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When I came into my library there were two 12' long double sided 42" tall double sided wood book cases that were empty and another three foot long section at the front of the library. There were 8 spinning clear book displays on top of the book cases crammed full of tattered paper backs from the 1990's and so much dust and dirt I about choked breathing the air. We won't even go into the office and storage spaces, that's another blog post all together!
So, the question came, how can I make this look more like a library and less like a ghost town?
I started by asking questions of the faculty that I did know at the school. I spoke to the athletes that I knew from coaching track and I sat in the space and just tried not to cry.
What I learned was that the students were readers, but no librarian in the library had scared them away. I also learned that the faculty didn't use the library instructionally, and the janitors never came in the space because they had been told not to clean it. Clearly I needed to change all of that almost immediately.
What I learned that was the most interesting was a friend told me that what he has observed in the past several years in the library was that anything placed on top of the book cases either by design or mistake got checked out. Hmmm...why is that? Were they lazy? Were the displays that amazing that students couldn't resist them, or did they simply need help finding their next book?
I needed to figure out how to display books in a way that will let them know who I am as a librarian and promote books in a way that is interesting and worthy of their attentions. To do this I did some homework of my own. I scoured the web in search of some answers.
This is what I found to be of tremendous help.
25 Ways Schools Can
Promote Literacy and Independent Reading by Kimberly Tyson, Ph.D., learningunlimitedllc.com
·
http://www.teachthought.com/uncategorized/25-ways-schools-can-promote-literacy-independent-reading/
o
Point 11 – Collaborate with the local library.
This point was one to ponder. How could
this benefit my students? Well, quite
simply, this is something that needs to happen because we aren’t open until 9
pm, but the public library is. Steering
students towards databases and resources available to them at the library can
help them get their homework done and increase uses for the public
library. A win, win in my mind.
o
Point 15 – Read what Students are Reading. At the elementary school this is much easier,
but at the high school level this is much harder. At 200+ pages on average for each book I have
started listening to books on tape in the car, reading during lunch, reading
all weekend, I cannot keep up! However,
when I can speak from a first-hand experience with students about books they
light up and become instantly interested in the book you are pitching!
o
Point 18 – Promote Books Through BookTalks –
this goes back to the reading what they read point discussed earlier.
Twenty Rules for Better Book Displays by Susan Brown
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There
are so many amazing, simply rules listed in this post that I felt it was silly
to list them all out. However, these two
are probably either the biggest sin, or the most neglected.
§ Displays
should reflect your patrons' interests, not your personal interests – OMG! This is my pet peeve. The last librarian at my school loved vampires
and zombies. Which I do understand are
popular, but when I checked the circulation history of these books and topics
there were only one or two check outs in the past 4 years. IMHO this does not seem like money well
spent.
§ Cross
promote. – Just like we’ve been saying in this class, how can we let students
who are busy with limited time want to come in and visit our space and check
out these displayed books.
Realistic Ideas to Get Teens Reading by
Ginny Wiehardt
o
There are some good tips here, and some points
to consider. Particularly the extended
hours point. In York County, there are
activity buses only on Tuesday and Thursdays.
The bus pick up time is 5:00pm.
I’m going to lobby that during sports seasons that I keep the library
open these two days from 7:00 am – 5:00 pm and then keeping regular teacher
hours from 7:00 am – 2:30 pm on the other three days. This will mean that technically I’m “giving”
hours that I’m not going to be paid for, but it may mean helping students when
they need it most.
o
The other great point is to ask for feedback. I’m going to begin next year with a student
and faculty survey. How is the library
doing? What do you want to read? What can we do better? The climate survey that had I begun at the
beginning of the year I would have done this year.
October I thought I would put out displays of scary books. Hoping to take advantage of the vampire and zombie books. I invited an English 11 class in to participate in book talks and listen to some book trailers. They used a form created by their teacher to record at least 4 books that they found interesting based solely on their book talk bookmarks. They also had to listen to at least two book trailers using QR code readers and iPads. They had to tell us why they had chosen the book that they did as well. Conclusion: They loved the book trailers, but they didn't enjoy scary/horror books. Clear violation of picking books based on what I like and what the previous librarian liked. Gotcha...move on.
October Book Displays:
February Book Display:
Black History Month display. As you can see, I took one of the wall book cases by the circulation desk and I converted it into a topical display area. Two reasons for choosing this location. 1) it is right by my desk, so I can point it out easily. 2) It's on the way to the teacher's lounge so EVERY teacher walks past it and they are noticing titles are new this year and titles that have been in their collection for years that have been hidden!
This picture was taken on the first day and within 15 minutes of putting up this display my first student came through and checked out five books! Her response to me, I kept going to the public library. Who knew I should have been coming here. She was so excited. This bookcase has gotten a lot of attention.
Next blog... The lure of the Booklists and Shelf Talkers/Book Talk Bookmarks
