My fourth H.O.T Contribution

4th Issue for Oct-Dec 2011 - ... can you guess? :)


MYSTERY THEME! I had tons of fun doing this theme, one of my all-time fave!

Tome Keeper ♥

My third H.O.T Contribution

3rd Issue for July-Sept 2011 - National Day Theme :)



The design company will tweak it a little to smoothen out the lines.


Tome Keeper ♥

Library Book Sale 2011

I volunteered for the Library Book Sale on 24th July 2011. Not for the actual event but the pre-selection for one of the charity groups - SINDA.

A few of us came together as a group and spent the morning choosing books and 'grabbing' as fast as we can. Half were selectors, the other half were packers.

All in all, it was a tiring morning but a very happy one working and volunteering with friends.

Little introduction:

The Charity Book Donation is a precursor to the NLB's highly popular annual Library Book Sale. Held on 23 and 24 July 2011 at the Singapore Expo Hall 4A, the Library Book Sale this year will offer a wide collection of more than 355,000 used books and magazines in the four official languages.

Starting from $1.00, these items are categorised under 'Adults', 'Young People' and 'Children' collections. Under each group, they are sub-divided into 'Fiction' and 'Non-Fiction'. Adult English non-fiction books will be sub-categorised under eight specific categories namely, Arts, Business, Cookery, Family, Health & Gardening, Pets & Animals, Recreation, and Travel Guides and a General category. Popular magazines such as Vogue, Women's Weekly, and parenting magazine Ma Ma Bao Bei among other titles will be on sale.

The Library Book Sale is open to all members of the public. There is no limit on the number of items that can be purchased. Items will be replenished at regular intervals over the two days of the event.

Library Book Sale details :

Date : 23 – 24 July 2011

Time : 9.30am – 8.00pm

Location : Singapore Expo Hall 4A








Tome Keeper ♥

Typical Mass Borrowing Outreach

This particular outreach was at Poi Ching School in July. The teacher had scheduled a two-days Mass Borrowing session for all levels (P1-P6).

So I would first notify the vendor staff two weeks in advance so they would have time to select and pack the books into boxes (all labelled accordingly; J/JS/JP - Fic/NFic). At the same time, I would need to arrange for transport as well to bring the boxes to-and-fro.

We would discuss beforehand the logistics required. As Poi Ching had done mass borrowing with us before, there wasn't a need to recce the area. For first-timers, usually the librarian would go down personally to choose the best spot (wide area for tables, lan point etc).

This Mass Borrowing session started at 8.30am so we (myself and two other Library Officers) were there at 8am for set-up. We opened the boxes and displayed some books in order for the students to browse.



While some did the unpacking, the other would set-up the Outreach laptops, along with the scanner and dongles to connect to the Internet. We also brought along a portable printer to print the loan receipt.



Let the browsing/borrowing begin!




The students were a delightful bunch! We had a double loan promotion going on and they were so excited, grabbing books left and right. Avid readers :)

Some who had borrowed their books sat down immediately to read. While others who could not borrow (had fines, didn't bring card etc) also picked up a book and read on the spot.

See the row of readers? Awesome picture, isn't it?


We'll have to remind the students repeatedly NOT to return the books at the school library. But it's inevitable to receive such cases. All in all, it was a good and fruitful outreach.

We had almost 80% of the books borrowed (brought 2000).

Tome Keeper ♥

NEA Roadshow on 4 June 2011

Sometimes, we have collaborations with external organisations and will help support their programmes with an Outreach -- usually consisting of a mass borrowing service + registration of new members / SMS reminder.

This is how a typical Outreach looks like (the National Library Board will have its own space). The NEA activity was located outside Tampines MRT Station hence TRL supported it.

We brought down books/AV that are suitable for children, teens and adults. It was a pretty long day and we worked hard to get as much loans as possible.

Tome Keeper ♥

Mother's Day, 14 May 2011

Hello folks!

In April 2011, a team was put together to look at how we can increase TRL's loans through programmes and promotions. Yours truly is part of the team and we brainstormed all the events in advance.

The plan was to have an event happening once per month and we tried to coincide it to a festive occasion or a celebrated holiday. A typical event runs from 10am - 4pm and there will be art booths in the foyer, J specials and crafts conducted by librarians, talks in the auditorium and redeemable goodies (made by our Wishers Aunties).

The first event under our WITS - LOANS ...

Mothers' Da!

I made this banner to hang at our foyer


A J librarian conducting a flower craft session


A volunteer came by to draw caricatures

There was a magic performance at the auditorium

Followed by a cake cutting celebration with mummies and their kids!

Yummylicious hazelnut cake

Top 3 prizes up for grabs for the Tribute to Mummy contest. The tribute can come in the form of a craft, poem, story, pictures... anything!

The event went well and our readers had loads of fun :)

Aww.. my mum came to support! Love ya!

Tome Keeper ♥

First Raise-A-Reader workshop

This interactive workshop is for parents and caregivers to discover ways to cultivate and foster the love for reading in a child; create a supportive reading environment for a child through meaningful activities and play and understand how the parent-child bond can be strengthened through reading together. Our librarians will also share tips on how to select books for your child.

-www.pl.sg

My second H.O.T Contribution

Hurray, I have been tasked to continue with the H.O.T ART segment. The theme for the coming magazine is 'Cyber Wellness'.

I took the opportunity to introduce T-Book (my floating idea) as a teacher character. The second image is the draft version of the final outlook - colouring done by external company.

The .. colour seems a little off, no?

Two parts to my segment : a Mouse Hunt game and the Cyber Wellness tip. Making a pun on 'mouse', I drew this hidden object picture for fun.

I decided to just give you the answer.. hahaha.. the tenth mouse.. is the real one! *ding*

Tome Keeper ♥

Update 26/3/2011:
The mag's out on the shelf!

Creche Visits :)

As part of our portfolio, we need to conduct Creche visits. That is, library visits for pre-schoolers. Some activities include, storytelling, art and craft and a library tour (introduction to library etiquette, membership and learning how to borrow books).

Tome Keeper ♥

My first H.O.T Contribution

H.O.T aka Hooked On Tales is a snazzy Children's Newsletter catered for Pri School students. It's published quarterly and filled with many recommended reads by us librarians, and also games/activities for the kids to participate in.

I was given an opportunity to draw a Halloween-themed colouring page and I jumped at it! I have been waiting impatiently for the newsletter to be out and it's finally here!

Very proud to have my art piece in this. Hopefully, there will be many more to come to share with everyone :)

Beware of pumpkinssss

Tome Keeper ♥