Library Day in the Life

For the first time, I am joining the over 300 librarians participating in the Library Day in the Life Project! The Library Day in the Life Project is a semi-annual event coordinated by Bobbi Newman of Librarian by Day. Twice a year librarians, library staff and library students from all over the globe share a day (or week) in their life through blog posts, photos, video and Twitter updates.

I am currently working as a school library intern one day a week in a K-8 independent school. This is my day:

6:20 Wake up, shower, eat, catch up on email, Twitter, and Tumblr

7:25 Make the 20-minute commute to the school

7:45 Arrive, meet with my mentor librarian and talk about day’s plan before school starts at 8. She found a box of old paperbacks to give away to students, so a gaggle of lower school kids are sifting through. It takes them a while to understand that these are books they get to keep and don’t have to bring back to the library!

8:00 School starts, no classes for the first two periods, but a board committee is meeting in the library. I catalog a stack of donated books including some popular chapter books and easy reader non-fiction. Mostly copy cataloging, but we do add longer descriptions and more subject terms, though these are totally informal. Have to look up a few series numbers for a few titles that aren’t clearly numbered and do a bit of original cataloging for some Pokemon books. A few books are library bound, so I just add barcode and spine labels to go straight on the shelf.

9:50 Time for the daily school-wide assembly! Wednesdays are kind of a grab bag, so I never know what to expect. Today, the 8th graders did a flash mob dance to Eye of the Tiger to interrupt a fake current event. Not the usual fare, but lots of fun.

10:05 Recess time! More students hear about the free books and check them out. A 2nd grader comes by to do a survey about what kind of books people like to read. I answer comic books from her list of choices. Start shelving the overflowing returns cart.

10:20 First of two 5th grade classes in a row. I observe the lesson which includes a review of BibMe, which they are using for a project, and some read-alouds that tie into their other classes: The Hatmaker’s Sign by Candace Fleming for their colonial unit and the beginning of The Friendship by Mildred Taylor, since they just read Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry.

11:10 During the second 5th grade class, I shelve books and finish up a few cataloging tasks from earlier.

12:00 Lunch-time! After eating, we are on library duty. More kids come in and finally empty out the free paperbacks box. Lots of students are in using the computers, but mostly to take pictures of themselves with FaceTime.

12:40 Study hall/SSR time. The library is open to 7th graders for quiet study or reading and lots of students are  using the computers and some settle in on the couches and in the storytime area to read. I help a student find some more dystopian books to read — she’s read a lot, but I give her a few more titles that interest her.

1:20 I go collect the 1st grade students for their library class. The single file line does not stay single file for the very short walk to the library! I observe the lesson which includes a reading of I See a Kookaburra! by Steve Jenkins and Robin Page and a look at some of Steve Jenkins’ other awesome non-fiction books. The students also watch a short video about the rainforest to tie-in with their regular class unit.

2:10 No more classes today, so my mentor librarian and I go over some professional development stuff before I head home for the day.

2:50 Lots of errands to run!

5:00 Home for the evening. Time to catch up on email, Twitter, Google Reader, etc. I have some YALSA committee stuff to work on, including finishing up the press release for the YALSA Writing Award Jury (look out for the winners soon!) and writing a blog post for the YALS Advisory Board to go with the upcoming Winter issue.

February 1st, 2012  ♥  Libraries  ♥  No Comments »