Summer Holiday Reading Mystery Packs
In response to the need for boys to maintain good reading habits over the summer break, the college runs a Summer Holiday Reading Programme which encourages unlimited borrowing to McGlashan families for the holidays. Every Year 7 and 8 boy receives staff assistance in choosing a large bag of books, while more senior boys select their books independently or with the support of the library staff or English teacher.
To assemble the Year 7 and 8 packs, we pair each boy with a staff member who talks to them about their reading and guides their choice of books.The library staff then add to the pack to challenge and extend reading levels but still with an emphasis on reading for pleasure. The bags themselves are provided by the Old Collegians’ Association and contain about 20 -30 books, a few Christmas goodies and some promotional material from the Dunedin Public Library. We also include a reading history for each student which parents might like to use as a confidence-booster and to compliment some excellent reading.
McGlashan boys did more reading than ever last summer with a whopping 2000 books in the 139 SHRIMP packs issued. Boys and parents have given us some amazingly positive feedback about the books in their packs and the ‘book talk’ they’ve enjoyed as a family. We are always thrilled with the response and with the enormous level of reading that this represents.
We continue to make reading for pleasure a high priority at McGlashan and are extremely grateful that the Board of Trustees, staff and parents continue to reaffirm the importance of reading in the lives of the boys in our care.
The SHRIMP packs can be collected in the last few days of school but are very heavy so some boys might need help, or a forklift, to get them home. All books are due back on the first day of the new school year. We suggest that the boys keep the books in the book bag so that they will know where to find them when it comes time to return to school in 2017.
I hope you all enjoy many hours of uninterrupted reading over the summer.
Merry Christmas.
Pam Garry
Library Manager
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