Addison Public Library

Where Are the Princess Books?

Illinois Library Association Annual ConferenceOctober 10, 2012

Child-Friendly Organization of Picture Books

at the Addison Public Library

Speakers

Mary G. Marshall Assistant Director/Head of Children’s Services

Addison Public Library

marshall@addisonlibrary.org

Brooke Sievers Head of Technical Services

Addison Public Library

sievers@addisonlibrary.org

Celebrate the Idea?

Or Worry that We’ll be Fired?

Reorganization of Our Picture Book

Collection

The Marathon:

Our Library & Collections Picture Book Collection: 12,500 items Completed weeding & adding RFID Tags August 2011 Picture books shelved on standard shelving, not in bins

Why Would We Do This?

Child & Adult Friendly Visual & Browsable Intuitive Discover similar books to

favorites Increase circulation

Ready!Preparing for the Project

For Your Consideration Where will you edit call numbers

for multiple items on same bib? Who has final say on the call

number? Who decides when a new

category needs to be added? What’s the criteria?

How will you communicate to everyone involved in the project that new categories were created?

Where to start? Which books will be in high demand with school or holidays?

How will you shelve the books without using bin shelving?

How will you make the collection available to the public during the conversion?

How will you process the collection with new call numbers?

How will you complete this project while the Library is open?

How will you purchase or create signage?

More For Your Consideration

HOW???

Set: Planning

What to Consider When Creating the Classification List

Approximately how many books might be in each category?

How will you create classification subjects within limitations of length of call numbers?

How will you create classification subjects that can be used to create lists (for example, using “jEASY” in Millennium)

How will you limit call numbers for printing (8-11 characters)

Creating Classification Lists

Created classification lists, using as a starting point subject lists created by Darien, CT and Indian Prairie (Darien, IL)

Worked on drafts (more than 7 drafts) of the classification (Two children’s staff members consulting with the Head of Technical Services)

Created lists to determine approximately how many books we might have in each category

Classification Draft #1September 2011

Classification Draft #2

Animals Basics Go,Go,Go! Holidays Me Nature PeopleAfrican 123 Boats 100th Bath Fall BabyBears ABC Cars Christmas Bedtime Gardens CowboysBirds Colors More (multiple topics) Easter Body More DadBugs Concepts Planes Halloween Clothes Sky FamilyCats Opposites Trains Jewish Fear Spring FriendsCows Shapes Trucks More Feelings Summer GrandparentsDinosaurs Time Islamic Firstday Trees HelpersDogs St.Patrick's Growing Water MomDucks Thanksgiving Love Weather PiratesForest Valentine's Manners Winter PrincessesFrogs Myday SiblingsMice OuchesMore Potty TeachersOcean SafetyPenguins Self-EsteemPetsPigsRabbitsSheep

Places Play StoriesCity Art FairytalesCounty Dance Favorites (Authors)Farm Music FoodFun Playtime FunnyHome Reading HistoryLibrary Rhymes ImaginarySchool Songs ScaryWorld Sports SeriesZoo Toys Spiritual

Trips Wordless

Classification Draft #3

Classification Draft #4

Classification Draft #5

Classification Draft #6January 2012

Classification Final February 20, 2012

Final Categories Animals Basics Go,Go,Go! Holidays Me Nature People Places Play Stories

Individualizing Categories & Sub-categories to Meet

Our Library’s Needs Animals: added “Horses” Used “Basics” Used “Go,Go,Go!” for Transportation : Added “Build” Holidays: Added “Islamic,” “Jewish,” “More” Me: Added “Health,” “Manners,” “Moving,” “Potty,” “Safety,”

“Senses,” “Special” Nature: Added “Weather” People: Added “Baby,” “Babysit,” “Royal,” “Witch” Places: Added “Beach,” “Fun” Play: Added “Playtime,” “Rhymes,” “Trips” Stories: Added “Birthday,” “Imaginary,” “Favorite,” “Movies,”

“Series,” “Wordless”

STORIESBirthdayFavorite (favorite authors: Brett, Brown, Carle, DePaola, Ehlert, Fleming, Henkes, Kellogg, Lionni, Numeroff, Potter, Sendak, Seuss, Van Allsburg, Willems)

FoodFunnyHistory (historical fiction)

Imaginary (imaginary creatures, science fiction, dreams)

Movies (books based on movies & TV)

ScarySeries (favorite characters: Angelina Ballerina, Arthur, Babar, Barbie, Barney, Batman, Bear in the Big Blue House, Berenstain Bears, Biscuit, Blues Clues, Bob the Builder, Caillou, Care Bears, Charlie & Lola, Clifford, Corduroy, Curious George, David, Diego, Dinosaur Train, Disney, Dora, Eloise, Fancy Nancy, Five Little Monkeys, Franklin, Froggy, Kai-Lan, Kipper, Little Critter, Lyle the Crocodile, Madeline, Maisy, Martha the Talking Dog, Max & Ruby, Mr. Men/Little Miss, My Little Pony, Olivia, Peanuts, Pinkalicious, Rainbow Fish, Rugrats, Scaredy Squirrel, Scooby Doo, Sesame Street, Shrek, Spider-man, Spongebob, Spot, Star Wars, Strawberry Shortcake, Teen-age Mutant Ninja Turtles, Thomas, Toot & Puddle, Transformers, Veggie Tales)

Spiritual (religious, creation stories, heaven)

Tales (Traditional folk & fairy tales, parodies, modern stories in the style of tales--arranged by tale name)

Wordless (stories told through pictures and without words)

Go! We’re Off

Created lists to determine approximately the number of items in the subcategories.

Start with the next big holiday so you’re not doing those while they’re popular

Series! It’s easy and a huge collection! Don’t forget to think about shifting! Sent completed books with sticky

notes to Technical Services for changes in catalog and spine labels

Shifted Created temporary signs

Children’s Staff, Go!

WorkflowCS staff pull books and put Post-It with new call number on the book

Used macros/shortcuts to edit call numbers in Millennium

TS knew to daily look for carts; took carts back to TS; only take what you can get done in the time allotted

Print spine label, cover old spine label on book with new, cover with book tape, & put the item back on cart

Shelve finished books, or put in pre-shelving, or return unfinished books to “To Do” cart

Finished!CS changed mind and back to the beginning….

Where to Start

Thanksgiving books Halloween books after the holiday Christmas books before the holiday Series Animals 1,2,3 A,B,C Other (lists and pulling subject

related books) Finally, alphabetical by author of the

books remaining

Shifting Holiday books were completed

before circulating for the holiday and then put on display

Use top of shelves for completed books (in the area where we estimated they would be)

Shift books to middle as tightly as possible to leave room at the beginning (Animals) and end (Stories)

As shelves were emptied, completed sections were moved

Temporary signs created

Two Children’s staff decided on the classification for the retrospective cataloging & Copy Cataloger classified new books, sometimes after consulting the children’s staff

Examined/skimmed the book to quickly determine the category.

Considered: How the book best fit into a category, series books trumped other categories, Holidays trumped all categories except series.

Checked subject headings for help, but found that LC subjects were not always helpful—especially with animal books

If a book could fall into more than one category, we chose the one that we thought would be most useful for patrons and sometimes also considered story time use

Where Do We Put This Book?

Fine Tuning “Series” trumps “Holidays” “Holidays” trump “Favorites” “Feelings (death) trumps everything “Potty” trumps everything

JEASYHOLIDAYSCHRISTMASBRETT J.

JEASYMEPOTTYSHEA B.

JEASYSTORIESSERIESANGELINA

Preparing Books for Re-cataloging

JEASY/PLAY/PLAYTIME

Which Should It Be?

JEASY/STORIES/FOOD or

JEASY/PLAY/RHYMES

Apple Pie that Papa Baked

jEASY/STORIES/FOOD

Which Should It Be?

Nature/Sky or Play/Pretend or Play/Trips

jEASY/NATURE/SKY

One Day, Daddy

Is This a Book about a Dog?

Maybe, but…

Call Numbers

Length Format- can you have

spaces? Dashes? #@!?

Those books are skinny… which part of the call number will show on the spine? Be consistent.

Spine Labels

Spine Label:Thicker Book

We Can’t Purchase Signs that Work with This Project.

What Do We Do?

Problem!

Make Our Own! Decide on what is needed on

the signs Find Clip Art Design & print on 11”x17” paper Laminate signs Bend & tape to bookends Used clear category signs for

new picture book shelving

Signs We Created

Side View with Complete Call Number

Front View with Subcategory for the

Princess books

Classification Signs for New Picture Books

Intermediate Signage

Draft of Endcap Signs

Draft & Final Endcap Signs

Final Signs--Multiple

Main Category Display Signs

Clean Up Ran a report in Create Lists (III-

Millennium) of all Picture Books Sorted by call number Deleted any that were correct Left with mistakes, typos, etc. Found the books on shelf &

corrected them Shelvers gave recently returned

books with old call numbers to staff to change

Change status of books without the call number change to missing with a TS hold

The Finish Line

Did You Hit the Mark? Know why you’re doing this

project and what you hope to accomplish so you can measure your success

Be sure to have before and after Circ stats

Track hours staff members worked on project; great to use for annual goals

Revisit decisions and see if they worked… maybe you do need a “Duck” section rather than just “Birds”

What We Learned Make all of your categories singular or plural Physically post updated category list Have a shared file of updated categories

everyone can access Change call numbers in groups; this helps TS

staff and re-shelving New picture books will take longer to catalog.

Be prepared for this permanent, additional time in workflow

Cataloging is a joint effort now Know that categories will be added and

changes made during the course of the project and be OK with it.

Divide larger sections further, ex: Animals/More

Some categories had more books than we expected: “Fox,” “Geese,” “Chickens”

Some categories had fewer books than we expected: “Horses”

The number of books that we couldn’t easily determine what they were about.

The number of animal books that weren’t really about that animal, ex: dogs

Once we moved the “Series” books together, Many were always out and we had extra room on those shelves.

What Surprised Us

Time to complete the project Deciding on main categories Deciding on subcategories for each

main category Deciding on the categories for some

of the books Determining best way to shift & shelve

during the transition Keeping shelf breaks logical for the

categories Finding commercial signs to purchase Difficulty in finding books if shelved

incorrectly Making main category signs show

from both sides

Challenges

Successes Increase in circulation of

Picture Books Many compliments from

teachers and parents about the new arrangement

Children discovering and returning to their favorite section of books

Patrons being introduced to many new books that they had not seen before.

What Did Patrons Think? Selected Comments before project was completed: A teacher was looking for picture books about winter. When staff showed her the

new cataloging & arrangement of books, the teacher was very enthusiastic: “This is wonderful and will be great for those of us who are teachers!” (January 2012)

When staff was helping a patron in the picture book collection, the patron commented on the new arrangement: “This is going to make it so easy for me!” (February 2012)

A teacher liked the way our picture books had been categorized so much that she did the same thing in her classroom. (April 2012)

Selected Comments after project was completed: A patron said, “I really like the way the picture books are organized. A staff member from another department: “I can’t believe how easy it was to find

the books on my list. I wish it had been like this when my kids were little.” A parent told us: “I love your new picture book section. It makes it so much easier

to find princess books for my daughter.”

Increased Picture Book Circulation May-September 2011 versus May-September 2012

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

0 500 1000 1500 2000 2500 3000 3500

1590 (May 2011)

1836 (May 2012)

2743 (June 2011)

3221 (June 2012)

2291 (July 2011)

2964 (July 2012)

1589 (August 2011)

2529 (August 2012)

1762 (September 2011)

2327 (September 2012)

30% Increase

59% Increase

32% Increase

15% Increase

18% Increase

More Advice Cooperation of Technical Services and

Administration is CRUCIAL to the Project Helpful to only have two or three people working

on the project—more consistency and agreement on what should be in the category

Don’t rely on LC cataloging to determine the classification of the book

Children’s Services Staff who are enthusiastic about the project is ESSENTIAL

What’s Next? Pull very easy nonfiction, such as song, rhymes, transportation

books and move to picture book collection Consider a system for cataloging non-fiction fairy tales Divide larger subcategories Consider changing Spanish language picture books into this

system

J398.8/CHIJ629.222/COL

Timeline of Preparation September 2009: Attended a presentation by the Frankfort

Public Library at ILA Conference Program on changing to BISAC for adult books

October 2009: Read about Darien, CT Library’s project in Library Journal

January 2011: Read the ALSC-L Discussion about “Picture Books by Subject”

January 2011: Discussed the project with our new Head of Technical Services & Children’s Staff

February-August 2011: Researched other libraries that were doing this type of classification.

September-October 2011: Created Classification Schedule for the project

October 2011: Visited Indian Prairie Library to view their collection

Timeline of Project October 2011-May 2012: Created lists to determine

approximately the number of items in the subcategories. Checked all the books in the picture book collection and assigned call numbers to each, shifted, created temporary signs, sent books to Technical Services for changes in catalog and spine labels

May 2012: Created permanent shelving, endcap, and top of shelving signs and completed final shifting

May 2012: Created a brochure for patrons with lists of the new cataloging

May 2012: Ran a list to find books that we missed and still had the old call numbers

May 2012-present: Work with Technical Services to determine call numbers of new additions to the Picture Book Collection

Questions?

Mary G. Marshall Assistant Director/Head of Children’s Services

Addison Public Library

marshall@addisonlibrary.org

Brooke Sievers Head of Technical Services

Addison Public Library

sievers@addisonlibrary.org

Selected ReferenceAddison Public Library Slideshow from ILA 2012 Conferencehttp://slideshare.net

Slideshows from ALA 2012 Conference: “Where Are the Truck Books?”Darien Library (CT):  They were one of the first libraries to do this project; however, they did not break their collection down as much as Addison did.  They have the largest part of their collection in “Favorites” and “Stories.”

http://www.slideshare.net/gcaserotti/ 

Stark County District Library (Public Library in Ohio): Smallest part of the collection converted. Also has a floating collection among the branches.

http://www.slideshark.com/Landing.aspx?pi=zHxzeh3Tvz5XUxz0&intk=62627515  

Ethical Culture Fieldston School Library: This was the most complete conversion of a collection—fiction and non-fiction and was done by a private school in New York City. We might want to try some of these ideas in the future.

http://www.slideshare.net/balaskaplan/i-want-a-truck-book-metis-presentation