At the Pasadena Conference of the A. L. A. in 1911, Miss Gertrude
Andrus led a discussion on library work in summer playgrounds, in
which she considered some simple methods of administration.
Gertrude Elisabeth Andrus was born in Buffalo, N. Y., acted as an
assistant in the Buffalo Public Library in 1900-1901; was a
student in the Training School for Children's Librarians in
Pittsburgh from 1902 to 1904; children's librarian in the
Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh from 1903 to 1908, and since that
time has been head of the children's department in the Seattle
Public Library.
The library in a summer playground serves a double purpose; it
supplies books in a district not otherwise reached by the library
and it acts as a lure to the use of the main library. If the
books are attractive, the children will follow them to the main
library and thus become permanent borrowers. So it is plain that
the books we place in our summer playgrounds must be of the most
popular type. Easy books, picture books, fairy tales, stories,
histories, books of travel, and books on games and manual arts
are the ones most in demand. A knowledge of the district in which
the playground is located is also necessary. If the children have
a school library and are accustomed to reading, the books sent to
the playground will differ from the kind sent to one in a foreign
district where little reading has been done.
As the library room is invariably used for other work on other
days, the books must be locked up. A satisfactory solution of
this is a built-in bookcase with adjustable doors which may
easily be lifted from their sockets and set aside when access to
the books is desired, and may be replaced and padlocked when the
day's work is done. The arrangement of the room and the charging
desk should always be made so that the exit can be very carefully
supervised.
In order to conserve our time so that we may have leisure to give
attention to individual children, we must arrange to have the
mechanical part of the work as systematic as possible. Playground
library work is a life of stress and strain. Everything comes in
rushes. There is always a mad dash for the door as soon as the
library is opened, for each child is sure that unless he is the
first he will miss the good book that he is convinced is there.
This rush of course makes it difficult to discharge the books,
slip them, shelve them, and at the same time charge the ones the
children have selected, to say nothing of helping the children in
their choice. We have therefore found it best to collect the
books beforehand, discharge them and distribute the cards among
the children before opening the library doors. When the Newark
system is used, however, and a child has drawn two books, this
may result in considerable confusion, for the books may be
separated and one may not be sure that both charges on the card
should be cancelled. When our first playground library in Seattle
opened, we used the Browne system of charging and this proved so
satisfactory that we have continued to use it in the others.
According to this method, each borrower receives two cards. When
a book is borrowed, the book slip is drawn and put with one of
the borrower's cards in a small envelope. It is readily seen how
easy it is to avoid complications when the books are gathered
before the opening of the library, for the slip of each one is
with the borrower's card, and if the borrower returns no book, no
card is given him. After the books are discharged and shelved and
the cards distributed, the children are admitted. In this way
much of the confusion incident to opening is eliminated and more
time is secured to help the children make their choice.
In order that the care of the books may not interfere with the
children's play, we have devised a checking system by means of
which the children may leave their books in charge of the
librarian until they are ready to go home. This not only allows
the children freedom in play but obviates the possibility of loss
of books through their being left on benches and swings. The
playground is a place of freedom and fun and good fellowship, and
the library's rules should be made as inconspicuous as possible.
The librarian should be not only willing, but anxious to enter
into the life of the playground as far as her duties permit. One
way in which she will be able to make herself popular not only
with the children but with the instructors is by means of story
telling. Joseph Lee says that story telling is the only passive
occupation permissible on a playground and the librarian thus
finds her work ready to her hand. She is able to advertise her
books, make friends with the children is a most effective way,
and at the same time relieve the playground instructor of a duty
which is sometimes found irksome.
She must remember that she is an integral part of that
playground, not a weekly visitor, and she must throw herself into
the interests and activities of the children with all the
enthusiasm at her command.
THE SELECTION OF BOOKS FOR SUNDAY SCHOOL LIBRARIES AND THEIR
INTRODUCTION TO CHILDREN
In the following article taken from the Library Journal of
October, 1882, Mr. S. S. Green says that his "principal object is
to show how books are selected and how children are interested in
books in the Sunday-school in which I am a teacher." It is
interesting to know that in a recent letter written to the editor
in regard to the use of this article Mr. Green says: "As I read
it over, it seems to me that the advice given in it is still much
needed." Samuel Swett Green was born in Worcester in 1837, and
was graduated from Harvard in 1858. In 1890 he was appointed by
the Governor of Massachusetts an original member of the Free
Public Library Commission. He was one of the founders of the A.
L. A., and also a life member, and was chosen its president in
1891. From 1867 to 1871 he was a trustee of the Worcester Public
Library, and he was librarian from 1871 to 1909, when he was made
librarian emeritus. Mr. Green has published several books on
library subjects.
It is gratifying to notice that the movement started several
years ago by certain ladies connected with the religious body
known as Unitarian Congregationalists, who organized themselves
under the name of the Ladies' Commission for the purpose of
reading children's books and preparing lists of them suitable for
Sunday-school libraries, has led within two or three years to the
formation of a similar organization in the Protestent Episcopal
Church, and more recently to that of one among Orthodox
Congregationalists.
Individual clergymen and others have also lately shown a great
interest in the work of selecting and disseminating good lists of
books suitable for Sunday-school libraries.
It is unnecessary to say that it was high time that this work was
entered upon earnestly. The officers of the more intelligently
administered public libraries had come to reject, almost without
examination, books prepared especially for the use of
Sunday-schools, and without consideration to refuse works
admission to their shelves issued by certain publishers whose
business it was to provide for the wants of Sunday-school
libraries.
It had become obvious, among other facts, that the same
objections that were made to providing sensational stories for
boys and girls in public libraries, lay equally against the
provision of books usually placed in Sunday-school libraries.
The one class of books was generally moral in tone, but trashy in
its representations of real life; the other, religious in tone,
but equally trashy in its presentations of pictures of what
purported to be the life of boys and girls.
Both classes of books were good in their intention, both
similarly unwholesome.
Gratifying, however, as are the results of this movement, there
is something more that needs to be done. Libraries must be
purified from objectionable literature; new books must be
properly selected; but after this kind of work has been done, a
very important work remains to be attended to, namely, that of
helping children to find out the books in the library that will
interest them and pleasantly instruct them. Every child should be
aided to get books suited to its age, its immediate interests,
and its needs.
The Library Journal, in its number for June gave the title of a
catalogue of the books in the Sunday-school library of the
Unitarian church in Winchester, Massachusetts. In this catalogue
short notes are added to the titles of some of the books to show,
when the titles do not give information enough, what subjects are
really treated of in the books annotated.
Something beside this is desirable, however. Children need much
personal aid in selecting books.
I have been conservant of the work of a minister who, about a
year since, after examining carefully all the books in the
Sunday-school library of his church, and after taking out such
volumes as he considered particularly objectionable and adding
others which he knew to be good, set himself the task of talking
with the children of his school about their reading. The school
has a superintendent, but he, as minister, also takes an interest
in it and has spent the time he has given to it, recently, in
talking with the children, one at a time, about books, finding
out from them their tastes and what they had been reading, and
recommending to them wholesome books to read and interesting
lines of investigation to pursue.
My principal object in writing this article is to show how books
are selected and how children are interested in books in the
Sunday-school in which I am a teacher. It seems to me that its
methods are wise and worthy of being followed elsewhere. The
Sunday-school referred to is that connected with the Second
Congregational (1st Unitarian) Church in Worcester,
Massachusetts.
Thirteen or fourteen years ago the library of this Sunday- school
was carefully examined and weeded. Every book was read by
competent persons, and the poorest books were put out of the
library. This weeding process has gone on year by year; as new
books have been added others not representing a high standard of
merit have been removed from the shelves. Great care has been
taken to examine conscientiously new books before putting them
into the library. The result is that the Sunday- school now has
an excellent library. It has found the catalogue of the Ladies'
Commission of great aid in making selections, but has not found
all the books recommended in it adapted to its purposes. A
competent committee has always read the books recommended by the
Commission, so as to make sure that such volumes only were
selected as would meet the actual needs of the Sunday-school we
have to provide for.
Books are now bought as published. A contribution of about a
hundred dollars is taken up annually. This money is put into the
hands of the Treasurer of the Library Committee, and the
sub-committee on purchases get from a book-store such books as it
seems probable will answer our purposes, read them carefully, and
buy such as prove desirable. The sub-committee consists of two
highly cultivated young ladies. When they have selected two or
three books they make notes of their contents. The books are then
placed on a table in the minister's room, and the superintendent
of the school calls attention to them--reading to scholars a
short description of each book prepared by the sub-committee, and
inviting the scholars to examine the books after the close of the
current session of the school or before the opening of the school
the following Sunday. After these two opportunities have been
given to the children to look at the books and handle them, they
are put into the library and are ready to be taken out.
This sub-committee has taken another important step within a year
or two. The members have read over again all the books in the
library and made notes descriptive of their contents, and the
school has elected one of the ladies as consulting librarian. She
sits at a little table in the school-room during the sessions of
the school, and with her notes before her receives every teacher
or scholar who wishes to consult about the selection of a book,
and gives whatever assistance is asked for in picking out
interesting and suitable books.
She is kept very busy and is doing a work of great value.
It is gratifying to me to find that this work of bringing the
librarian into personal contact with readers and of establishing
pleasant personal relations between them, which has been so
fruitful in good results in the public library under my charge in
Worcester, has been extended to Sunday-school work with so much
success.