We've decided to form a Family DVD Collection & are working on expanding this section. (This is been after talking with some of our church members.) How do you suggest to label these movies? Fam? All?
~ What we are doing now~
Media Type: For DVDs we label with "DVD".
Books: We use C = Child, J = Junior, Y = Youth and then the adult is not labeled with a particular letter, it's just understood.
For Kids' Books(child through Youth, except board books) :
We use F = Fiction & SC = Series Collection. Dewey Decimal Classification system is used for non-fiction. B = Biography & Bib = Bible.
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I'm trying to work out a system that should be workable in years to come. Basically, if DVDs are family friendly - they will go there. If appropriate for a particular age group, then they will be shelved with the corresponding section (Child, Junior, Youth, Adult).
We just purchased Christmas Oranges. I'd like to indicate the year produced due to duplicate performances such as with Little Women.
One possibility would be --- DVD
FAM
Chr
(2012)
OR . . . DVD
ALL
Chr
(2012) IF . . . this DVD were to be a series, I would indicate it as Chr01.
~~~~~~~~~~~What am I missing or not seeing? I was thinking of 2 categories; Factual (use DDC system) & General.
Replies
Thanks to everyone for you replies. I love to hear how others classify & categorize their libraries. It's really helped us to process how we handle things. I still need to get The Church Library Ministry Information Service as suggested by Sandra. It seems like their is so much one can buy, but I'm really looking forward to obtaining this particular source.
We now have DVDs divided into Child (C) / Junior (J) / Adult (no abbreviation) / Family (Fam).
If the DVDs are informational / comedy or any other than a movie, the DVD gets a Dewey Decimal call number.
So far DVDs that we have don't fall into the Youth category. If a DVD would be specifically for youth, than we'd designate with "Y".
Ours is pretty simple.
A movie called The Black Stallion would be
DVD
BLA (first three letters of the title, not counting THE)
A kids' veggietales would be
J
DVD
VEG
We typically go by title, or by series name if there are a lot of them, like the Veggietales.
I think this is what I'll do for our DVD Family Section:
I'll simply label them & then add a Family Sticker.
Fiction = F & B = Bioptic (is that the term we use for Biography, but it's on film? Please correct me if I'm wrong) & Factual/Documentary = DDC number.
So . . .the movie Heidi becomes . . . DVD
F
Hei
2006 plus a sticker identifying this as a Family DVD.
For a non-fiction or factual movie on DVD . . . instead of F or B I'll use the appropriate DDC System number. Also will place a Family Sticker on the spine.
We're not automated. On the check-out card I may use FAM or ALL to indicate that it's a Family DVD.
Why are you putting the 2006? You don't need that. If it is a series, you can put V.1, book 1, Chr01, or something like that- nonfiction series get classified with their dewey numbers. See if you can ask for Eva Nell Hunter as a friend- she's the true expert.
Well, Martha I think you're an expert in your own right!
Thinking through the "2006" ---
There are different versions of the same movie titles such as is the case with Heidi. The production year would quickly help to distinguish which version. Since we are not automated (maybe someday?), the due date slips sometimes covers this information on the back of the DVD case.
I was thinking that with books sometimes the year of publication is put into the call number & so that it may be appropriate for DVDs.
Thanks so much for helping me to process this. I just want to come up with a system that like you indicated won't be cumbersome or complicated, and yet will help to service our church attendees. I've been hearing out their wishes/needs and observing reading patterns as much as possible. It seems as if a Family Section for DVDs would feel a certain need for various ages & situations.
Thank you so much in "thinking out loud" with me. I want to purchase more books regarding library science when money will allow.
Update on our "Family Section" : I did not put the year on DVDs. Also, I ended up labeling a bit different than I said here. Don't know if I'm going against the "rules" or not, but here is what I did.
For Heidi DVD --
DVD
FamF = Family Fiction
Hei
If non-fiction, the 2nd line becomes "Fam + DDC Number".
I bought clear, pre-laminated dots for seasonal identification (Red Dot = Christmas) & put them on the DVD spine top.
The other Librarian and I disagreed (in a friendly way) about where to put Family type DVDs. I agreed having a separate place near the children's area. I have a "disclaimer" sign, suggesting parents/guardians to preview material.
I appreciate the "thinking out loud" with me here. I'm OK with critic of any kind. Thanks!
Okay- we use Concourse, and if you are at all thinking about automating with one of the systems out there, it would be good to stick with Dewey. You can separate them physically or stick a sticker on them to designate family etc.
1st line is the report class (what type of thing it is- book, dvd, cd, kit, board book, easy reader, etc.
For Christmas Oranges because it is fiction, I would use DVD, F, Chr (1st three letters of the title)
For something non-fiction, Use DVD, then the Dewey number classification as if it were a book (see Sears, and/or the Church Librarians reference book (the turqoise one you get from Lifeway for 10.00), and first three letters of the title. Eva Nell Hunter has a wonderful article on the main page down at the bottom on classification- she has taught this for years and has LOTS of experience. If I had a DVD on Martin Luther (either a documentary or a biopic like LUTHER- we classifiy that as a biography. DVD, B, LUT. For Juvenile/juniors- put a J. For Children's- put a C- Don't make it too complicated or you can get really bollixed up. The Church Librarians big notebook (also listed as a resource somewhere on this- try EQUIP, also has some helps on classification. This is the part I like the most.
Thank you, Martha. You are re-affirming a lot of what I'm processing mentally. Since you posted this, I'm reading through EQUIP. Unfortunately, the one article about classifying DVDs & CDs does not link anymore.
So then you would classify family DVDs into the various groups first ( Child . . Adult . . . Junior . ..) & then either apply a corresponding sticker or physically group them together? I was thinking of making Family DVDs it's own group.
AS far as buying the Church Librarian's Big Notebook, is that the same as packaged pages ("Church Library Information Service") I can buy at LifeWay? I do have the book A Classification System for Church Libraries by Morlee Maynard. It's been a wonderful resource for us -- I bought one for me & one for our head librarian.
The Church Library Ministry Information Service, updated edition, is available from LifeWay as a download. Buy it, download it and print it instantly, if you want! The updated edition has information on classifying and processing newer materials (such as DVDs, CDs, etc.). Click on the LifeWay box in the right-hand column on this page to go directly to the CL page on the website and choose the item that says "available immediately" -- it is listed at $19.99.
This update was just released in August of 2013, so it has much newer content than the earlier edition. All of the EQUIP training process is based on this updated book and articles available through this Church Librarians Network website.