Do you take your children to the local library?

[Legacy]

We go most Wednesdays, and I'm always amazed by how few parents and children there seem to be there.

Libraries are such a fantastic FREE resource, I often wonder what it is that stops parents from going?
Is it

• habit (i.e. were never taken as a child)
• convenience
• location

??

I just love it, 'cos the children feel that they aere 'getting something new' each week without me having to pay for it, it's obviously good for their reading/ education, and you don't end up with trillions of books all over the house. (We still buy books, but more often it's after first finding a type/ author through the library).

Anyway, if you want to get into the habit, I picked up a leaflet about a summer reading challenge kicking off all over the country from next weekend for the summer holidays - it's called The Big Wild Read, and kids can register for it, aim to read 6 books over the summer hols, and then get some goodies/ prizes etc.

More info here: The Big Wild Read

My son is too young at 2 and a half. He just runs around like a nutter knocking books of the shelves, and he won't sit still for the storytimes they have at our local library. I tend to buy lots of books secondhand for him at the moment (he is a book monster!), but as he gets older I'll take him to the library. I loved it as a kid!

Fio - which library do you use?

We love our local library and go down pretty much every Saturday morning and have done for the last years - since DD was 3 and DS 5. They love it and because it is always the same librarians they discuss and recommend books to DC etc although the library is quite small and DD thinks she might have read everything!

Our local council has also been running "Book Groups" for children which have been brilliant.

OMG, yes.Myself and DDs are regulars. Have always loved the library and save a small fortune reserving books online. In fact, the staff thanked me last year for my support as one of the factors in their budget is the number of books reserved and I had collecte so many it gave them an increased budget for the year ahead!

DS1 invariably chooses 10 books at a time and I invariably fail to return them by the due date, so the fines we pay not only keep our local library afloat but have also financed the war in Iraq.

We go every Saturday without fail. We all take 6 books out every Saturday. In holidays we tend to go twice a week because we have finished the books too quickly.
The staff are great - DS2 seems to use the staff toilet every time we are there, and they save new 'teenage' books for DS1 (13) because they know that he has read everything in the teenage section.
Weekly attendance at a library is a necessity for me, let alone the children. I am particularly proud that my reading habit has rubbed off on DS1, because he is usually one of the only teenage boys in the library. He tends to win most of the competitions at his age range (possibly because he is the only entrant!!)

yeah - they are so skinnny they fit between the metal book alarm thingies - we get loads of free books that way

We have not been for ages. TBH I find it hard to fit in these days. The late opening evening is Wednesday when DS has football practice from 6-7. They are open 9-12 on a Saturday but DD has dancing from 9.30-10.30 which means she is not home much before 11. I could easily take DD because she is home with me two days a week. It is DS that is more difficult. This Saturday DD has a party that starts 20 mins after the end of dancing. I can't take them after school on Friday because DH and I are going to see the financial advisor. There just never seems to be time. If they had more extensive opening hours I would definitely be more inclined to go.

Also DS is 6 and is on chapter books. He is reading Cool by Michael Morpurgo as his school reading book. I am reading him Danny the Champion of the World. DH is reading him Horrid Henry and the mega-mean time machine. OK the Horrid Henry will only take a week or two at most. But the other two take longer so he doesn't get through books at the same rate as he used to do.

Our library has a brilliant online catalogue and ordering service. It's a dream to use. And the atmosphere at the library itself is brilliant for kids and for adults. It's in a middle-class university town: I agree with earlier posters that the best libraries tend to be for the kids and families that need them least. Step out of our town into the surrounding, deprived former-mining villages and you find very poor libraries.
My quibble with our library is that I don't like having computers (and DVDs) available there. Though my older son will seek out books very keenly, my younger son is distracted by the possibility of using the computers instead.

The recent DVD addition in my library is bugging me.

My lot used to love book browsing, they now spend more time drooling over the DVDs, have to keep hauling them away. Not exactly what I have in mind when setting out for a library visit.

Think they should be in a box behind the counter. We get dagger stares most visits anyway so won't be the one offering that suggestion!!!

Actually not quite sure what place DVDs have in a kid's library, library visits are all about fostering a love of books. Taking home a shiny new borrowed DVD kind of takes the edge of the books they've just selected.

We have 2 libraries within 6 miles & visit them most weeks.We also have a mobile library which comes every 2 weeks,as we are a bit in the sticks.It is a rare week when we haven't taken out the maximum number of books allowed.

The dd's especially love the mobile library,as the librarian is great & lets them stamp their own books & sit on the folding seat.They regard this as the greatest treat ever.

Our nearest libraries are open til 8pm at night & you can renew books online & order books,so I don't have any problems accessing services.

I wanted to take DS to the library this week to get a head start on him doing the summer book reading challenge. Looked at the opening times - 2-7 tomorrow but I am working and then he is at football 6-7, then 9-12 on Thursday so that is totally out, 2-6 on Friday, but he doesn't finish school until 3.30 and DH and I have to see financial advisor at 4.30, 9-12 on Saturday but DD has dancing 9.30 - 10.30 and then a party 10.50 - 1. So that is this week totally scuppered. I will have to try for Monday.

I have to say that I don't see the availability of DVDs a problem.

We go to the library every week, and altho ds drooled over the DVD when they were first added, the novelty has soon worn off, and I do let him browse them when he wants to. I let him borrow ONE if he wants to, but he pays the 50p out of his own pocket money. I also insist he chooses books. If he won't look at the books at all, then he doesn't get the DVD.

This week he borrowed 'over the hedge', and we all sat down to watch it together.

Having DVDs doesn't preclude the borrowing of books, it's just an added attraction.

Yep, go most weeks. We make an afternoon of it. My DD1 loves going on the bus in to town so we get on the bus and go straight to the library then came home on bus. It fills an afternoon and both DD enjoy themselves. DD1 loves books and would stay there all day but do have problem with DD2 (16mths) as she loves to shred books so I do spend alot of time chasing her round making sure she is behaving but still take them both.

We love the library, two within a good distance with lovely kids areas, the best one being in the town centre, so on a Saturday we usually go to 'boring bank' then 'lovely library'!

Whenever we get on the bus ds asks if we are going to the library, he loves it. We do the summer scheme every year too (mindees and stepsons, and ds), and ds did the baby bookcrawl too.

We sometimes go to story time for under 5s on a Friday morning. Two stories, craft session, drink and snack.

We also do the craft seesions for the summer read scheme, and our libraries hold different fun workshops too which I always book for mindees in the school holidays s they are really varied and interesting (last one was on african culture - clothing, lifestyles, dance, music, etc). Mindees loved it!

Last week I borrowed 3 baby einstein videos, 2 books for ds, 2 for me, and two local history photographic books for older mindees to look at. All for free!!

For anyone interested [[http://www.bigwildread.co.uk/ here] is the link to this year's Summer reading challenge, The Big Wild Read.

I've had to search for it because Nottinghamshire haven't yet updated the link on their Libraries website, it still links to last years Reading Mission.

Try the link again here

I take my 8 month DS every month for the baby nursery rhymes session and we get books out too. I got his library card at 5 months . I think its great being back in the kids section looking for books for him.