Gunter Schlamp shares: “After more than two decades of advocating school libraries in Germany – an especially hard nut to crack -, I published a book about school libraries. It begins with a small chapter that describes how I, as a teacher, learned to appreciate school libraries and organized some of them, followed by a short overview of the situation of school libraries in Germany. The main topic of the book is the future of the school library as a learning space.

Various experts have contributed to the book: Guenther Brée, chairman of the Hessian association of school libraries, describes how “media quests”, that is, information searches in a variety of formats, and media education, with a focus on film, can be integrated with the teaching of subject content. Dr. Markus Fritz, director of the school library system for the German-speaking minority in South Tyrol/Italy, explains how the school libraries in South Tyrol address information literacy and describes the measures for assuring the quality of South Tyrol school libraries. Buffy Hamilton compares a good school library with a good restaurant – enchanting closing words.

The book offers a list with more than one hundred links, which is also available on the website of the publishing house and which allows a deeper exploration of my vision. The book is not a how-to manual, but an appetizer for parents, teachers, school administrators and librarians:

Schulbibliotheken im Zentrum. Erfahrungen, Berichte, Visionen