Partnership Reading Ambassador Trip

Our Reading Ambassadors (Pupil Librarians) from across our partnership schools came together for a special trip today, to Central Library, in Southampton! The trip was designed to put in place library training for our ambassadors, for them to cascade back to the rest of the school!

Pupils were met by two librarians that work at Central Library, the biggest library in Southampton - it stretches over three floors! They had a tour of the library and found out about the different books that the library stocks - did you know that there is a special section in the archives that focuses on the history of Southampton, including maps and artefacts? You can also find old copies of the Southampton Yellow Pages and Phone Book - the teachers enjoyed looking up relatives and friends living in Southampton in the 1990s-2000s!

Pupils were taught about how fiction books are ordered alphabetically and how this is organised in a library as large as Central! They also learned about the Dewey Decimal system and how Non-Fiction books are organised in the library, and about the books that are in each category. They had time to read and relax in the library too, as well as enjoy a story read by the librarians!

In the afternoon, pupils went to Mansel Park Primary. They looked at the library there and the impressive library displays and enjoyed a tour of the school. They completed some online training, hosted by Hampshire Library Service, that taught them how to take care of the library, how to create a library display and how to use the library software 'Reading Cloud'. Pupils created their own "library action plans" to take back to leaders in their respective schools. They will then create their own 'Librarian Training' video, to play to pupils in school to show them how to use the library and to help train future librarians - watch this space for further updates!

It was a lovely day out and pupils from across the partnership enjoyed working together and sharing their ideas.