Abstract
School libraries contribute to student wellbeing as one of the few spaces at the school where students from different year levels can interact and engage in informal learning . Drawing on the case study findings, this chapter presents the perspectives of 44 students on their new or refurbished school library at 7 schools in Queensland , Australia . Students participated in interviews about their lived experience of their existing library , and drew their imagined ideal library spaces. In the existing libraries, they valued spaciousness , technology , social connectedness and choices and control ; while in their ideal libraries, they imagined peacefulness , comfort , connectedness to the outside world through natural and technological links, and adventure . The findings support a framework for fostering student wellbeing through the school library that builds upon an apparent three-way synergy between the goals of the Melbourne Declaration, students’ ideal library features and preferred spatial qualities.
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Willis, J., Hughes, H., Bland, D. (2019). Students Reimagining School Libraries as Spaces of Learning and Wellbeing. In: Hughes, H., Franz, J., Willis, J. (eds) School Spaces for Student Wellbeing and Learning. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-6092-3_7
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