Glass half full or half empty?

There has been a lot of talk recently in library circles about ebrary's "2011 Global Student E-book Survey". News of the results have been coming out in bits and pieces for several months now. You can find a good summary at the No Shelf Required blog. Reactions to the results vary from--"kids don't like ebooks" to "Why bother with social media when kids don't use it for research?"--but the results don't seem to justify the reactions. O.K., so 41% of the students in the survey are currently using social media for research or study, while 59% are not. Before we start pointing out the almost 20-point difference between the two groups, we might pause to marvel that 2 out of 5 students are already using it.

For some reason many adults, including librarians and teachers, want to downplay the changes being made by ebooks and new forms of information searching. You can almost hear the sigh of relief from the media when they are able to report that teenagers aren't really crazy about new media. Surveys that give us a snapshot of a specific point in time will never give a complete picture of how people are moving. The important thing to watch is the trend over time. Reading on digital devices hasn't swept the country quite as quickly as is often predicted in Silicon Valley, but it is slowly and surely creeping into public consciousness. Considering how much bad publicity social media has received in recent months over privacy issues and lurid stories of bullying, it is surprising that so many students are intereted in using it intensely. Instead of bouncing back and forth between hailing innovations as saviors of education and denouncing them as dangers and frauds, librarians and other adults ought to concentrate on helping students learn to use all these new tools to share information and insights. They are terrific ways to collaborate with students all over the world and learn more than past generations ever could about what life is really like out there. Percentages don't matter nearly as much as the people behind them who are quietly going about their business of investigating the world they live in.

Pointing the Way for Parents

With picture book apps multiplying like the kittens in Wanda Gag's "Millions of Cats" parents, as well as librarians, are wondering how to choose the best of them. There are reviews in some of the journals including School Library Journal, which are helpful but many reviews are appearing in blogs. Helping parents to find reviews that can help them is not always easy. Recently I came across a useful blog that suggests ways of using apps with children as well as linking to reviews. The Digital Media Diet is an active blog that offers articles on using blogs as well as purchasing them. A recent blog post for parents describes how volunteering in your child's school can be enriched through the use of apps for early literacy. The blog also links to many review sources for children's apps such as Great Kid Books and many others. Why not introduce the parents in your library to some of these useful and convenient guides in the confusing world of children's apps. You'll be doing a favor to them and to their children.

Is this the school of the future?

Providing computers to elementary and high school students is not a new idea. It’s been discussed and experimented with for ten years or more, but now we have a chance to look at some of the results. The school district in East Mooresville, North Carolina, issued a laptop to each of their students three years ago. Since they the district has worked out a model of teaching allowing students to progress at their own rate with the help and supervision of teachers. Some of the kids, according to a N.Y. Times article on the schools describe this as “like having a personal tutor”. Scores for students have moved upward and so have graduation rates for high school students. The schools are almost overwhelmed by educators from around the country who want to observe this success in action.

What does this have to do with librarians? Well, it strikes me that this school is educating students in a way that is a lot like the way a library works. Children’s libraries, whether in schools or public libraries, operate on an individualized learning model. Libraries make resources available, help children to choose appropriate ones, and provide the guidance to use resources effectively (although budget cuts have made it difficult for many librarians to interact individually with patrons, but that’s another story). The model provided in libraries has proven to be effective in schools. The laptops aren’t the real story—the provision of individualized attention and support are what matter. Even if the results at the Mooresville schools prove not quite as great as they now seem to be, their success during these years is a vindication of the idea of libraries.

Public libraries, ever since their beginnings, have been an ideal setting for individuals educating themselves with the help of public resources. Now schools too are discovering that in a world where people can be overwhelmed by a deluge of information, children need to learn how to steer a path toward educating themselves. It is a great time for libraries to partner with schools to discover the best ways to help in this endeavor.

Bring on the e-readers

There’s been a lot of hype lately about how ebooks are being used in schools and libraries for children and adults. Ebooks are popular, and some children as well as adults say they prefer reading ebooks to reading print. Librarians, always eager for anything that increases the love of reading, would like to increase their collections. But what can we do for children who don’t have e-readers? Even though these devices have become more and more popular, they are by no means universal. Some libraries manage with a Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) but that penalizes parents who cannot or prefer not to buy e-readers, and the policy opens the possibility of teasing and competition among the children.

The preferred solution for most libraries is to buy devices and make them available to children either in the library or to borrow. A report in School Library Journal gives a round-up of the possibilities and problems in buying Kindles, iPads, and other reading devices in children’s libraries. Even setting aside the expense, which can sometimes be covered by donations or grant money, there are complications. The companies that produce e-readers have aimed their devices at consumers not libraries. Books are designed to be used on only one device at a time. Vendors are not always prepared to handle agreements for purchasing multiple copies of ebooks. For classroom use, the devices have to be synched so each child is looking at the same book and this is a problem.

There are far more questions than answers to the many problems in providing ebook collections and e-readers in children’s libraries, but patrons want them and librarians are going to have to work with publishers and vendors to figure out ways of providing access. Libraries and schools are large purchasers of books and should have some leverage in getting publishers to move more quickly to move to digital books. The purchase of the devices, administration of collections, availability of titles wanted, integration of catalogs, and the high costs involved are barriers. This is the kind of problem that professional associations are designed to work out. It’s time for librarians, individually and in groups, to pressure publishers and others in the business to confront these issues and provide answers. The children can’t do it by themselves, so this is a time to step up our advocacy and speak out for the young people in our schools and libraries.

Who knows about the awards?

The highlight of the American Library Association’s Midwinter meeting for children’s librarians every year is the annual awards ceremonies. The ceremony is always held early in the morning in front of a packed room full of conference-weary attendees,who wait hopefully for the announcements. Many libraries hold mock-Newbery events prior to the conference in which staff and patrons can vote on the books they think should be awarded the Newbery Medal, so everyone has a stake in the outcome. The ALA awards are the most prestigious award childrens books can get in America. This year’s event happened this week in Dallas, Texas.

News of the winners of the award spreads quickly throughout libraryland. If you haven’t heard, then check these books out. Jack Gantos won the Newbery Medal for his novel Dead End in Norvelt and Chris Raschka won the Caldecott award for the best children’s book illustrations for his wordless picture book A Ball for Daisy.

Normally publicity about the award would spread quickly in print and on TV. The New York Times and other mainstream papers carried stories about the winners. As the Publishers Weekly pointed out however, the usually reliable Today show on NBC did not interview the winners. PW sounds a bitter note about how children’s literature is undervalued and many of us will agree. Parents are often the last people to learn about the medal winners, yet many of them like to buy good books for children’s birthdays or take them out of the library for children. Lots more parents watch TV than read the print newspapers. It is a shame that important new children’s books are not being publicized on the shows that people watch.

Perhaps it’s time for librarians, teachers, and others who care about books for children to write to NBC and the other networks and tell them what they are missing. If we are going to keep children reading and writers and illustrators producing great books for them, we have to urge the media to publicize the best that is being produced. In the meantime we can publicize the books in our libraries and on our Facebook pages and Tweets. Let's make our voices heard in support of children's books and reading!

Will teachers write their own textbooks?

The online world has been full of discussion these past few days over the release of Apple’s new authoring tool for e-textbooks. If you want to see the sunny, Apple version of what is being offered, go to their website and watch the video. I’ve downloaded the software and tried using it myself and it’s one of those programs that’s a pleasure to use. Input is easy for images, links, videos and presumably other media. I would advise any librarian who has a Mac and an iPad to download it and try it out. But, of course, there is a catch.

Despite Apple’s claim that the software will revolutionize textbooks in classrooms, there are many difficulties in its way. The most important is the expense of providing iPads for all students in a school. What are librarians and teachers going to do about the proliferation of valuable material that can only be accessed through expensive devices? Some schools and many libraries have a BYOD policy of “Bring Your Own Device” and that may work in some situations. It’s not likely to be accepted in many communities where almost none of the families can afford to buy an iPad, much less providing one for each child in the family. And school districts, struggling to pay for paper and pencils, are unlikely to be able to supply and maintain enough of these devices to satisfy classroom needs.

There is another problem, and that is the authors’ and publishers’ rights to sell their materials through any outlet they choose. Anyone who develops content in ibooks/author program has to agree to sell only through Apple. Several commentators have pointed out the ramifications of this, including the Huffington Post.

Does this mean that public institutions like schools and libraries should avoid supplying these products? It’s seems to me there is a useful place for this program right now while we are still waiting for possible legal challenges to the restrictions Apple is placing on it.

The exception to Apple’s tight hold on the materials produced is for anything that is given free to users. Wouldn’t an ibooks/authors presentation of lessons or instructions be useful for many purposes? A teacher could put her lesson about California Missions into a small package including text, illustrations, perhaps a video and provide it on the school library webpage. Or a librarian could format a lesson of library instruction and make it available on the same webpage. These are materials that are routinely offered free to library patrons and students. Because Apple exempts the free distributions of materials developed in its author program, there would be no conflict in developing these. And think how you would impress the tweens and teens who come to the library and use it.

More video in the library

One of the websites most often blocked in school libraries is YouTube, yet this is one of the most popular sites for both children and adults. It offers videos that can be great resources for school projects and class presentations. And YouTube is working hard to tailor the site for specific audiences. A recent article in School Library Journal reports on the YouTube school site that offers a collection of educational videos for elementary and high school students. The site offers a wide range of videos that can easily be incorporated into classroom lessons. They can also be used by individual students either in the school library or public libraries. Yet still the fear of school authorities for allowing students free access continues to block this asset from many schools. As SLJ reports, many school librarians have been told they may not use this resource in their school. Instead of being allowed to see these videos from a safe site at school, they will have to go home and look them up on the general YouTube site where they may discover exactly the content some parents and teachers don't want them to see. When will we learn that we cannot restrict children today to the narrow confines of information they had access to in years past? Librarians should work hard to make appropriate sites like YouTube/Schools available to all children in school and public libraries. An access policy based on fear does not serve our children well.

In an age of streaming visual content, YouTube has carved a niche for itself which grows bigger year by year. To understand this phenomenon, take a look at John Seabrook's article in the New Yorker which details the way YouTube was started, how it has grown and where it is heading. The future may not be exactly as planned, but it looks certain that YouTube has a future and parents, teachers and librarians had better prepare to make the most of it instead of futilely trying to keep it away from children.

Libraries save us from piracy?

One of Publisher Weekly's most dynamic blogs, the PWxyz blog has called attention to something that often gets lost in the discussion about SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) and other discussions about the right of individuals to access content. Besides being technically unwieldly and probably unworkable, SOPA deprives people of the right to find out about digital content they might otherwise not encounter. For more than a century public libraries have served to let people find books, magazines, and other content they either never heard about or cannot afford to purchase. Most people learn to love a book or an author by reading material borrowed from a library--or sometimes from a friend. Reading it once, or listening to music once, isn't always enough, so library borrowers turn into buyers. That's been happening with books all these years and it can happen to ebooks too. Most people are willing to pay a reasonable amount of money to purchase material they want to keep as long as buying it is made convenient. Instead of helping libraries by allowing them to lend ebooks to their cardholders, many publishers have worked to restrict lending. Somehow they believe the model that has worked for a century and more in developing devoted readers won't work any more. Instead of trying to restrict use, publishers ought to work with libraries to enable more people access to both print and digital content. Readers, authors, and publishers all benefit from having a community invested in producing and consuming artistic content. Let's call for sanity instead of SOPA.

New twelve-step program for children's librarians

If you or your colleagues are suffering a bit of post-holiday letdown and back-to-work blahs, you may want to consider some changes that can energize the way you work. Instead of the same-old, same-old routine of familiar picture books for storytimes and lackluster class visits, resolve to try a few new tricks in 2012. Here are twelve suggestions for ways to make your services more interactive and exciting for children and librarians alike. Take advantage of all the new gadgets many children found under the Christmas tree this year. Welcome apps into your library; let children write blog posts on their smartphones and laptops; start using Facebook to tell the world about your library as well as your friends and causes. Here are twelve ideas—one for every month of the new year. Try them and see how you can chase away the doldrums.

Twelve Resolutions for 2012

1. Evaluate one new children’s app every week. Encourage others in your department to do the same.

2. Plan to attend one new conference, workshop or webinar this year—get your request for funding and time off in early to avoid disappointment.

3. Set up an advisory group of tweens or teens who are frequent library users. Take their suggestions seriously.

4. Start a work journal—at the end of every day (or the beginning of the next one) jot down what tasks you worked on, what you accomplished, a new idea that came to you. Keep the notes to use for annual reports or grant proposals.

5. Feature at least one graphic novel in every book display you mount in your library or on your website

6. Contribute an item about children’s services to the library’s Facebook page at least once a month

7. Volunteer for a committee of your state or national library association

8. Practice taking pictures with your smartphone or camera so you can document your programs or materials (Don’t forget to get parental permission before posting kid’s photos online.)

9. Contact your local PTA and try to speak to a group of parents at least once each semester—preferably at the beginning of the school term.

10. Exchange visits with other libraries in your region—once a month or once a season see what other children’s librarians in your area are doing.

11. Make your summer reading program an interactive experience by setting up a blog for middle-grade participants.

12. Open a twitter account and tweet about what your library is doing. Follow as many other children’s librarians as you can find.

Making the Most of the Neglected Years

Occasionally an article appears in a newspaper or journal that appears to have little connection with libraries or education but which, on second thought, offers insights into children’s services. The NY Times published a piece this week about how scientists are turning their attention to changes in children during the middle childhood period of 5 or 6 to 10 or 11 years of age. These crucial years, before the turmoil of adolescence are a time when children’s brains are becoming more adult-like. Almost all societies offer special roles to children as they enter middle childhood and become capable of taking responsibility for adult-like tasks. In many pastoral societies, young girls are given the responsibility of caring for younger siblings, in some communities they learn to prepare family meals; boys learn to watch flocks and tend livestock or they learn the rudiments of hunting. In Western societies there is no comparable assigning of tasks. Few families expect 7 or 8-year-olds to babysit or help much in the house or garden. The acknowledgement of a child’s growing maturity at this time is marked by starting school and learning the developmental tasks of highly-developed societies—learning to read, to calculate, and to understand the tools we depend on in our daily life. All teachers, librarians, and parents acknowledge the importance of school in our culture and especially the importance of learning to read, but for the most part we don’t think about school as an introduction to adult work. All too often school is thought of as an interlude—a chance to get children cared for during the day and keeping them out of mischief. The tasks of school are often considered artificial lessons that must be mastered in order to pass tests and achieve recognition.

The scientists who study middle childhood have noted that these years are the time when children begin to be noticed and brought into society. In infancy and early childhood, in many cultural settings, babies and children are almost ignored. Sometimes they are not even given names until they reach the middle childhood years of becoming useful. No other creature has the long, extended growing-up period that human children have, and of course the period has become more prolonged as human work has become more complex. Perhaps it would be useful for more of us to think about the wonderful period of middle childhood when, with a brain grown to adult size, children are poised to learn more quickly and easily than they will during other periods of life. School age children are ready to be challenged with new tasks, new knowledge and new insight into other people. Most librarians have noticed that these middle-childhood years often coincide with a greater interest in reading than most people will have in later life. These are the years when we should offer children a rich and varied diet of books and other media that will stimulate their imagination and also give them a grounding in the realities of the world around them. All too often libraries become so fascinating by the joys of picture books and storytimes for toddlers that the slightly older school aged children are neglected. We are lucky that scientists are pointing out the importance of this life stage and as librarians and teachers we should take advantage of some of the new insights to offer the best we have to children starting their years of adult responsibility.