Still getting ready...

I've been working a little here and there to make a difference at the library. Most of the time I was at the school this week, I was working on getting books re-cataloged and re-labeled.

I'm still not sure what to do about the whole "special collections" section. I think the idea of the collection was sound when it was started, but it just isn't working for me. I have pulled small series (only 4 or 5 books) and re-cataloged and labeled them. I have been a librarian long enough that I don't believe in lumping things unnecessarily. My biggest project was the graphic novels that had been thrown together in the SC. I moved anything nonfiction back into nonfiction. If kids are looking for shark books, I want them to find them together in the nonfiction, even if one is a graphic novel-styled and another is made using photographs. I noticed a lot of graphic novels are being put in the 741.5 section of nonfiction, no matter what subject. So I changed them around, for example, putting the graphic novel classics (Swiss Family Robinson, Around the World in 80 Days, etc) under a single call number, "Graphic Classics."

I've also been mulling over the idea of what to do about stuffed animals. I get the idea of stuffed animals based on story book characters. I get the idea of stuffed versions of our school mascot, leopards. I don't get the idea of having a bunch of random, garage sale reject toys. Today when I was at the school, our principal pointed out the mountain of stuff in our resource room. She explained that I could take anything I wanted, and leave anything I didn't want from the library. The teachers take what they want and the leftovers are taken to other schools. Pretty cool idea, really. I ditched the last of the fake plants (dust catchers & spider web bases). I also took in 2 tubs of stuffed animals that have nothing to do with books. I still kept a small tub of beanie babies. I also found a bunch of puppets. I want to find a fun way to display them. What I don't understand was why the library had a bunch of random stuffed animals spread through it when I found, stuffed in a cupboard, a bunch of really nice Dr. Seuss character toys and almost all of the Laura Numeroff "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie" type toys. I also saved a couple of really nice monkey toys. I was thinking of using groupings of similar animals to create displays. The monkeys could be reading "Curious George", the bears reading "Wake Up Sleepy Bear", the giraffe's reading "A Giraffe and a Half" and the penguins reading "Tacky the Penguin". Something along those lines anyway. Eventually I want to have a huge leopard collection, we'll see how it goes.

I also wanted to note that I've started adding extra pages to the blog. I want to have one for each of the grade levels with ideas of read-aloud books for them.

Here are a few "before" pictures of my library.  Check out that skylight!  The collections are pretty evenly distributed with a work/computer area to my immediate left, nonfiction to my front left, the story area directly in front of my desk, fiction, jr fiction and special collections to my front right and easy readers to my immediate right.