Our School Library

How many books should you have? 

• If you are in Year 5 or 6 and are a Free Reader take 1 fiction and 1 non-fiction (a book with a number on the spine).
• Year 6 can take books with a ‘T’ on the spine.
• If you are in Year 3 or 4 and are a Free Reader then you should have 1 brown book and 1 non-fiction (a book with a number on the spine).
• If you are on pink, red, yellow, blue, green or orange then you can also take a 1 bar book.
• If you are turquoise, purple, gold, white or lime then you can also take a 2 bar book.
• If you are a colour coded reader then you should have 1 book on your colour as well as:
  • 1 non-fiction book (a book with a number on the spine)
  • 1 Graphic Novel (a book with a black sticker on the spine) or
  • 1 picture book

Book Bands

At South Farnborough we use a book banding scheme, this may be different from the book bands you have been using at your child’s infant school. Each child is assessed when they start with us and given a colour band of books to read. The colours become progressively more challenging. The colours range from pink to brown with brown books being free reader starter books for lower school pupils

As part of your child’s reading journey, it's important that they have access to lots of different kinds of books and are exposed to a wide vocabulary. Book banding is designed to enable children to have access to the variety of books they need whilst still being supported at the correct reading level. For a child to be an effective reader, they need to not only read the words on the page but also understand what they have read. We will carefully monitor your child’s reading and move them to the next colour band when they are ready.

Reading with your child at home plays a vital part in their development as a reader and will help nurture their love of reading. Any reading done at home can be recorded on the Boomreader App which we look at in school. 

How to choose the right book for you

Remember you can always ask your friends, family, teachers, librarians or reading ambassadors for recommendations! Why not check out our book reviews.

Author Guy Bass Officially Opens the Refurbished Library - September 2018

We all had a wonderful day when Guy Bass, award-winning author of such great books as ‘Stitch Head’ came to open our school library!

It is with great thanks to our fantastic PTA, who contributed £13,000 towards the renovation, that the library was able to go ahead. The children love it and it has helped focus reading as a such an important part of our school.

Guy stayed all day and the children had a hilarious time listening to his stories, tales about his life and why reading is so important to him.  A truly inspirational day!

Your Local Library

Our nearest public library can be found in Farnborough Town Centre (Pinehurst, Farnborough GU14 7JZ) and is open most days until 5pm. 

We like to take the children there for a visit, usually in Year 3, to have a look at what they provide, talk about memberships, clubs and reading challenges that they run in the holidays. 

For more information visit their website: 

https://www.hants.gov.uk/librariesandarchives/library/libraryfinder/farnborough-library

Memberships

Children's memberships are available free to anyone under the age of 16 who lives in Hampshire. 

Your membership entitles you to:

• borrow up to 30 books at a time for 28 days
• borrow up to 5 magazines for 7 days
• renew items up to 5 times
• use the digital library for free. 

Other local libraries: 

Aldershot - 109 High Street, Aldershot, GU11 1DQ

Fleet - Fleet Road, Fleet, GU51 4BX