PYP读书月｜一起成为知识渊博的探究者

Rome was not built in one day. With regarding to “being knowledgeable”, there is no shortcut to take. Large amount of practices is the same important as reading large volumes of books. There is an old saying that Learn as much as you can and do all you can. Diminish the distraction, and hold a dear to knowledge, then everything sorts out of fell into place. It is one of the important approaches that we can get knowledges.

Then how to help students cultivate good reading habits, and take it as a hobby?

In the PYP monthly assembly, Ms Ge from Mandarin group vividly and emphatically announced the opening ceremony for reading activity. Let’s see what’s waiting for us on the reading journey.

The library in Beijing Royal Foreign Language School is an open-plan space for reading, and it not only a place where teachers and students can have classes with massive various teaching resources, but also a treasure for students who want to explore as long as they are free.

In the PYP program, ATL (approaches to learning), such as research skill, is playing a more and more important roles in inquiry. Students can fully enjoy their time in library by inquiry whatever they want to.

They can research books according to their needs, from content to hobby. Especially for the UOI (unit of inquiry), teachers and students come to library to search information they need. When students research information and take notes, the librarian and UOI teachers help them, if they need. PYP department hold an activity called “Monthly Book Drifting”, and prepare beautiful Reading Bankbook to encourage students to keep reading. We make every effort to create a nice environment for cultivating information literacy and cultural literacy.

All the books are located based on the six transdisciplinary themes (who we are, where we are in the place and time, how we organize ourselves, how we express ourselves, how the world works, sharing the planet). The Chinese and English picture books help students develop their imagination; the scientific books assist students in roaming in the sea of science; literature books enlighten students.

The library in PYP has a large book collection for grading level reading. It introduced whole set of graded level reading books issued by Iverson (Iverson from New Zealand was part of group member for producing worldwide famous graded level reading books issued by Oxford University Press, Macmillan Education, McGraw Hill, Scholastic), and whole set PYP Readers Series issued by Pearson and America Harcourt English graded level reading books. Since PYP library collects lots of books which are on the list of report on What Kids Are Reading issued by Renaissance, it can fully meet the reading needs of teachers and students.

There are more than 6,000 books in PYP library. PYP library is a cozy place to read books, and students read books in different position. They might sit in a circle, read books with their face down, or stand against the wall. The furniture in PYP library is movable, so the setup can be changed easily to meet the teaching need from teachers and students.

In the early morning, when coming into the classrooms, you can find teachers reading books quietly among the students who are into reading books; several students listening to stories, sitting around the teacher. It is also quite possible that you can see the scattered knots of people share books.

In order to take the policy of sharing books into effect, we hold an activity called “Monthly Book Drifting”. Each grade is part of it, so more and more students can enjoy reading by sharing books.

Sure, regarding reading, it is not even close. However, it is the culture of loving reading and the spirit of being eager and perseverance to pursue knowledge that we want to preserve, not the books.