Why have school libraries?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The school library was my safe space as a child. The librarian was kind and had a limitless supply of books, and it was less chaotic in there than in the classroom. I spent as much time as I could in the library. God bless school libraries.

That’s exactly what I was going to comment. The library saved me during some tumultuous times. It gave me a safe, calm place to be where no one had any demands of me. I grew up to work circulation in the school library and hope I provide that to others

[Anonymous]

In my hometown rural Virginia the public library is small and a 7 mile drive from my home. The school libraries were my only source of books and inspired a lifelong love of reading for my sibling and I.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Classroom "libraries" are usually a hodgepodge group of inexpensive Scholastic books and freebies that a teacher has managed to beg off their local Buy Nothing group. They can't be compared to the curated collection of fiction and non-fiction books that have been chosen and organized by a professional to support learning objectives and provide factual information. It's like calling the Little Free Library on your street corner the equivalent of a public library.

The classroom library is far less diverse and often skews to the lowest common denominator, so if you have an advanced reader, the only way they’ll have appropriate reading material is from the school library, because the librarian will steer kids to their appropriate levels. Not everyone can send books from home. FLES was a total waste of time and only turned my kids off Spanish. Neither continued with it beyond ES. This is APS.

[Anonymous]

So speaking specifically about APS and ACPS - I have to agree with the OP. I feel the money would be better spent hiring reading teachers to remediate reading.

Both APS and. ACPS good public library systems that are within reach. And before you say something silly like parents who don’t speak English might not know about them! I suggest you visit a library in these areas mid morning for the toddler storytimes and check out how many nannie’s are there with their charges. Or visit one not in a wealthy neighborhood to see who is using the computers.

Throw in the fact that free books in these two areas are plentiful. A plea to parents can easily yield an amazing response. Then consider how many of the PPs on this thread have almost guaranteed to have purchased books for their kids in some format in the last 30 days and bragged to someone about their kids impressive reading level. They don’t need school libraries for reading material.

And research? Yeah that is so poorly taught and random that tbh they are better off taking a short virtual course and being directed to use a citation generation website.

Cutting school library funding and redeploying the space and resources has definitely come up in the past.

[Anonymous]

You seeing some people at the libraries doesn’t equate to most children having regular access to them. And you’d rather have parents choose books for kids than a qualified professional? I’ve worked in districts that shut their libraries down to cut staffing and reallocate space. The results were not positive. There’s a reason those schools now have dwindling enrollment as parents flee for private.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So speaking specifically about APS and ACPS - I have to agree with the OP. I feel the money would be better spent hiring reading teachers to remediate reading.

Both APS and. ACPS good public library systems that are within reach. And before you say something silly like parents who don’t speak English might not know about them! I suggest you visit a library in these areas mid morning for the toddler storytimes and check out how many nannie’s are there with their charges. Or visit one not in a wealthy neighborhood to see who is using the computers.

Throw in the fact that free books in these two areas are plentiful. A plea to parents can easily yield an amazing response. Then consider how many of the PPs on this thread have almost guaranteed to have purchased books for their kids in some format in the last 30 days and bragged to someone about their kids impressive reading level. They don’t need school libraries for reading material.

And research? Yeah that is so poorly taught and random that tbh they are better off taking a short virtual course and being directed to use a citation generation website.

Cutting school library funding and redeploying the space and resources has definitely come up in the past.

So you think maybe 1.5 reading specialists would be better than regular visits to the school library?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So speaking specifically about APS and ACPS - I have to agree with the OP. I feel the money would be better spent hiring reading teachers to remediate reading.

Both APS and. ACPS good public library systems that are within reach. And before you say something silly like parents who don’t speak English might not know about them! I suggest you visit a library in these areas mid morning for the toddler storytimes and check out how many nannie’s are there with their charges. Or visit one not in a wealthy neighborhood to see who is using the computers.

Throw in the fact that free books in these two areas are plentiful. A plea to parents can easily yield an amazing response. Then consider how many of the PPs on this thread have almost guaranteed to have purchased books for their kids in some format in the last 30 days and bragged to someone about their kids impressive reading level. They don’t need school libraries for reading material.

And research? Yeah that is so poorly taught and random that tbh they are better off taking a short virtual course and being directed to use a citation generation website.

Cutting school library funding and redeploying the space and resources has definitely come up in the past.

So you think maybe 1.5 reading specialists would be better than regular visits to the school library?

Yeah, that does not add up. How many people can 1 1/2 reading specialist serve in one on one meetings as opposed to entire class is visiting a Library a couple times a week?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So speaking specifically about APS and ACPS - I have to agree with the OP. I feel the money would be better spent hiring reading teachers to remediate reading.

Both APS and. ACPS good public library systems that are within reach. And before you say something silly like parents who don’t speak English might not know about them! I suggest you visit a library in these areas mid morning for the toddler storytimes and check out how many nannie’s are there with their charges. Or visit one not in a wealthy neighborhood to see who is using the computers.

Throw in the fact that free books in these two areas are plentiful. A plea to parents can easily yield an amazing response. Then consider how many of the PPs on this thread have almost guaranteed to have purchased books for their kids in some format in the last 30 days and bragged to someone about their kids impressive reading level. They don’t need school libraries for reading material.

And research? Yeah that is so poorly taught and random that tbh they are better off taking a short virtual course and being directed to use a citation generation website.

Cutting school library funding and redeploying the space and resources has definitely come up in the past.

So you think maybe 1.5 reading specialists would be better than regular visits to the school library?

Yeah, that does not add up. How many people can 1 1/2 reading specialist serve in one on one meetings as opposed to entire class is visiting a Library a couple times a week?

Also our school’s library budget is around $9000/year (+/- based on enrollment) that would be less than $500/year for each classroom

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:A couple other purposes:

- the librarian helps teachers pick good books to teach content and loans books to teachers to read in class.
- librarians reach research skills and helps reach how a library works
- kids are exposed to a wide range of books. This builds content knowledge which is tied with better reading skills
- libraries have books of all reading levels, where classroom libraries are limited to the main grade level of the class. So my kindergartener can get a chapter book on his favorite subject we can work on at home
- it's hard to find time to go to the library, but if books show up, we end up reading them and my kids get far more reading in

As far as costs, they are far less than you'd expect. Many libraries keep books in circulation for many years.

Elementary school teacher here. The first item on this list doesn’t get enough attention. Not all kids’ books are created equal. If a teacher does a general search for a book on a certain curriculum topic, they will have to weed through a lot of so-so books to find the gems. We are so lucky to be able rely on our librarians to know what the real gems are and to keep on top of new options. I also feel like our librarians enable us to provide something akin to bibliotherapy. If a student is having challenging experiences, I’ll often ask parents if they want me to ask the librarian to find the student some books that might be helpful. They are really a great support. I’ll also say I’ve been a teacher for many years. I’m about to retire. The level of professionalism and the knowledge base of school librarians has really increased over the years and their jobs have expanded. I wonder if OP is asking her question because she remembers the librarian at her own childhood school not doing very much. It’s really a different situation now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It just makes me sad you would even ask this.

But that's an annoying response when the question was genuine. Can't you express your sadness AND address the question too? Surely you can elaborate your position to the OP so that he/she can understand why even daring to ask the question would evoke sadness. Otherwise, aren't you just feeding your own need to look down on someone without explanation?

[Anonymous]

The OP seemed to suggest the trade off is between library and foreign language.

I can’t imagine a language curriculum that could teach anything meaningful in a 30-45 min block once a week. Meanwhile, library lets my kids explore their very niche nonfiction favorite subjects in ways that would be impossible in a classroom library.

Librarians are also often the ones teaching digital citizenship, copyright/fair use, and will likely be on the front lines of the AI fight (what constitutes cheating in a ChatGPT world? How do you use tools appropriately while also building writing and critical thinking? How can we make students critical questioners of what they see online in an era of deep fakes?).

All of that is far more valuable to me than the marginal benefit a child would get from 1/wk language class

[Anonymous]

Once a week foreign language will do nothing. Maybe teach your child hello, goodbye and to count to ten. No disrepect to the world language teachers since they would almost certainly agree with me, but it just isn't enough time and practice to really teach a language. My middle schooler's language teacher has gone so far as to say that even though they can't officially give homework, to really have the language sink in the kids should be doing even 10min per day of review in the evenings.

Librarians and school libraries aren't just once a week in the child's life as other PPs have already documented. The librarians and library are amazing resources for the teachers. The library is a safe and welcoming place for kids. At the schools my child has attended the library is open before school and sometimes even at lunch for kids to come in and read or study.

The other reality is even though we have tremendous public libraries in Arlington and Alexandria, time is also an issue. Working parents and busy kids may have trouble getting to the public library on a regular basis, whereas having the library at school means it's available daily or at a minimum weekly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Once a week foreign language will do nothing. Maybe teach your child hello, goodbye and to count to ten. No disrepect to the world language teachers since they would almost certainly agree with me, but it just isn't enough time and practice to really teach a language. My middle schooler's language teacher has gone so far as to say that even though they can't officially give homework, to really have the language sink in the kids should be doing even 10min per day of review in the evenings.

Librarians and school libraries aren't just once a week in the child's life as other PPs have already documented. The librarians and library are amazing resources for the teachers. The library is a safe and welcoming place for kids. At the schools my child has attended the library is open before school and sometimes even at lunch for kids to come in and read or study.

The other reality is even though we have tremendous public libraries in Arlington and Alexandria, time is also an issue. Working parents and busy kids may have trouble getting to the public library on a regular basis, whereas having the library at school means it's available daily or at a minimum weekly.

Lots of people make this type of comment; but I think it's more about just not thinking about going to a library in the first place. School libraries (especially in elementary) are just "there" and incorporated into the kids' day. They don't have to think to go or choose to go. Public libraries are available; but they aren't incorporated into everyday thinking and life for most people. Like the theater. It's there; but that doesn't mean people are going to avail themselves of it, even if it's free.

[Anonymous]

Ah, yet another pre-ordained “solution” in search of a problem. OP must be a consultant who’s used to being praised for a variety of bad ideas.

[Anonymous]

What’s your plan for the library space?