Ask Slashdot: How To Reimagine a Library?

dptalia writes "I'm part of a team tasked with re-imagining my local elementary school's library. Libraries, especially school libraries, are struggling to remain relevant in today's world, when so much reading and research can be done from home. But this school has mostly low-income students who don't have the sort of high-tech resources at home that we all take for granted. What ideas do you have to turn an elementary school library into an environment that fosters innovation and technology?"

Comments

more than books

[schneidafunk]

Lend out tools, toys, computers, and other things. The grand idea should be for people to learn for free.

Re:more than books

[sneakyimp]

Cheap desktop computers running free operating systems. You can install Ubuntu or some other *nix distro free on pretty much any old used computer.

WiFi access. I would imagine that your internet bill will likely be your biggest long-term expense. You can get some pretty awesome consumer routers, install DD-WRT on them or tomato USB or whatever) and get some pretty fancy functionality. I've been eyeing this one.

And maybe the most affordable ebook readers or tablets for checkout. You might get a sponsorship from Google or Amazon -- they are all too anxious to rope people into their ebook ecosystems. I would try to avoid these book ecosystems for cost reasons. You can also get all kinds of amazing old books through project gutenberg. Maybe OLPC would have a suitable device?

You might also keep some physical books of historical interest or perhaps large maps or other visually oriented works that resist digitization.

Re:more than books

[sneakyimp]

I think an underrated component of libraries is the librarians. I think I'm imagining a modern library as more than just a place for the public to connect to information. It's a place where the public can go to learn about something and get help in finding the information. Sometimes having access to the internet just isn't enough. You need to find a *person* who has specific expertise.

Re:more than books

[turkeydance]

here's what worked in our low income elementary school libraries: 1. allow children to stay there until after 6PM when a parent could pick them up. this ONE thing was the most popular, and might be extended to 7PM. 2. allow 7AM entry, too. this was hit-and-miss, but where it hit, it was a BIG hit. both the above need a minimum of 3 PAID adult (over 25) supervisors. this is in addition to the actual librarian. 3. then, just stay out of their way. they'll let you know the next direction. in other words: don't guess and hope for change.

Re:more than books

[as.kdjrfh sxcjvs]

Google is only useful after you have learned something about how to search. School librarians are good at teaching people how to search. Helping students learn how to use any index, including Google -- and judge the results they get -- is a superb goal for a school library.

Re:more than books

[sneakyimp]

You are mistaken. Google is great of course, but it's only a tool. I've searched for obscure things on google for weeks without any luck at all. I made a call to some librarians at an ivy league university and they found definitive information and got back to me in a couple of days. There is value in someone who specializes in the process of locating high-quality information like primary sources of authoritative works on a subject.

Ask the Students?

[ScottCooperDotNet]

We'll tell you to stock the shelves with Calvin and Hobbes, How Stuff Works type books, and dinosaur stuff. This may be some of what the boys want, but it can't hurt to actually ask all the students what they are interested in. Skip the card catalog, and encourage exploring.

Teach kids how to search for data

[jmilne]

My own kids have this problem. They assume that if they type something into Google, they'll find what they need. The problem is, they don't know how to properly structure their queries so they find the relevant stuff quickly, so they end up wasting time just in the searching. Take the time to instruct the kids on how to structure a query in Google, and you'll save them a lot of time so they can actually complete their assignments quicker. Also, introduce them to other information sites like Wolfram Alpha or searching through a local newspaper database, so that they're aware that sites other than Wikipedia even exist.

Teach the students what a library is

[Tiger4]

The students presumably want to learn things. If they don't they will only go there if forced. So, first, you show them what a library is and how it is used to access information. The staff, catalog, the stacks, how to request materials, and most important What They Can Find in the Books (and recordings and videos, etc). Once they see it as a living tool that they know how to use, they will tell You how it should be better set up.

This is Elementary School.

[LWATCDR]

Books! Really people their is nothing wrong with good old fashioned books! We are talking about little kids probably from the ages of 5 to 10 years old. Tools? Technology? Stories, adventure, science, and just fun books is what you need. Get the kids in love with the written word. Most of the ideas I am seeing target maybe the oldest age group but nothing for the majority of the age groups involved.

Re:This is Elementary School.

[RKThoadan]

Agreed. I'm reading through these and thinking that very little is applicable to my 2nd grader, who loves libraries (school and public) for the incredibly quaint reason of just checking out books. On the other hand, her school has a dedicated computer lab. She gets computer lab 1 day a week and library one day a week. She greatly prefers library day.

As far as I am concerned a library should foster a love of reading and imagination. "innovation and technology" are alright, but they aren't the most important things in the world.

Keep in mind that in general, half of elementary school is about learning to read. The transition from "learning to read" to "reading to learn" is generally around 3rd grade. There is definitely a case to be made for a more technology centered area in middle & high school, but I don't really think that is the case for elementary.

Re:This is Elementary School.

[ignavusinfo]

I was wondering when someone would mention books.

The other must have for a library is a librarian. Honestly, at the elementary school level libraries are no less relevant than they've ever been -- research is research and learning how to do it, even with a crappy old encyclopedia and out of date dictionary is a vital skill. So if your school's library is irrelevant it's time to find a new librarian because there's your problem.

Librarians are also pretty skilled at finding and purchasing the right materials, recommending age-appropriate books, fighting censorship, and -- at least when I was a kid -- being an non-teacher/non-parent adult confidant. Parents, even involved, educated ones, can't fill the same role.

Re:This is Elementary School.

[nbauman]

Good point. But you need a good librarian to run it.

Without a librarian, all you've got is a dumpster-full of books.

Some books are better for kids to read than others, and without a librarian, they're lost.

I used to go into the Donnell Library teenager's room in Manhattan, go to the 500s, and find a book shelf of every good math and science book I read or wanted to read in high school.

It takes a librarian to create a selection like that, where any book you pick up is interesting and worth reading.

When "libraries" depend on "donations" of books other people don't want (i.e. garbage), they get best-sellers of 10 and 20 years ago, Readers' Digest collections, old inspirational books, and manuals for Lotus 1-2-3 and WordPerfect.

Over the last several decades, school librarians have been getting fired, and school libraries have been shut down because there was nobody to run them. The affluent neighborhoods have great libraries. The poor neighborhoods don't have them any more.

Re:Most visitors...

[Whorhay]

One of the things I kind of miss from going to the library is having a curated collection of books to peruse. When I try and find a good book to read on Amazon there is such an enormous collection of stuff that finding a new book is a serious challenge. When I was a kid I would just go to the relatively small section of the library and look through that. I could take a book off the shelf and read a few pages to see if it appealed at all. With online book stores I'm mostly left to buying books by authors I already know, exploring new authors is an fiscal gamble. So thus far I've bought very few ebooks, instead I've stuck to the public domain works.

NoooOOOoooo

[the eric conspiracy]

Don't, just don't.

You have already said these kids don't have a lot of technology available at home.

Well, turning this library into a tech haven will make it inaccessible to kids with weak tech skills. That's a disaster.

What you want is the library to be a place where kids get the basics. An introduction to technology that they will meet as they grow up should be part of it. But at the same time they should be able to interact with the library using the skills they have.

I betcha a lot of that will be good old fashioned books.

Re:Make sure the have basic English reading skills

[cnkurzke]

I honestly think you need to explain to the students the value of "reading pre-curated knowledge" from established experts (aka books) versus random one-off drivel on the screen (which includes comments on slashdot)

Too many times people think in a post-wikipedia world "real books" are outdated.

Re:Redefine "Library"

[rwa2]

Yes... based on my university library, I'd actually break down a "library" into 4 distict sections, and size them appropriately: individual vs. group, and "unplugged" vs. tech.

Library as a cathedral of knowledge and meditation: (individual unplugged) : your "traditional" view of a library, where silence and sensory deprivation is enforced, stacks of books organized into sections, and isolated nooks and crannies with bean bags and desks for reading / study / sleeping. My most productive study space was a hard desk at the end of a stack in the basement of the engineering library.

Library as a tech center: Need to break out into individual "serious work-focused" computer stations, and collaborative conference rooms. The collaboration environments would need to be scheduled out, but have all the accoutrements of modern conference rooms: wifi, whiteboards (both smart and dumb), projectors, servers and client stations for LAN-parties, etc. But of course encase it in glass so they can be monitored.

Advertising

[flymolo]

Get a display space near the cafeteria or some other place where students go frequently. Put books there that are interesting to the students. Thor comics, Ender's game whatever the media is already advertising for you.

Talk to teachers and hold classes in the library occasionally so the kids feel comfortable there.
See if the school will add DVDs to the library's collection.

Get them there and they'll figure out how to use it, but you have to get them there.

If they can put meeting rooms in, so clubs can meet there that would be great as well.

Video games.

[JustAnotherIdiot]

When i think back to my elementary school, there was only one reason to visit the library other than to check out books, and that was to play games on the computers.

We had games like Spellevator Math Blaster as well as some adventure game that constantly quizzed various knowledges that I can't for the life of me remember the name of.
(I wish I did because I never beat it and I'd love to go back and do such now)

The point is, there's many an educational game out there, and it's an easy way to get younger kids learning things they may not otherwise take interest in.