The Golden Age of YA Fiction is Here

It’s a great time to be a teenage reader!

Just take a look at the movies that have been playing to packed houses at our local multiplexes these past few years  - The Hunger Games, Twilight series, The Host, Divergent, The Fault in Our Stars, plus the upcoming If I Stay, Thirteen Reasons Why and The Giver to name but a few – all of which started life as novels for young adults.

Probably the secret of the success of these books is their universal appeal; these are stories that, while featuring teenage protagonists and aimed at the young adult market, are gripping, sophisticated and highly original.  These are novelists who wouldn’t dream of patronizing or failing to challenge their readers, which has won them an army of fans (including a huge number of not-so-young adults too).

The new display in the library showcases just some of the titles that have captured the imagination of cinemagoers in the past couple of years.  If you’ve loved these movies but haven’t read the original book, why not give it a try?  Reading the novel is like opening a window into the thoughts, feelings and histories of the characters, and also often reveals extra facets of the story that the filmmakers weren’t able to fit in.

So call into the library and pick up the novel of your favourite new film today!

Know For Sure

Swans now benefits from a truly fantastic new digital resource called Britannica School. 

You might have seen the old Encyclopaedia Britannica sets – well, in this new information age, these have been updated and much improved and now take the form of a huge, fully searchable database of information, accessible from school and from home.

Research projects make up a significant proportion of work set in any secondary school academic career, and there are many hazards to relying on the internet to provide you with reliable sources of information.  This is why Britannica School is a vital tool for students.  Search for the topic you are researching, and this database will show you every article it has relating to your search, all of which have been verified by experts. 

But it gets even better - down the left hand side of the page you will find a menu that takes you directly to journal articles on your topic, related e-books and, best of all, a list of suggested websites on which to continue your research.  All of these websites have been specially selected by educators as being great sources of totally reliable information.

You can even create your own My Britannica profile, on which you can save all your research in order to come back to it later.  You can also create references so that you can cite all your sources, be fully academically honest and really impress your teachers with your skills.  There are three levels of information so no matter what your age there will be something to suit your needs.

Students, your lives just got a lot easier!  So don’t delay - before you start your next research task, call into the library and ask for your password and quick tour, to open up a whole new world of easy, reliable and responsible research.

Word of the Day

This new daily challenge began today at secondary school.

Each day will feature a different word, and these will gradually be added to our word tree, which has now taken root next to the slope.

Activities will change on a weekly basis.  This week the challenge each day is to write three original sentences using the featured word, and the first five entries submitted to the library before 4pm will win a merit.

Today´s word was...

Revile - to criticise angrily.

There will be a brand new word tomorrow and a brand new challenge next week so if you're a word fan... watch this space.

New School Year - New Books!

Welcome to a new term at Swans!

It´s great to see everyone again after a refreshing summer break, and it's fantastic to welcome new students too.

And we have been blessed with some new additions of our own... Over the summer, the book order arrived and the library now has hundreds of the best new titles to tempt our readers.

Among these, popular Young Adult fiction from writers like Robert Muchamore (Cherub and Henderson Boys), Veronica Roth (Divergent series), Cassandra Clare (Mortal Instruments), Darren Shan's new Zom-B series and several books by literary sensation John Green.

For younger readers, we have the Dear Dumb Diary series, hilarious books by David Walliams and the Gallagher Girls series.

IB students will find plenty to interest them among our fiction collection, as well as the best in enrichment titles, including Walter Isaacson's biography of the late Steve Jobs, a study of the working methods of Google ("In the Plex") and fascinating new titles for environmentalists "Violent Earth" and "Dire Predictions".

Graphic Novel fans will find our collection of this art form greatly expanded to include the Scott Pilgrim series and a selection of Japanese manga.

And as if that wasn't enough, we now boast all of the titles on the recommended reading lists for every age group.

So there really is no excuse not to make 2014-15 the year that you become an avid reader - see you soon!