Dear LM_Netters:
Thank you for all of the responses. I received thirty-two emails about morning
crowds. I split the responses into two categories. Open door applies to people
who do not have any specific set of rules other than school rules. Students flow
in and out. The librarians will kick out individual students or groups if the
behavior or noise is unacceptable. The rules group ask that students sit at
tables, have a purpose, and/or require passes from teachers.
Many people pointed out that there are other places for students to hang out with
friends. Our students cruise (yes, like cars. They go round and round the school)
the halls in the morning.
I have been a pure open door person, but next year I plan to implement something
another librarian is doing with her students. She has a sign-in sheet where the
student write down their name, what they are working on, and the name of the
teacher they are doing it for. If the student wants to read a magazine or book,
they may do that, but they have to write that down (in other words, a commitment).
Many people suggested talking to the Freshmen classes. My principal has a meeting
with Freshmen at the beginning of the year. I will ask to be one of the speakers
at that meeting.
Now for the responses.......
Open Door
----------
I've grappled with this for 18 years. I need the library open to teach the students
proper library use and behavior. They'll need to know how to use public and college
libraries without someone hushing them all the time. But, so often, I get tired of
being the quiet police. I've tried assigning seats. The theory is that they won't
talk (as much) if they aren't sitting next to their buddies. The theory is also
that they've come to the library to study, so it doesn't matter who they sit by. It
is all theory. The library is much quieter (and emptier), but it isn't real life
either. Some schools require students to have passes from classroom teachers before
they can come in the library. Those passes are supposed to have the library work
that the student wants to do. That really cuts down on library use too. About the
best thing I've found is to make the topic part of the Freshman orientation. I
teach WHY we must be quiet and WHAT I'm going to do if they don't manage
themselves. The most effective thing I've done to support my goal to have them
police themselves is to "send out" everyone in the area when a group is noisy. My
point is that they all know the library is a quiet place, and they haven't made
those around them be quiet. Just sending out one noisy kid never works. Send out
the whole table at least. They come back the next day, and they are quieter.
In both my present school and my last one, we opened before school was in session.
This is only my second year here, but I was 9 years at my old school, and found
that the morning crowd changed from year to year. Some years we had kids that we
really needed to 'sit' on, and kick out fairly often. We did find that those kids
eventually stopped coming in - not the free and easy place they were looking for.
I'd suggest you keep on as you have been. Keep your eyes on them, and they will
probably stop coming in when they see that they are being supervised. Good luck.
We don't have that problem in the morning, although we do open at 7:00. However,
I'm beginning to have that problem during lunch. I, too, have told certain students
to leave and one student was out for a week. Other than that, I'm still feeling my
way. I'm trying to stay focused on what I want the space to be at lunch -- a hang
out or a refuge for those who want and need to study -- while maintaining a
welcoming atmosphere. Good Luck!
Yes, we are open at 7:00 in the morning and first period begins at 7:40. The
students who come to the library have something to do, either using books or
printing last-minute projects using the computers. Our cafeteria is open and serves
breakfast. That is where the most of the early morning socializing takes place.
There are two study hall aides on duty there at 7:00 for supervision, but they
really have very few problems.
Hi, Just thought I'd pass along my experience. I definitely exclude groups that
have a negative impact on the environment. Kennedy-Kenrick is a small (550-600)
student school, so my library is not crowded until the ends of quarters. At other
times the students that come on a regular basis are less focused, work a little on
school work, a little socializing, and a little Internet browsing. I warn them if I
can follow their conversation from my desk that the conversation is too loud and I
consider it an invitation to join them. Sometimes that's enough to quiet them down.
Sometimes I just invite them to take a time out. They leave for the day and I'll
let them try the next day. If they are still not getting it then I refuse to give
them a pass for a longer period of time. The length of time depends on what the
problem has been. Of course, this is possible because I have small numbers and the
kids are pretty good and respectful. Hope this helps.
I get about 20-50 kids a morning between 6.30 AM to 8 AM (first class). it is very
open - in fact we serve as a hall way as well. I've never had a problem yet-- the
most I have to do is remind some that walkmans are not allowed in the school - and
once in awhile I get people who seem to be suffering from budding hormones and want
to sit closely - or even 2 in one chair- but that is rare. The same school rules
apply - they must be in uniform - they must be respectful - and they must follow
library rules. I think in the 3 years I have been here I have had to leave my
office twice to correct behavior. I am even amazed that everyone pushes her/his
chair in ( I have to admit this is a big rule with me).
I have an open door policy in middle school. I also have a contract that states
what the library is for, and not. If a student is violating it, he signs a contract
that states s/he understands the rules of the library. And if s/he cannot obey the
rules, then they will seek another place to be. Second offense, a copy of the
signed contract goes with student to office for disruptive behavior offense.
Our doors open at 7:15 and for a half hour we are the most popular place in town!
The kids are waiting when the doors are unlocked. The numbers range from 100 - 150
each morning. Some finishing work, but most just catching up with friends. After
school it can be the same way ( we stay open till 5pm), but most students head home
fairly quickly. We do allow the rules to slide, kids don't have to whisper, but we
do expect them to respect each other and the library. We do not hesitate to ask
kids to leave and have from time to time had to ban certain kids from the library.
This hasn't happened in two years, but this year is still young. Generally, if
students get too rowdy we tell them it is time to find another place to be for the
morning/afternoon. They usually cooperate. As for your gut feeling about your
freshman class - keep your eyes open. There are always those classes that have more
than their share of high maintaince kids - it does seem to go in cycles.
I have an elementary school, but my 7th grade is a "rough" bunch. They are very
disruptive and destructive. I used to allow students any time in small groups. I do
teach classes, too. I had to put a stop to the 7th grade coming outside of their
class time or when I was available. They never returned books to the shelf and they
had spitballs all over the conference room and I found they were visiting
inappropriate sites on the web. If your gut is telling you they are up to no good,
then they probable are. A few days ago, I read someone's suggestion about having
laminated passes. You set the limit for how many students and when your passes are
all given out, no one else comes in.
Perhaps there is little comparison because I only have 200 students, but since we
are just upstairs from breakfast in the dining room wing, enroute to classes and
where printing jobs get picked up and the am news read I can have a fair amout of
traffic for the beginning of the day. My bottom line when I have to redirect people
is to ask them for an academic focus or to socialize elsewhere. If they interfere
with my work getting done, as in I have to spend my time noticing them, or keep
others from having an academic focus, then they are in the wrong place. Reading
news and magazines and quiet sharing is fine but their rights stop where the next
guy's start. Its called library citizenship! They don't like me hovering over their
conversations so they usually tone it down. I also lean on the seniors for good
modeling. Our seniors have some privileges by contract and one of the features is
they show some leadership in behavior areas. I pick my individuals and small groups
to approach strategically and let them know I count on them if we are going to be
open to large groups.
I have a building that is freshman only and I have an open door policy (which is
good since I don't have any doors.) This year we have to supervise more than we
have in the past. I'm trying to think of ways to improve the situation but I would
rather have it this way then to try to make rules I can't enforce. I have had to
ask some students to leave and I have had to talked directly to some of the groups.
Basically right now I just have to except that because I let the students in I will
have to spend that time supervising. The good side of that, the teachers, office
staff, principals and security staff appreciate what we do and like the student
centered environment. A lot of the students enjoy the fact that the library staff
is friendly, helpful and available in the morning.
I understand your problem and your uncomfortable feeling, as we have an open door
in the am and pm (to say nothing of our 20 break mid-morning, and 2 lunch periods).
While I normally consider this a time to get some owrk done, if they're a bother, I
concentrate on them. I just keep leaning on them, saying the same things over and
over (my new favorite this year: "I love you individually, but as a group, you're a
real pain. Keep the noise down.") until they either shape up or find another place
to hang out. Occasionally I just stand next to them without saying anything until
they get the hint. One thing to look forward to: those kids, boys in particular,
will change so drastically next summer that you won't even recognize them next
fall. They will have matured into the nicest, friendliest kids who will have
completely forgotten that they got on your nerves.
Nice problem to have! I don't know what you mean by 'large crowds' -- I open to all
comers at about 8:00 (classes start at 8:45). Mostly they want to use the
computers. We are a school of 500 (grades 8 to 12) and my morning 'crowd' ends up
at about 20 to 30 by the time the bell rings. They are usually controlled, but if I
see or hear something I don't like, I boot the kid out. Maybe for a day or a week
or a month -- one student was booted for a year for nearly damaging equipment. I
don't have much trouble. Our library has the area about four standard classrooms. I
can see if you have a hundred students and you are the only supervisor that there
could be trouble. I don't know how I would handle that -- get help, maybe.
I have an open door policy--from 7:45 to 8 in the morning and then from 3 until
4:30 pm in the afternoon. The rest of the day the library/media center is available
to students on passes if classes are not using the library. Students are generally
pretty good--we are a boarding school, I know where they live <grin>. I have been
known to suggest to students they find another place to hang out in the morning or
after school--disruptive behavior, inappropriate language, etc. During the school
day, they go right back to class and a disciplinary referral is written. One of the
major uses of the library on non-class time is email--some of the kids want to do
Chat or Messenger which are prohibited. that is probably my biggest problem--but
they are learning -= so far this year only 3 students have had their internet
privileges revoked for that or for hacking. I have found that students who are rule
breakers tend to bring their buddies with them so as you say, my gut feeling is
keep an eye on them. I say, go for it--follow your intuition.
I have an open door. They are asked (told politely) to leave if they are too loud
or wandering around aimlessly.
This is a question I have tried to avoid. Our Library is open for 1/2 hour before
school and it too gets very noisy. Unless the disturbance is so bad as to affect
others, I usually let it go before school. Our kids know that they have to behave
in the Library but I am more lenient before school than at any other time. There
are certain students I always watch!! Does your school have homeroom first thing in
the morning? If so, could you ask the freshman homeroom teachers if you could speak
to the different rooms and talk about behavior before school. Maybe all freshman
can be gathered into one area and you just have to do this once. Good luck!
I do have an open door policy and I do exclude those students who aren't capable of
behaving in the manner I have defined. If am I constantly reminding students about
their behavior then I have to assume that they are disturbing to the rest of the
people in the library and that is never acceptable. Sometimes I will start with a
one or two week exclusion and if the problem continues after that, then I exclude
them until they feel they are ready to exhibit the expected behaviors. If this time
arrives they come and talk to me about it and we again go over the expected
behaviors and what will happen if they aren't shown.
As far as I'm concerned, the library is open to one and all from the time I arrive
until I leave. I have grades 7-12 coming in. As you can imagine, the older kids
don't come in as much as the younger ones do. Usually I don't have any problems. I
have had to exclude certain individuals for a time, but they either learn to behave
or decide on their own to go elsewhere. This week I averaged over 20 students per
day in before school. Of course, several are in daily...
Hi Susan, Our IMC (1200 students in the school, 10-12) is open for anyone to use
the facilities including the computer lab at 6:30 a.m. However, we do not allow
loud talking, eating, horsing around etc. If occasionally I get a group that does
this, they are quietly reminded that the IMC is for quiet study and the Commons is
open for eating breakfast and visiting with friends. I usually don't have a problem
with this because we have the Commons area. The kids that really want to study or
print out their report are working quietly.
I'm in a boys' high school, and the morning is my favorite time. The kids come in,
finish up their work, use the computers like mad, talk, connect. If someone was
disturbing the balance, (which is much looser than the rest of the day) I would not
hesitate to tell them that they weren't welcome. It will spoil it for everyone if
you don't. The morning should feel good.
Rules Group
------------
One thing we do to limit our numbers is to require that students give us their
STUDENT ID card as they enter. No ID, no entrance. That helps. Plus, if someone
acts up, we have their ID and name. If it's particularly crowded, we also limit
students to two per table. When all tables are taken, we don't admit any more
students. The library is reserved in the morning for students who actually want a
semi-quiet place to work. If students are chatting, I send them to the cafeteria
immediately. There are too many students who legitimately need my help for me to
waste my time shushing others. :-)
I can't help you with a policy, but I do have a suggestion - why not see if the
admin would assign a teacher or a monitor in the morning to assist with
supervision? This might be a big help with the troops.
Hey Susan. My rule is that students are in a seat, in groups of 3 or 4 as the table
will allow, and they may not move the chairs or furniture. Keeping them in small
groups seems to keep them quieter. Good luck.
When I was doing high school, we had a similar open-door policy but it was during
lunch time rather than early morning. We had lots of drop-in traffic. What we had
to do was require everyone to have something to read or be doing research on and
limited the number of students per table. We did not allow students to come in
"just to see someone for a minute". If they came in, they stayed until the end of
lunch period. Like you, we kicked out anyone who would not comply or who became
unruly and the banishment lasted from three days to two weeks. We had to supervise
closely, circulating around the room so the students were aware of our presence.
Pay attention to your "gut." It's probably right. I narrowly prevented a big fight
in the library by doing just that. There were several students urgently seeking out
one particular boy, then toward the end of the period, it seemed the library was
suddenly the place to be and a lot more students than usual poured through the
doors. I sent a library worker to get the ass't prin. asap, met the group at the
door and faced them down. I told them if they were there for anything other than
reading magazines, then they should leave immediately. Luckily the ass't prin (whom
NOBODY messed with!) showed up at that moment. Took me several minutes for the
adrenaline rush to die down so I could breathe normally again!...You are wise to be
cautious.
I didn't have to put morning crowd restrictions into effect, and I don't really
have any advice because I'm at an elementary school, but I had to chuckle when I
read your post because I DID have to put lunch time restrictions on the 1st
graders!! (Kind of a freshman parallel). I tried letting them in but en masse they
had not a clue that the inside of a building was any different from the outside.
When their bell rang (we have staggered lunches spanning 1 1/2 hours), the 2nd
graders and I rolled our eyes, pushed up our sleeves, and straightened out the mess
they'd left. I finally decreed them restricted till after the winter break, when
I'll be willing to see if they've "matured".
Yes, we always did. But we had a "sign-in" with reason for being in the library. We
suggested that we needed the statistics for the "before school" use in order to use
it with discussions about library personnel (and we did use it later to justify the
hiring of an aide to work the desk earlier than others began. The student signed in
with full name, task to be accomplished, and teacher of the class for which the
class was to be accomplished. If there was no specific task or teacher to cite --
the student saw me -- often they just wanted to "read the sports magazines" (that
was okay but they then committed to that rather than just hanging out.) Just a way
to solicit a commitment out of the student. For the most part each followed through
with their sign-in commitment.
We don't exclude groups, but we do limit the number. When we hit 40 (the number of
chairs we have available in the main room, excluding chairs at computers), we do
not admit any more students. We are only open from 8:10 to 8:30. Our enrollment is
about 1250. We do toss misbehavers.
We have an open door policy before and after school as well as during lunch. We
main that the students must have a reason for being in the library. They cannot
"just hang out and talk." The Library is a place for quiet work or reading. If
students want to visit or socialize, they can do that in the halls or someone's
classroom. We have always told them "If you aren't in here to do quiet work, you
need to go elsewhere." Our standard rules for acceptable behavior still apply
during class time or before or after school :
1. you are in the library to do quiet work or read
2. no food or drink
3. you must sit and work quietly
4. only four chairs per table
5. only one body per chair
6. no talking from table to table
Standard consequences: 1. We believe in the "three strikes and you're out" rule -
we will warn a student or group twice and the third time they must leave. 2. If we
have to "kick" someone out twice, they are "banned" for the next day. 3. We have
had to "ban" students for the remainder of a semester because they continued to
"break the library rules." - we keep hoping they are trainable - but they aren't
always.
Susan, I am in a middle school, but I have discontinued allowing kids to "hang
out." If they are seriously browsing for books, reading, or quietly going over or
doing homework, that is fine. otherwise, out.
I'm a high school librarian, also. One of the joys of my job is being able to open
the library around 7:15 each morning and allowing any students to come inside to
use the computers (we have 20 now), check books in or out, or play chess (we have
formed a chess club and have 56 students out of an enrollment of @ 350). Sometimes
the noise level gets a little high but the chess players know that when I say, "Why
does Mrs. Gray love chess?" they respond, "Because it's QUIET!" As for talking
while on the computers or elsewhere in the library I just do not tolerate it. I try
to warn them once but if they ignore the warning or choose to continue
inappropriate behavior, I tell them they must leave and excourt them out. We are
lucky in that we have a commons area and they always have an alternative place to
go. ("If you want to visit, go to the commons. That's what it's for.") Another
thing that has helped was that a teacher last year told all her classes just before
bringing them down to the library that "the library is Mrs. Gray's classroom." Once
they realize that they are in my territory and my word is sort of law, they seem to
accept it. And I find I can relax and enjoy sharing the space and resources with
those students who want to be there. Students can also come into the library during
break (20 min.), at both lunch shifts, and after school for at least 45 min. So
they have pretty good access. Also, throughout the day teachers schedule to bring
classes in. Hope this helps your problem. I really love what I'm doing and look
forward to coming to work every day. Good luck to you!
I tried the same open door policy as you do, and came to the same conclusion. It
became too much...the place to hang out; therefore, this year, I limited before
school access to those who had "library business." That can include reading
magazines, books, checking in or out books, doing research, or typing for a class.
I know exactly what you mean. Until this year we had an open door policy before
school. But at the end of last year we started becoming a hang out, not a library.
We hated to do it, but this year we require passes before school. We let teachers
know that they can write a pass for a week at a time for legitimate library use.
This has eliminated the chaos and we have a nice group before school. And if a
student needs to check out a book or study or do research, we still have the option
to let him in.
Thank you all!
Susan
--
Susan Myers
Chesnee High School Librarian
Virtual Reference Desk Volunteer
http://www.spartanburg2.k12.sc.us
Email: rudimyers@onebox.com
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