Welcome to the Lloyd Rees Library

The Ironside State School was opened in 1870, five years before education in Queensland became compulsory. The original roll listed 46 pupils. Today Ironside's population fluctuates between 710 and 740 students drawing enrolments from Brisbane's western suburbs of St Lucia, Toowong and Indooroopilly.

The school was selected as a Centre of Excellence in 2001 with a focus on Science and Technology.

Built in 1986, the library is named after one of Australia's most widely respected landscape painters, Lloyd Rees (1895-1988) who was a pupil of Ironside in the early part of last century.

The library is an open plan facility central to all teaching areas. The layout includes two spaces available for class bookings - fiction and non- fiction.

Fiction is colourful, comfortable and spacious furnished with large floor cushions and a bright rug. This popular area is used for pleasure reading, story time, listening to audio titles and watching videos.

Classes using the non-fiction area have access to a pod of four desktop computers, two scanners and a colour laser printer. These are connected to the school network via wireless access. Teachers and students also have the flexibility of using a ceiling mounted data projector, sixteen Toshiba laptops and six iBooks.

The school's information literacy program remains in its early stages and varies in the intensity to which it is supported. Information literacy skills are discussed with teachers during planning for each integrated unit. Skills identified to be taught are then planned in detail with the teacher-librarian.

Cooperatively planned author/illustrator and literature study units are popular with all teaching staff and are enjoyed by students especially if they involve an ICT component such as web quests and bookraps.

A variation on the flexible timetable operates to allow classes access to the library. Infant classes have first preference to secure a regular borrowing time, then classes working cooperatively with the teacher-librarian book the sessions they require. When these bookings have been made the timetable becomes flexible!

Literature and reading are promoted to Ironside students in a number of ways: competitions, author visits, displays and posters, reviews in the school newsletter and promos on assembly.

An extremely popular competition this term was the Interhouse Library Cup where house captains and student leaders were involved with a library borrowing challenge.

A revised library monitors program is proving very popular. The program encourages students to work through three levels to finally achieve the honour of 'Life Membership'. Rewards, recognition and badges contribute to the success of this program.

The library, staffed with one full time teacher- librarian and 20 hours of aide time, is open everyday from 8:00am through to about 3:45pm.

The Interhouse Library Challenge Cup
Photo Courtesy of Ironside State School

A Christmas book fair in the third last week of this term heralds the end of activities for the year.

Cath Roche, Teacher- librarian, Ironside State Primary School

Last updated November 2003