Comments on: Taking it to Twitter: Librarians Debate the Demise of Dewey

By: http://tinyurl.com/freewinch52404

http://tinyurl.com/freewinch52404 — Tue, 29 Jan 2013 05:13:23 +0000

This specific blog post, “Taking it to Twitter:
Librarians Debate the Demise of Dewey | School Library Journal” was in fact superb.

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By: Metis | fulllapfullheart

Metis | fulllapfullheart — Wed, 14 Nov 2012 15:18:46 +0000

[...] I’m sure you’ve all read the article in SLJ by now, but here it is again anyway: http://www.slj.com/2012/10/technology/social-media-technology/debating-the-demise-of-dewey-fostering…#_ Share this:TwitterFacebookLike this:LikeBe the first to like this. This entry was tagged [...]

By: Jess

Jess — Tue, 23 Oct 2012 00:00:22 +0000

I work in a public library (where there is no such thing as a summer vacation to reorganize…) I’m intrigued by a lot of the ideas in the article and it was definitely thought provoking. We currently do more genre-izing for fiction. In children’s we have a regular fiction section, with fantasy & scifi and mysteries separated out. In our picture books, we’ve added stickers for topics like ‘things that go,’ ‘fairies and princesses,’ seasons, pirates, look & find, alphabet, counting, etc. All fiction is still arranged by author’s name, but this helps with browsing and readers advisory – well worth the effort! The chapter books have been separated as long as I’ve been coming to this library, but most of the picture book stickers were added in the last few years and are the kind of thing that can be done gradually without drastically rearranging or necessitating new call numbers.

By: Jennifer Still-Schiff

Jennifer Still-Schiff — Sun, 21 Oct 2012 23:27:40 +0000

I think Dewey number tattoos on a librarian are pretty awesome. What I don’t like is how DDC makes so many obstacles for young children to overcome. Our pre-readers and K-2 students don’t feel at home with Dewey. Maybe they memorize where the “dogs” books are, so they successfully check out a book each library class. But are they finding what really interests them, new things to light them up?

And you know what else bothers me? The way most libraries separate out fiction and non-fiction for children. Does a child who loves trucks have to read only facts? How about truck stories? Like The Village Garage or I Stink? What if she could find those without needing a grownup to intercede?

Dewey works fine for adults. We’re not satisfied with “fine,” and that’s one of the reasons we moved to Metis. We think it removes barriers for kids to have great moments of discovery at the library.
You wonder who has the time to reorganize their library? I’d have to say that only a deeply reflective and passionate group of people would give up their summer vacation to try something new. Well, we did it and we think it works better in our library. Come take a look.

By: Deb Cooper

Deb Cooper — Wed, 17 Oct 2012 12:00:15 +0000

In our library system, we’ve reorganized the picture books into glades similar to Darien’s but haven’t ventured into changing any nonfiction, although I’d be willing to think about this. We have the picture books divided into subject areas (glades), and shelved alphabetically by author within the glades. Our children’s librarians tell me this is improving their circulation; I’m eager to compare stats in the spring.

By: Heidi Snively

Heidi Snively — Tue, 16 Oct 2012 23:40:41 +0000

Expiring tatoos aside, Dewey works! Especially when the full number is used to keep subjects together so hungry sharks are not found free-ranging among the fishies. Dewey works because a student learns one system and can walk into (almost) any library and be at home. Dewey numbers too difficult? Nonsense! Our 3rd graders have no problem finding their book among approx. 15,000 items by it’s Dewey call number. As to ordering fiction by genre, it works until someone else catalogs the books. One local public library has genre-ized their adult fiction, and it’s frustrating to look for a book’s sequel and find that it’s not in fiction but over in mystery, or sci-fi/fantasy. It’s frustrating to want to read an author’s body of work and have to trek from genre section to genre section if that author has challenged him/herself to write other things. Parting thought, ala Andy Rooney: have you ever wondered who has the kind of time to reorganize their collection??

By: Sue Giffard

Sue Giffard — Tue, 16 Oct 2012 23:40:32 +0000

Librarians have traditionally opted for consistency and neatness over other ways of operating. Traditionally, the needs of our users have not been at the top of our priority list. I believe that if libraries and librarianship as a profession are to survive into the future, we need to turn things around and put our users’ needs at the top of our priorities. The standard that we used when designing Metis reflected that. We asked a number of questions. Are we serving the needs of our child users with our mode of organization? Can we do it better? Can we make our library’s organizational method reflect children’s thinking more clearly, in the way that the organization found in a kindergarten or third grade classroom reflects children’s thinking and their mode of being? Can we increase children’s success in simple library searches? Can we help to increase their joy in the library? These questions led us to abandon Dewey and design something else. There is no solid research that shows that Metis is superior to Dewey in an elementary school library; we implemented it only a year ago. However, our anecdotal experience every day in our library with our students shows its value. In my third grade classes I no longer have to show or remind students where the dog books or the magic books or the airplane books are. They are able to do these searches on their own after the first couple of sessions in my room. I find myself able to talk to students looking for “a good book” who are unsure of what they might enjoy. That alone is an amazing gift to me as a librarian deeply committed to helping students find books that they might enjoy or love.

By: Jamie Prince

Jamie Prince — Tue, 16 Oct 2012 22:50:24 +0000

I am new to librarianship, and find the amount of individualism expressed in school libraries confusing – many libraries using Dewey modify it to pull out early reader books by level, or series. Is there any solid research out there to suggest that Metis is superior to Dewey? or to defend Dewey? I tend to be on the side of the patrons in term of organization, but we also need to have standards across elementary school libaries or we will have the same anarchy that existed pre-Dewey.

By: Laura Shea-Clark

Laura Shea-Clark — Mon, 15 Oct 2012 21:37:20 +0000

I’m in favor of real word structures, but I would like to point out that Dewey is designed to keep like things together but only if one uses the full number. We lose this if we artificially chop off the number after a particular number of digits.