The mission of the library program is to promote literacy, foster a love of reading, support the school’s curriculum, and create a place where inquisitive young minds feel welcome to explore. Third graders have a weekly library class, which includes storytelling, read-aloud, learning activities, and time to choose and borrow books.

• Review and expand on K-2 skills
• Independently select materials using online library catalog
• Independently locate materials in the library
• Introduce structure of dictionary entry
• Choose appropriate type of reference work to answer a question (encyclopedia, atlas, dictionary, thesaurus, almanac, online database)
• Review differences between online news sources and printed newspapers
• Use table of contents, index, and guide words to answer a question
• Introduce difference between primary and secondary sources
• Introduce concepts of note-taking and citing sources
• Biographies with timelines, photographs, primary sources
• Visual literacy (infer information from photographs)

• Storytelling
• Read-Aloud
• Listening skills
• Critical thinking
• Text-to-self, text-to-world, and text-to-text connections
• Exposure to diverse experiences and perspectives through literature
• Exposure to different genres of literature
• Hands-on exploration of the library
• Hands-on learning activities
• Practice using technology to access online resources
• Sharing knowledge / reporting back to group
• Encourage reading aloud to one another
• Author visits