Book Week Theme

The theme of TD Canadian Children’s Book Week 2012 is Read a Book, Share a Story and will celebrate the importance of sharing stories. 2012 marks the 100th anniversary of Lillian H. Smith becoming the first trained children’s librarian in Canada, and in the British Empire. Our Book Week theme highlights the important role that librarians play in sharing books and creating lifelong readers.

The Canadian Children’s Book Centre has carefully sourced Canadian children’s books that involve libraries and story sharing, for parents, teachers and librarians to share with children. Readers will be introduced to Nicholas, who with the help of the head librarian, has to return a lost chimpanzee to the storybook where he rightfully belongs, and to Jennifer, a young storyteller who finds herself stranded on an island where the elders disallow the telling of stories. These and many other characters will share their stories with Canada’s young readers. The Book Week 2012 Theme Guide will be available online in January.

Lillian H. Smith was a native of London, Ontario and was appointed as the first trained children’s librarian in the British Empire in 1912. As a monument for the forty years that she worked on developing the children’s literature collection for the Toronto Public Library, the Lillian H. Smith Library was opened in 1995. In addition to her services in Canada, she had an international reputation and she wrote many articles and books on children’s literature and on building children’s library collections.