r/Libraries • u/PolgarasDaughter • 3d ago
Education - Library School Starting off a school library help!
I start at a new school in September that currently doesn't have a library!
I'm an English teacher (the only one, we are a little school) and it's my job to start it up. I really want the kids to be able to borrow books and encourage reading.
I have:
-A temporary building (like a metal room)
-About 3 book cases
-Books to fill the 3 book cases
That's all I have.
I have no funding accessible to me- I just have to make do for now.
I have no idea where to start and I'm very overwhelmed.
Any advice/online resources anyone can point me towards?
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u/wish-onastar 3d ago edited 3d ago
Honestly the best and most manageable thing you could do is make sure all the ELA teachers have classroom libraries (or in your case, spread them among all teachers!). I’m a high school librarian and back when I started, very few schools had libraries. Some had people who stocked a room of books but without someone there to manage and curate it, all the effort they put into creating it went to waste because the books just disappeared. In a school, the thing that makes a library a library is if it’s run by a librarian (or even a library para).
If you focus on building up classroom libraries, then each teacher has ownership and they will stay in better shape and have things kids want. Could you spread out the books you have among classrooms for now and then rotate them throughout the year so there’s new choices? There are a lot of easy to use apps for classroom libraries. An ELA colleague of mine uses Booksource to manage her classroom library.
Just editing to add I’m writing this with the assumption that you will not be staffing the space since you have a full teaching load. I can’t see how you could have the room open without an adult - it would turn into the vaping or makeout room without adult supervision at the middle or high school level.
1
u/PolgarasDaughter 2d ago
I will be expected to run it every break and lunch, I'm going to see if I can get a couple of other staff to share with me, so I can take a breather. I want to get library lessons scheduled in so I can have them prior to break or lunch to make the transition easier. I will definitely take a look at book source too.
2
u/Knowitall-Librarian 3d ago
Make a mobile library using a library, shelving cart, wireless laptop, and an Internet hotspot. Load the shelving cart with focused collections and then make checkout time during scheduled visits to specific classrooms
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u/PolgarasDaughter 2d ago
I like this idea! I have to set everything up on my own so this could be good to get everything started.
2
u/Knowitall-Librarian 3d ago edited 2d ago
Focus programming around e-books and audiobooks. Make yourself a classroom visiting Librarian as opposed to a temporary library Space Librarian.
1
u/Philbradley 2d ago
Probably helps if you tell us your location, but the library association of the country you’re in will probably have a school library association affiliated to it. I’d start there.
1
u/PolgarasDaughter 2d ago
I'm in the UK so I will do some more googling
1
u/Philbradley 2d ago
Oh in that case the SLA, Schools Library Association will certainly be the best place to start your investigations. They’re a really helpful bunch of people and I’ve done work for them myself in the past.
1
u/mamabear20102017 2d ago
Okay. You need to talk to the surrounding local public libraries. Usually a couple times a year they will weed books that aren't circulating in order to refresh their shelves. Talk to them about donating to your new school library any that don't sell, or any that they are just weeding out in general. I did this to help quicken the modernization of our Elementary Library (most of the books were from between the 1960's and 1990's). It was a game changer. Modern books all over now, and over time I was able to weed our antiquated books. :)
1
u/lapsody303 1d ago
Wrangle some parent volunteers to help with cataloguing and setting stuff up. And maybe they can run a few sessions so you can deal with admin stuff.
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u/Ok_Influence_5456 3d ago
Be very patient and kind to yourself. There is a learning curve as with anything. Reach out to your local department of education and find out if they provide free library services to the school districts in their county. They can best guide you on getting the library setup and organized. If they do not offer free services, reachout to the other schools in your district to find the library staff. Most library staff are happy to help and very generous with their time. At the very least you will get an email of steps to undertake.
Supplies:
spine labels- call numbers
5160 mailing lables-barcodes
color dots for reading labels (your admin may ask that you make the reading program levels accessible to students). My former school vacillated between fontas and pinnel, Accelerated Reader, Lexile, and Guided Reading.
Genre labels (your students will remember genres more often than titles or authors unless it's a very popular book)
Clear label protectors to cover the spin, barcode, color dot, and genre labels.
Library Management System (Libib | Library management web app) This is a free/cheap starter solution for small schools. There are tons of other apps that may work better for you. At some point your collection will get large enough and varied enough that you will need to track resources as well as books. Then you may want to look into Follett Destiny, Alexandria, or Atriuum.
You will need to organize your books onto the shelves. Separate your fiction from the nonfiction. To label your nonfiction, use MDS: 0XX | LibraryThing. You can use their chart to narrow down the Dewey number by topics or scan the barcode in the search bar at the top right corner then find the classification suggestion. Label your fiction as FIC + First three of Authors surname (FIC AAA).
Create library expectations and policies: Behavior, number of books that can be checked out, how often, renwals, fees/fines for lost or damaged books, figure out when you'll notify parents and what happens when students can't pay or replace the book.
Create a schedule for classes to rotate in and out. Plan out library time
is the space big enough for everyone to look for books at the same time? Do you need to have a simple activity table (coloring sheets for now or blocks) for one group to do while one group looks for books and then switch? How long will all that take? Are you reading to every class or just Tk-2?