Win a book voucher

Post comments here about the books you read over summer. The person who posts the most comments will win a book voucher.

Summer Reading Programme

All students except year 13s or anyone else who is leaving this school over the summer period can take part.
You can borrow books over summer and we'd love you to do so.
You will need to have returned all your current library books, bring in your form signed by your parents to say that you are returning next year and that you will return all books in the first week back in 2014. Then come in at a time convenient to you to choose your books. Tell your families about our open days - see the poster above for details. They might like to see your library and choose books too.

Some great books to read

The Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor
This is an awesome senior fantasy story with an equally awesome sequel called "Days of blood and starlight". Karou is studying art in Prague and is being plagued by her ex boyfriend. Lots of normal independant teenage stuff is going on, but Karou has a secret life behind a door in the city where she works for Brimstone gathering teeth from all around the world. What are the teeth for? Why has she got an obsession with angels and flying? Why does this obsession make Brimstone, who is like a father to Karou, very angry? The answers to some of these questions are revealed when Karou takes a trip to Marrakesh on a quest for more teeth. This is a must read for anyone who likes the idea of star crossed lovers and parallel worlds.

For something realistic
Never fall down : a novel by Patricia McCormick

It's been a while since I've read about Cambodia and this one didn't really tell me anything new, but if you haven't read about the Pol Pot era in Cambodia, this is a good book for you. Based on a true story it is about Arn and how he survived these horrific years. I was interested in how difficult it was for him to adapt to his new safe life and to live with himself after what he'd done to survive.

Library Week and Reading Challenge update

Library Week

Mystery Books This was a great success. 70 books were issued to students and 22 to staff members. Keep handing in the feedback forms so you can go into the draw for a prize.










Author visit - Kate De Goldi What an awesome inspiration she was to the students who were able to see her!










First line of a novel competition We had 34 entries from students and 11 entries from staff members. The winning entry for the students was from a year nine student! Congratulations to Bonny Wedgwood. Her entry read:
It's really hard being the son of an alpha; in fact hard doesn't even scratch the paint work.
There were two winners in the staff catagory. Congratulations to Mr Dye for this gem:
Miriam lovingly named all the flies on the window-sill after children in her class, then vacuumed them!
and Ms Dashfield-Speight for this one:
She'd carefully stashed the time away, minute by stolen minute, and now she was ready to use it all up in one glorious hour.
All entries are on display in the library.

Annual Library Quiz We had a lot of fun and the winning team was Phoenix Court made up of : Anthony Jones, Dorian McAdam, Dhayne Turksma and Fraser Haxton.

August Reading Challenge
Results as at 20 August
Remutuka 41
Te Awakairangi 40
Orongomai 36
Tokomaru 28
You still have until the end of next week so get reading and don't forget to let us know when you've finished your books!

 

Library Week

Events

August Reading Challenge House Competition
For every book that you read in August your House will get one point. Plus we will give out a prize for the person who reads the most books. Check in with the librarian when you finish your books to get your points.

Kate De Goldi - Author visit
We are lucky to be able to have Kate visit our school to talk to all the year 11s and some year 12s on Tuesday 13 August. This is sponsored by The New Zealand Book Council Writers in Schools Programme.

Library quiz
Will be held on Thursday 15 August at 11am. Just turn up to take part. We might have to limit numbers on the day. You can eat your lunch in the library on that day plus we will have some snacks available.

Mystery Boook
We will have some really good books all wrapped up in brown paper for you to borrow for the week. You won't know what the book is until you unwrap it. So challenge yourself to read something you might not otherwise chose. There will be feedback forms in the books for you to fill in and completed forms will go into a draw for a prize.

First line of a novel competition
Get your thinking cap on and write the most awesome first line of a novel and we will judge the best one for a prize. The beauty of this is that you don't even have to write the whole novel.

What to read and how to choose?

This is always a problem when using the library. If you don't know what to read next, have a look at our path finder bookmarks near the issues desk. We have the following lists :
Dystopian Fiction - books like The hunger games set in a future world where life is often a struggle.
Paranormal romance - books like Twilight. They can have angels, vampires etc and there's a love interst.
Fantasy - books like Harry Potter with magic or fantastical creatures in them.
Chic Lit - books like Jacqueline Wilson with stories for girls that are light although they sometimes deal with issues.
Adventure spy stories - books like Anthony Horowitz "Stormbreaker"
Horror stories
Courage in adversity - books like A Child Called It both fiction and non-fiction.
Supernatural stories - stories with ghosts, but not the romance ones on this list.
Murder mysteries

There are some great websites that you can use too.

http://www.goodreads.com/
http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/
http://www.whatshouldireadnext.com/
http://www.literature-map.com/
http://bookseer.com/
http://www.insideadog.com.au/

Then there's the school's OPAC which you can access from inside the school and from home. See the site links in the Heretaunga Intranet site. There are reading lists on the OPAC or you can do subject searches. Or you can look at the new items.

Personal recommendations are another really good way of finding good books. Talk to your friends about what they are reading and enjoying. Ask your teachers and the librarian for recommendations.

Then you've finally got a book in your hand, but how can you tell if you're going to like it? We do all have different tastes. So read the blurb. Then read the first page. If you're hooked then that's easy carry on reading. If you're still not sure then give it a few more pages, but if after the first couple of chapters you are really not enjoying it then try another one.

Happy reading everyone

New Zealand Post Children's Book Awards

These are the titles that we have in our school library this year.

Earth Dragon, Fire Hare by Ken Catran

Into the River by Ted Dawe

The Nature of Ash by Mandy Hager

Reach by Hugh Brown

Snakes and Ladders by Mary-Anne Scott

My Brother's War by David Hill

Red Rocks by Rachel King

You can vote for your favourite by picking up a voting form from the library or go to http://booksellers.co.nz/%5Bbooksellers-category%5D/%5Bbooksellers-category-lvl2%5D/vote-childrens-choice-award-2013

Come and have a look at the display in the library and watch the slide show of the books.

Iron Man 3 3D movie night

The Home and School Association is running a screening of Iron Man 3 in 3D at the Ascot Theatre on Sunday 28 April 6pm to raise funds to upgrade the library computers. Tickets cost $15 for students and $20 for adults and include a goodie bag and 3D glasses. Watch the trailer..........

Hurry up and buy your tickets.

We have several Iron Man graphic novels in the library to inspire you to watch the movie.

Busy start to the year

It's week six and I've just realised that I haven't updated the blog!

So here goes - what have we done this year so far?

Well we've had Learning to Learn with the year nines where they all learnt how we do research at Heretaunga College.

We've had several groups of new international students orientated in the library.

We've been collating and analysing our Summer Reading programme data. On this topic just so's you know we had 47 students take part in our Summer Reading and 258 books were loaned out.  Kayla Braybrook made the most blog entries and won the book voucher. We found that some of you didn't know that there was a link to this blog from the school's Intranet and therefore couldn't find the blog.

We've been buying lots of new books. See the new books page for some examples.

Year 13s are busy with Biology, Economics and Music research and I've helped many of you with access to EPIC. I'm happy to help anyone who's missed out.

New Zealand Book month is under way and the $5 book vouchers are available in the library if you want one.

Summer Reading Programme

Seniors need to have all their library books back now and in years gone by that meant that was the end of things, BUT this year we are allowing borrowing of library books if you are returning to Heretaunga College next year. To do this you need to get a form signed by your parents and have all your books back. You can come in any time to pick up books or take advantage of our Family Open Days to choose books. See the poster.
Start making comments on this blog about the books you are reading and be in to win a book voucher prize. Make sure you put your name in the comment.

Young Adult novels based on fairy tales

I've read a few books like this lately and the most recent one was Cinder by Marissa Meyer. See this book trailer.
Another couple in the genre are
The long, long sleep by Anna Sheehan
Between the lines by Jodi Picoult and Samantha Van Leer

Keep reading over the holidays

Here are some ideas

To find out more about these books and other books in the library, click on the ETaunga link (scroll down in this blog and look to the right of the page). Then look for site links, click on the library - catalogue. Then click on OPAC search. Look at the new items list and the reading lists for ideas.

Congratulations to Mary Fisher

Our wonderful ex student, Mary Fisher has represented New Zealand in paralympic swimming and won four medals to boot! We are sooo sooo proud of Mary. Here's the video of her coming a very close second in the 100m backstroke. We can't find the one of her gold medal win in the 200 medley.

Mary is so inspirational in that she not only swims, but achieves so much in music and is very driven academically.

August Reading Challenge House Competition



 

Library Week

Apirana Taylor

Visited our school on 31 July. He was very exciting and the students who saw him couldn't believe a poet could be so entertaining. His incorporation of Te Reo and traditional Maori instruments added to the performance.

Quiz

We had a record number of teams this year - ten in total and competitiveness was very high. The winning team was made up a group of year 12 girls - Katherine Tuck, Kiriana Tahana, Emma Groombridge and Haylee Groenveld.

Olympic Reading challenge

Tell us what books you've read in August to get house points. The books must be titles that we hold in the library.

Meeting the author

We've just had two fantastic opportunities to meet two amazing authors.

On Wednesday we had Mandy Hager visit our school. She is a New Zealand author and has written Run for the trees, Smashed, The blood of the lamb trilogy and recently The nature of Ash. All of which are absorbing teenage novels of quite different genres. My personal favourite is The blood of the lamb trilogy which is a dystopian fiction that has strong racism and human rights themes. All of her books include social issues, but are fast paced with lots of action.

Then on Thursday a small group of us were very lucky to be able to go to Hutt International Boy's School to see Chris Paolini - author of the Inheritence series. He was a very engaging speaker.

Wonder by R.J. Palacio

I've just read this fantastic book about a boy with a terrible facial abnormality. Auggie wants to be ordinary, but it's impossible for him to live an ordinary life when everyone notices his abnormality before they find out what he's like as a person. I loved this book because Auggie is such a strong character and the people whos lives he touches also add their perspective. I recommend that everyone reads this book. It will help you to be more accepting of others. Also watch the author interview to find out her inspiration for the story.

New library books

In a recent survey you told us that you want us to buy more new books. You'll be pleased to know that we've just bought many new titles. Here are just some of them. Don't forget to ask for anything that  you would like us to buy by using the suggestions for purchase form at the issues desk or clicking on the page link to suggestions for purchase on this blog.

To see all the new books, check out the list on the library OPAC. You can access the OPAC in several ways.

From a library computer just login and open Internet Explorer - the library home page will automatically come up. Click on OPAC search from here.

From a computer eslewhere in the school. Open ETaunga and click on the link that says HC library page.

From a computer outside the school. Google ETaunga and open the student portal. You will have to sign in at this stage with your school login. Click on School library catalogue link.

Death cure : the exciting conclusion to The maze runner trilogy

I've just read it and it was very exciting and tied up all the loose ends. If you haven't read this series yet, you need to start with The maze runner then The scorch trials. These books are dystopian fiction similar to The hunger games. Highly recommended.


If you like these kind of books then have a look at the reading list in the OPAC called dystopian fiction. You will find 82 titles listed there. Enjoy!

This new book looks fantastic.

Check out the trailer here. We have the book and it looks like it's going to be the next big series.