From December 31st, 2020, Heart will be closed to new submissions, and will go into an archived state for a year or two.  This will give you time to download anything from the site which you have found useful over the ten years that Heart has been running.  When I first started Heart – 10 years ago! – in March 2010, with the first post in September of that year, not many people had their own blogs and places to showcase the amazing work that they were doing.  Now many school librarians have blogs, and are on Twitter, and you are all shouting about the fantastic things that our #greatschoollibraries are doing.  The time is now right for Heart to quietly bow out and hand the baton on to you.

Some of the highlights over the years have been our very first post, about the  School Libraries Commission Report which was published in September 2010.  It was followed by our reporting of a statement from the Education Minister Nick Gibb, saying that he believed every school should have a library – we are still waiting for that!  Our very first Christmas TV schedule from the wonderful Helen Smith from Eckington School came out in December 2010 – and is still going!  I am very honoured to have that post as the last one this site will host.  We reported on the launch of the wonderful Stan Lee Excelsior Award, again, still going 10 years later. And our mass lobby of Parliament was reported on here too, by Barbara Band, one of the organisers.  Plenty of other news and reports have taken place on Heart – from SLOTY announcements, Carnegie and Greenaway announcements, other Book Prizes, and more.

You should also have a look, using the categories tags at the side, at some useful articles to take note of and download.  I have chosen a few which I thought you might not want to miss.

Creating a Literary Tube Map

Using Minecraft in your schools

Marcus Alexander video – why spend money on your library?

Anime Club at Fort Pitt Grammar School

Taking InfoLit lessons into Google Classroom

Creating Zines at Fort Pitt Grammar School

Google Hacks from Lenny Dutton

Dewey Card Game from Matt Imrie

Designing a library layout with the help of students

 

And many, many more!  Also remember to look at the Evidence Base Tab to download any reports you may need, although you will also find some of these on the Great School Libraries site.

And finally, thank you so much for all the incredible contributors to Heart.  Every single person who has written something for the blog, or given me information like Book Award Winners has enhanced this blog.  This site was always for you and about you, and you have ensured that it reached all around the world.  Keep on shouting out about the wonderful things you all do.  Heart Facebook page will close, but Heart Twitter will change to my own personal account.  As this site is not longer paid for, some of the links are not working as well as they should, particularly embeds.  I have pointed you to articles that still work perfectly well though.

Love to each and every one of you – and thanks for everything! – Caroline