Customer Reviews

Elementary School Librarian's Survival Guide: Ready-To-Use Tips, Techniques, and Materials to Help You Save Time and Work in Virtually Every Aspec

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

That's what this book does. It helps very much.
It has forms, charts, letters, and patterns to
help you. Topics such as physical organization
of the library, how to build
support for your programs, discipline,
storytimes, and booktalks are just a
few of the many subjects covered in this book.

It goes beyond what you learn in school and it is
all in this one handy volume.

This book, which I discovered in a catalog from World Almanac, I believe, was a very useful asset in my two years of learning experience as an emerging librarian. I found information which was verified in my graduate school coursework to gain my Masters' Degree in Library Science. Later, I found many recommendations and commendations for this volume. I will continue to return to this book for resources and ideas and good basic aids to the librarian in an elementary school. Additionally, their are great ideas that can translate to middle school and high school librarians and their many, multi-tasking roles!

This book truely is a survival guide! As a new media specialist I was basically clueless about how to get started. This book offers suggestions for everything a media specialist has to deal within an elementary school. It offers everything from positioning furnisher, sample activities/lesson plans, reproducible worksheets and letters, etc. This book is easy to read and understand. I would recommend it to all new media specialist or veterans looking for new ideas.

As a recently certified school library media specialist, I was excited to see this title. I purchased it without checking the date. Big mistake. The book has more information on card catalogs than computerized catalog systems. The information on planning and lessons was very basic. The "chapter" on dicipline is 9 pages long (3 pages of reproducibles). I was hoping for information on weeding, collection development and promoting the library to students, and actual lesson ideas. This book does not deliver. It may have been useful 14 years ago, but should not be considered today. Any introductory class on educational media or library science will cover all of this and more.

Don't get me wrong - Ms. Bannister has done a laudable job with this "instructional manual." The only point I feel compelled to make is this "survival guide" is "97%" better suited for a first year school librarian. After a full year "on the job", most of her book's contents are researched and dealt with - by necessity. Read this book the summer before starting as a first year school librarian or after being away from the profession for a few years.

Has some basic, good ideas, but needs to be updated. Most people can make up their own forms, charts, clip art, etc. and save on your hard drive. Pretty old, mostly outdated in the computer world... Nothing on "media centers" either...

I would have recommended this book to new librarians in the 1970's or early 80's, but it is out of date. I have already sent our media center's copy to surplus and recommend that you not purchase the book. We have to keep up with our patrons' needs in the present decade.

At one time I believe this book would have been a vital lifesaver, but at this point, for me, it seems outdated. Each aspect of librarianship is covered, but the current level of technology in most school libraries is not taken into account. One chapter details how to switch a card catalog over to a computerized system. Today's new librarians have a very different perspective than the new librarians that would've found this to be useful. I wouldn't totally write this book off my list since some of the reproducible forms seem like they would be helpful. At the same time, I think newer looking versions of them might need to be created or located on the internet.