Saturday, October 11, 2008

Collection Development Policy

The following was an assignment for a Collection Development Policy.

Santherby Elementary School Library

Collection Development Policy

Introduction: This Collection Development Policy reflects the needs of the students and staff at Santherby Elementary School. We serve a student population of 580 students residing in the south eastern area of Welltown, Texas. Most students come from middle to lower income families with approximately 35% of our students qualifying for free/reduced lunch. Our library contains 10 computers equipped with 17 educational databases and limited internet access, approximately 3,500 non-fiction titles and 5,500 fiction titles comprise the collection. We also have a selection of audio-visual material appropriate for a range of ages and interests.

Mission: The Santherby School Library Mission is to ensure that students and staff are lifelong learners, readers, and effective users of technology and ideas enabling them to be productive members of society. This complements and supports the Wishwell Independent School Districts mission statement to prepare all students to become lifelong learners who are productive, responsible, and participating members of society.

Objective: The Santherby School Library Media Specialists strive to provide students with age and developmentally appropriate materials for educational and recreational purposes in order to reach their full potential by exploring the widest opportunities possible. The collection will reflect the library mission and support the curriculum by providing materials for both staff and students in the content of each grade level. Library media specialists will work cooperatively with administration and teachers to provide resources which represent diverse points of view, stimulate critical thinking, and promote educational goals.

Selection Policy & Priorities: Book purchase recommendations may be made by staff, parents, and students. Final decisions will be made by the Library Committee after consulting with purchasing resources about content, availability, and cost. School library media specialists, administration, teachers, and community members comprise the committee. The core collection should contain a diverse range of material reflecting truth and art. It should meet the needs of many different learning styles. It should reflect different points of view to promote critical thinking and provide relevant information for the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills examinations.

Selection Criteria:
  • Is the material age/developmentally appropriate for our students?
  • Is the material timely, or will it be outdated in a short period of time?
  • Is the material pertinent to the curriculum and the objectives of the instructional program?
  • Does it fill an area in which there is a deficit of material?
  • Is it appropriate for a diverse student population?
  • Is the content accurate and does it thoroughly represent its subject?
  • Does the material represent differing viewpoints?
  • Is the material visually pleasing and readable?
  • Are the illustrations supportive of the text?
  • Is it a well known or award winning author?
Collection Maintenance:
  • Materials that are disfigured beyond repair will be discarded.
  • Materials that are outdated or obsolete will be removed from the collection.
  • Materials that are age/developmentally inappropriate will be removed.

References:
Collection Development Policy. James Solomon Russell Junior High School Library. 19 September 2008. http://www.geocities.com/lisajunedenton/collection.htm

Library: Collection Development Policy. Patti Holt. 2006. The Jewish Day School of Metropolitan Seattle. 19 September 2008. http://www.jds.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=74&itemid=101

Resources for Librarians. March 2008. Texas State Library & Archives Commission. 18 September 2008. http://www.tsl.state.tx.us/ld/pubs/schlibsurvey/chillsec4.html

Tuesday, September 16, 2008

The following is a library mission statement created as a group for my current class 5143. It is a fictional library. Pieces of the statement were borrowed from a variety statements. 

Santherby Elementary School is the latest addition to the Wishwell Independent School District. We are one of four elementary schools in the district providing quality education for children in the Wishwell community.

Santherby Elementary School Library

Mission Statement

Our mission at the Santherby Elementary School Library is to promote a love of reading, and to encourage students and staff to become lifelong learners and effective users of technology and ideas.

To accomplish this mission the library specialists will:
  • Encourage a lifelong love of learning and reading within and without library walls by providing information in a variety of formats.
  • Seek to stimulate students' curiosity and enable them with the skills to research ideas and become critical thinkers.
  • Promote collaboration with teachers to plan, design, and deliver curriculum through learning strategies that meet the individual needs of all students.
  • Ensure that administrators, teachers, staff, and students are effective and efficient users of information and technology.
  • Promote responsible citizenship by helping students develop positive habits and attitudes through active participation in society.
  • Provide a welcome, comfortable environment conducive to student learning and inquiry.
References
Burnley-Moran Library/Media Center (pre-K-4th Grade), Charlottesville, VA

Vision of Texas Schools. Adapted from Information Power: Building Partnerships for Learning (1989) American Library Association and Association for Educational Communications and Technology.

Albemarle County: Agnor-Hurt Elementary School (K-5), Charlottesville, Virginia

Tuesday, August 5, 2008

Internet

Teacher Librarian is a website based on a journal for K-12 school library professionals. It provides articles on collaboration, technology, book reviews, and more. It offers free access to past articles, but a subscription is required to view current ones. TWU Library subscribes to Teacher Librarian. I first noticed this journal when searching through my database and used Google to locate it.

Monday, August 4, 2008

Multimedia


Super Librarian is a video for a public library, but it illustrates the many tasks that a librarian needs to perform. This is appropriate for all types of librarians. The video is a cute clip to show to students in an elementary school library.

I found the video using YouTube.

Sunday, July 13, 2008

Citation Pearl Growing Search Strategy

Citation pearl begins with a known item. When you look up the item you use the index or search terms from it to search and locate more items like the one that you have. I began with a journal article that I had found during a previous search.

Database Used:  Academic Search Complete

Topic:  Everyone Wins: Differentiation in the School Library by Carol Koechlin & Sandi Zwaan

Found article

Even though on this database you can click on Find More Like This, I needed to continue my search using the given strategy. To continue my search for more articles, I clicked on the last of the subject terms given, libraries & education.

Libraries & education search = 509 hits


This gave me a number of hits to look through, but I didn't need to look very far. On the first page, the tenth hit was an article on librarians as reading teachers.

Are Librarians Reading Teachers Too?

This hit gave a whole new set of subject terms that I could click on and continue looking for more articles. I would use this strategy again. This is a great strategy to use when you have some information and just need a little bit more. It saves time from starting the search from the very beginning.

Specific Facet First Strategy

Specific facet first strategy uses the most specific facet to do your search. If you don't know which is your most specific facet, you can search your facets individually to get it.

Database Used:  LexisNexis Academic

Search Topic: Changing Role of the Elementary School Librarian

Facets:
changing role = 998 hits
elementary school = 997 hits
librarian = 1,000 hits
My facets were very close, but I chose elementary school to start with.

Search #1:  elementary school = 997 hits

These were too many hits to look through and I wanted to narrow my results. I went the route of successive fractions. Within my results I added my next specific facet, changing role. The results were "No documents found". I went back and tried my last facet, librarian.

Search #3: S1 and librarian = 21 hits

The third hit looked very interesting. It was an article from The Washington Post.

Third Hit:  School Libraries Make Room to Learn; Multimillion-Dollar Investment Promises     Better Books, Computers, Appearance

I liked this strategy to search with, but I need practice to come up with my most specific facets. Since I don't know which facet would be the most specific, I need to look them up first and that takes up valuable research time. I feel I would get more use out of successive fractions than with this strategy. 

Saturday, July 12, 2008

Successive Fractions Search Strategy

This is a Successive Fractions search strategy. This strategy is used when searching broad concepts with a large number of hits. It narrows the search by applying limiting techniques like Boolean operators. This is done step-by-step until the search is reduced to a manageable number of hits.

Database Used:  Library Literature

Search Topic:  Changing Role of the Elementary School Librarian

Concept search #1:  elementary school
Results:  1,922 hits

Concept search #2: S1 AND role change OR position change
Results:  6 hits

Concept search #3:  S2 AND librarian OR media specialist
Results:  4 hits

I was surprised at how quickly my search results were narrowed. Unfortunately, I ended up with only 4 hits of which only 1 was relevant to what I was looking for. I need to go back and revise my concepts.

Fourth Hit:  The Changed Role of the Elementary Library Media Teacher

Friday, July 11, 2008

Building Block Search Strategy

This is a Building Block search strategy. It starts with single concept searches that usually result in a very large number of hits. When all of the single concept searches are completed, they are combined using Boolean operators. This narrows the topic and reduces the number of hits.

Database Used:  ERIC/FirstSearch

Search Topic:  Changing Role of the Elementary School Librarian

Concept search #1:  (role change) OR (position change)
Results = 30,155 hits

Concept search #2:  school OR (elementary school) OR (primary school)
Results = 403,506 hits

Concept search #3:  librarian OR (media specialist)
Results = 5,353 hits

Combined concept searches:  S1 AND S2 AND S3
Results = 102 hits

After the combined searches were completed, the first hit yielded a match. This article discusses how library media specialists can be partners in student achievement.



Thursday, June 26, 2008

Library Thing Tagging

Library Thing tags: 809.92(1) 2007(1) 21-0(1) adult nonfiction(1) assigned reading(1) bibliography(1) books about books(1) children(1) children's(1) children's fiction(1) children's literature(8) children's literature genres(1) curriculum(1) education(2) elementary(1) fiction(1) giveaway(1) historical fiction(1) illustrated(1) Information Needs of Children(1) international literature(1) librarianship(1) library(1) library science(3) library stuff(1) lis 5564(3) Literacy(1) literature(2) MC-Native American(1) multicultural(2) non-fiction(4) picture book(1) poetry(1) professional(1) rc n/a(1) rc na(1) reading(1) scholarly(1) School(1) Summer(1) teacher resource(1) teaching(1) text(2) Textbook(7) unread(2) Unreviewed(1) week1(1) Writing(1)

Library Thing link: http://www.librarything.com/work/55073

I chose Essentials of Children's Literature by Carol Lynch-Brown. The book discusses the presentation of literature and sharing literature with children. It is comprised of three parts. Part One is about current trends and introductory materials needed to begin selecting, reading, and evaluating children's trade books. Part Two defines and describes genres of literature and the types of books found within those genres. The part that interested me the most is Part Three because it presents curriculum and teaching strategies. I like that the target audience is for K-6.

Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Library & Education RSS Feed

Looking at School Library Journal gave me a number of choices for an RSS feed. I decided to choose two of them. The first one I chose gives information on education news in general. The second one I chose gives information on library tools and trends. 

Thursday, June 12, 2008

Library Podcast

Search Engine: http://everyzing.com
Podcast Name: Notes From The Electronic Cottage 6/12/08 by Jim Campbell

Topic: These days we hear that the Internet is killing libraries. That would be a surprise to the hundreds of thousands of Mainers who find that today's libraries are both "brick" and "click," both physical spaces and gateways to the cyber world of information, including information we would have to pay for if we tried to access it ourselves.

I chose this podcast because it gives a great example of how libraries and librarians are changing to meet today's society.  In a technologically driven society, the state of Maine is adapting its libraries. Almost every library has high speed internet and other digital services. This not only includes elementary school libraries, but university and public libraries as well. Services (I didn't think of) like a subscription to a medical journal where you can look up and print an article that you would otherwise be charged for.  You can also receive assistance when searching for information, the correct information. As Jim Campbell puts it, "Libraries can help us get access to loads of information. Librarians can help us make sense of it." Well put!!

Monday, June 9, 2008

Blog Entry/Quote

Search Engine Used: http://blogsearch.google.com
Excerpt from Reflecting on 568 - Changing Role of the SLMC
Posted by: Elizabeth

On a related note, the use of the term "media specialist" instead of "librarian" reflects this change in the view of the role of the "library". No longer is the library merely a holding space for books, but rather a laboratory for learning, creating, and participating.

Elizabeth is a grad student at UB library sciences program. It is interesting to note that library science students across the nation are looking at how libraries and librarians are changing in today's society.

Sunday, June 8, 2008

Introduction

This blog was created to satisfy requirements for my master's course LS 5013, Information Storage and Retrieval at TWU.
 
The topic that I will be exploring is the changing role of the elementary school librarian. Gone are the caretakers of book collections with expertise in author's studies and encyclopedia searches. Now, elementary school librarians are expected to be information providers, production specialists, and teachers of electronic information retrieval.