If you do not want to sign up for any of the ISLM-coordinated activities for October, you can still plan your activities to commemorate International School Library Month. You will undoubtedly have your ideas, but here are some suggestions from Team ISLM.

1. Creative Writing: Plan creative writing activities for your students, such as poetry writing, short story writing, and descriptive pieces. Use tools such as writing frames, creative modelling, visual stimulants, and so on to assist and support your students.
2.  Poetry Reading: Hold a poetry reading in the school library/ classroom where students read poems they have written themselves OR poems they choose in which the poet's world appeals to them.
3. Posters: Ask your students to create posters inspired/imagined by the books they are reading. This also works well for poems your students are reading. A3 size works well for this.
4. 100 years from now....: Ask your students to imagine their school library, village/town/country one hundred years from now. They either describe it in words or present it visually, in 3D, or musically.
5. Our World: Instruct students to research global issues such as the environment, climate change, conservation, recycling, flooding, or a relevant local issue of their choice, and to present their findings in the classroom, school library, or via an online medium.
6. A themed reading assignment:  Choose any topic for your themed reading assignment. Make a list of titles with that theme and invite your students to read from it. Ask them to imagine what life is like for people in various situations, for example, disability, diversity, LGBT issues, racism, overcoming adversity, being a refugee, domestic violence, etc.
7. Book Buffet: Here's a reading activity that allows students to read from books that aren't usually in their genre of choice. "Book Buffet is a time-based reading activity where students get to taste (know) different genres. Table cloths, paper plates, and name tags can be used to make tables and chairs in the library look like a buffet table (of genres). Set a timer for ten minutes or less (according to the library schedule). Place books of various genres on different tables and ensure that each child receives one book each time the timer buzzes. If you place 5 books from each genre, each student will sample 25 books. Give each student a piece of paper and a pen so that they can write down their thoughts on the book they have tasted. And, during the library period, they can read the entire book that they found the most interesting during the activity."
8. Book Bingo: Create a bingo card and invite your students to read a specific type of book. They are rewarded for completing a row, vertically, horizontally, diagonally, and so on. The readers after completing an entire card earn an appropriate reward, such as a book poster, a book, and so on.
9. Book Displays: Create a display of books in your library that raises awareness of authors who portray specific kinds of the world in their books, such as a fantasy world, a historical world, a parallel world, a war world, and so on.
10. Focus on George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four: Orwell's classic novel 1984, which was first published in 1949 (50 years ago this year), imagined a future world. Invite your students to read Orwell's book (or selected excerpts from it) and hold a class discussion comparing how Orwell imagines life in 1984, life as it was in 1984, and life today.
11.  Book Discussion: Organize a discussion about favourite books and/or authors between students and their teacher/school librarian.
12.  Book Talk: Arrange a discussion between students and their teacher/school librarian about their favourite books and/or authors.
13.  Tell a story/tell a folktale: Invite parents and/or grandparents from different cultural backgrounds to read a folktale from their own culture. They can come to the event dressed in their specific national or ethnic costume. A variation on this activity would be to invite the adults to read a story in their native (primary) language.
14.  Act Out: Arrange for senior students to visit primary schools and read and act out a story or a selection of stories with props. This can be a fun interaction with a lot of imaginative elements for both senior students acting out the story and junior students acting as the audience.
15. Author/Illustrator Visit: Arrange for an author to visit the students and interact with them. Such presentations motivate students to read and write. Students can create a questionnaire to interview the author about their writing style, the publishing industry, and other topics.
16. Library Scavenger Hunt/Treasure Hunt: Under the supervision of teachers, hide books, library materials, and other items throughout the school.

The activity has a time limit.

Form groups.

Provide team leaders with a list of prepared clues, a kind of map, to assist them in locating the hidden materials.

The library is where the hunt begins and ends.

To complete the activity, each team's map, signed by each member, must be handed over.

1. Make your Storybooks: Depending on the age range of your participants, you can make your storybooks as simple or as sophisticated as you like. Students can create fiction or nonfiction storybooks based on any theme or idea. They can gather information on a specific topic and create storybooks based on their research for non-fiction. Completed storybooks can be displayed in an exhibition. These books can also be utilized for an in-house school book fair.
2.  Debates: The topic of ISLM projects allows for active debates, debates, and many other forms of discussion. For example, you could organise a series of events called "Peaceful Professions for Peace." There are numerous movements and organisations (Doctors without Borders, etc.). There are many books in which the heroes are members of such professions. It is possible to introduce and reveal to readers the importance of such professions through the framework of events (discussions and exhibitions, meetings (for example, in the format of a "Living Book"), reviews, and lectures).
3.  Peace symbol: There are peace and harmony symbols in every culture (dove, white crane, laurel wreath, myrtle branch, and many more). These symbols can be found in world literature, national literature, and art. Such research will be of interest to readers. You can hold an illustration exhibition, installations, a reader's conference, and a bible caravan. If you have the opportunity, you could even organise a literary graffiti contest.
4.  The Running Book Intellectual Marathon: This race has its own set of symbols and rules. Organizers and volunteers plan the route and prepare questions, paraphernalia, and gifts for respondents. And they take to the streets, engaging the city's residents in an intellectual marathon, discussing important and interesting topics.
5. Problematic Reading. It is a well-known technology for developing critical thinking abilities through reading and writing. Fairy tales, parables, and stories can help solve both hero and global conflicts. Reading the fairy tales of the project partners and discussing the characters and their conflict situations helps to understand similar problems. One can work together to achieve peace and harmony. As the saying goes, "Finish the story in peace."
6. Reading Military Subjects: There are many books devoted to military subjects, both artistic and documentary in nature. It is critical to read them and assist readers in analysing and drawing conclusions. Correlate the histories of the country, the world, and the family. Human destinies are hidden behind the figures and facts. It is necessary to teach readers how to work with warrior databases and to assist them in compiling time tapes, family trees, and research.
7. Organizing Fan Fiction: Many literary stories about peace, global peace and harmony do not end the way we would like. You can organize a fan fiction contest.
8. Create a new world: You can offer readers the opportunity to create both a physical and virtual capsule of the world as a message to future generations. A book must be included in this capsule, in addition to objects. This is a book that will have a huge impact on the world.

The list of activities is endless. One can investigate, design, and implement the best-suited activities while keeping in mind the readers' age, reading level, and interests. The idea is to promote reading and celebrate libraries. We appreciate our schools sharing their best ISLM activity with us. Happy ISLM! 

Warm Regards,

Team ISLM