Day Three

Reading is important in school activities. The library has an excellent collection of more than 60,000 books. There are books in English and other languages spoken by students and teachers, such as Dutch, French, Italian, Japanese, Hindi and Arabic.

The AICS Library Catalogue offers access to the entire collection in all three campus libraries.

The school encourages students to borrow books and read as much as possible. Therefore, parents are encouraged to visit the library after school hours to borrow books for their children and themselves.

Every week, the librarians meet with each primary group to read a story. During this time, children borrow books to take home for the week.

The library team is very important for the good performance and organisation of the library. The head of the three libraries is Marion Sabrié. Matthew Olson-Roy, a great writer of middle grade and young adult fiction, also works there. He organises great activities, such as teaching information literacy in secondary schools. We also met the library assistants: Despina, Mousami and Chris.

They told us how the library works and how it is organized. They showed us the online catalogue they use for the book loan service. They also showed us how they had arranged the books: fiction and non-fiction. On the shelves the books are organised by a coloured label according to age.

We observed how they told stories to the primary school pupils. We also watched Matthew doing an activity with his secondary school students about books which are banned in some countries.

The youngest children came to the library with a bag that they had previously painted in class. As the children picked up the books they wanted to take home, they put them in the bag.

In the afternoon we went to the OBA Oosterdok, the Amsterdam public library's central location. Matthew was waiting for us in the cafeteria of the library. He told us how they coordinate with the public library. The public library knows the primary school curriculum and the different projects that are carried out in all schools in Amsterdam.