Assignment+2

Step 1-Community Info;[[image:b1.png width="341" height="485" align="right" caption="Source: City of Coquitlam Website"]]
===My school is located in Coquitlam, BC, which is a suburb to Vancouver and Burnaby. The population of Coquitlam is 114,565 people according to the 2006 Census. Miller Park Community Elementary School is situated in the Burquitlam Area of South West Coquitlam. This is one of the oldest developed neighborhoods in the city of Coquitlam. Most of the dwellings in the area are single detached dwellings and apartments built in the 1960's. The commercial sector of Burquitlam is aging with long strip malls locacted along Clarke Road. As this area continues to grow older, it is beginning to seek revitalization through city projects and the pending arrival of the Evergreen Skytrain Commuter Line to the Burquitlam area.===

===Miller Park Community Elementary school is located in School District 43. The Coquitlam School District is made up of three cities, Coquitlam, Port Moody and Port Coquitlam. It has a total of 45 elementary schools (K-5), 13 middle schools (grades 6-8), and 9 Secondary Schools (grades 9-12). The Coquitlam School District is the fifth largest district in B.C. The district serves over 30,000 students in various programs. Some of the programs at the elementary level include Neighborhood, Montessori, French Immersion, Mandarin program in Elementary. Our middle and high schools also offer unique programs such as Gifted Clustering, French and Montessori programs, Rock School, Fine Arts and Hairstyling School.===

School Info;
===Miller Park is a dual track school that offers a full Montessori Program consisting of four classes and a neighborhood program consisting of seven classes from grades K-5. The school population includes a wide range of socio-economic backgrounds, many of our students are considered vulnerable according to the EDI study of 2007. Approximately 20% of our students live in the one of two housing coops in the area. The following map displays the results from the Early Development Institute (EDI) Questionairre given to Kindergarten teachers to complete. As indicated above the map shows the level of vulnerability of the students in one or more category and the socioeconomic status of the neighborhood. The Burquitlam Area in which my school resides is indicated in blue.===



===The Miller Park catchment is showing a steady decline in each grade level. Recent observations of new students and families to Miller Park show an increase in newly landed immigrants from many different countries of the world. We currently have 18 different languages identified as primary languages spoken at home. The table below indicates the diversity of Languages in the City of Coquitlam.===


 * ~ Mother tongue ||||||~ Coquitlam, City ||~  ||||||~ British Columbia ||
 * ^  ||~ Total ||~ Male ||~ Female ||^   ||~ Total ||~ Male ||~ Female ||
 * ~ Total population[| 32] || 113,560 || 55,780 || 57,780 ||  || 4,074,380 || 1,998,390 || 2,076,000 ||
 * ~ English only || 65,790 || 32,815 || 32,975 ||  || 2,875,770 || 1,429,035 || 1,446,735 ||
 * ~ French only || 1,715 || 760 || 950 ||  || 54,740 || 26,910 || 27,835 ||
 * ~ English and French || 180 || 115 || 60 ||  || 5,920 || 2,715 || 3,205 ||
 * ~ Other language(s)[| 33] || 45,880 || 22,085 || 23,795 ||  || 1,137,945 || 539,730 || 598,220 ||

Our enrollment is 242 FTE, this includes;

 * ===91 Montessori Students===
 * ===11 Aboriginal Students===
 * ===71 E.S.L. Students===
 * ===11 Gifted Students===
 * ===17 Ministry Categorized Funded Students===

Step 2-Community Partners (Library);
===In order to make progress with this unit of study, I will need support from the PAC, my principal, and our city of coquitlam public librarians. First, I would like to approach my principal and PAC, seeking financial support to purchase new and appropriate media resources to support my Continent Unit for Grade 4's. Having financial backing will allow me to broaden this section of my collection and utilize current resources for my Continent Unit. Second, I would like to seek out the Childrens librarians at my local library. They have been extremely helpful to me when it comes to recommending new titles that would support the curriculum I am focusing on in my own library. It is my hope to that they will help me seek out appropriate resources for the Continents. Other resources in the area will be Kidsbooks and United Library Services, both stores where I do my purchasing.===

Step 3-Background Info;
===As mentioned in Assignment 1, my focus is in the area of Social Studies for Grade 4. My particular unit of study will be on the Continents. The students who will make use of this collection are the three grade 4/5 classes in my school. There is sixty grade 4/5 students in the neighborhood program and another twenty-three grade 4/5 students program in the Montessori program who will come once a week for 45 minutes classes. Unfortunately, my schedule only allows for one collaboration block per week. My library is on a fixed schedule only allowing for me to teach this unit during the classroom teachers prep time.=== ===The teachers involved are always very supportive of what I am doing in the library. We often collaborate and provide scaffolding lessons with each other when it comes to things like research projects, spelling bee and speech writing. Two of the teachers involved have over 10 years classroom experience, while the third is new with 3 years of teaching at our school. Already they are frequent clients in my library, seeking sources for there other classroom themes and Reading Power lessons.===

===Currently, the students in grade 4/5 at my school use the library for book exchanges, researching, and internet usage. I have noticed that the students in this age group are using the library less frequently for book exchanges. I often hear them say they are reading something at home and they do not wish to take out another book. This age group seems to be more focused on the being online, rather than perusing the shelves for the latest titles.===

Step 4-Readings
===Chapter 3 of Bishops book really confirmed to me that I need to be really aware my students and the community in which my school serves. The profiling of my community made me think twice about the purchases I have made and those I wish to make in the future. Some of the past purchases were not really suitable form my clients as they were long, small print. My students seem to like the high interest books especially when it comes to intermediate chapter books. As the Teacher Librarian, the demographics of my community suggest that I need to purchase books that are of high interest, and low readabilty, books for boys, large print and nonfiction. The non-fiction section of my library is always popular. In the past, I have always wanted to purchase only hardcover books for this section. Bishop does suggest that purchasing paperbacks books is a wise choice in schools were there is trasiency. In my case, this is very true, many a time I have returned to work on Monday to learn that students have been up and moved out of our school and those precious hardcover library books are gone!===