On Sun, 1 Sep 2002, Madeline L. Buchanan wrote:
> A valid reason for restricting areas of the library is today's parents. The
> first time that a first grade class came into the library this year a
> student checked out a book that the parents thought was too hard for him (a
> book in the easy collection) and really made a fuss. We are a K-8 school
> and since the teacher is not in the library, it is very hard for me to
> supervise little ones on the nonfiction shelves. I individually help the
> ones who want books on a specific nonfiction topic and shelve books such as
> Grolier's Nature's Children separately so that the students can easily
> identify them.
>
> As you know now, parents will go to the administration when something goes
> wrong instead of coming to the library to merely exchange a book that they
> feel is too hard for the student. It is very unfortunate. I even have
> parents who will not let their children check out books at all, even to let
> the books remain in the classroom instead of taking them home. They are
> afraid that the children will lose the books and have to pay for them.
You bring up genuine problems. I didn't see it much in my Oregon schools
but I saw it a lot here in Las Vegas, for whatever reason. I started by
being the first one to go to the principal. Then I bought as many easy
readers as I could find. Then we told parents as they came in that we'd
help the children find one book for reading practice. Anything beyond
that was their choice. Parents accepted that compromise.
For those who worried about losing books, there wasn't much I could
really do. I will mention, however, that when I took the job, the
principal called me aside to say the previous librarian rarely lost
a book. She said if we were getting books out into the hands of all
the children, especially the ones who needed them most, she expected
we'd lose some books. She said she fully expected some books to move
to Mexico over winter break, so on and so forth. But she said that
was a risk of the job she was willing to live with; she wanted books
in the hands of the children.
J. Rathbun, Librarian | "You may say I'm a dreamer,
Mojave High School | but I'm not the only one..."
Clark County School District |
Las Vegas, Nevada | John Lennon
Email: jrathbun@orednet.org |
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