Salli and Netters,
While it's true that this age is likely to tear books, this is no excuse for not
attempting to train them. Since the preschool teacher is ignoring her
responsibility, please take matters into your own hands and talk to them and
practice with them each time they come. I have been very proactive with my kinders
and continue to work with my 1st & 2nd graders, and my teachers have been very
supportive. I'm pleased to report that our books are staying nicer!
Some suggestions: For board books - Scholastic and Charlesbridge publishers have a
lot of offerings as do the inline book vendors, and you can also find them
discounted at discount dept. stores like T.J. Max, Ross, and Marshalls. Talk to
your principal about alternate forms of funding (PTA/PTO) so you can go and
purchase them yourself and get a refund from school directly. At stores like these,
you need to buy as you see them - they are gone when you go back.
What about cloth books? If you have parents or grandparents that sew, some of the
fabric stores carry cloth books on panels. These are also washable. For stiffer
books, iron on Pellon brand backing before sewing.
It may be only one or two students that are the real problems. Do you have an
opportunity to observe them?
At orientation this year, I brought a bowl filled with cotton balls, along with a
("low tech") potato masher from my kitchen drawer. When I talk about book care, I
tell the students "Mash potatoes, not pages!" I ask them if a grown-up at home
makes mashed potatoes (many families still do!), then I show them the masher and
the cotton balls. I do a couple of pretend mashes (the teachers got quite a kick
out of this!). I tell them they can ask to help mash the potatoes at home. Then I
show them an old catalog (make sure it's something you don't want any more, like an
old phone book or catalog) and tell them "This is an old catalog I don't use any
more that I'm going to throw away, but I want to show you what I mean about not
mashing pages. " Then I say, "When you were little, you used to push the pages like
this, mashing them with your palm." I exaggerate and of course the pages wrinkle
and may even tear. I ask them what will happen to a nice book if we do that? Will
we want to!
see a book book with mashed up pages? Oh no, of course not! (You could show them
a book's colored pages that are now wrinkled and not nice to make your point). "Now
we're in school and not babies any more. We need to know how to turn pages nicely."
Then I show them how to turn the page carefully from the top right corner ("Pinch
and push" gently) with the right hand. I have them wave their left hand - "That's
our book holding hand!" and then have them wave their right hand - that's our page
turning hand!" After they select books in the library and get checked out, they
usually sit along the floor against the bookcases and look at their books (we don't
have enough tables to sit at) - so I work with them on this, gently correcting
their hands so the left is holding the book and the right is page turning. (Their
natural inclination is the reverse). You want them to turn from the top so they
don't turn from the bottom near the the bound edge - otherwise you will have way
too many small tears along the bottom edges along the spine.
We also talk about not coloring or drawing in books - if we want to color, we color
in a COLORING book or on paper, not in library books!
You need to keep working on this each week. You need to emphasize, "I like the way
Johnny is turning pages nicely! Oh, Maria is going a good job too! That's
wonderful!"
Another thing I do for all grade levels is remind them that the books we have now
need to last for them now and for children coming up behind them in the younger
grades, and even children still at home, and even children still not born yet! So
we need to take good care of these books, and they will last and share their
stories a long time. I emphasize they are "OUR books," not "my (the librarian's)
books." We share them so we need to keep them nice for all of us to enjoy. This
seems to really sink in and it keeps the message positive.
Joanne Ladewig, Library Media Technician (A.K.A. "Library Lady")
Lawrence Elementary, GGUSD Garden Grove, California
shatz1@earthlink.net
"We're Library Techs. We improvise, we adapt, we overcome! WE READ!"
" You may be only one person in the world, but you may also be the world to one
person."
- - - comments are my own and may not reflect those of my employer- - -
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