School Library Day-to-Day Operations

Stephens, Claire G., and Patricia Franklin. School Library Day-to-Day Operations. Santa Barbara, CA: Libraries Unlimited, 2013. ISBN: 978-1-59884-941-7

Publisher's Description

... [This book] provides essential knowledge for anyone running a school library, explaining how to build and maintain a collection that students and teachers alike will be able to use to easily find materials for research and pleasure reading.

This hands-on manual will be invaluable to library clerks in developing sound procedures for preparing books and a wide range of other items—such as magazines, DVDs and audio books, and instructional materials— ready for circulation. The book also offers practical advice for establishing an efficient ordering process, checking in an order, and staying in compliance with school and district financial policies. And, because even the best library clerk can't always do it all on their own, the author identifies effective strategies for getting support.

Highlights
• Provides clearly and simply written information for anyone tasked with running a school library
• Includes top-ten lists
• Supplies answers to frequently asked questions
• Features sidebars with additional helpful resources

Sample Topics
AV Materials
Books
Budgeting
Circulation of Materials
Contents of School Library Collections
Instructional Materials in the Library
Ordering Materials
Periodicals
Policies and Procedures
Processing
Purpose of the School Library
Role of the Library Clerk

School Library Manager

Woolls, Blanche, Ann C. Weeks, and Sharon Coatney. The School Library Manager. 5th ed. Santa Barbara, CA: Libraries Unlimited, 2013. ISBN: 978-1-61069-133-8

Publisher's Description

This very readable text is updated to encompass the new role of school librarians in managing the digital world in libraries.

This textbook is simply the ideal guide for preservice school librarians and those new to the field. After a brief introduction that describes the history of the role of the school librarian, the book covers how to choose a credential program, identify the requirements for working in each of the 50 states, and avoid the pitfalls of looking for and choosing a job. The text even supplies a first-week "survival guide" for excelling in that new position from the beginning, covering the challenges of successfully managing collections, facilities, personnel, and technology. Critical subject matter such as librarian/teacher collaboration, curriculum integration, proposal writing, tackling leadership, and the role of a school librarian in the legislative process are addressed as well. This latest version of this established, "go-to" text provides updated coverage of student learning assessment, supplies new information on managing digital and virtual libraries and collections as well as social media in the library media center, and supplies careful attention to key strategies to meet AASL and Common Core standards.

Features
• Presents up-to-date information and thorough revisions of a well-established and popular textbook
• Highlights the teaching role of today's school librarian
• Emphasizes the newest AASL standards, the Common Core standards, and the management of 21st-century digital and virtual libraries and collections
• Supplies comprehensive coverage of current issues in school library media center administration

Sample Topics
Assessment of the Library Program, Resources, and Staff
Managing Technology in Library and Classroom
Managing the Library Facility
Managing the Resources in the Library and the School Library Program
Managing the School Library Budget
Preparing Proposals for Additional Funding
Providing Continuing Development for Teachers
School Library Staff
School Personnel
Working with Teachers and Curriculum

Table of contents

 

Booktalking Nonfiction

Bromann-Bender, Jennifer. Booktalking Nonfiction: 200 Sure-Fire Winners for Middle and High School Readers. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow, 2014. ISBN: 978-0-8108-8808-1

Publisher's Description

[The book] will provide an introduction to selecting and writing booktalks for nonfiction books with a focus on unique informational texts and biographies and autobiographies. A booktalk is a summary of a book presented in a way that would interest someone in reading the book described.

Why non-fiction? Because the Common Core Standards Initiative, which most states have adopted, requires that 70% of the materials students read be from the category of informational texts it is especially important to focus on nonfiction when sharing books with students. Here’s everything you need to do just that.

Chapters cover selecting, writing, preparing, and presenting booktalks, special tips for high-interest, low-level books, and using non-fiction in the library and the classroom. Two hundred ready-to-present booktalks arranged by genre are also included. Genres include animals, famous people, sports, crime and serial killers, movies and television, religion, war, history, and the supernatural.

Table of contents

Developing Library Collections

Pattee, Amy S. Developing Library Collections for Today's Young Adults. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow, 2014. ISBN: 978-0-8108-8734-3

Publisher's Description

[The book] features policies that deal expressly with materials that respect the intellectual freedom of young library patrons. It emphasizes the importance of everything from needs assessment to collection development, encouraging librarians to consider informational, recreational, and curricular needs and interests as the library staff select material on behalf of young adults.

With detailed guidelines for developing and evaluating collections of print and electronic material, Amy S. Pattee devotes chapters to materials selection, acquisition, and assessment, describing fiction and nonfiction genres, graphic forms, and multimedia and electronic materials, including networked resources, e-books, and computer games. Developing Library Collections for Today’s Young Adults may be consulted by librarians charged with the development and maintenance of public library collections for young adults and may be employed in library science courses related to young adult literature and library services and collection development.

Table of contents

Success with Library Volunteers

Holt, Leslie E. and Glen E. Holt. Success with Library Volunteers. Libraries Unlimited, 2014. ISBN: 978-1-61069-048-5

Description:
This book covers principles, practical guidelines, and best practices for establishing and operating a successful library volunteer program in any type of library. Topics covered include recruiting, managing, and retaining volunteers as well as future trends in the usage of volunteers in library programs. It also includes an extensive description of a successful program implemented in the King County Library System (KCLS).

The World's Strongest Librarian

Hanagarne, Josh. The World's Strongest Librarian: A Memoir of Tourette's, Faith, Strength, and the Power of Family. New York: Gotham, 2013. ISBN: 978-1-59240-787-3

Note: Josh Hanagarne will be the Thursday night banquet speaker at the 2014 Oregon Library Association Conference.

Publisher's Description

Josh Hanagarne couldn’t be invisible if he tried. Although he wouldn’t officially be diagnosed with Tourette Syndrome until his freshman year of high school, Josh was six years old and onstage in a school Thanksgiving play when he first began exhibiting symptoms. By the time he was twenty, the young Mormon had reached his towering adult height of 6’7” when—while serving on a mission for the Church of Latter Day Saints—his Tourette’s tics escalated to nightmarish levels.

Determined to conquer his affliction, Josh underwent everything from quack remedies to lethargy-inducing drug regimes to Botox injections that paralyzed his vocal cords and left him voiceless for three years. Undeterred, Josh persevered to marry and earn a degree in Library Science. At last, an eccentric, autistic strongman—and former Air Force Tech Sergeant and guard at an Iraqi prison—taught Josh how to “throttle” his tics into submission through strength-training.

Today, Josh is a librarian in the main branch of Salt Lake City’s public library and founder of a popular blog about books and weight lifting—and the proud father of four-year-old Max, who has already started to show his own symptoms of Tourette’s.

The World’s Strongest Librarian illuminates the mysteries of this little-understood disorder, as well as the very different worlds of strongman training and modern libraries. With humor and candor, this unlikely hero traces his journey to overcome his disability— and navigate his wavering Mormon faith—to find love and create a life worth living.

Implementing the Common Core

Achieve, and American Association of School Librarians. Implementing the Common Core State Standards: The Role of the School Librarian [action brief]. Achieve, 2013.

 

Online Description

The Common Core State Standards provide an opportunity to realize systemic change and ensure that American students are held to the same high expectations in mathematics and literacy as their global peers — regardless of state or zip code. This Action Brief for school librarians is a starting point, designed to increase awareness of the standards, create a sense of urgency around their implementation, and provide these stakeholders — who are faced with dramatically increased expectations in the context of fewer resources — with a deeper understanding of the standards and their role in implementing the standards. Achieve, in partnership with the American Association of School Librarians, released this with support from MetLife Foundation.

 

This action brief is also available online.