[CALIBK12] Interfiling non-English books

[Amber Claflin]

Rusty,
We have a small but growing collection of materials in languages other than English at our elementary libraries.  We at first shelved them with the English-language titles because our hope was that our EL students would find them with the English-language titles.  This did not happen unfortunately and we also struggled with students who thinking they had the English language version of a title instead had checked out the book they wanted in a language other than English (usually Spanish). We have since created a section in the library for non-English titles. The majority of the titles are in Spanish but we also have other languages including Mandarin, Japanese and Russian. This section is organized just like the English-language section with Easy, Fiction and Dewey.  The materials circulate more often and a real plus is that we can point parents to this section to find materials to read to their children at home.  It is easy for them to make selections and easy for library staff to see if a book on a particular topic is available or if they need to find the materials necessary elsewhere for the student.

We add additional letters to the call number for the non-English titles (SP for Spanish, JP for Japanese,...) and gave up on the other labels.  It seems the more labels a book has the less patrons pay attention to them.

Hope this helps.
Amber Claflin
District Teacher Librarian
Etiwanda School District

________________________________
From: calibk12-bounces at lists.sjsu.edu [mailto:calibk12-bounces at lists.sjsu.edu] On Behalf Of Rusty Tooley
Sent: Monday, February 02, 2009 10:39 AM
To: 'calibk12 at lists.sjsu.edu'
Subject: [CALIBK12] Interfiling non-English books

At my K-5 school, we have a small but significant Spanish-speaking population, and therefore a smallish amount of Spanish-language library materials for them; maybe 200 books, about 1% of the collection.

The Spanish-language picture books, early readers, and primary nonfiction are shelved together in the same area as their English-language counterparts, and I make those available (in fact, encourage them to take) to my Spanish-speaking students - especially kindergarten and first graders - who have someone at home who can read the story to them.

We also have Spanish-language nonfiction, transitional chapter books, and regular chapter books. These are interfiled with the English-language titles. I understand the reason for this is for Spanish-reading students to find these books beside the English-language titles when they are browsing. Truthfully, though, I have perhaps one or two older students who read Spanish well enough to want to check these out.

I struggle with my second - fifth grade students not realizing that some books they are selecting are in Spanish. Students see Harry Potter, Captain Underpants, or Junie B. Jones and take the book, not noticing that the title/text is in Spanish nor that there's a Spanish materials label on the spine. (Maybe I should put a larger label on the front cover.)

I'd like to pull these books out and shelve them separately as well, but I wanted to hear from others, especially in elementary libraries, what you do and if there's some reason not to that I am not considering.

Thanks!

--
Rusty Tooley
Teacher-Librarian
Barron Park Elementary School (M-Th)
Ohlone Elementary School (F)
Palo Alto Unified School District
www.pausd.org


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