Hi. I received 11 responses to my request for incentives to motivate student
assistants to shelve. The answers are below:
Davinna Artibey
Library Media Specialist
Horace Mann Middle School
Denver, CO 80211
I try not to, but I did at one point when I had a long term sub in and they
weren't working for her well. We then gave them a free ice cream in the
cafeteria for every 50 or 100 books they shelved. That meant I had to keep
track of how many they shelved. I had a system of having them all have
different colored 1" strips of cardstock w/their initials on them. It meant
the extra task of separating the cardstock tags, keeping tallies and filing
them in an expandable folder. (I normally have students use the same
cardstock tags, pull them and just reuse to know they are filed correctly).
The cafeteria let me buy boxes of the ice creams at cost and give out my
coupons. The other idea I gave my sub. that she chose not to use was to have
them enter a drawing once for every 10-20-30 however many you want, books
shelved. Then at the end of the month have a drawing for a gift certificate
to friendlies, small stuffed animal, book, etc.
We too have lulls in the reshelving, one incentive I've found that works
well for me (no extra work, lots of extra reshelving" is for me to drop
everything I'm doing and challenge them to help me "clear the cart". If we
clear it they all get double treats (they normally get two pieces of candy
for their recess reshelving...but I'll double it to clear the cart). I find
they love to work with me on it and the challenge.
Deb Becker
North Broad Elem.
Oneida, NY
Jbecke1@twcny.rr.com
I have middle school students for library aides. I have no problem having
them shelve the books that are returned daily. Every 9 weeks, I assign them
a section of the library. Example nonfiction, series, and then fiction by
reading level (we shelve our fiction books by AR reading level -
controversial, but that's another story). The students seem to take pride in
making "their" shelves look good, by dusting, shelving, and making sure
books are straight. They do a great job of shelving the books
alpahbetically, but many books still end up in the wrong location, due to
other students.
However, making sure that the books were totally in alphabetical order and
locating lost books was another story. I give the aides a grade on their
shelvesonce a week: 0-3 out of order is an A; 4-6 books is a B; 5-9 is a C,
more than that and they have to do the shelves again the next day to earn a
grade. Even that gets old, so sometimes, but not always, I bring treats for
an A,B, or C. Sometimes its cookies (1 for a C, 2 for an A or B), sometimes
it's bookmarks, pencils, candy kisses, or any other special surprise. (On
the second day of grading, if they flunked the first day, there is no
treat.) It's not every time, so the students try for that A or B, and
don't know until they are finished if there is a surprise on that grade day.
I hope this isn't confusing, but contact me if it is, and I'll try to answer
questions or explain it better.
My library aides do a great job of running the library, while I catalogue
books. I am sure to tell them often, that the great job that they do, makes
ME look good!
Nora Jones
Keep smiling!
It makes people wonder what you're up to ;)
I have a huge plastic jar full of candy for bribes. I also have two
parties, one right before winter break, with all kinds of desserts, and one
with pizza and dessert at the end of the year. It's definitely worth the
cost. Of course, I work with younger kids, and don't let them shelve. I'm
bribing them to straighten shelves!
Good luck.
Mary Clark
Library Media Tech I
La Costa Meadows Elementary School
Carlsbad, CA USA
760-290-2128
Mary.clark@smusd.org
Lucky me, I have a girl who shelves without my asking, and then shelves more
and more and more.
I try to make the shelving assignments small and spread the joy to
everyone(other than Becky who marathon shelves). If I give only 12 books to
each student, that's a lot by the end of the day. I've also had great luck,
believe it or not, being the detention monitor b/c some of those students
would much rather shelve, or organize the cart, than sit still.
My best motivator is food. We promised a lunch from any of the fast food
restaurants to the group that completed the best project. Our winning group
selected Subway. We ate with them that day. When I suggested that type of
reward again, the winning group not only applauded the great food they had
had, they said they had a really fun lunch that day with great conversation.
But small candy bars for completed assignments etc help too, or the chance
to listen to headphones while they work.
Let me know what works.
Terry
Good morning:
OK-this may sound obvious but I have found that it works.
Shelving-one of the ways that I have been able to motivate
others to do it is to do some of it myself and trying to be excited about
it. Yes-I know we are all busy and feel that this is something that we hired
the aides to do, but few students want to do things that they feel is
"unimportant" and "boring". If they come in and see a big stack of books
that haven't been touched all day, they will feel that it is not quite as
important as you seem to think.
Another way to motivate them is that I point out all of the
good books that are on the shelf that may have been missed if you hadn't
shelved the book next to it. Most of my student aides are readers and are
always looking for new books and some are interested in what others are
reading and just grab off the returned book shelf, while others are always
wanting to scope out the shelves anyway so they might as well be doing some
work while they are wandering.
Sorry if I sounded condescending in all of this, but if you
show in some way that it is important and necessary that the books end up in
the right place on the shelves, they will have a much better attitude about
doing the job.
Blessings-
Carol Van Brocklin
Librarian
Mindanao International Academy
Davao City, Philippines
My student aides receive community service hours for their help in the
library which is reflected on their transcript. That seems to be the best
motivator and the fact that I have been known to fire and replace
students....
Shelley Bertsch
I split up the areas, so each student is only
responsbile for a certain section. You can
periodically check out their work. Give tickets each
time everything is correctly done, shelved etc. Then
have them drop tickets in a jar for drawings of
prizes!!! More times they are caught doing something
right, more chances they have of "WINNING." You can
be very creative about prizes depending on your
budget!!!!
Barbara Herman
Kennedy High
Taylor, Mi
Davinna;
When I was blessed with student aides :), I let them pick sections of
shelving to be responsible for. Every so often I would inspect them. This
was then part of their grade.
Now that I'm in a K-8 school, I don't have student aides. So I have the
students who wish to do so "adopt" a shelf. I then periodically "inspect"
them, based on their ages, of course. If they pass inspection, they receive
a smiley face in my grade book. Smiley faces may be used to check out
additional materials, or traded in for prizes I pick up at the dollar store,
Oriental Trading, and my own collections.
I gave my middle school aides at my previous position many privileges. They
were allowed to use my bathroom, and I gave them a place to store their
stuff. They could check out more books than other students, and check out
videos.
I also gave them little birthday parties, and had contests between different
class periods for shelving, processing, and even minor cataloguing. Winners
received lunch from McDonald's, nachos, pizza., etc. (Not all at once, of
course!)
It also helped when we all went out and shelved together. Seeing me shelve
kept them on track and helped them to see how important shelving is.
Hope these help!
Louise Colette Leonard
Martin J. Gottlieb Day School Library
Jacksonville Jewish Center
Jacksonville, FL
Lleonard@ssdsjax.net
I have 4th and 5th graders helping out which I know is different than middle
schoolers, but they seem to really appreciate this incentive: they receive
a "waiver" for an overdue that can be applied at the circulation desk and
allow them to overide a block on their account. I made little certificates
on the computer, had each kid sign one, store them in an envelope at the
student assistants' work area. They are for one use only.
Robin Ludmer
Teacher-Librarian
Peidmont, Ca.
Good luck there! I have high school T.A.s and they don't like to shelve and
sometimes getting them to read shelves is like torture.
I have known adults that were not capable of shelving books and I have had
others who were fantastic. Personally, I don't mind shelving books but it
seems like a waste of my salary to pay me to put books away. Plus, I am
always too busy doing other things to make shelving a good part of my day.
My TA's get a grade and a good part of their grade is based on shelving and
other basic, clerical library tasks.
Jaime Meadows
St.Helens High School
St. Helens, OR
Maybe you need to set a time limit. A daily / weekly prize for how
many books they can shelve in 10 minutes. The first 10 minutes they
come in, have them shelve. Then THEY HAVE TO STOP! Have them do
something else. Keep track and give small prizes according to output.
They might get more done in that short time period than 1/2 hour of
moping.
Just remember, no one likes to do the same thing day in and day out,
every day.
Most people like candy!
Katherine Martinez
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