Ten librarians from five schools gathered on a Saturday 10 September at Groendal Primary in Franschhoek to listen with interest to a presentation – and then demonstration – of the new CBN toolboxes. Their reaction was heart-warming. Plans are afoot to start a network in Franschhoek to use the toolboxes as a team with children from local schools.
This was in many ways a test workshop for the brand new toolbox called Books and Stories, and we were delighted with both the reaction – and the proposed action – that is to happen with this new resource.
We have been building the toolboxes for two years now and it is exciting to begin the testing and evaluating. There is still a lot to fine tune, but the basic plan is working and we have had interest from everyone who has seen the toolboxes.
We were only able to work with the children for an hour, due to time constraints – and more time is clearly needed to make the most of the contents of the box – but the librarians were able to get a good idea of how CBN operates. For the toolboxes, we have broken up a big workshop of possibly two or three days into ten bite-size mini-workshops, suitable for a Saturday morning or an after-school activity. An hour and a half would be enough for children to be thoroughly involved in two books, take part in two book activities and have time for some quiet reading on their own – of books that are part of the theme for the day.
Our thanks to Margie Cunnama who orchestrated the event and to Groendal Primary for use of their premises.
The workshop was funded by the Franschhoek Literary Festival trust.
The librarians who took part were:
Petulia Classen and from Wemmershoek Primary.
Veronique Janse and Melissa De Wet from Wes-Eind
Astrid Williams from Pniel Primary
Clarodin Roos, Margareth Hoffman and Theresa Samuels from Groendal Primary
Nonzukiso Skade and Amanda Maqhubeia from Dalubuhle Primary
