Spring Brook's LMC Mission Statement is:
To Provide lessons, activities, and resources that will assist students and staff in becoming effective users of information, developing a pattern of life-long learning and fostering a love of reading.
Visit and comment on the LMC BLOG at:
Information Literacy is what the Spring Brook LMC is all about. It is here that students learn to determine information needs, plan strategies for research, access information, evaluate information, use information and evaluate the process and product. The staff in the LMC continually helps students become good users of information.
There are over 20,000 items in the LMC for students and staff to borrow. We also have a Parent Resource Center that has materials available on various issues facing modern families. If you are interested in being set up with an account to check out materials from this area, please email
natalie_hoyle@ipsd.org.
- Students in grades 2-5 may check out 3 items
- Students in 1st grade may check out 2 items
- Students in Kindergarten may check out 2 items later in the year. (One item may be checked out until after the first quarter).
The Spring Brook LMC has a flexible schedule. This means that classes do not come in on a fixed basis for a set period of time each week. Instead, it allows the LMC Director to work collaboratively with the other teachers and students so that lessons are complementing classroom activities. This helps maintain continuity in students' work.
The LMC is a fully automated facility for both circulation and the catalog. Students check out their own materials at the circulation desk. Search stations are available in the LMC. In addition, the catalog can be accessed from computer on the school network. Students are given assistance and instruction in the use of the online catalog on an ongoing basis. Formal class instruction of on use of the catalog usually begins in 2nd grade.
The World Book Encyclopedia, Nettrekker, and Facts on File, as well as other research resources are available at any computer in the building. There is home access for all three. Please contact the LMC Director for these user names and passwords.
During school registration, parents are asked to read and sign Spring Brook's Acceptable Use Policy (AUP). The Internet is viewed as another tool available to teachers and students for curricular enhancement. All sites to be used by students are previewed beforehand by the teaching staff.
Students may come to the LMC anytime to check out library materials, do research, take Accelerated Reader tests or for free reading during the school day with teacher permission. Students are encouraged to come to the LMC as often as needed. There are always qualified and enthusiastic adults to help students find materials.
Our goal is for students to see the LMC as the center of their learning experience at Spring Brook - a place they enjoy, where they find information they need, and especially, a place that prepares them to be lifelong learners.
For those interested in purchasing a birthday book, please click on the link below.
First of all, thanks so much for sharing your time and caring for our students. The difference that you make in the lives of our students is phenomenal. You are appreciated! As part of the Spring Brook team, parent volunteers add an important contribution to the educational environment.
If you choose to come volunteer in the Spring Brook LMC, we might ask you to help out with assisting students in finding books, processing new materials, decorating and creating bulletin boards, assisting with copying, collating and cutting materials for the LMC, cleaning AV equipment and LMC shelves, and much more!
We prefer to have volunteers work twice a month, for continuity, but other schedules can be accommodated. If you have an interested in helping out in the LMC, please contact the Spring Brook LMC at 428-6605.
The focus of the technology curriculum is to integrate computer use with what is being taught in the classroom. For example, students may create a power point presentation to produce a social studies report or reinforce math skills through the use of a software program. They may use our online research databases to assist them in finding information for a topic of study within the curriculum.
Following district standards, grade-level objectives encompassing a variety of skills such as keyboarding, word processing and desktop publishing are met throughout the year. Teachers select grade appropriate software to use in their instruction. The LMC Director collaborates with teachers to help make technology meaningful for students.
Our computer lab is equipped with enough Dell PCs to allow an entire class to work in the lab together. In addition to the computer lab, we also have thirty laptops that teachers can check out and use either in the LMC or the classroom. We also have a color laser printer, black and white laser printers, a scanner, data projectors, digital cameras and other tools of technology to help facilitate teaching and learning. The building is fully networked.
In addition, students in grades 2-5 use Accelerated Reader to support development of reading and comprehension skills.
We have several online research tools available for students. Five that are accessible from home are Facts on File, Nettrekker, and World Book Online, World Book Kids, OSLIS Citation Maker. Please contact the LMC Director (natalie_hoyle@ipsd.org) to get the passwords to access these databases.
Destiny Online Catalog
Reading Promotion
Rebecca Caudill Award
Spring Brook participates in voting for the annual The Rebecca Caudill Award. Below is the link for the website that lists the nominated books for the award. All of the books are available in the Spring Brook LMC. Of course, these titles are always available at the public library or your favorite bookstore. We will also have some of the titles available at the fall book fair.
For more information on the Rebecca Caudill program for students in grades 4-8 and annotations of each title, you can visit
www.rebeccacaudill.org.
The LMC Director booktalks the Caudill list to familiarize Spring Brook's 4
th and 5
th graders with the new titles every year.Voting for the winners will take place annually in February. Students must have read at least 3 titles to be eligible to vote.
Monarch Award
Younger students have been asking, “Why can’t we vote for books too?" ISLMA, the Illinois School Library Association responded with YES YOU CAN! and created a kid’s choice award, similar to the Rebecca Caudill Award, but for younger students.
The Monarch Award list has 20 nominee titles, ranging from non-fiction, poetry, picture books, to chapter books. This year K-3rd Grade Spring Brook students are registered to participate in the Monarch Award. Teachers are reading some of the titles from the nominee list to students in the classrooms. In February, participating students will have the opportunity to secretly vote for their favorite Monarch title.
For more information about the Monarch Award, visit the ISLMA website at http://www.islma.org/monarch.htm.
Other reading promotions happen throughout the year, such as:
Parents: Check out the Tumble Books Library with your children at home:
www.tumblebooklibrary.com
Username: ipsd
Password: books
The Wild Thing Invasion!
On October 29, Spring Brook Elementary hosted a Family Literacy Event focused on Maurice Sendak’s book, Where the Wild Things Are. 148 people joined the wild rumpus to celebrate reading. Celeste Giles, Naperville Public Librarian, Linda McCoy, Spring Brook Reading Specialist, and Natalie Hoyle, Spring Brook LMC Director emphasized the importance of reading aloud to children for at least 20 minutes a day. “Children need to find books that are just the right fit,” said McCoy pulling out various shoes from her bag “just like shoes fit the activity, books too should have a purpose.” “My goal is to pass on love of reading to Spring Brook students, by being a passionate reader, booktalking, and motivating students to read” said Hoyle. After kids made their own wild thing puppets, Stuart Vance, Spring Brook Kindergarten teacher and Miss Hoyle wowed the young audience with a dramatic reading of Where the Wild Things Are.
AR Program
Accelerated Reader (AR) is a reading motivation program where students read books, take a comprehension test on the computer, and are awarded points for correct answers. Throughout the year, we award students with prizes and privileges from pencils and erasers to a free recess for their class and a chance to make the morning announcements on the intercom.
Our list of AR Spring Brook's AR books can be found by clicking on the link below: