the intellect. As humans, we constantly come together to celebrate our accomplishments and natural blessings: We build sports stadiums to admire physical prowess; we set aside park land to worship natural beauty; we construct museums to be transported to the past. In the same way, we create libraries so we can savor, together, what the world’s great minds have conceived - and, lest we forget, that encompasses everything from the Ancient Greek dramatists to the giggle-inducing Captain Underpants.” 18.
• There is a reading area that entices readers to read.
By creating reading areas in our libraries, TL help to create a context for reading. Who doesn’t prefer a comfortable cushion or armchair to reading at their desk or table? Aidan Chambers has had a further, and important, observation about reading areas. He argues that, “Reading areas also signify value. You don’t devote a place solely to one special activity unless you believe it to be enormously important. Just by being there, used in a certain way and protected by simple, reasonable rules, a reading area announces to children… that, in this community, reading is understood to be an essential occupation.” 19.
• I read aloud to readers, and encourage teachers, parents and children to do so, too.
Oral storytelling and read alouds set the cultural and literary framework necessary for children to become readers. By reading aloud to them, we model reading for our students, we inculcate them into the world of print and we inspire them to read for themselves. According to Krashen, “it appears that simply reading to children may have an impact on the amount of reading [they do]” 20.
Chambers explains how reading aloud to young children helps them to acquire skills and understanding vital for their development as readers. “In listening to someone reading aloud, we place the burden of responsibility on her. We don’t feel we must succeed with the print but that she must succeed in holding our attention by what she does with it. So we relax, we
don’t feel threatened, we’re protected by the competence of the performer. and as we listen we become used to the Text - experience of the story or poem itself as we know it inside our heads (which I’ve called the Test.) When the time comes to tackle print on our own, we’re prepared for what we find communicated by it. We know what kind of Text is held in the language of the text. (In fact we are finally able to tackle the text ourselves because we know what to expect it to do to us and what we must do to it.)” 21.
• There are places where readers can discuss their reading.
Readers need quiet places in which they can read, either alone or with a partner. They also need places where they can talk about books with other readers, both informally and as part of class or library activities. By talking about books, readers are able to reflect upon their reading and make the kinds of connections necessary to develop superior reading comprehension skills. Further, as the American Booksellers Association discovered, “the commonest reason for choosing a book is that we have heard about it from our friends.” 22.

I will ensure that books and other reading materials are easy to find.
Aidan Chambers, in his book The Reading Environment, draws a clear distinction between books being available and being accessible. A terrific library collection is useless to readers if they can’t easily find and borrow its contents. For TLs, this means a library layout that is logical and that makes good use of the space. It means shelves and spinners that aren’t so crammed with materials that readers struggle to find the books they want. Bonnie Braxton asks “…do you have the stereotypical library like the one that Madam Pince rules over at Hogwarts - ‘tens of thousands of books, thousands of shelves, hundreds of narrow rows’? Do the books stand shoulder-to-shoulder like an army, in strict alphabetical or numerical order, ranks broken only when some clever student breaks the code and finds what she was looking for?” 23. The implication is obvious: if you do, you need to make some changes!.
One thing that comes to mind is that you probably need to weed your collection. I weed mine, almost constantly, and feel happiest when there are a couple of books in the recycling bin as proof that I’m on top of the weeding situation. But, like a garden, new weeds seem to spring up almost constantly.
Funnily enough, a good weed can actually make a collection seem bigger. After I took over the school library, I deselected over half the collection and shipped it out in one hundred boxes. A couple of teachers on staff made their displeasure clear and I felt pretty much under the gun until one day a grade 8 girl wandered in to look for a novel and said, “Since you’ve been the librarian, there are so many more books of the shelves.” At first I thought she was being sarcastic, but, following a good look at her expression, realized that she was perfectly serious. With the garbage gone, and the shelves (rather pleasingly) half empty, it seems as though there were more good books to read. After all, most of the haystack had been removed, leaving just the needles.
• There are book displays.
My library is the size of two classrooms, with bookshelves on three walls and almost floor-to-ceiling windows. Book displays are hard to accommodate, but we find room for revolving displays on two freestanding bookshelves and in the glass case just outside the door. New books, OLA Forest books, graphic novels, records books, books about cars and other vehicles, they’ve all had their moment in the sun. Aidan Chambers writes, “Book displays make books prominent. They stimulate interest. They are decorative. They deeply influence the mental set of people who see them…
Putting books on show is also an important way of making recommendations by remote control.” 24.

I believe that readers need to be able to take books to wherever they need to go - to the classroom, home, over the holidays and on vacation.
Over the years, I have observed classroom teachers, and TLs, restrict where readers could go with the books they borrow. I have heard of teachers who arrive in the library with their classes in tow and instruct those classes to find a book and read, but then won’t allow them to sign the books out. I have concluded that this is some weird time-wasting exercise. The idea makes me crazy because the children are left feeling frustrated, and the TL is left to reshelve the abandoned books.
In some schools, teachers, particularly Primary teachers, will not let their students take library books home. Perhaps it’s because they want these books to form a revolving classroom library for silent reading periods. If this is the case, then they and TLs need to refer back to the fact that readers may borrow four items each.
Then there is the issue of holidays and vacations. Personally, I am unable to conceive of a break without books. When I go to the cottage, each August, books take up more than half of my bag. If we want children to develop into committed readers, then we must encourage to borrow books over holidays, and see to it that they depart for vacations elsewhere with lots of good reading material, especially for those interminable air flights and car rides. Sure, this makes for some extra work around rounding up stray books, but the pay off, in terms of reading, is more than worth it.

I acknowledge that readers, and particularly readers-in-training, often need help to find their way to the library.
I fear, at times, that reading might become a casualty of the information age. Don’t get me wrong; I love computers and view my Apple laptop as a cross between my right arm and a second child. It’s probably going to be listed as a beneficiary in my will. But, in the rush to sign up for times on the Library computers and to address curriculum expectations, time to visit the library and simply peruse the shelves in search of a good novel seems to have disappeared.
• Every class needs a regularly scheduled book time.
Next year I am going to tackle every teacher in the school and strong-armed them into signing up for a regular book exchange time.
Programs such as Get Caught Reading, the Boys’ and Girls’ Book Clubs, and the OLA Forest, help to capture the attention of many readers and get them into the Library, where I can ply them with books and encouragement, but I worry every time I catch sight of a student I don’t recognize.
If, as a TL I were granted three wishes, the first would be that every student was brought to the library by his or her teacher at least once every two weeks.
• Outside school hours, computers and the opportunity to socialize get readers through the door.
I am at school by 8 o’clock and am regularly greeted by a large group of students eager to get into the Library. By 8:55 a.m., when the bell rings, there are typically 25 to 35 children in the library, ranging age from six to thirteen. I admit that the majority of them come to use the computers, to play, truth to tell, but there are readers who settle on the sofa and in the
armchairs, or who make for my reading chair near the carpeted area. There is even one grade two girl who sits on an old chalkboard bench underneath the big glass terrarium to read everyday. Others finish homework at the round tables, or play cards.
My early morning companions may not all engage in reading before school, but they all know me and I know them, and this facilitates discussion around books and reading.

I affirm that all readers need free access to the library.
The best time for readers to come to the library is when they need a book, regardless of what is happening at that moment in the library or in the classroom, for that matter. Like most TLs, I have posted a weekly schedule on the library door so that students and teachers alike will know when I am out, when I am in, and when I might be free. For the most part, they disregard the schedule and, I admit, I have encouraged them to do so.
• Scheduled times often do not correspond the in-between-good-book times.
When readers come, they know that, as long as they are quiet, they are welcome, and this includes when I am teaching and when I am on prep time. Occasionally, readers aren’t able to access the resources they require because I’m busy and cannot help them, so most teachers have identified students in their classes who know their way around the Library catalogue and the automated check out system. Fortunately, there are a lot of students who enjoy manning the circulation desk, so I generally don’t have to. Sure, some books walk out without being properly check out, but surprisingly few.
I experimented very briefly with library passes during my first months in the library. The experiment was rapidly abandoned when I realized what an administrative headache these passes represented. The absence of passes has virtually never caused a problem; if things become hectic, I simply let readers know they’ll have to return later. I’ve concluded that passes are another hallmark of the TL as control freak.
• Readers who have completed their class work and those who have not.
“[R]eading cannot be left to the pupil’s leisure time. Many children come from homes where serious reading is simply not a part of the way of life”, asserts Aidan Chambers 25. The notion that only readers who have completed their classroom work will be allowed to visit the library is one that TLs must address, since it suggests that “accessibility [is] a reward… to confirm the success of some children and the failure of others,” 26. a strategy almost guaranteed to produce reluctant readers.

I will be a facilitator of reading and readers.
Teacher-Librarians can play a critically important role in fostering a love and habit of reading among students; they are ideally situated to act as what Aidan Chambers, in The Reading Environment, calls “enabling adults”. “All other obstacles in the way of learner readers can be overcome if they have the help and example of a trusted, experienced adult reader. Any committed reader who has come from a non-reading, book-deprived background knows that, which is why I place an enabling adult at the centre of the reading circle,” writes Chambers. 27. Most readers can recall an adult reader who mentored them as they discovered the power of reading, that teacher, or aunt, or parent, or TL who communicated his or her love of good books and who, perhaps, put into their hands that first ‘home-run’ book that got them hooked.
• I will talk about books with every child I meet.
Promoting reading among young children is akin to preaching - or selling used cars. You must believe absolutely in what you say, and you must talk with enthusiasm. Ray Dorion and Marlene Asselin write that,“When teacher-librarians model and celebrate the power of reading with students and connect them with meaningful books, students become more motivated to read, view reading favourably, and see themselves as readers.” 28. One of the greatest compliments I’ve ever received is one I overheard. One child, a student in our Junior LD program, whispered to a friend, “Boy, she can really sell books!”
• I will promote reading and readers through school-wide literacy programs.
Dr. Stephen Krashen argues that we must educate readers about the power of reading. 29. I think one way in which TLs can do so is by initiating and running reading programs. In addition to the OLA Forest, and the Get Caught Reading program, I run a Boys’ Book Club and a new Girls’ Book Club. I have also started this blog to share my love for books and reading with the school community as a whole.

I will lead by example.
“Readers are made by readers” states Aidan Chambers, 30. so it follows that TLs must be readers. They must read both fiction and non-fiction books that interest their young students, so that they can promote and discuss them with those students, and books that satisfy their own reading tastes. Fortunately, Dorion and Asselin assert that, “Teacher-librarians are, first of all, readers themselves - reading is in the blood.” 31. My own experiences with TLs suggest that, for the most part, their assertion is true. For the sake of young readers, it is to be hoped that the remainder will either come to reading or will leave the library in pursuit of other professional interests.

Footnotes
1. Krashen, Stephen. (Sept 2006) Free reading: is it the only way to make kids more literate?. In School Library Journal, page 43.
2. Krashen, Stephen D. (2004) The Power of Reading: Insights from the Research.
3. Ministry of Education of Ontario (2006) The Ontario Curriculum Grades 1-8 Language, page 10.
4. These words are engraved on a paperweight given to me by a parent. The words are attributed to Madeleine L’Engle.
5. Hart-Hewins, Linda and Wells, Jan (1999) Better Books! Better Readers! How to choose, use and level books for children in the primary grades, page 28.
6. Krashen, Stephen D. (2004) The Power of Reading: Insights from the Research, page 13.
7. Chambers, Aidan (1991) The Reading Environment, page 13.
8. Daniel, Mayra C. (Summer 2005) Helping linguistic minorities read independently. In Academic Exchange Quarterly, 9, page 307.
9. Sullivan, Michael (August 2004) Why Johnny Won’t Read: Schools Often Dismiss What Boys Like. No Wonder They’re Not Wild About Reading, in School Library Journal, page 1.
10. Chambers, Aidan (1991) The Reading Environment, page 37.
11. Krashen, Stephen D. (2004) The Power of Reading: Insights from the Research, page 92.
12. Ibid, page 103.
13 Chambers, Aidan (1991) The Reading Environment, pages 20-21.
14. Ibid, page 36, my emphasis.
15. Ibid, page 11.
16. Riesterer, Linda. (Nov-Dec 2002)(Book) talk them into reading: the problem I was dismayed when circulation statistics showed that circulation was declining in my middle school library. (Reading motivation: too old to read?), in The Book Report, 21.
17. Krashen, Stephen. (Sept 2006) Free reading: is it the only way to make kids more literate?. In School Library Journal, page 53.
18. Olson, Renee (August 2000) My Noisy Sister. (library as place) (Brief Article). In School Library Journal, 46.
19. Chambers, Aidan (1991) The Reading Environment, page 30
20. Krashen, Stephen D. (2004) The Power of Reading: Insights from the Research, page 86.
21. Chambers, Aidan (1991) The Reading Environment, page 53.
22. Ibid, page 74.
23. Braxton, Barbara (June 2004) Landscape your library to attract students, in Teacher Librarian, Vol. 31 Issue 5.
24. Chambers, Aidan (1991) The Reading Environment, page 23.
25. Ibid, page 36.
26. Ibid, pages 10 - 11.
27. Ibid, page 15.
28. Dorion, Ray and Asselin, Marlene (2005) Literacy, Libraries and Learning, page 11.
29. Krashen, Stephen D. (2004) The Power of Reading: Insights from the Research, page 89.
30. Chambers, Aidan (1991) The Reading Environment, page 87.
31. Dorion, Ray and Asselin, Marlene (2005) Literacy, Libraries and Learning, page 15.

Works Cited

Braxton, Barbara (June 2004) Landscape your library to attract students, in Teacher Librarian, Vol. 31 Issue 5, p42-43, 2p; from Professional Development Collection via EBSCO:
http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=tfh&AN=13573706&site=ehost-live

Chambers, Aidan (1991) The Reading Environment, The Thimble Press.

Daniel, Mayra C. (Summer 2005) Helping linguistic minorities read independently. In Academic Exchange Quarterly, 9, p306(5). Retrieved April 14, 2007, from Expanded Academic ASAP via Thomson Gale: http://find.galegroup.com/ips/infomark.do?&contentSet=IAC-Documents&type=retrieve&tabID=T002&prodId=IPS&docId=A136071126&source=gale&userGroupName=ko_k12pr_d63&version=1.0

Dorion, Ray and Asselin, Marlene (2005) Literacy, Libraries and Learning, Pembroke Publishers Limited.

Galda, Lee, Cullinan, Bernice E and Strickland, Dorothy S. (1993) Language, Literacy and the Child, Harcourt, Brace Jovanovich, Inc.

Hart-Hewins, Linda and Wells, Jan (1999) Better Books! Better Readers! How to choose, use and level books for children in the primary grades, Pembroke Publishers Limited

Jobe, Rob, and Dayton-Sakari, Mary (2002) Info-Kids: How to Use Nonfiction to Turn Reluctant Readers into Enthusiastic Learners, Pembroke Publishers Limited

Krashen, Stephen. (Sept 2006) Free reading: is it the only way to make kids more literate?. In School Library Journal, 52, p42(4). Retrieved April 14, 2007, from Junior Edition via Thomson Gale:
http://find.galegroup.com/ips/infomark.do?&contentSet=IAC-Documents&type=retrieve&tabID=T003&prodId=IPS&docId=A151663678&source=gale&userGroupName=ko_k12pr_d63&version=1.0

Krashen, Stephen D. (2004) The Power of Reading: Insights from the Research, Heinemann

Ministry of Education of Ontario (2006) The Ontario Curriculum Grades 1-8 Language, Queen’s Printer.

Olson, Renee (August 2000) My Noisy Sister. (library as place) (Brief Article). In School Library Journal, 46, p9. Retrieved April 16, 2007, from Military and Intelligence Database via Thomson Gale:
http://find.galegroup.com/ips/infomark.do?&contentSet=IAC-Documents&type=retrieve&tabID=T003&prodId=IPS&docId=A65132287&source=gale&userGroupName=ko_k12pr_d63&version=1.0

Riesterer, Linda. (Nov-Dec 2002)(Book) talk them into reading: the problem I was dismayed when circulation statistics showed that circulation was declining in my middle school library. (Reading motivation: too old to read?). In The Book Report, 21, p8(2). Retrieved April 14, 2007, from Student Edition via Thomson Gale:
http://find.galegroup.com/ips/infomark.do?&contentSet=IAC-Documents&type=retrieve&tabID=T003&prodId=IPS&docId=A94129988&source=gale&userGroupName=ko_k12pr_d63&version=1.0

Sullivan, Michael (August 2004) Why Johnny Won’t Read: Schools Often Dismiss What Boys Like. No Wonder They’re Not Wild About Reading, in School Library Journal, Retrieved April 16, 2007, from Junior Edition via Thomson Gale: http://find.galegroup.com/ips/infomark.do?&contentSet=IAC-Documents&type=retrieve&tabID=T003&prodId=IPS&docId=A121503814&source=gale&srcprod=STOJ&userGroupName=ko_k12pr_d63&version=1.0