Jeffrey Hastings reviews Follett eBooks, Follett Shelf, Destiny Quest and Follett Digital Reader app.

School Library Month, that time when we celebrate the inventive, inspirational work of teen and youth librarians around the country, ended April 30th, and I’m a little sad to see it go. I realized the other day that as the CEO and co-founder of Figment, an online community where teens and young adults come together to create, share, and discover new reading and writing, I’m something of a Y.A. (Young Adult) librarian myself.

Since launching a year-and-a-half ago, Figment has grown to a community of more than 230,000 registered users who have created a collection of 400,000 original pieces of writing—everything from sonnets to memoirs to multi-part steampunk novels. That’s about 10 times the size of your average local library.

Our users come to the site not only to write and share their own work, but also to read. On Figment, they discover new books by professional writers, and they pour through one another’s’ stories, leaving each other in-depth feedback and encouraging comments. 

In this online library, reading and writing go hand-in-hand. Almost as often as our users take books off the virtual shelves, they add their own new creations to the collection. A user is a poet in search of an audience one visit, and an avid fan of another member’s Hunger Games fan fiction the next. Student writers read an excerpt of the latest young adult title and then have the chance to ask the books’ author about her writing process. The interchange between the creation and consumption of literature is fluid.

As in the best physical libraries and classrooms, this connection between reading and writing is key to building literacy. In its recent research report “Writing to Read,” the Carnegie Corporation stressed that “Intensive writing [is a] critical element of an effective adolescent literacy program.” And with only 31-percent of eighth grade students performing at or above “proficient” level in reading, it’s essential to actively, aggressively incorporate writing into the teaching of reading—whether that comes through explicit learning in the classroom or through places like Figment where students bring reading and writing together organically. Timothy Shanahan, the past-president of the International Reading Association has gone so far as to predict, “If reading and writing are taught together, different and better things will occur.”

As we have celebrated libraries this past month and throughout the year, we should remember to encourage writing as a natural and vital complement. In doing so, we will not only help build a generation of great writers, but also a new generation of avid, skilled readers.

Jacob Lewis is the CEO and co-founder of Figment, an online community for teens and young adults to create, discover, and share new reading and writing. Since launching in December of 2010, Figment has grown to a network of more than 230,000 registered users who have posted more than 400,000 original pieces of writing. Jacob is the former Managing Editor of The New Yorker, where he worked for more than twelve years, and of Conde Nast Portfolio. He lives in Brooklyn, NY.

“Libraries Occupy the Heart of the Occupy Movement” is the lead headline for Nov/Dec issue of American Libraries the article [p.19]. It tells the story of the library that sprang up at the Occupy Wall Street encampment as a spontaneous action on the part of some “occupiers” who donated books to entertain those living there. But it grew into a regular collection and is now being organized by librarians and library students.

I don’t bring this up because of the politics of the Occupy movement but rather because I think that it’s telling that in this outdoor, politically charged, time-extended occupation, people still crave a place to unwind, study, collaborate, and relax with books and other resources. I’ve written before about the library as a ‘space’: the building in a school or a community that collects the resources together, organizes them for ease of use, and teaches it’s users how to use them. But while the space is important – in fact essential, the people who develop those spaces we call ‘library’ are the true important aspect; they’re the organizers, the developers, the administrators and instructors – as well as the folks who motivate and inspire the users of those materials.

There are discussions on many librarian blogs about how the school library profession needs to change- and change soon – before it dies all together. Among the suggestions are those that suggest that the librarian need not be located in a physical space, and perhaps he/she wanders the school teaching in classrooms or virtually by way of a computer or other online device.

But I contend that the space – the building, the closet, the little trailer in the school parking lot – that is called ‘library’ by those who attend the school - is still the most important classroom in that school.   It’s the place where people gather: kids come in and out all day, administrators hold faculty meetings there, teachers congregate to collaborate, research or just drop in for a chat.  The librarian, with help from a clerical assistant, organizes that space to include all the many ways that kids, teachers and administrators learn and use materials and information. 

Our library space is often noisy and crowded; full of kids doing a wide variety of things- yes, even including studying.  When I ask them why they come instead of heading out to the local donut shop or other places they could be going at lunch time, they say things like “I don’t know, it’s comfortable here or “It’s a good place to get my work done instead of later at home.”  I’ve also heard “My friends are here doing homework so I figure I’ll do mine now too”.   Since I’ve added a jigsaw puzzle to the mix of other activities available in our library, several kids have decided to spend their lunchtime hanging out and putting it together.

People like to congregate and people like to “make a library”. When I go to a friend’s cabin in the Sierras, there’s a library of books, computers and magazines located in the main lodge. In the Senior Center, there’s a library and even in most of the local coffee joints… yep, you guessed it – a library.  People like to make a set-apart space for reading, contemplating and writing, and they make these spaces regularly.

Even if we closed down every school library in the nation, kids would find a place to get together to study, talk and hang out. So why not keep the school library? Why not a place where there are books, computers, paper, pencils, printers and most importantly credentialed school librarians to help them when they need it?

When educators envision the school of the future, they regularly ignore the school library. Poetic visions of these futuristic schools – some of which are being created right now – include designed spaces where students drop in  between their classes.  These spaces could be a cafeteria-like place, a study center, a ‘teen hangout’ resting place, or a high-tech retreat for studying or for following personal interests. Again, I contend that all those things sound like just a library.  In these futuristic visions I rarely read about the person the designers think will monitor, lead or develop these spaces.

Have we so kept our very name – Librarian - out of the loop of future thinkers that we’re never considered to be a part of their plan?  It appears so.

Let’s take a look at our own library spaces as we realize that kids, like everyone, want to congregate, work together [or at least side by side], and have the resources they need at their fingertips. 

The best, most reliable resource they need to have in this space is their librarian – a 21st Century teacher teaching, guiding, facilitating the instruction that will help them get to where they want to go.

What does that look like, really? If you have any ideas, please weight in by commenting below.

Now what…..

A few weeks ago we got the official White House reply to the We the People petition we started for school libraries in January.   It was a team effort to get the 28,000+ signatures for the petition and we had been waiting patiently (ok, maybe not so patiently) to see what the reply might be.  You can read the petition and reply by clicking here.

Right after the reply came I wrote some initial thoughts on my blog.   In that post, I highlight three benefits I saw from the White House Petition. 

•    We were successful!  We got school libraries on the White House radar.  Their statement clearly shows a support for school libraries and the critical role they play in schools.

•    We saw what happens when we all work together.  In my career, I’ve never seen such an amazing job of coordinating libraries of all type to work on a single issue.  This is a clear example we can succeed when librarians advocate for each other (regardless of what type of library they are).  We need each other and have to be willing to work together!  This was a great example of doing just that.
•    We continue to work on being a more vocal and visible presence.  With the AASL Congressional Briefing, the White House Petition, and now in a few weeks with National Legislative Day, we continue to raise the important issue of school libraries to our nation’s leaders.  We still have a long way to go, but I think we are moving in the right direction.

As I reflect on that post, I guess the million-dollar question is where to do we go from here?

I don’t have a crystal ball, but I think we continue to move in the right direction.  Each step has been a step forward in helping to educate Washington about the power and potential in today’s school libraries.  I think the petition is just one teaching tool.  Just as we use different strategies and techniques with our students, we have to do the same with leaders in Washington.

We each have to take some ownership of this process – librarians, vendors, community members, parents, students, etc.  We can’t assume that someone is going to do it.  When we hear we need to call Washington on important library issues, we need to pick up the phone and do it.  We need to send those emails.  We need to make those contacts and make our voices heard. 

The same can be said at the state and local level.  They have to hear from school library advocates!  They need to hear how important the community thinks libraries are to the school ecosystem.  They need to hear those voices loudly, clearly, and often. 

There is little doubt there is much work to do with all types of education and government leaders to help them see the impact and importance of today’s school libraries.  But, we can’t give up.  We have to keep working on a variety of strategies and use a plethora of teaching tools until they understand completely!

Carl is the librarian at North Elementary School in Noblesville, Indiana and the 2011-2012 President of the American Association of School Librarians.  He can be reached at carl@carl-harvey.com or @caharvey2 on Twitter.  He blogs at Library Ties.

If you enjoyed this blog post, then read these posts in Carl Harvey's series on library advocacy:

• White House Petition for School Libraries! Signatures Needed Now!
• Carl Harvey Discusses the Next Steps in Advocating for School Libraries

A few weeks ago some colleagues and I were talking about our libraries and how long we had each been in our positions and where we had worked before when we started talking about the changes we all had made when we first walked through the doors of our different library jobs.

Invariably we each first looked around at the physical space and measured the changes we’d make right away usually centering on making the space “ours”. That would mean moving desks, creating bulletin boards, and even changing the arrangement of shelves when they weren’t bolted down to the floor.

It was in mid-discussion that someone asked “what if we were to walk through our doors today – as if we were the brand new librarian. What changes would we make today?

I thought of this as an incredible challenge to take back with me to school the following Monday because while I have made some great changes, I knew that it still wasn’t where I’d like it to be yet.

And so…what if I were just hired - what would I see and what would I change right now to make this library say what I want it to say about learning, teaching, searching, creating, and inviting students and teachers to join in on all those things?

So in unlocking the door on that ‘first’ day and walking around I noticed that the librarian’s desk was sitting in a back room, the shelves were placed in a very neat row but were totally uninspiring, and the chairs are way too big.

Why is this so important in this day and age when we are more often taking the library into the classroom and into other learning spaces. I absolutely applaud this trend and value it as an extension of the physical space we call ‘the library’. But that human need to gather together for social, emotional and educational engagements demands, in my mind, that we create and nurture a space for these activities to take place. The library, with all it’s resources and most importantly, the librarian there to participate as a teacher in those social, emotional, educational and creative pursuits indeed makes the library the most important classroom space in the school.

Our job is to nurture that space in such a way that every time we walk into a classroom to work alongside our teaching colleagues we ‘bring the library’ with us. And when it’s lunch time, or study hall, or tutorial or after school time, students and teachers know that they can congregate in the library to continue their studies, ask the questions, create their presentations, and build their skills with the help and guidance of their librarian.

I’ve started working with a local company to make a new reference desk out in the middle of the room, we’re creating new bulletin board displays; we’re purchasing an interactive whiteboard for easier instruction. These are the first ‘new steps’ we’re taking to make changes to our space. Next up: taking a look at our instruction.

BTW: Anyone want to buy some 1 ½ size chairs?

Connie Williams is a high school librarian and an advocate for school libraries.You can contact her via email, or leave a comment below. 

At a district Technology Committee meeting we were divided into partner groups to brainstorm about what ‘best practices’ we might look for in using technology in the classroom.  My colleague Doug and I had been struggling with trying to identify just what good technology teaching looks like and how to best accomplish the learning goals we might have for our students.
As often happens in discussions like this we played around with ideas and listened to our colleagues and then discussed some more amongst our own assigned group. And it was in the middle of the discussion where we were almost coming to the ‘big idea’ that we were after and had been going around and around when Doug said: “it’s like the Amish doll. The Amish doll has no face and is plain and it is meant to be that way.”

When a child is handed an Amish doll, he/she gets to decide what the doll’s face looks like, is he smiling today? Does she have blue eyes like me or brown eyes like you? One day they are blue, and the next day they’re brown but maybe they turn blue after she eats blueberries. That doll can be whatever the child wants it to be – mother, father, teacher, doctor – at any given moment as the play progresses.

The Amish doll. A perfect metaphor for learning.  – if we give our students the tools, the outlines, the forms, the basic shapes; then they can fill in the ‘faces’. In terms of technology: teaching with technology; not “teaching technology” is the goal. It. Is. So. Simple.

We were tasked one time to visit classrooms and ‘drop in’ to see what role technology was playing in any given day. It was sort of a ‘snapshot’ of a day. The group fanned out to different school sites, different classrooms and reported back after a few hours of observation. The task: observe technology in use.  It was during our reporting out to the group that our Amish Doll metaphor took shape.  Our favorite lesson used no technology at all at the point we observed the class. Students in the 4th grade were in groups and were reporting to each other about books they had read. Each was assigned a role and each had a job to fulfill within their roles related to the book talking. We saw engaged students on task working together. Upon our return we thought about why that lesson was so compelling – it had given each student the ‘outline’ for what needed to be accomplished and then let them use their creativity, their prior knowledge, their content [derived from their reading] and their skills to bring it all together in a formal discussion.  The “Amish doll” approach gave them the form but not the steps.

While we might think that the very term  “Amish doll” is the antithesis of “technology” it actually has more to do with how we design our lessons rather than whether we’re using technology.  That same book-talking lesson could have been accomplished using blogs, wikis or google docs. The students could have used Voice Thread and images they created to post their book discussions or Animoto or any of the hundreds of 2.0 tools.

It’s about the simplicity of lesson creation – giving students the form, the parameters and the content they need to learn… and then letting them invent their own path to accomplish that learning.

Connie Williams is a high school librarian and an advocate for school libraries.You can contact her via email, or leave a comment below.  

Step Six: Conduct Inventory

Conducting an end-of-year inventory can be a headache if you don’t have an efficient and easy process. That’s why we have provided you with detailed, step-by-step instructions on conducting an inventory. These helpful tips and easy instructions can be viewed as an eLearning or read as a Destiny Help article in the Inventory Resource Center at www.follettsoftware.com/inventory.  Each resource will walk you through the process, making your end-of-the-year inventory process less of a headache and more efficient and quicker. Save time during your End of the Year inventory by visiting the Inventory Resource Center today. Resource: eLearning:  Conducting your inventory version 10.0

Questions? Call 800.323.3397. And don’t forget, if you need a new scanner or replacement barcodes, check out www.DestinyExpress.com for easy online ordering of inventory essentials.

Melissa Fuentes, Product Marketing Manager

Preparation is essential to success! And knowing how to set up for your end-of-year inventory requires a lot of preparation. To assist you with this we have provided a few helpful tips below for preparing your equipment and collection.

Step Three: Prepare Your Collection
1.    Return all items to their proper places.
2.    Catalog any new books or items, so they will be in the system.

Step Four: Prepare Your Equipment

1.    Identify which method / devices you will use to scan your barcodes. The options are: 
•    Circulation scanner (or keyboard) and laptop with Destiny Library Manager running.
•    Circulation scanner (or keyboard) attached to a computer with Follett Remote.
•    Dolphin
•    Falcon with Destiny Library Manager running.
•    Falcon with Follett Remote (wireless not available).
•    Panther with Destiny Library Manager running.
•    Panther with Follett Remote (wireless not available).

2.    If using a Circulation Scanner:
•    Hook the scanner up to the computer using the serial or USB Circulation Scanner.
•    Scan a few items into the “Scan or enter-one-at-a-time” field in Destiny to ensure your scanner is working properly.

3.    If using a Falcon, Dolphin, or Panther:
•    Locate the battery, power charger, base and USB cords (or Serial, if Serial Dolphin).
•    Fully charge your device.
•    Read the Reference Guide, Destiny Handheld Devices, to review using your device.
•    Ensure that your device is clear of all past inventory scans
•    Perform a few test scans with each device and load them, to make sure they are operational (see appropriate Reference Guide below for more information).
Resource: Destiny Help > Contents Tab> Click on “Hardware “on the left side of screen or click on the icons on the main landing page> Click on your specific product. NOTE: Getting Started Guides for each product are on the right-side of the page.

Step Five (Optional): Using Follett Remote

1.    If you have no wireless connectivity, or if are using a computer without a connection to Destiny Library Manager, Follett Remote is a good option. The executable file for installing Follett Remote on your computer can be found in Destiny’s online Help. If you are using a Follett Panther or Falcon the application is already installed for your use.

Resource: Destiny Help > Contents Tab >Click on “Hardware” on the left side of screen or click on the icons on the main landing page> Click on your specific product

2.    Before uploading your scans, view the following eLearning:
Resource: eLearning: Using Follett remote for Offline Circulation version 10.0

Questions? Call 800.323.3397. And don’t forget, if you need a new scanner or replacement barcodes, check out www.DestinyExpress.com for easy online ordering of inventory essentials.

Melissa Fuentes, Product Marketing Manager

I love the spring.  This year in our neck of the woods has been especially beautiful as we’ve been experiencing milder than normal temps, so the flowers are blooming, the grass is turning green, and it has made for a wonderful celebration of spring! 

But another reason I love the springtime is because April is National School Library Month!  What could be better than an entire 30 days devoted to celebrating and recognizing all that the school library program brings to the school community?  National School Library Month is the perfect opportunity for school librarians to get out there and spread the message throughout the school and the community about what 21st century school libraries look like and what 21st century school librarians do! 

I could spend this entire blog post just telling you the history behind the month, but it will be so much easier if you listen to the podcast with Lucille Thomas who spearheaded the establishment of school library month almost 30 years ago.  There is also additional history and documentation provided by AASL as well.

The School Library Month Committee has been hard at work pulling together a variety of tools and resources to help you celebrate National School Library Month.   There are flyers, public service announcements, ideas, podcasts, webinars, and even a student video contest (deadline for submissions is over, but winners will be announced in mid-April!).  You can access all of these on the AASL website –
http://www.ala.org/aasl/aaslissues/slm/schoollibrary

National School Library Month is the perfect opportunity to get the word out about the great things happening in your school library.  There are countless ideas you could do:

•    Special programming or events.
•    Invite parents, administrators, and legislators to come in and tour the program and facility.
•    Share what students think about the school library in newsletters, flyers, etc.
•    Create a video to post on the library website about how the library impacts students and staff.
•    Research contests to get students using library resources.
•    Unveil new resources – books, eBooks, databases, etc.

My guess is you’ll be able to think of a lot better ideas than I did in just a few minutes, but the possibilities are endless.  The AASL website has lots of great ideas, too.  Many of the Advocacy Tips of the Day would make great ways to promote National School Library Month, too. 

Make sure that everyone in your school knows that April is National School Library Month and just exactly what the school library does to support students in preparing them for their future.  But, don’t let it end there.  It is always great to have a month to celebrate school libraries, but in the back of your mind thinking about celebrating school libraries all year long.  We can’t rest after the 30 days this month.  School librarians have to constantly and consistently be working on advocating and promoting what they are doing each and every day for students.

Happy School Library MonthCarl is the librarian at North Elementary School in Noblesville, Indiana and the 2011-2012 President of the American Association of School Librarians.  He can be reached at carl@carl-harvey.com or @caharvey2 on Twitter.  He blogs at Library Ties – http://www.carl-harvey.com/libraryties/

Thinking – How do I get started with my end-of-year inventory? Well, we recommend that you first check out the resources in the Inventory Resource Center at www.follettsoftware.com/inventory. The resources include eLearnings on Planning and Conducting your inventory, Destiny Help articles and more helpful tips for getting your end-of-year inventory done without the headache. To help you get started with your inventory process we recommend that you:

Step One:  Find out which Version of Destiny you are using
When searching for or inquiring about inventory topics, it is helpful to know which version of Destiny you’re currently using. Find out which version of Destiny you currently have by opening Destiny in your web browser. At the bottom of every screen is a line of small print that reads “[©copyright year] Follett Software Company.” Click on that line. This will launch the “About” box which includes the Destiny version number. For example, if you are running Destiny v8.5, you will see “(v8.5 (rc8) – 07/08/2008).” View the eLearning videos for the version you currently have for Destiny.

Step Two: Create an Inventory Schedule
1.    Determine who will be conducting inventory (i.e. librarians, aides, parent volunteers, etc.).
2.    Determine when you are going to conduct inventory.
3.    Decide if you want to inventory part(s) of your collection, or your whole collection. Weigh Your Options.

•    The advantage of performing a full inventory is that you can conduct it while books are checked out. If you take this approach, you will only need to scan the books that are on the shelves, because Destiny Library Manager will automatically account for any items that are Checked Out, Loaned Out, On Order, Out for Repairs or In Transit.
•    The advantages of performing a partial inventory are that it takes less time and it allows you to verify items in collections of interest to you, such as fiction, reference or literary criticism. If you select this option, you should set up a schedule of partial inventories to conduct over a period of time, so that all your materials eventually get accounted for.

Resource: eLearning: Planning Your Inventory version 10.0
Questions? Call 800.323.3397. And don’t forget, if you need a new scanner or replacement barcodes, check out www.DestinyExpress.comm for easy online ordering of inventory essentials.

Melissa Fuentes, Product Marketing Manager