Thanks to everyone for your responses! I've set alarms on my computer to go
off near the end of each class period, so hopefully I'll get in the habit of
asking kids to clean up after themselves until they get into that habit
themselves. Due to administrative issues at my school, I am not allowed to
"kick out" kids from the media center or close it temporarily during class
periods or lunches, even though that seemed to be a resounding theme in the
responses I received. :) Below is a sampling of the responses (I'm not
going to copy every one, because many are similar).
* [My personal favorite, because I've been fighting for this for 3
years] I used to supervise study halls in my media center too, and until I
got them out of the library, I was fighting a losing battle. I finally told
the headmaster he was paying me way too much money to be a study hall
monitor! When the accreditation review committee came in, I won! Start
working to get those study halls out of your library. You have way too much
to do to ride herd on a bunch of kids who are not there to do research and
read!
* This is what I do....I give them three warnings. After that, I tell
them that if they can't work as a team (ie all in the same lunch period)
then that lunch will be closed for a week. It usually works with other
students picking up the garbage.
* Do you have enough repeat kids each period to assign the clean up to
them or have them be the 'supervisor'? Even if you can have a couple of kids
do the reminding that they all need to clean up after themselves. Perhaps
if you can set a timer to go off just before the end of each period (do you
have a cell phone you can program in the times?) to help make you aware of
the period changing...The other idea is, if you have the available
technology is to set up a video camera (preferably hidden) that focuses on
the areas that are left messy. That will take some time to review but it
might help catch the culprits...
* Maybe you could have rotating monitors each hour. Pick two or so
each hour and those two don't let the class go until the room is clean.
Remind them that your area is like people who leave their trash and trays
out in the cafeteria and that if it continues to happen, the whole class
gets punished and has to do... (whatever your school does)
* Assign a few students in each class to be 'aides" and make sure that
everything is picked up when each class leaves. They'll be a lot tougher on
their friends than you would. Make sure there is some privilege attached to
the duty.
* Hang signs in the media center reminding students to clean up after
themselves
* I've had the same problem in my library during evening study
hall--particularly in one area which is harder for me to supervise. I
started picking up the trash at the end of the day and making a "collage" of
all the items. I put this collage right next to the sign-in sheet for study
hall, and explained to students coming in that it was made from the garbage
they'd left on the floor/tables. Every once in a while a student will see
something and say, "oh, that's mine. . ." and then the realization dawns on
them. It hasn't completely eliminated the problem, but it has helped.
* Offer a game day for the cleanest group. I used to give the kids
points for each class, and once the class reached 150 points, they got a
game day in the library. They could earn 25 points a day, so that meant
game day about every 7 weeks (no one ever got a full 25 points every day!).
I gave 5 points for keeping voices down when entering the library, being
respectful to each other, keeping the library neat, lining up politely when
time to go, and-- hmm, it's been 7 years since I did this, so can't remember
the 5th point item. 2 Minutes before class ended, I would go through and
give each class their points. Good Luck!'
Ann Carstens
Media Specialist
Holy Family Catholic High School
8101 Kochia Lane
Victoria, MN 55386
(952) 443-4659
carstensa@hfchs.org
"Research shows the highest achieving students attend schools with good
library media centers."
Keith Curry Lance
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