Learning Resource Centre

Welcome to the Library at Cecil Jones Academy

What are you reading?

Opening Hours

Monday – Friday 8:00AM-4:00PM

The Cecil Jones Library is open to all before school, during break and lunchtime and after school every day. All students are able to take a book out for 4 weeks at a time and with thousands of books to choose from we aim to encourage all students in reading for educational growth as well as for pleasure.

“A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies . . . The man who never reads lives only one.”

About Our Learning Resource Centre

The Library at Cecil Jones is a versatile space, offering curriculum support, library lessons and a friendly environment to our students, staff and visitors. Whether students need revision guides for their chosen subjects, or want to try a new book series, our Librarian is on hand to help guide and direct.

There are an abundance of activities taking place within the space including:

Accelerated Reading Programme

Our year 7 and 8 students take part in the Accelerated Reader initiative where they compete within tutor groups to obtain the most points. Every Reading Practice Quiz has a point value assigned to it based on the book level and the word count of the book (the book’s difficulty and length) this helps encourage and make reading fun and helps pupils to improve their reading and literacy skills!

Individually, students can read to get points towards earning reading badges.

Milestones:

• 500,000 – Bronze Book worm Badge and Certificate
• 1 million – Silver Book worm Badge and Certificate
• 2 million – Gold  Book worm Badge and Certificate
• 3 million – Golden Owl  Book worm Badge and Certificate
• 5 million - Choice of book for the library with sticker and Certificate 

Reading Sessions

Our Year 7, 8 and 9 students all participate in timetabled reading lessons where they are able to change their reading book and complete quizzes on Accelerated Reader. In these sessions, the classes also read a book aloud together to support the development of spoken language and comprehension skills. Some of the books that the classes have enjoyed have been, Trash by Andy Mulligan and Skulduggery Pleasant by Derek Landy.

Homework Club

Homework Club is held after school on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday and students of all year groups are welcome to attend to and have access to the computer suite to ensure their homework is completed.

Author Visits

Our library space has most recently hosted an author visit. Jennifer Claessen, author of The October Witches, came to talk and do a creative writing workshop with some of our Year 7 and 8 pupils.

Here is a review from one of our students about the event

“Jennifer Claessen has really inspired me to move forth in my writing passion and I now understand how many stages a book must go through before being published into a real and beautifully written story with an incredibly intriguing plot full of plot-twists”

Drop Everything and Read

During tutor every Thursday the whole school participates in DEAR time where we all, teachers included, drop everything we are doing to take some time to read. During this time the Library is used by our sixth form students who hear our Year 7 students read aloud to them.

Chess Club

Chess club is run by students for the students, with a running leader board on display in the library!

Quiet Corner

To promote mental health and wellbeing we have created a quiet corner in the library. In this corner we have a variety of books all about mental health and wellbeing. There are books about coping with anxiety and exam stress, how to practice mindfulness and much more.

Book Recommendations….

Here are some must-read suggestions from our librarian!

City of Bones – Cassandra Clare

George and the Big Bang – Lucy & Stephen Hawking

Unbirthday, A Twisted Tale – Elizabeth J Braswell (Disney)