• 2021/2022 Impact Report

Librarian

  • Engaged students in extracurriculars such as book club and Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) Club. Our book club had 30 members and met once a month to discuss books and play trivia games. We read eight books over the course of the year and met with two authors during that time. This is the first year the D&D Club met on campus and we had over 50 kids join. The club met weekly after school on Thursdays, filled the library tables, and even spilled into the courtyard at times.
  • Hosted three Scholastic Book Fairs over the course of the academic year: fall, spring, and a BOGO Fair before the summer. These book fairs help students build their own personal libraries at home and are an important fundraising source for the library. We raised funds to support club and makerspace activities, to buy new books, and to bring author James Ponti to our campus.
  • Promoted reading over breaks through challenges such as the Winter Reading Challenge and Summer Reading Challenge. The Winter Reading Challenge encourages kids to try different genres and formats of books. The Summer Reading Challenge is designed to keep kids reading throughout the break.
  • Challenged students to a friendly book trivia competition: Clash of Titles. This May event is a jeopardy-style game where kids compete to reign as the Clash of Titles Champions. Questions can cover any of the eight books that were on the Clash of Titles list this year. Five teams competed this year.
  • Lone Star author James Ponti connected with students during an author visit. Students were encouraged to read new genres and inspired to tell their own stories. James Ponti is a New York Times Bestselling author and is currently working on his fourth book in the City Spies series.
Book club members sitting at tables in the library while listening to the first chapter of
 
 
10,307
print books in collection
 
19,534
ebooks books in collection
 
14,092
print books checked out
 
2,417
ebooks books checked out
 
Students stand around a table covered in books. Two signs stand on the table that read “Adventure” and “Horror.”

Teacher

  • Art classes visited the library to learn about databases and how they can be used during the research process to find credible, accurate, and up-to-date information for their art history projects. Most students utilized the Biography database so they could find information about artists throughout history.
  • Together with one of the Career & Technology Education teachers, the Investigating Careers classes learned to implement the design thinking process and create using a 3D Printer. The student groups identified problems in the school or at home and then designed a product that could meet that need. The products were then modeled using 3D printing software and printed using our new Dremel 3D40, a gift from the Bradley PTA.
  • 6th grade ELAR classes visited the library during their poetry units to explore poetic structure and line breaks. They compared narrative poems written in verse and then removed the line breaks to turn the words back into sentences. During students' analysis, they decided that the line breaks helped emphasize meaning and emotion in poetry. They were then able to practice turning paragraphs into poems by adding line breaks.
  • 8th graders visited the library to put their argumentative skills to the test with a modified game of Snake Oil, competing to create the most compelling argument for their made-up products. In their 8th grade ELAR classes, students were learning to craft arguments with supporting evidence. A skill that translated well to this creative and silly card game that had all kids engaged and trying to one-up each other, all while practicing their argumentative skills.
  • 8th graders engaged in the research process through a flipped classroom environment using databases such as ABC-CLIO World History Modern Era, ABC-CLIO American History, Biography, and Gale in Context Middle School to answer a question they developed for their research projects.
 

Students sit at tables in pairs or threes while working on Chromebooks.

Lesson Spotlight

After returning from winter break, Bradley’s two journalism classes met in the library weekly to develop their social media sleuthing skills. We examined posts and uncovered how the posts were meant to make us feel, checked how posts were accessed, came up with questions we needed to ask about posts, and pondered what motives creators or social media accounts might have for posting material. After seven weeks of classes together, Bradley Journalism kids learned that discerning fact from fiction on the internet is serious work and that all posts should be researched before sharing.

 

Collaborator

  • Before the school year started, middle school librarians collaborated to create library orientation lessons that would be engaging and informative. This year that took shape in the form of Library Jenga where each block in the Jenga tower was marked with a question that student groups would then research to answer. Students from 6th-8th grades all played the orientation game during the first few weeks of school.
  • In collaboration with 6th grade ELAR, students came to the library to explore genres and to participate in a book tasting to discover their favorites. Book tastings expose students to different genres by giving them a few minutes to pick up and read a book from one genre and then exchange it for another after a timer goes off. Some classes took it a step farther and completed a genre personality quiz that helped them further discover what genres they might enjoy the most.
  • During the 8th grade ELAR nonfiction unit, classes visited the library and investigated connections between fiction and nonfiction. After reading a picture book, the students were asked to consider the different nonfiction topics that the book explored. In this case, we read "Can I Be Your Dog?" by Troy Cummings and then went on to read articles about homeless animals and animal shelters, with an emphasis on current statistics in San Antonio.
  • The library became a poetry hub in April by becoming the meeting place of two before school poetry writing clinics, showcasing poets, and works of poetry in a library display. To celebrate National Poetry Month and to encourage young writers to express themselves creatively, the ELAR Department along with the librarian organized and hosted the Bradley Bear Poetry Slam in early May.
  • The librarian along with the academic dean co-chaired the I Celebrate You committee. This was a collaboration between Bradley academic departments to honor and recognize national holidays and heritage months in the school book displays and special collections in the library.

Collaboration Spotlight

Together with Bradley’s instructional technology specialist and our current campus technology innovator, a 7th grade history teacher, designed a Breakout EDU experience for the 7th grade Texas History students. The students were placed in teams and challenged to solve puzzles that tested their knowledge of classroom content about Texas exploration, Texas Missions, and Texas colonization. While most of the game’s content was a review, the last chapter of the breakout challenge was a preview of what was to come for the students. The kids were playing a game, thinking critically, working together, and competing to be the first ones to “break out” of the library experience. The students solidified their working knowledge and were introduced to new ideas and content all while having fun in the library.

 

Students sit around tables with Chromebooks as they work on a Texas History escape room. A teacher stands in the background near a whiteboard with a timer counting down on it.

Campus Leader

  • Collaborated with the counseling department to create SEL programming for professional development in the fall and presented on Discovery Education educational strategy frameworks to staff. These educational frameworks can be translated to any subject area and become academic routines for students and teachers to follow so that the focus can be on learning while engaging in familiar procedures.
  • Led a parent session in collaboration with our family specialist called “SORAing into Summer,” to teach parents how to keep their kids connected to literacy throughout the summer. Parents learned about SORA (an online library of eBooks and audiobooks), their public library, reading challenges, and the benefits of reading graphic novels and manga.
  • Promoted the library program and events through monthly Instagram posts (@bradleybearlibrary) and sharing events via the Principal Bear Blast Newsletter.
  • Serving on the school leadership team has boosted library visibility on campus while also allowing the library to explore ways to serve the school community. The library played a part in events such as appreciation days throughout the year and Greenback Night.
  • Attended Education Service Center, Region 20’s Learning & Libraries Virtual Conference and learned a variety of ways to support students and staff, new instructional strategies, innovative technology applications, and heard from a wide variety of presenters about library programs. Creative strategies to utilize social media will be implemented in the upcoming school year.
 
Instagram post screen capture showing kids sitting around a table playing Dungeons & Dragons.
Parents sitting at tables in the library. The librarian presents information to the parents.