Biblionasium – “GoodReads for Kids”

Biblionasium is an online reading community for children age 6-13. This social network allows children to exchange book information with other students, parents, and teachers in a safe environment. Children can monitor their reading progress, share book recommendations, write book reviews, create book lists, and earn virtual rewards. Teachers can observe students’ reading status and interact with them over many of the same activities, in addition to report compilation and collection needs determination, based on student feedback. Knowledgeable about what their children are reading through the parent portal, Biblionasium also promotes parent-child book discussions (Biblionasium, n.d.).

Biblionasium is a free service that can be accessed by selecting the join now button from Biblionasium's home page where a user will be prompted to select whether he or she is an educator, parent or student.  Alternately, a student whose teacher has created a class log in may access Biblionasium by selecting Login With Biblionasium from the home page’s menu bar. This video describes how teachers can enter their class rosters on Biblionasium:

Students whose schools subscribe to Biblionasium through Follett's Destiny Library Manager Platform, may use their Destiny log in to access Biblionasium through Destiny or use their Destiny log in on the Biblionasium site.  This video explains the many benefits of using Biblionasium linked to Destiny, one of which includes viewing the materials’ current availability (whether checked out) within the library's physical collection (Biblionasium, 2017).

Once on the site, students have a list of actions to choose from, the most common are add books and log your reading. To add books, a user types the name of the book in the search bar and a list of corresponding books appears (ex: a book within a series). Once the correct book is selected, the user will click add to shelf and will be prompted with options, such as I am reading it. Once the book is added, users can enter how many pages they have read and how much time that day they have spent reading the book (Bond, 2014). Sharing books with others via the recommendation option is another fun feature of this site; select the book from the my books tab (of previously added books on one’s account), click recommend it, choose which friends to share it with from the list provided, then choose from the pre-set list of notes to include, such as This book made me think of you (Biblionasium, 2012).

There are many ways in which Biblionasium can be incorporated into an instructional activity to support student learning in the elementary school library. Through Biblionasium’s challenges tab, a media specialist could create a reading challenge for students to choose their favorite picture book from the annual list of South Carolina picture book award nominees read over the school year. Students could easily keep track of which books they have read and use the star rating system and notes section to help them determine their personal favorite. The media specialist, who has access to the students’ reading logs, could encourage time management tips to help keep them on track to finish the books by the end of the year. An additional student lesson could be created through the use of Biblionasium's review it tab; students could write their own book review, then compare it with professional ones from a source such as School Library Journal. One school district even used Biblionasium to successfully connect their school year literacy efforts to their county’s public library summer reading program, as discussed here.

References

Biblionasium (n.d.). Frequently asked questions. Retrieved from https://www.biblionasium.com/faq.

Biblionasium (2012, November 16). Biblionasium for kids: How to recommend books [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=how+to+recommend+a+book+on+biblionasium&docid=608000714953197924&mid=1A248E7AD473C80923D71A248E7AD473C80923D7&view=detail&FORM=VIREHT

Biblionasium (2017, May 10). 6 ways to use your Destiny library collection with Biblionasium [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=biblionasium+you+tube&&view=detail&mid=49E27690D7C258AE827C49E27690D7C258AE827C&&FORM=VRDGAR

Bond, M. (2014, September 8). Biblionasium tutorial [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=biblionasium+you+tube&&view=detail&mid=B420D2BCAEF94A2FFC88B420D2BCAEF94A2FFC88&&FORM=VRDGAR