Halton Daemons
Last year, as part of the Everybody's Reading project, Halton Libraries teamed up with Games Workshop to stage two Lord of the Rings events. At that time the interest in the "Lord of the Rings", due to the film, was immense and there was awareness of the popularity of Games Workshop amongst the target age group.
Both events were heavily over subscribed and the majority of the tickets were distributed within the first few days of the events being promoted. The events themselves were extremely successful with over 40 attending each event. Halton Libraries were invited to a Lord of the Rings day held in Runcorn Hill Country Park. This was organised by the parks Rangers and included a Ring Trail around the park, readings from the books, face painting and competitions. We brought along Games Workshop, who proved again to be immensely popular and attracted large numbers of interested parties. Eight more events followed across the borough.
Ever since the first event back in March 2002, the library has been inundated with requests for more and more Games Workshop events. Therefore it was decided to start our own club in Halton Lea Library.
The Halton Daemons meet every two weeks in the library. We now have over 100 members (they don't all come every week, thank goodness!). The ages of the members are predominantly 12-18 year olds and include Lads and Dads, girls and even a Mum. The atmosphere is fantastic and it's great to see the older members (who we have delegated as Mentors) welcoming and encouraging new and/or younger members.
It is rare that you get an initiative in this area that actually works and brings so many young people into the library on a regular basis. The club combines elements of reader development, creative writing, teamwork skills, art development and increased library membership.
The feedback we have had from parents has been really encouraging for example: one young member is dyslexic and his mother said that since being in the club, and having to write out Army Lists and do background reading to support the hobby, his confidence and skill has improved.
Our methodology is featured on the Literacy Trust website as part of their 'Lord of the Rings in Libraries' report
http://www.readon.org.uk/campaign/bookedup/Report.pdf
and our 'Halton Daemons' website (a bit out of date now) is at:
http://www.halton.gov.uk/libraries/haltondaemons.asp
