Friday, May 25, 2012

The Magic 8 Ball cataloguing technique

When I was cataloguing books earlier I started thinking - where was the perfect place to put this book?
It needs to be somewhere that the book will be used, but it also needs to be the place where it should be if a teacher or student looking for that subject happened to browse the shelves. And it happened to fit into two (or possibly three) Dewey Decimal numbers. Sometimes it can be difficult to decide. Sometimes, cataloguing is an art.

Have you ever watched The Big Bang Theory? There's an episode where Sheldon decides that he will make decisions solely with a pair of dice. The dice tell him what items to choose from a menu (even though they are really weird and don't go together at all!), what kind of clothes to buy and even whether he can go to the toilet ... or not.

Depending on your point of view, this kind of decision making is pure genius, super crazy or maybe somewhere in the middle.

Watching this episode made me think of my friend's Magic 8 Ball. It was this round plastic toy which could supposedly tell you the best thing to do in any situation. You were supposed to ask a question, shake it, and then look at the little plastic window to get your reply. The answers were usually corny, things like "Signs point to yes" and "Decidedly so". Who says stuff like that? Oh yeah, Magic 8 Ball...
Everyone wanted a Magic 8 Ball - you couldn't buy them easily, only if you went overseas.
So of course, we all had to have turns using it.

Now they've made an online version. (There are lots to choose from if you'd prefer another one!)
You'll never have to think too hard about a decision again.

So, maybe I'll ask the Magic 8 Ball where to put my book. That could work, right?

Monday, May 21, 2012

Old is new again


Vintage and retro seems to have taken off on a whole new level lately. Anything old is charming.
Which is perfectly reasonable. Heaps of that stuff is awesome.

Do you remember library catalogue cards? Probably not, if you're one of our students.
But if you're older than 25, chances are you've come across them sometime in your life.

For those of you who are asking - "What is a library catalogue card?"
It used to be the way you found a book in a library. Yes, before computers.
There would be drawers full of cards, arranged in order. It took a lot more time than searching on a computer because sometimes the way that you thought of a book was not the way that the librarian thought of the book. So it would be classified by a random word that meant nothing to you. These days, that can still happen - but the computer will help by suggesting similar subjects or titles so it's so much easier. And if you spell a word wrong then hopefully the computer can correct it for you.

Now that most libraries have computerised library catalogues, the dusty old card cabinets have been replaced with shiny new computers.
People have done all kinds of interesting things with old library catalogue cards, like making books and jewellery, and using the actual card storage boxes as wine cabinets and all kinds of other things.

But the coolest library catalogue card related thing I've seen lately has to be the library catalogue card generator. You simply go online, write a bunch of things and it comes out looking... like a library catalogue card.

Make one. You know you want to.

Tuesday, May 15, 2012

“Know where to find the information and how to use it - That's the secret of success”

Today, one of our year 4 students asked me a very good question. "What's the point of doing this? Is this really library work?"

They were practicing taking notes. One of the things that a researcher might find themselves needing to do.

So what was my answer?
"Yes, great question! If you were doing some research on something, you'd make notes right? And where can you find information?"
His answer?
"Oh, ok, the library."
Sometimes younger students don't make the connection with the library and finding (and processing) information. When they are older, the ability to come to the library, find information and take notes will be very useful. Yes, there are photocopiers and printers. But still, they'll need to know how to highlight and choose appropriate facts for whatever they're studying.

Even if students don't actually come in to the physical library and stay at home instead to use online resources, the ability to strip out and digest knowledge will stand them in good stead.
Many libraries have now developed extensive online collections - especially universities.
This means potentially less students in the physical library, so they really will need to know how to do things for themselves. (Although luckily, in most of these libraries, an online librarian is only a chat window away). When today's students find themselves in the workforce, they will discover that having good research skills will give them the competitve edge.

Having worked with university students and new graduates, it's clear that many of them have not acquired sufficient information skills, and may not do so until they find themselves in the workforce and are mentored by competent researchers.
So here's hoping that some of the information finding skills we're sharing here in the library, and in the school as a whole, are enabling a whole future generation of Harrow kids to arrive at the university library (and the world) with a distinct information finding advantage.

p.s. Wondering where the title quote comes from? Hint: it's someone who was very successful.

Monday, May 7, 2012

What's in a name?

Last week there was suddenly a run of small children asking me for books with their names in them. Books where one of the characters has the same name that they do, or better still, books which have their name in the title. Finding books for children named Sophie, Olivia and Jack is easy. But it's more difficult looking for stories to suit the multitude of Thai nicknames. You can find a book which is about the subject of the nickname, but it's just not the same.

In English language children's books there are names which come up over and over. And the name of a character is important, an essential part of them which could make or break the story. Think back to a book like Where the Wild Things are. The escapades of the daring and difficult Max come to mind. What about The Tiger who came to tea? Straight away it's got me thinking about Sophie and the Tiger who drank all the water out of the taps. There's also the more recent stories of Oliver who travelled far and wide and Olivia. Lily is a name shared by two of my absolute favourites in the children's book world - the Blue Kangaroo series and Lily's plastic purple purse. When it comes to more unusual names you can find books like You'll soon grow into them, Titch.

Disney has had a lot of influence on names. Sleeping Beauty is no longer Sleeping Beauty - she's Aurora, of course! Now I know what to look for when one of the girls asks for Belle (Beauty and the Beast), Ariel (The Little Mermaid) and Tiana (The Frog Prince). They've even put out lists of baby names inspired by Disney. It will be interesting to see if authors pick up on these names too. Guess it will take a while for them to filter through though.
Baby names for girls.
Baby names for boys.
Thank you, Disney.
This has me wishing that I could read Thai. I'd love to know what the most common Thai children's book character names are. Obviously they'd be Thai names. But what would they be? Something like Namtaan or Ploy for a girl? Or Nop or Ong for boys? The most common Thai nicknames at our school are English words like Proud. So would the characters have an English nickname? And if so, how do you write that in Thai? Since I can't read Thai (and am unlikely to be able to anytime soon!) I looked up the most popular names in English language children's books... which turned out to be a really interesting thing to do.
Especially since I haven't been able to find anything conclusive yet!

It does seem that the most common names in children's books are names such as Jack and Max for boys, and Rosie and Lily (hmm, both flower names) for girls. But I don't know for sure. The names would also vary by country the book was written in, the era and circumstances around the publishing of the story... plus a range of other factors.
Hmmm... I think I feel a research project coming on!