Week in Review: Wedding Shower edition

This week the Matthews Library saw a wedding shower! Ms. Melinson and her little helper, Mary, planned a wedding shower for yours truly, who got married over the summer. It was a wonderfully whimsical soirée featuring delightful company and yummy food, such as Bookworms, Aladdin’s Magical Pasta, and googly-eyed cheese puffs.

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On Friday Dr. Fisher’s 10th graders were in to narrow down their Sophomore Project subjects. Inspired by Ms. Melinson’s walks with Doctora Portillo, students were split into pairs and walked around the back field discussing their topics.

Bonus:

Our honorary library dog, Quaffle (Becca’s lovable Saint Bernard), stopped by for a visit!

Week in Review: Ancil Hoffman edition

 

On Monday Mrs. Eustace’s enthusiastic 6th graders were in the library to learn how to find books using the catalog. On Wednesday we had our first Book Club of the new school year, which you can read about here. Be sure to check out our Goodreads page for all the books we talked about. Friday was the annual Ancil Hoffman picnic where the black team won, which we hear is a usual occurrence at these shindigs. Congrats to the black team and a valiant effort by the red team!

Bonus:

The red team’s resident dinosaur dropped by on Friday for a book before heading off to the picnic. Just another day at the library!

September Book Club

We had our first High School Book Club of the new school year on Wednesday, though we were a bit uncertain of when to start now that Dr. Bell isn’t here! It was nice to see old and new faces alike as students and faculty discussed what they read over the summer.

Ms. Melinson talked about The Hate U Give and mentioned hosting a special book club devoted to the book in October. Keep an eye out for that next month! She also read the book All American Boys, which has similar themes to The Hate U Give. Ms. Melinson also talked about A Gentleman in Moscow, a book loved by everyone who’s read it so far. Both Ms. Melinson and Mr. Wells declared it the “best book of the year”.

Luca said he jumped around a started several different books, including A Confederacy of Dunces (which caused groans from the faculty) as well as some biographies by Nick Offerman and John Cleese. He also mentioned reading Einstein’s Dreams, which Ms. Melinson said was one of her favorite books.

Josh also started a lot of books this summer including a collection of Winston Churchill’s speeches titled Blood, Toil, Tears and Sweat: The Greatest Speeches, Worth Dying For: The Power and Politics of Flags, and Empires of the Word: A Language History of the World, a large book he described as “interesting, but a slog” to get through.

Heloise read some amazing books this summer like The Alchemist, which she said was “life changing” (Doctora suggested that if you liked The Alchemist you should read The Little Prince and compare the two books). Heloise also raved about Mr. Palomar and The Night Circus.

Becca read Saving Hamlet and thought it was amazing with its fantastic, flowery writing and diverse cast of characters.

Ms. Batarseh read a book with a title almost as long as the book itself, Through the Eye of a Needle: Wealth, the Fall of Rome, and the Making of Christianity in the West, 350-550 AD. She said despite its dry title, she loved the book because of the passionate writing style of the author and because it was a book where she had to look up the meaning of words, which is not a usual occurrence for her.

Layla mentioned she likes dystopian books because anything can happen in them and said she read Red Blood over the summer, which she really enjoyed.

Ms. Nellis said she was re-reading Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis. She describe it as “eye opening” and for people who want to know what people outside of California think.

To view all of the books we talked about, check out our Goodreads page!

Week in Review: Labor Day Edition

While we technically had a shortened week thanks to Labor Day, the library felt as busy as ever this week.

We had our first Leadership Lunch on Wednesday featuring Gabi and Esme speaking about their enriching summer experience at the Chicano/Latino Youth Leadership Project. Their experience inspired them to promote the idea of bringing a Chican@/Ethnic Studies class to Country Day. They also talked about what DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals) is and the impact it will have when it’s repealed.

Also on Wednesday we witnessed a silent protest take place outside the library on the gym wall. This was in response to the mural on the gym walls being painted over, which you can read about here.

On Friday Dr. Fisher’s 10th graders were in to learn how to narrow down their topics for the Sophomore Project and turn their subject into a research question. Friday was also the first meeting of the year for The Glass Knife, the High School’s literary magazine. New and returning students were encouraged to “sign over [their] souls to the Glass Knife” by Heloise while discussing jobs and potential theme ideas for this year’s book.

Here are five out of eight of our Summer Reading raffle winners! Good job and congratulations to Mia, Hailey, Kaitlyn, Nick, and Chance! Check out their Summer Reading activities here. Simone, Annabel, and Aidan – don’t forget to come to the library and claim your prize!

Welcome back! part 2

Welcome back, students – officially!

Orientation day kicked off the week on Monday. In the library we had the 6th graders who were learning how to access their Cavalier accounts and later the 9th graders who learned some do’s and dont’s from Student Council and information about their upcoming trip.

The school year was officially off and running on Tuesday and by midmorning we already had a class visit – Mr. Hagmann’s book elective! Middle School students were in to choose books to read and later review.

On Thursday Mr. Hagmann was back, this time with his 8th grade independent reading class. Students learned how to use their independent reading sites where they’ll review the books they’ve read and comment on their classmates’ reviews.

On Friday Dr. Fisher’s 10th graders were in to begin thinking about topics for their Sophomore Project. This year students are concentrating on local Sacramento area topics. Dr. Fisher had some good advice for students: find subjects you’re passionate about.

Outside the Matthews Library is a tree in honor of Lauren LaMay’s memory. Students, faculty, and anyone touched by Ms. LaMay are invited to write a memory on a leaf where it will be hung up or to place private memories in the knot where they will later be given to Ms. LaMay’s family. Here’s the tree’s progress so far.