Children's Plus Survey: headline results

A quick summary of the Children's Plus Survey results, which are mostly very encouraging.

Children were asked whether they thought that the library overall was ‘good’, ‘OK’ or ‘bad’. The standard is that 77% should state that the library is ‘good’.

• 89% stated that the library overall is good.
• The highest results, discounting those libraries that had less than 10 questionnaires completed, were Norden and Wardle libraries, with 97%.

Who do children visit the library with?

• The majority visited with ‘someone from my family’ (58%)
• A good proportion visited with their school, nursery or playgroup (23%)
• A proportionally larger of respondents at Langley, Junction, Smallbridge and Wardle libraries visited the library on their own (over 16-23%). This was very different to the remaining libraries (where this tended to be less than 10%).

Why do children visit the library?

• The most popular activities were ‘borrowing things’ (66%) or ‘reading’ (41%).
• Also popular were ‘using computers’ (34%) or ‘looking around’.
• ‘Playing with toys’ was popular at Darnhill Library (35%) and Balderstone Library (47%).
• Belfield, Langley and Wardle had very high proportions of children visiting to use computers (all over 50%).
• Doing homework was a key reason for visiting Wardle Library (39%).

Why do children borrow books?

Children were asked why they like borrowing books from the library (applies to those who stated that they visit to borrow books).

• The majority ticked that they ‘like reading’ (68%), that ‘the library has good books’ (44%) or that they ‘want to get better at reading’ (39%).
• At Belfield, 57% ticked that they wanted to read books to help with their homework - much higher than elsewhere.

What do children think of our books?

• 86% thought our books are good
• 13% OK
• 1% bad

What do children think of homework help?

• 67% thought homework help was good
• 30% OK
• 3% bad

Compared to how children responded to the similar question for books and computers (below), this is a disappointingly low result.

Use of computers in libraries

Children were asked where they use computers (they could tick more than one option).

• The majority use computers at home (72%) or at school/nursery/playgroup (60%).
• 42% use computers at the library.
• Smithybridge, Norden and Alkrington had a low response rate for those using computers in the library (between 15-20%).

Why do children use computers?
Children were asked what they use the computers for in the library (applies to those who stated they visit the library to use computers).

• The majority use them for playing games (65%)
• 53% use them for homework.
• 54% use them for looking at websites.

What do children think of our computers?

• 83% think they are good
• 16% OK
• 1% bad

The number of respondents ticking ‘good’ was quite low at Alkrington and Belfield (less than 70%).

Participation in activities

Children were asked if they had been to the library for activities such as reading groups, events etc. They could tick more than one option (including ‘none of these’).

• 47% had not attended any event.
• 26% had attended an under 5s event, and 26% a holiday activity.
• 17% had attended a ‘book or reading activity’, 9% an ‘after-school activity’ and 6% ‘to take part in a reading group’.
• 44% of children at Norden, 49% at Alkrington and 41% at Smithybridge said that they had attended an under-5s activity - a much greater proportion than other libraries.
• Nearly 50% of respondents at Darnhill had attended a holiday activity - again a much greater proportion than other libraries.

Children’s perception of libraries

Children were asked if they thought the library was ‘a friendly place’, ‘a safe place’, ‘easy to get to’, etc. In general, all libraries scored highly in each of the perception questions apart from ‘open when I want’.

• 100% of Castleton, Langley, Spotland and Wardle respondents thought the library was a ‘safe place’.
• However, only 85% of respondents at Castleton thought the library was ‘easy to get to’ - lower than other libraries.
• Some libraries scored low on ‘open when I want’ (50-60%). These were Alkrington, Smallbridge and Wardle.

The impact of libraries on children

• 66% said that use of libraries had helped them to read better.
• 53% said that it helped them to ‘learn and find things out’ - this was particularly high at Belfield (69%).
• 47% said that it helped them to do better at school - and this was very high at Belfield and Norden.
• 38% said that it helped them to ‘join in and try new things’.
• 32% said that it helped them to use computers, and 24% to ‘make new friends’.
• At Balderstone, Belfield and Darnhill, 40-50% of children said that they made new friends in the library.

Age, gender, ethnicity

• 56% of respondents were girls, 44% boys.
• The largest split in gender was at Spotland, where 70% were girls, 30% boys.
• The majority of respondents were aged 5-10 (54%)
• 80% identified themselves as white, 20% Asian, black, ‘mixed’ or ‘other’.
• Belfield and Smallbridge had the largest proportion of respondents from ethnic minority groups - both over 40%.

Library Tree Party

Balderstone Library's Tree parties were held on 7th and 9th November as part of the Breathing Places campaign.

Twenty-seven adults and thirty-two children attended the two sessions.

The under 5's event included stories, craft and a nature trail.

The Library tree (a beautiful thick card 3D tree from the BBC) has now been decorated with children's art work from the event.

What Makes You Happy

Littleborough Poetry Group is having a workshop for children called "What Makes You Happy" at Littleborough Library from 2.30pm — 3.30pm on Monday 29th October.

The workshop's suitable for children aged 7 or over.

If you're interested, please ring the library — (01706) 378219 — to reserve a place.

Heywood and Wheatsheaf Libraries — temporary closures

The Wheatsheaf Library will be closed for re-carpeting from Wednesday 7th November 2007 for approximately 3 weeks.

Books and other items on loan can be returned to the Special Services unit which is situated opposite the main Library entrance in the Wheatsheaf Centre.

Heywood Library will be closed from Monday 12th November 2007 for approximately six months for extensive refurbishment works.

Some of the stock from Heywood Library, notably Best sellers and Graphic Novels, are being temporarily transferred to Darnhill Library, which will have a temporary extension to its opening hours.:

Darnhill Library opening hours from 12th November 2007:

Monday	9.30-1	2-7.30pm
Tuesday	9.30-1	2-5.30pm
Wednesday	9.30-12.30pm
Thursday	9.30-1	2-5.30pm
Friday	9.30-1	2-5.30pm
Saturday	9.30-1	2-4pm

We still want to see you, even if these libraries are closed!

Items issued at Heywood and the Wheatsheaf in the run up to the closures have extended loan periods so that they are not due back until the libraries are expected to re-open. Fines are not incurred on days when libraries are closed.

Borrowers from Heywood and the Wheatsheaf Libraries are welcome in all libraries in the Borough. Your barcoded library card lets you borrow or reserve items from any of our libraries.

We apologise to our customers for any inconvenience.

Masquerade!

Half term week
Monday 29th October to Saturday 3rd November

Make a mask at your local library

What’s available?
Here’s a clue!
Witch pumpkin the cat make the wolf owl with?

Call in any time during usual library hours

Big Wild Read

From my first look at the rough figures we have increased those starting The Big Wild Read by 18% and the figures for those finishing is up by 2%. (I haven't had all the starters' cards back in yet for me to double-check all the figures so we're not audit-proof yet.)

We had about 36% of the children finishing, which is below our target but getting nearly seventeen hundred children involved and reading something over the summer holidays isn't to be sniffed at.

Once I've confirmed the figures I'll see how they relate to the promotional work we did at schools just before the holidays. It'll be useful to see if our visiting a school to talk about the summer reading game leads to an increase in participation.

National Poetry Day

Today's National Poetry Day, with this year's theme being dreams.

Do you have a favourite poem on this theme? Please use the "Comment" function on this blog to let us know about it. My favourite poets are Paul Cookson and Spike Milligan.

Some of the children's poetry books in our libraries.

Springhill High

Pamela Taylor-Bramwell went to last night's open night at Springhill High School to promote the services for schoolchildren we provide in our libraries. The school's very keen on the children being members of their local library. Karen Taylor, the school librarian, is encouraging as many as possible to join and is working with Pamela to make sure they've all got PIN numbers as well as their library barcodes so that they can use all the facilities available on the Kids' Portal.

Pamela explained how to use the Kids' Portal and also told them about the online information services that are available for the children to use at home as well as in our libraries.

Children's Book Week

It's Children's Book Week, the annual celebration of reading for pleasure organised by Booktrust. This year's theme is the environment, which follows on nicely from the Big Wild Read and complements other activities we've been involved in such as LEAF and the BBC's Breathing Places campaign.

If you or your children don't already have a favourite book or story about the environment, or if you want to try something new, our Big Wild Read and Little Wild Read lists might give you a few ideas.

LEAF again

Another days' worth of LEAF workshops tomorrow, this time in the Memorial Gardens. I hope the weather holds!

This is a good opportunity to sell our services to the children and the accompanying grown-ups. Last week's session in Littleborough Library let me present the library as a friendly, welcoming place with fun things to do and simply heaving with interesting books. This week's session lets me demonstrate that library services don't stop at the front door of the building and that the public library service is more than just a building with a sign stuck on it and some neat stuff inside.

These events are also always a good opportunity for networking and sharing ideas. I'm always happy to borrow or adapt ideas that will keep my "act" fresh with my audiences. (I wonder what I would think of some of my earliest storytimes.) Keeping a high positive profile with partners and potential partners is also money in the bank for possible future events and programmes.

Richard and Judy's Kids' Book Special

A few weeks back we were one of the library authorities contacted by somebody from "Richard & Judy" to see if we'd be interested in getting one of our children's book clubs involved in the programme's children's reading promotion. Sadly, in the end the groups we suggested weren't able to get involved but it was nice to be asked and it certainly generated a bit of interest!

Rochdale Readers children's book club has decided to "shadow" the Richard & Judy Book Club by reading the titles in the list and getting back together to share their impressions. If you want to try it yourself the list's on our Kids' Portal.

Big Wild Read

The Big Wild Read officially finished on Saturday. I'm now busily collecting all the "finishers' cards" so that we can make sure we get everybody's certificates out to them. Some children have elected to pick up their certificates from the library but most are having them presented at school.

It's a lot early days for doing all the number-crunching for the performance indicators. For the next few days I'm just focusing on getting the ends tied up and hoping that all the children enjoyed themselves and got something out of it, whether they finished or not.

LEAF

I spent all day yesterday at Littleborough Library, providing the Library Service's contribution to the Local Environment Action Fortnight. This is something we like to get involved in each year as it's a subject close to my heart and it gives us another opportunity to present our libraries as learning and information venues for organisations working with children.

The event went really well. The workshops I presented gave the children the opportunity to do some environment/natural history-related craft activities (Big Wild Read leftovers with a few garnishes but popular with the children anyway).

I also made our Kids Portal available on the People's Network PCs and encouraged children to have a look at it and then let them look at some of the linked sites in our "Wild Stuff" list. The jigsaws in the Smithsonian's "Great Cats for Kids" page proved very popular.

CIPFA plus surveys

I had a long-standing arrangement to meet a class at Balderstone Library this morning, which was a good opportunity to get the children to give us their views in the CIPFA Plus survey, which starts today.


An unanticipated tripping-up point: some of the boys were putting a cross in the box for "I am a girl" and some of the girls were putting a cross for "I am a boy." We actually want them to put a cross in the box that applies to them. After a bit of a think the teacher came up with the explanation for the confusion: schoolchildren see a tick as meaning "yes" and a cross for meaning "no." So putting a cross in the "I am a girl box" meant "no, I am not a girl." Now we know I can warn everyone to make sure to explain that we want crosses in the boxes that apply.

Percy is a Punk Postscript

A really nice trip out to Kentmere Primary School. They've made a nice reading area for the children to use and it all looks very neat and friendly.

The teachers are running a "featured author" promotion with the children, the first one being Anne Fine.

They even managed to rustle up a ribbon for me to cut for the opening!

Percy is a Punk

Off to Kentmere School for a bit of a performance. They're opening a new library space in the school and they've asked if I'd help launch it with a recitation of "Percy is a Punk," which the children have enjoyed in the past.

It's an opportunity for me to burn off some of my youthful energy!

It's still not too late to finish the Big Wild Read!

Thanks to everyone who joined in this summer's Big Wild Read events. We hope you enjoyed them!

If you haven't finished the Big Wild Read reading game there's still time: the game doesn't finish until 22nd September.

• Wild Reads!

Picture Book Parade

We have thousands of picture books for younger readers in our libraries. The story books include many favourite characters including Postman Pat, Kipper and Maisie. There are also lots of books telling stories in rhyme, which are great fun for reading and sharing (there's some brilliant bedtime reading amongst them!) And many of the books are introductions to the world around us, involving colours and shapes, animals and machines, and people of course!

We've listed a few of these titles in our Picture Book Parade. If you want to find more picture books, follow the links in the authors' names or the series. And you can see far, far more in any of our libraries!

Children's and Young People's Library Survey

Monday September 17th will see the start of the CIPFA Plus user satisfaction survey for children. Our libraries have done similar surveys for adult users in the past, now it is the children's turn to give us their views.

I hope the survey will be fun for children to do but most importantly it will give us valuable information to direct our library services for children in the future.

Booked up

Booked Up is the new national programme which encourages Year 7 children to read for pleasure. This autumn every 11-year-old in England will be able to choose a free book from a list of 12 specially selected titles.

The Reading Agency is working in partnership with Booktrust to promote the Booked Up programme to public and school library services in England. The aim is to provide children with the opportunity to read all the Booked Up titles for free at their public library; to encourage and promote opportunities for joined-up working between public libraries, school library services and schools and to give positive library messages through the programme and its website.

To support this programme we've added more copies of the Booked Up titles to our library stock. You can check the Library Catalogue to see whether or not a copy's available at your local library.

John Piper's Puppet Show

John has been visiting Rochdale for a number of years now. Cuthbert the Crocodile and I are old friends - he likes chocolate!

Sammy the Sealion and Jack Rabbit helped Cuthbert out this year and John linked the puppet show to The Big Wild Read.

Rochdale Libraries very own Charlie Chough crow puppet now acts as Cuthbert's warm up act. Charlie had his picture published in the Rochdale Observer when he accompanied John and his puppets at Smithybridge Library. John didn't want his picture taken as that would have spoilt the surprises!

John Piper's web site

Craig Bradley - performance poet

Craig Bradley visited three of our libraries as part of The Big Wild Read. We were treated to the Big Wild Rhyme Road Show.

He is an excellent performance poet and I would recommend anyone to give him a go with their group. The show is entertaining, visual, lively, educational and downright funny!

We had children aged between three and eleven (and one aged 76) and I know he also goes down well with secondary school age pupils.

The Big Wild Read has gone global!

Certificates for The Big Wild Read will be reaching as far as Malaysia as one finisher will be returning home there shortly with her certificate, etc. I wonder if she will plant the seeds out there too? Sadly, there is no funding for me to fly out and present the certificate at her school, so we sent it to Spotland Library for her to collect in person. The Big Wild Read seems to have really taken off!

The activity table is new this year and I wanted some variety for it, otherwise we would have ended up with six weeks consisting of nothing but pictures to colour in. Activities this summer have included: decorating plant pots; wildlife masks; butterflies; wild summer cards; and animal crafts. The activity table isn't without its teething troubles: we got templates for cutting out sticky-back plastic shapes for the plant pots and they turned out to be inflexible and very fiddly to use. Something for us to bear in mind next time. Other than that, the activities have been very popular with the children.

Books to treasure at family fun events

Children get the chance to discover the treasures in books at two family fun events this week.

The Library Service is holding the family fun events to gift Bookstart Treasure Boxes to children starting school in September 2007 who did not receive their Treasure Box at Nursery this year.

The events are on:

• Wednesday 22 August
  Wheatsheaf Library, Rochdale from 2pm until 4pm


• Friday 24 August
  Littleborough Library from 2-4 pm

Both afternoons will be drop in events with face-painting, crafts, freebies and balloons on offer. The Bookstart Bear is also hoping to make an appearance.

Parents are asked to bring their red health book if possible. It will also be an opportunity for other parents to find out about Bookstart.

Bookstart in the UK is the first national books-for-babies programme in the world.

Every baby born in England is now entitled to three free Bookstart Packs at the following ages:

• 6-9 months - the Bookstart pack, gifted by the Health Visitor


• 18-30 months - the Bookstart+ pack again usually gifted by their Health Visitor


• 3-4 years - Bookstart Treasure Box - gifted in the child's pre school year.

Children starting nursery in September will receive their Treasure Box at their Nursery before August 2008.

Big Wild Summer!

Your local library is Going Wild this Summer!

If you are aged between 4 and 11 years of age why not join THE BIG WILD READ?

• If you want to take part, pick up your FREE folder and wild flower seeds - available from 30 June at libraries across the borough.
• Visit your local library throughout the Summer for a variety of free WILD events and
  collect stickers and other surprises as you read.
• Free swim tickets, medals and certificates for all children who make four visits to the Library to complete the BIG WILD READ CHALLENGE.
• All who complete the challenge will be entered into a draw to join in a local tree planting event.
• Big Wild Reads

Special events at your local libraries

Places are limited, please ring the relevant library to book your FREE place.

Guy de Paul’s Magic Show
For children aged 4+

• Friday 27 July 10.30am at Heywood Library
• Monday 13 August 10.30am at the Wheatsheaf library
• Monday 13 August 2.30pm at Junction Library
• Tuesday 14 August 10.30am at Norden Library
• Tuesday 14 August 2.30pm at Brimrod Chapel

The Bug Box
Roger Swailes introduces a variety of big wild insects. For children aged 5+

• Thursday 2 August 10.30am at Castleton Library
• Thursday 2nd August 2.30pm at Spotland Library
• Thursday 9 August 10.30am at Milnrow Library
• Thursday 9 August 2.30pm at Wardle Library

The Wild Road Show
Animals galore! For children aged 5+

• Thursday 26 July 10am at Alkrington Library
• Thursday 26 July 11.30am at Langley Library
• Thursday 26 July 2pm at Belfield Library
• Thursday 26 July 4pmat Smallbridge Library

Big Wild Rhymes with Craig Bradley
Entertaining, dynamic and fun performance poetry show complete with bongos. For children aged 5+

• Friday 3 August 11am Littleborough Library
• Friday 3 August 2pm Middleton Library
• Friday 3 August 4pm Balderstone Library

John Piper’s Puppets
For children aged 4+

• Friday 17 August 10.30am at Smithybridge Library
• Friday 17 August 2.30pm at Middleton Library
• Monday 20 August 10.30am at Heywood Library
• Monday 20 August 2.30pm at Darnhill Library

Join a local Bug Hunt with a countryside ranger
Family event. All ages welcome

• Monday 23 July 2.30pm starting from Balderstone Library
• Tuesday 21 August 2.30pm starting from Littleborough Library

Curly Cat
Make your own shoebox theatre For children aged 7+

• Friday 10 August 2-4pm Wheatsheaf Library

Drop in events
No need to book, everone welcome.

Animal Face-painting

• Tuesday 24 July 2.30-4.30pm Middleton Library
• Tuesday 31 July 2.30-4.30pm Langley Library
• Monday 6 August 2.30-4.30pm Heywood Library
• Tuesday 7 August 2.30-4.30pm Spotland Library
• Thursday 23 August 2.30-4.30pm Castleton Library
• Tuesday 28 August 2.30-4.30pm at Milnrow Library

Wild craft activities
Try a different Craft Activity each week throughout the Summer at your local library. Don’t forget to bring your BIG WILD READ folder and choose new books at the same time!

• Week beginning 23 July - Ugly Bugs
• Week beginning 30 July - How does your garden grow?
• Week beginning 6 August - Wild Life Masks
• Week beginning 13 August - Butterflies
• Week beginning 20 August - Wild Summer cards
• Week beginning 28 August - Animal Crafts

Note: All Libraries CLOSED on Bank Holiday Monday 27 August.

The fun doesn't end with the school holidays - look out for the autumn events in our libraries!