LEARNING RESOURCES CENTRE (LRC)

Our Learning Resources Centre is a dual-use room containing library and computer areas.

Students are encouraged to sign out their favourite library books by way of our L4U automated library program. We do carry a full collection of Fiction and Non-Fiction books, along with numerous reference manuals. The SAC has recently approved $ 8000 for Library books and $ 5000 for Accelerated Reader books.

We are also very excited about our library. We welcome Mrs. Walsh., our librarian, who comes to us with a strong computer and library background. She is accessioning new books for our eager readers and will be ordering new ones.

Our School District has also partnered up with the Edmonton Public Library. All students at St. Marks have been sent home a Youth Library Membership Form whereby students will be given free library cards to borrow books, DVDs and even video games free of charge. Parents, make sure that those forms are returned.)

Also, every month students have access to Scholastic Book Orders whereby students can purchase popular high quality reading books for their own home libraries. The 8As have even started their own Book Club which runs Thursdays during LA.. St. Mark has caught Literacy Fever!!!!!!

Literacy

Wow! What a month for literacy at St. Mark! The month began with READ IN WEEK. Monday started with special guests Rob Brown, former Edmonton Eskimo, Joe Simons, author and Ms. Amanda Woodward, an aboriginal storyteller sharing their stories and experiences with the classes as Living Books.

On Wednesday, representatives from the Edmonton Public Library presented Book Talks on this year’s nominated titles for Young Readers’ Choice Awards to spark interest in reading.

On Friday, students were encouraged to talk about reading at home with family and friends. They were to INTERVIEW a family member or friend to find out what makes reading great-having a favorite genre or author, learning new things, making an emotional connection, being caught in an adventure, entering the fantastical, magical world of a story, challenged to solve a mystery, or perhaps being scared silly.

To top off the month, our Parent Society approved the purchase of a popular novel set, The Hunger Games. Classes will soon begin this novel study and will be treated to a fieldtrip in the spring when this novel hits the theaters.

The LRC is fitted with 33 student workstations. Students save their work to the education server, which accesses the internet through a high speed connection. Student work saved to this server can be accessed from home through the myECSD portal.

In total St. Mark has two large (and one small) computer labs in operation totaling 75 networked computers available for student use. In addition, numerous classrooms have pods of student workstations. All computers are equipped with Windows 7, the complete Office 2007, Encarta, All The Right Type, and The Learning Equation (Math). Students may also take tests from various online providers.

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