The theme for this year’s book week is One World, Many Stories. With such an open theme, I found it very challenging to come up with a display idea for the Library I work in.
When I recently recieved a new puppet from Vietnam for my collection of puppets- I was inspired! Before books, puppets were used to tell stories. What if I used my collection of puppets from around the world as my display. I could also use the windows at the front of the library similar to department store windows and put the puppets in them.
I wanted to try and make each window like a puppet theatre so it needs a curtain and a banner celebrating the theme. I found the curtains image on the internet at http://www.myvbay.com/2011/06/one-enchanted-eveing-musical-review.html, and I found the banner/ ribbon in MS Publisher 2007 clipart.
To make the curtains fit the window, I measured the windows and transferred those measurements to MS Publisher 2007. I then resized the curtains to fit, printed it out on multiple sheets of A3 paper, glued the pages together and cut out the opening to see the puppets. I then used sticky tape to ‘hang’ the curtains in the window.
The backgrounds behind the puppets are 3 panel folding display boards with black fabric draped over the top. All of the puppets except my Vietnamese Water Puppets are holding scaled copies of book week nominated titles. I could not attach copies of the book week books to the puppet’s hands without damaging the paintwork on the puppet.
This has been a wonderful opportunity to blend my passion for puppets with my role as the Teacher Librarian as well as creating a talking point around the school. Many teachers have suggested that I design animated windows for Christmas just like some of the major department stores here in Australia… we’ll see when Christmas comes around.
Book week will be held this year from August 20 to 26th.
