One of Futuraskolan International Rådan’s parents very kindly donated a lot of Spanish books for young learners. Thank you!

This school year, Futuraskolan International Rådan is focusing on building up the Spanish and French book sections of the library.

Here are two pictures of what Futuraskolan International Rådan’s library looked like during the summer.

Students and staff returned A LOT of books! There wasn’t enough shelf space for all of the books.

Two new bookcases were added to the library over the summer. When the old bookcases were moved to make room for the new ones, they fell apart and there were books everywhere!

The good news is that all the books were back in place by the time school started.

Futuraskolan International Rådan’s library has a selection of books in different languages. This school year, it was decided to focus on building up the French and Spanish sections since these are the two languages offered at the school.

One of Rådan’s staff members is spending a year teaching in Portugal. Near her school there is a second hand bookstore called Déjà Lu – Livraria Solidaria. This bookstore is run by people with Down Syndrome and all the money collected from sales is used to support The Portuguese Down Syndrome Association.  The bookstore offers secondhand books in languages from all over the world. This Rådan teacher will buy used French and Spanish books from Déjà Lu and bring them back to Rådan when she visits during the holidays.

Thank you, Déjà Lu for the work you do! If you ever visit Cascais, consider stopping by the bookstore.

Futuraskolan International Rådan’s staff and students are happy to be able to support Déjà Lu and are looking forward to reading a whole bunch of new books!

Déjà Lu links:
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Futuraskolan Rådan’s grade 3s have been learning about the Stone Age through to the Iron Age as part of the International Primary Years Curriculum unit on Scavengers and Settlers. Scavengers and Settlers explores the idea that humans are special. Unlike other animals, we can adapt and learn new skills in order to survive, which is exactly what our ancestors did in the Stone, Bronze and Iron Ages.

The International Primary Curriculum is a comprehensive, thematic, creative curriculum with a clear process of learning and with specific learning goals for international mindedness and for personal learning based on the IPC personal goals of cooperation, communication, thoughtfulness, respect, resilience and morality.

The IPC has been designed to ensure rigorous learning but also to help teachers make all learning exciting, active and meaningful for children. Learning with the IPC takes a global approach; helping children to connect their learning to where they are living now as well as looking at the learning from the perspective of other people in other countries. The IPC is used by schools in more than 65 countries around the world.

Futuraskolan Rådan’s library works with teachers, students and support staff to ensure that books are available for all units of study.

“I have always imagined that paradise will be a kind of library.” –  Jorge Luis Borges, poet and writer

Tucked away on an upper floor of Futuraskolan Rådan is the library. It is a small, cozy space filled with books.

The majority of books are in Swedish and English, but there is a small collection of books in other languages as well. The books are organized by language and then by age group: Swedish books on the right and English books on the left. There is a separate section for both Swedish and English non-fiction.

The books for the younger students are arranged in boxes by subject. There is a picture on the box identifying the subject. There are also boxes for the middle year students’ books and these are colour-coded alphabetically to help the students find their favourite author.

Several grade 5 students have become library helpers and are learning how to sign out and check in books, how to mend broken books and how to reshelve returned books.

Futuraskolan works with LGR11 and the International Primary and Middle Years Curricula. Teachers and classes rely on both fiction and non-fiction books from the library that complement the topics they are working with.

The library is a used by students and classes, as a meeting area, and for two different book clubs.

Here are some very early morning pictures of Futuraskolan Rådan’s library.

A library with a Morning View

Very Early Morning in the Library

A bit of Light in the Library

Futuraskolan Rådan has a lot of staff and students whose first language isn’t Swedish. In fact, there are over 21 different mother tongue languages at Rådan!

One way that the library supports learning for students whose native language isn’t Swedish is to provide resources in various languages.

Click here for a wonderful webpage from Internationella Biblioteket that offers free e-resources in 20 languages.

Enjoy!

Futuraskolan Rådan’s staff and students have 21 different mother tongue languages!

One way that Futuraskolan Rådan’s library supports these students is to offer books in a wide range of languages. The selection is quite small at the moment compared to the other sections of the library.

However, one way that the school community helps out is by donating books in various languages.

The most recent donation was a series of six stories in Spanish.

Donated Spanish Books

Thanks to the grade 3 and the grade 5 students, Futuraskolan Rådan’s library was able to purchase over 4,000:- SEK worth of new books.

This year, the focus was on English books, particularly early readers, science series, thrillers, books for dyslexic readers and non-fiction.

In total, over 100 books were bought for the library thanks to the hard work and dedication of the students!

A small sample of new books

What’s a book sale without a warm cup of coffee and a bite to eat?

Futuraskolan Rådan’s grade 3 students set up and ran a very successful bake sale during the school’s first used book sale.

The book sale and bake sale raised over 4,000:- SEK for Futuraskolan’s library!

Bake Sale run by Grade 3 Students

Throughout the autumn, a handful of book-loving grade 5 students organized Futuraskolan Rådan’s first children’s used book sale. The students distributed flyers, and sorted donations.

On November 30, 2018, their hard work and dedication paid off as parents, friends and neighbours came to school to buy books. Lots and lots of books!

The book sale was a huge success and raised over 4,000:- SEK for Futuraskolan Rådan’s library!

Futuraskolan Rådan’s first Book Sale