Barnens bibliotek (The Children's Library) is a Swedish national website promoting reading. The website is financed by the Swedish national Council for Cultural Affairs and administrated by Kultur i Väst - The Västra Götaland region cultural administration.
The Children's Library started in 1996. We have approx. 1500 visitors a day. Many children's libraries and schools have the site as starting point on there computers for children.
The main target group is children and young people up to approx. age 14. Children are in several ways involved in and contributing to the site - as writers of book reviews and novels, as reporters, voices, Sign language actors and critics. They decide, through their questions and wishes, what new functions and pages we create.
You will find thousands of book reviews and novels by children.
The quizzes and contests always relate to books and reading. We write articles and news on children's books, authors and events.
There is no physical library connected to the Children's Library but we offer e-booklending in cooperation with Elib.se.
Exploring and using the website is free of charge. If they wich so, children can create there own personal profile page, create multipal book lists, chat to friends, vote in the Book Jury, write reviews and stories...
The website has a synthetic voice that reads the information and some book-reviews are read by children or transformed to sign language.
The Children´s Library consists of several part. Here are some of them described.
KATALOGEN - THE CHILDREN´S BOOK CATALOGUE
Since 2003 we host the national children's book catalogue summoning all books published for children and young people (not educational materials).
In The Children's Book Catalogue you can write what you think about the book or create you own book list with the function "My books". You can listen to the book reviews or see several of them in sign language. You can search books by category or subject, find information about the author and find books similar to the shown book.
In The Children's Book Catalogue we also have information about books in other languages published in Sweden.
www.barnbokskatalogen.se
BOKJURYN - THE BOOK JURY
Bokjuryn is no longer a national reading promotion due to lack of funding. The funding from The Swedisch Art Council ended in 2015.
But several municipalities and libaries runs local versions of the Bokjury.
Anyone between the ages of 0 and 19 can be a part of the Children's book jury. Each year, since 1997 children vote on their favourite books published during the past year. The voting children can win prizes, usually a book, or sometimes a visit from an author to his or her school. The winning books are presented at a press conference at april 23. The press conference can be seen on the web.
The winning books are divided into four age related categories: 0-6 years, 7-9 years, 10-13 years and lastly 14-19 years. There also is a reward for comic books/manga and nonfiction books. The voting procedure is made entirely through the website. Children can vote on there own or teachers and librarians can collect votes and report them.
Read more at www.bokjuryn.se
BARNBIBBLAN - PLAYGROUND FOR THE YOUNGEST
In this part, Barnbibblan, reading are not needed. Here you will find rhymes, animated stories (one is even translated to Spanish, Finnish and Arabic), songs and a explore-the-language-part including sign language, bliss and pictogram. From approx. 3 years old.
www.barnbibblan.se
FÖRFATTARE - INFORMATION ABOUT BOOK-CHARACTERS, AUTHORS & ILLUSTRATORS
When children seek for more information about books they will find links to books and character webpages as well as authors and illustrators. Every mounth we introduce a author, with an interview, photos and books.
Månadens författare (Author of the mounth)
In cooperation with author organizations we produce presentational videos. We also have a lot of author interviews made by children. Visit our channel on Youtube to see some of the interviews: www.youtube.com/BarnensBibliotek
SKRIV - WRITER´S CORNER
To the Writer´s Corner children can add their poems, rhymes, stories and comic strips. Information from publishers about publishing, a list of writing camps and some writing instructions and tips can also be found here. If you are a member you can administrate your stories, change or delete, make them visible for only yourself or for others.
ÄPPELHYLLAN - THE APPLE SHELF
At the Apple shelf you will find information about media for children with reading disabilities. The Apple Shelf informs teachers and parents about the different forms of media that libraries have for children with special needs: talking books, videos with sign language for deaf children, tactile books, Braille books and so on.
Read more at: appelhyllan.se
RESOURCES FOR CHILDREN'S LIBRARIANS
The Children's Library also have pages for professionals. We offer themes with book-lists and posters
More information and recourses for children´s librarians are found at Barnbibliotekscentrum (the Swedish children's library centre) with the goal to promote and strengthen the development of children?s librarianship, build a documentation centre, promote specialized training and education among many things .
Read more: www.barnbibliotekscentrum.se
LEARN MORE OR COOPERATE WITH US? Please contact Katarina Dorbell
Barnens bibliotek
Box 856, S-501 15 Borås, Sweden
Phone + 46 33 35 76 28, Cell + 46 708 18 20 02 (Katarina)
info@barnensbibliotek.se
Staff: Katarina Dorbell, Project manager
Andreas Josefsson, programming