Week in Review: Spring Break Edition

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Ah, Spring is in the air! That means warmer weather, pretty flowers, and allergies are all on the horizon. It also means Spring! Break! Is! Here! The week kind of flew by in the library—like so many bees carrying sneeze-inducing pollen…

We had  Dr. Bell’s AP English 12 and English 12 classes in the library to work on a couple of short story projects. Along the same line, the Glass Knife had some super serious board meetings during lunch, where they worked on submissions and discussed other top secret things for the magazine.

On Friday, we had an exciting day checking out books to students and teachers to read over the break. Ms. Melinson shared a delightful cup of tea with Sophie, Tori, and Lia as they worked on some yearbook spreads before heading out. We hope everyone has a fun, safe Spring Break—we’ll see you all in a couple of weeks!

Week in Review: Masked Edition

We were very happy to see more sunshine this week! The weather was warmer, no one had to wear rain boots, and we got some really cool additions to the library: student art! Ms. Didion shared some of her class work with the library and we’re honored to feature them on our slat walls!

We also had some fantastic discussions during our monthly High School Book Club on Wednesday. Click this link to read more about the discussions and the Great Brownie Debate of 2016.

On Friday, Ms. Melinson’s advisory had their end-of-quarter lunch, and they ate Indian food while listening to Bollywood dance music. Big shout outs to Mrs. Naify who generously donated her time to pick up the food and deliver it to the happy advisees! We had so much fun, we forgot to take pictures!

 

March Book Club

 

On Wednesday we had our monthly Book Club meeting, where students and faculty join together in the library for the love of all things books! Ms. Melinson made the second round of her “experimental brownies,” where she asked the kids to compare the flavor qualities of these with last month’s brownies. She baked last month’s brownies at a “normal” temperature and then this month she decided to try a new way: “low and slow” at 250 degrees, which experts have told her is the absolute best way to bake the tasty treats.

The results?

The first month’s brownies were standard and tasty, and these brownies were a bit more fugdey—yet equally delicious. The verdict: brownies are delicious, and none of us discriminate. Just give us brownies.

Ms. Melinson talked about Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie We Should All Be Feminists, an adaptation of the author’s powerful TED Talk about feminism. If you haven’t seen the Talk yet, here it is! And if you love Adichie, you might also enjoy checking out Roxane Gay’s essay collection, Bad Feminist.

The students have been busy reading books like Paul Kalanithi’s When Breath Becomes Air, and Cassandra Clare’s first installment of the Dark Artifices trilogy: Lady Midnight. Avi mentioned that she finally got around to reading Eleanor and Park, which sparked a conversation about the latest criticism of the book and its questionable racism with the descriptions of the characters. To read that criticism, click here.

We all circled back to what it’s like to have to read Young Adult fiction as a school assignment—or any book for that matter. The faculty agreed that everyone should revisit the classic books they read in school after a couple of decades have gone by; they found that they typically enjoyed and appreciated them a lot more after the fact.

What a lively Book Club we had this month! For a full list of all the books discussed during this and previous Book Clubs, check out our Goodreads list here.

Week in Review: Rainy Week Edition

Oh, what a rainy week it has been at Country Day! We’ve been holding down the fort (not literally; we had to take that down last week) here in the library…some of us wonder if we’ll be needing to ride our kayaks to school next week.

On Monday Ms. Melinson gave a presentation to the Grandparents Club, where she discussed all things library! The ladies were able to learn about some of the programs and projects that we offer throughout the school year.

Tuesday we had another lovely Musical Lunch, where the High School Orchestra delighted us with several selections to carry us through the rainy afternoon.

We had several of the 7th Grade classes in the library throughout week to work on Renaissance Fair, March Madness, and Feudal Japan projects. Whew!

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And after completing all of their Renaissance plant books, the Middle School hosted the annual Renaissance Faire. While this event usually takes place outside, the rain moved the festivities indoors. Nonetheless, it was a frolicking good time!

 

Week in Review: Seuss Edition

This week we primarily focused on celebrating Read Across America Day, where we had outrageously cool and comfortable seating all day in the library for students to quietly read. We had tea/hot chocolate for students and specialty coffee and treats for teachers.

Tuesday we had a short-but-sweet visit from the woodwind chamber group during lunch; they played us a couple of songs and we can’t wait to hear more of their selections in the future!

Throughout the week, we had Ms. Burns’ 7th Grade Science class in the library to work on their botanical books for the Renaissance Faire. Students spent their class time researching the origins of plants and their uses during that time period and tracing illustrations. Lookin’ good, you guys!

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Read Across America

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To celebrate Dr. Seuss’s birthday and the joy of reading (not that we don’t celebrate that every day), we had our 452nd annual Read Across America festivities in the library. We served up hot chocolate, tea, and comfortable seating for High School students to enjoy. For the teachers, we served up Ms. Melinson’s homemade treats, tea, and Mollie made some fancy pour over coffees.

A handful of High School and Middle School teachers brought their classes in throughout the day for projects and quiet reading. We were especially proud of the super-duper-legit fort that Sean constructed for us beforehand. We’re pretty sure he moonlights as a professional fort builder on the weekends. It was such a hit that we decided to leave it up for the rest of the week.

During the All School Read, we encouraged classes to fill out sign-up sheets to let us know what they were reading. We were overwhelmed by their enthusiasm to read and get into the spirit of Read Across America.