We are in the process of revitalizing and reorganizng our small church libary. I would like to break down the categories on the children's shelf. The children's books all fit in one tall bookcase that has six shelves. There are books ranging from picture books to a very small selection specifically for teens. The problem is between these two sections because of the range of reading levels amongst our young people. There are some books at the lower levels that are difficult for some upper elementary aged children. There are also books at the highest level that are easy for some primary school aged children. I don't want to label the whole section children because then all the books might be overlooked by an advanced reader as well as teens who think that the children's section doesn't include their age group when some of those books are actually at their reading level. I am thinking about using three labels: Picture Books; Youth; and Teens. But then I run into the problem that Youth is associated with the teen age bracket at our church. Another idea would be to put one label at the top of the shelf that states: Children and Teens. Does anyone have ideas or suggestions?
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We have 3 categories: Children, Juvenile, and Youth. Within Children, most of the hard cover picture style books are shelved by author. We also have shelves of C# which includes non-fiction childrens books (generally shelved by Dewey). Our paperback books tend to get lost on the shelves, so while they are labeled the same as the other Children's fiction books, we have paperback books in baskets. We don't try to shelve them or keep them in order. Children and parents that are new to the library can browse the basket without stressing about what to do with a book once they pull it off the shelf. We also have baskets for board books with the same idea. Parents can sit their toddlers and preschoolers with a basket of board books while they browse. Juvenile fiction, for us, is beginner and intermediate chapter books, no matter the age. Youth is more advanced chapter books. We go round and round sometimes with Juvenile and Youth levels, often labeling and relabeling books to find the best fit. We might put them in Juvenile (generally because they are listed as Juvenile) only to find the reading level is higher or the subject matter is more advanced. Absolutely, if we find that the subject matter is more advanced, it definitely goes on the youth shelves. That's not to say that we have anything that shouldn't be on a church library shelf, but subjects where a person dies or the fight scenes are more intense, get put in youth. We have found that about the age that children get their first phone, the number of books they are checking out drops, meaning that our youth section doesn't get used as much. Also, if a teen is advanced enough for our youth books, they automatically are attracted to the adult fiction section. All three sections are around a sitting area and close to each other so children and parents are free to find their own reading level. Some children move to chapter books quickly while others are take longer. We also keep a list of great books for read aloud and occasionally do a "Read Aloud" display. There are wonderful books like, Honey for a Child's Heart and The Read Aloud Family (in our parenting section) that help with displays and help families find great titles. We have two more sections under Juvenile: Juvenile/Youth for non-fiction (J#) and Juvenile/Youth biographies (JB). We clump those together because they are small (but growing) sections. We find that these sections get used especially by homeschool families. Some of this was developed before our current team started working in the library. We play with it some, but it generally seems to work.
There are about 500 books in the children's section of our church library. It is used weekly by the K-4 school. I am not there but a couple of hours a week, and unfortunately not usually when the classes come, and it is impossible to keep those books in shelf order all the time. What has worked for us was to identify each book as EASY, CHILDREN, JUNIOR AND YOUNG ADULT...generally broken down as Pre-K, K to 5th grade, 6th to 8th grade, 9th to 12th grade. Then further identified by Dewey number and Fiction. This sets up basically 8 categories. Then I used a different color label protector for each group. This has allowed the aide that brings the children to library each week to direct them to an appropriate section which is easily identified by color. It also allows the books to be put back on the shelf, even if not in proper shelf order, so the kids can find books in their reading range. Not perfect but it has worked for about 15 years. This year the new school administrator is pushing the Accelerated Reading program which has added another layer to the system. With some help I am identifying which books we currently have that are AR. I am currently looking up the AR info for each book at home and creating labels with Reading Level, Point Value and Test Number to be attached to the back of the book and placing a small green dot on the spine of each AR identified book. This is going to make it easier for them to find the AR titles within their Reading levels. It is a real time saver for the aide as they only have about 25 minutes when they come to the library. There are certainly challenges to trying to run a library, even a small church library, on very limited time frame on a volunteer basis with other volunteers helping very sporadically, especially since my time is very limited. This setup is certainly not the way I ran my public school library for 15 years! But it will have to do unless they want to fund a full-time librarian. Hope this gives someone else ideas as to what they might do.
We have different sections for each of those three categories.
Picture books have a spine label that says JE and then the first three letters of the author's name. They are shelved on lower shelves so little people can look at them.
Chapter books for children who can read well are labeled J FIC and the first three letters of the author's name. If they are non-fiction, they have a Dewey number instead of FIC.
Books for teens are labeled YA FIC and first three letters of author's name. Non-fiction for them have a Dewey number instead of FIC.
We also shelve separately the Easy Readers; their spine label says ER plus first three letters of author's name.
As picture books became more sophisticated we began classifying all books for children and youth as J for juvenile. So there is JB, JF, and non-fiction with a J prefix. We put a red dot on very easy picture books, have separate shelves for juvenile chaper books and another for graphic novels. We label the shelves so that folks know where to look for a particular kind of book.
Geneva Pope
We use 3/4" dots on the spine, just below the label. Green for picture books and Easy Readers and easy chapter books. No dot for middle grade and neon green for Teen. They are not interfiled. We use the dots for fiction and non-fiction. The Teens hace 2 shelves placed outside the youth section next to the Adult fiction shelves.
Also, re' dots, we use fluorescent orange on the spines on Large Print books in the Adult fiction and non-fiction. Very easy to pick out.
Looking at my comment... that should be the teens have 2 bookshelves, not just 2 shelves.