The Change has begun!

Last week I wrote about implementing a big change in my library - arranging my fiction area according to genres.  This week, I jumped right in and started the first steps.  I have to say up front I would NEVER have even considered this if I did not have the amazing parent volunteers that I do.  There is no way I would stay sane trying to do this alone, while also keeping the library open to students.  One volunteer in particular is my motivator. She can sense when I need a pep talk and will encourage me when things seem overwhelming. She's, in a word, AMAZING!!!

Before deciding on making the change, I read several blogs and articles about how to approach this process, but the most helpful by far was Leigh Collazo's blog. She laid out the entire process so neatly that this intimidating task seems much more doable.  I started out with her framework and made minor adjustments that fit my collection and my students. A million thanks, Leigh, for documenting  your process so nicely!  I think it's key to have record of how any library is arranged so whoever inherits the library next can easily pick up the arrangement.

My first step was deciding on the genres I would use in my library, and then picking the one genre I thought would have the least amount of books.  For my collection that was the sports genre (or so I thought!  I recently worked on mythology - my collection is severely lacking in this area!).  I ran a report in our library software using the keywords of "sports" and listing other individual sports.  That generated a few hundred titles.  My library volunteer and I then began pulling these books off the shelf and loading them on book trucks.  We then played around with our software to determine the correct call number for each book. We decided on F AAA - Sports.  I thought it was important to keep that "F" in front and just tack my special genre label on the end.  After that decision was made, each book had to be scanned and the call number changed.  Again, I had a fabulous friend come in to help me with this process.  I've decided this whole change will take a village!

Pulled books ready for stickers

After the call number was changed it was time for stickers.  I decided I would just color code each book instead of removing the original spine label to save time, as well as keep the uniformity of the labels.  I also didn't want to change any of my specifications with the companies I use to purchase my books for the library.  And I love the colorful stickers :-)  While one class came in the library this week, my volunteer suggested I ask the teacher if her students could help put stickers on the books. She thankfully agreed, and in 25 minutes those students put stickers on the entire sports collection and half the Historical Fiction section. Library Ninjas are awesome!!  I'll definitely be going back to this method with each section.

Library ninja helpers, the sticker monsters!

After the stickers were placed on the books, they were moved to a bookcase in my library classroom as a temporary location.  They look nice, don't they?

newly "stickered" books in their temp location.

My next step is to make room in the main library to start shelving the books that have been "stickered".  This will be a little tricky.  I would like to avoid the "bookshelf shuffle" as much as possible, but I'm afraid there aren't too many ways around it.  Time to get creative!