Dry again! New Books, and College Materials

With over a month since our last post, it seemed expedient to fill everyone in on the latest. Since Fred added our flag holders and coat hooks, we have had quite a few new additions to the library. The order we placed for books and materials using our state library allocation has arrived, and we have been busy trying to get those books processed. Within the same time frame, we also received orders from YWAM publishing for some new Christian literature (including 11 biographies en espanol), hard cover fiction and non-fiction books for both the elementary and HS library rooms, and some additional biographies.

At about the same time as the new book arrivals, also came water. First, with the torrential rains we experienced there was a ceiling drip in the HS Room (A.K.A "The Red Room" so monakered for its bright red rug). That wasn't too monumental, and as it was only in one area, the water could be collected in a regular garbage pail, but it continued to drip for a few days even after the rain stopped. Less than a week later, on a weekend, I popped into the library office to find the rug becoming saturated from below. Where that water came from was a mystery to me, but all the boxes of new arrivals were moved to higher ground, the custodians were notified, and minor damage was averted. Subsequently, we are back on dry land, and it appears the ceiling leak has been stopped, and source of underground springs causing the problem in the office has been eliminated.

After consulting with Mrs. Anderson in the Guidance Office, we have reestablished the College Materials Shelf and relocated it in the highschool room. It is here that college catalogs are made available to any secondary students who are interested in looking at them.

Virtual Tour of the SCS Library

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Take a virtual tour of our library

Thanks, Fred! Video

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Thanks, Fred!

Today our library saw a few new improvements. Fred from the custodial staff came in to hang some coat hooks in the office so now Mrs. N and I both have places to hang our coats when we come in to work. Up to now, mine has been draped over the back of my office chair and my long winter coat regularly risks being run over by the wheels on the chair as it moves back and forth, and Mrs. N. has been hanging hers on the back of our extra chair. The High School Room received the addition of a flag hook, so our Christian and American flags are on proper display on the white wall.

As the weather gets colder, our High School Room has become more and more frigid and those who need to use it have been seeking other locales to hold their classes. A second space heater was added last week, and it takes a few hours, but that takes the edge off the cold, but only enough to make it comfortable if one wears a sweater or sweatshirt. Tim B. came in today to suggest another solution to our lack of heat problem: move the bookshelves in the closet that are covering the radiators. He said he can send some of the custodial staff in to help us move the heavy furniture around to make that happen. That will probably be one of our next library improvement projects.

More Wiring and Lots of Noise...

With construction comes loud sounds, and Friday our decibel level must have pegged the meter. The contractors who had come to work on getting the wiring in so that phone and Internet could follow calmly warned us that we might want to move out of the way as the sounds would be loud. I admit, their calm attitude with the statement lulled me into a sense that movement might be unnecessary (after all, I had tolerated some pretty loud noises before) so I didn't move immediately, as I wasn't expecting what came. Lisa P., preschool teacher, and I remained at the computer to use the library searcher when suddenly we were nearly paralyzed by a shrill piercing sound that came with a drill bit penetrating a concrete wall ten feet to our right. We both instinctively put our hands to our ears, but it was too late; some temporary hearing loss resulted before we could cover. It seemed amazing to me that the contractors themselves could tolerate it -- without the use of earplugs -- and I admit we both decided to exit rapidly. The worst of the noise passed quickly, but the fear of its return kept me searching for work projects that would be constructive but could be accomplished outside of the library rooms all the rest of the day. The end result of that pain was that our wiring was installed that day; no small feat. What's up next? The setting up of the phone and computers...and I have heard that should be happening shortly.

Working on the Wiring for Phone and Internet

Progress continues. Some days ago we had the workers in to drill holes for wiring and internet. I watched late one evening as they drilled and tapped on walls on both sides -- inside the library itself and in the teachers room, and boiler room which are on the west side of the elementary room.

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HS Library Under Construction -- Maximizing Use of Space in the Fiction Section

About two days ago the time came to attack the fiction section in the high school library. Our ongoing problem of having more books than shelf space needed resolving. The temporary solution: adding a small bookshelf and moving materials over beginning with the end of the alphabet (authors whose last names begin with Z) and working our way backwards while incorporating more space on each shelf in the moving process. Mrs. N worked hard on that and had some help from our faithful third grade assistants as she worked.

Biography Section -- HS Library

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Moving Furniture in the High School Room...

Friday I wasn't around SCS, as I attended a Librarian conference sponsored by CLASC, and heard authors Rob Reid, and Avi speak. Coming back today, I felt inspired to tackle what is probably the most underdeveloped area of the library -- the High School Room. Thus far, that particular space has been a partially completed area, with books mostly in place, but hard to find. Mrs. N and I spent time rearranging the biography shelves. Before today, one was near the door, another on the opposite wall near to the fiction section, and the third in the adjacent corner nearest the non-fiction. We decided it would be more intuitive to have all the biography bookshelves together leading into the corner of the room nearest the non-fiction. We spent time emptying shelves, moving bookcases, and then replacing the books on shelves. The nearly empty bookcase near the non-fiction has been moved back to its original location near the fiction books so it can be used to spread out the books on those shelves. This will allow for room to add more fiction books, and get the things that are piled on top of shelves onto the shelves.

While we were at work, some of the construction crew came in to check out the white wall for work they will need to do soon installing an airconditioning unit for the newly constructed area. Admittedly, we were a little nervous, wondering if we would be told that the bookshelves we had just moved would need to be moved again, but were told that the shelves shouldn't be in the way. With those reassurances, we will continue to work on labeling and redistributing the fiction books to make better use of our space and allow students and staff to have easier access to materials they need.

More 4th graders come to work...sprucing up the HS Room

We had an enthusiastic group of first time 4th grade workers come in today during lunch time. Cory, Juliet, Julianna, and Ashley came in to lend a hand and set to work reshelving (putting recently returned books back on the shelves), shelf reading (making sure books are in their proper places) in the Elementary Room, and putting up posters in the HS Room. Our faithful third grade regulars came in too, with newbie Daniela, and worked on getting the discards processed for the teacher cart. Which leads to the following announcement -- Teachers: we have a cart of "overstock" and newly retired books that are up for grabs if you are interested in adding to your classroom or personal/professional teaching libraries. Stop in and take a look.

The Dewey Song with 5B

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Full house...

Today was busy. We had a full house of third and fourth graders today during their lunch time. I imagine the cafeteria felt a bit empty then as these middle elementary students were all in the library. What for? You may well imagine. About a half dozen were there to help stamp books, dust with our cool brightly colored fuzzy dusters, shelve books, rearrange some materials stored on carts . Some of our regulars are Tabby, April, Emma, and Hannah. Today they were joined by Noelle. They come often, along with some of our fifth graders (see a previous post), and pitch in wherever they are needed. The rest were in to return and check out more books. I have been pleasantly surprised to see how many students are coming down during their lunch times on days in between their weekly class library time to trade the book they are finished with for a new one. What a blessing to see our students developing into such avid readers!

E-Progress

Today's library accomplishments were mostly in the electronic mediums of web page design. After an early morning donation of gently used books (thanks Mrs. F!), I got going on both the SCS library webpage on the school site, and also on the newschoolnotes.com page. The page on the SCS website requires login and password through the school website itself, but the schoolnotes page is accessible to anyone searching the web at: http://new.schoolnotes.com/SCSLibraryMediaCenter

We had a visit today from Alex and a technical advisor/visitor re: wiring needed to get our phone working and computers up and running. It appears that things are continuing to move forward toward getting our new computers set up in both the HS and Elementary Rooms so that students will be able to do OPAC searches and use computers for research. We are excited about that prospect as it will provide more computers for students to do title, author, subject and keyword searches on their own. This will foster student independence and engagement in problem solving, as well as critical thinking skills as they practice strategies on how better to find information and materials of interest to them.

rearranging things in the office

The former "book nook" now serves as an office and storage space for the library. In order to utilize space more efficiently, Mrs. N. and I spent some time today rearranging furniture. Once we got the go ahead to leave the old bookshelves in place (turns out they shouldn't be a fire hazard after all) we tried to move the black file cabinet to a new location...tried that is until we found it pretty much unmoveable. Combination of weight and friction against the carpet caused me to rethink the idea and opt to move the lighter beige cabinet instead. We now have the photocopier plugged in in the office between the door and the hefty black cabinet. More than a few dust bunnies were uncovered when we moved the cabinets around requiring a little vacuum cleaner action. The space is now much cleaner and provides easier access for those passing through to the High School Room, as well as for getting things from the shelves or cabinets in the west end of the room.

Authors We Know Wall for K-2nd grades/The Hobbit Projects by 8th graders

Had some help yesterday with a new feature specifically targeting K-2nd graders: the "Authors We Know" wall. Right over the pillows we have begun a bulletin board that will develop as the year progresses. It will list all the authors that we study in library for K-2nd grades as well as the authors they are studying in their classes. Fifth graders Julianna, Isabelle, Emily, Kristina, and Ashley did the coloring and mounting of the authors and center bubble for our "web" (graphic organizer where ideas relating to a topic are placed in circles surrounding the bubble with the main topic). Great job, girls!

Mrs. Whitehorn's 8th graders are reading "The Hobbit" and created some fabulous projects. Several of these are in the process of being displayed on the white wall at the back of the High School Room where they will be showcased for a season to add some warmth, texture and color. Terrific work by Damaris, Jordan, and Virginia!

New Developments

It was another cold day in the SCS library. I was warned that that space gets very hot, but so far it has been quite the opposite. To make it a little more comfortable for the resource students who have class in there, I brought a little space heater from home. Mrs. N(unez) and I wondered aloud if perhaps the uncovering of some previously undiscovered upper vents affected something with the heating unit. It is also possible that our white wall, which now is an outside wall is not so well insulated and may be giving us greater exposure to the elements. The radiator in the Elementary Room was working...and stirred me to make some furniture moves in order to get the pillows away from it. The computer nearest to the door is now in the HS Library Room (not hooked up, but physically in that space on the white wall) and the doggie bed with pillows moved into the corner. The two rugs nearest the door also were moved closer to the doggie bed and the easel, chair, guitar and a/c unit were reshuffled and placed again behind the door.

In the center of the Elementary Room, there was a photocopier next to the printer on the old card catalog. The copier was moved to free up a working surface for those of us who do the circulation. The copier is now in the office, awaiting another furniture reshuffle so that it can be plugged in there. Most of the wall space in the office is covered from the floor up by furniture so we had to do some crawling under the desk and looking behind things with a flashlight before the much sought out electrical outlet was discovered...hiding behind the big black file cabinet to the right of the doorway. Another curious discovery was the radiator behind a wall of bookshelves in the office. We are not plugging the copier in until we are sure we have all the furniture arranged in the most efficient and safe configuration.

Latest developments...walking into the library

Since the end of August, much has been happening in the library space. Those of you who have been around for a few years will remember that the current library space consists of half the old library and the entire HS art room. As you pass the library door and walk into the elementary room of the library, you immediately face sturdy wooden shelves that rise to the ceiling bearing Christian literature and missionary biographies. The shelving units are stacked two high, and books reside on the lower of the two units only as the upper shelves are too high for our elementary patrons. The 5x8' green rug that met the door is still there, but another rug matches up to its edge to expand the carpeted area to 5 x 16' and allows students a place to sit. In lieu of the tables that are temporarily in storage because of our reduced space, it is this area that is now used as a learning area. Looking left, and behind the door, one finds a black teacher chair and newly assembled teaching easel (one of Library Assistant Mrs. Nunez' and my greatest challenges and most significant accomplishments of this day), shelves with some teaching materials on them, a guitar, and portable airconditioner.

As one looks to the right, it is apparent that some furniture has been removed...a desk, typewriter, and bookshelf no longer reside in the corner. Instead, some more space has been opened up for our students to sit. One computer with an adult sized chair still sits on/near the cart the typewriter was on, and is awaiting a new home in another part of the room.

The shelves that are immediately to the left of the computer hold fiction books, and are topped by our Terrific Token jars (more about these later). The wall that the door is on also has a new addition: The "Books We Recommend" bulletin board.

It is this area that immediately greets the visitor to the SCS Library. What comes next? That will be the subject of our next post.