LASL Back to School 2024 Newsletter

Louisiana School Librarians,

As we all cling to the final days of summer while looking forward to the fresh start that each new school year brings, we wanted to send a note of encouragement and resources. We know that the past few years in many communities have been challenging for libraries, but we hope that this year will bring book joy and a renewed love of learning.

LASL is excited to help make Battle of the Books a state-wide event in collaboration with the Louisiana Young Readers' Choice Award Program and the State Library. We also have some ideas for a virtual book club with the Louisiana Teen Readers' Choice and for you to create a Staff Reading Initiative at your school. Below you will find some resources to share more details about all of these programs. We hope you will make plans to join us next month for our LASL Town Hall Meeting, where we will share news about the organization and talk more about how you can make these programs a reality in your school community.

Over the past few years, we've really pushed the idea that we are #BetterTogether as school librarians. We want to take that a step further, to let you know that #WeNeedYou. If you have been a member of LASL in the past, July is the time to renew your annual membership -- or become a member for the first time. And as always, if you need support and resources at a local level, please contact us at geauxlasl@gmail.com.

We Need YOU!

The LASL Executive Board

This is the program description for the 6-8 grade Battle of the Books competition that will be shared at the upcoming Town Hall Meeting. There will be a similar program (with some adjustments) for the 3-5 grade group. We are also working with the State Library and LTRC Committees to start a monthly virtual high school book club with the books from the LTRC list.

If you would like to receive more information about these programs, please complete this form.

Book Selection:

• The twelve books selected for the school year’s Louisiana Young Readers’ Choice Award ballot will be used for the Battle of the Books Competition.

• 2024-2025 6-8 Book Selection

Librarian/Sponsor Expectations:

• Read and contribute questions for at least three books. Use the Kahoot template to submit your questions.

• Host a school-level competition following the guidelines below.

School-Level Competition:

• School-level competitions may be set up as individual competitions (to determine the top five scorers at your school to create your team) or team competitions (teams of five) to ultimately decide the team of five students who will go on to the regional competition.

• Students should read at least five books from the list in order to participate.

• Competitions should be held in February.

• The competition has three rounds:

• Kahoot: 48 questions/4 from each book

• Puzzle: includes title, author, genre, characters, and summary for each book

• Quiz Bowl: 48 questions/4 from each book; BuzzIn

• Scoring: For each round, individuals/teams are ranked and awarded points accordingly (100 points for the highest scoring individual/team, descending in 10 point increments). Only the teams with the four highest scores from Kahoot and Puzzle rounds will go on to the Quiz Bowl round.

Regional Competition:

• The regional competition will follow the same format as the school-level competition, but with new Kahoot and Quiz Bowl questions. The puzzle round will be the same.

• Competitions should be held in March.

• The competition has three rounds:

• Kahoot: 48 questions/4 from each book

• Puzzle: includes title, author, genre, characters, and summary for each book

• Quiz Bowl: 48 questions/4 from each book; BuzzIn

• Scoring: For each round, teams are ranked and awarded points accordingly (100 points for the highest scoring team, descending in 10 point increments). Only the teams with the four highest scores from Kahoot and Puzzle rounds will go on to the Quiz Bowl round.

• Other activities, such as ice-breaker activities, virtual author visits, Bookmobile collaborations with local public libraries, collaborations/prizes with local bookstores, and lunch are encouraged but should be organized by participating librarians from that region.

Do you want to boost reading morale around your school? Here is a fun, friendly competition that promotes literacy throughout your school. Our Leaders should be Readers!

How to get started:

• Create a google form for staff members to fill out after they finish a book/magazine, article, etc.
• Sample Form
• Create a google sheet to keep up with weekly words read.
• Sample Sheet
• Staff members are awarded badges for their reading achievements. Badges can be tailored to your school campus (ie: badges in school colors, mascot, etc).
• Sample Badge

How to participate:

• After each staff member finishes their book, magazine, newspaper, devotional, etc. they will fill out the Google Form letting you know how many words they’ve read.

Incentives:

• After reaching each word milestone, staff members will receive a badge to hang outside their door stating how many words they read.
• The staff member’s name will be announced during morning announcements each time they reach a million word milestone.
• The staff member’s picture will be added to the school’s Facebook page when they reach one million words.
• Prizes are awarded at the end of the year for most words read.

Join our very own LASL Past President Amanda Jones for her book launch party at Cavalier House Books in Denham Springs or Lafayette!

Email: geauxlasl@gmail.com

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Twitter: @LAofSL