Assignment+Four+Reflection

Reflection on Weeding For this assignment I have looked at a very specific aspect of the collection, those books relating to Ancient History and Archaeology. This narrow focus means that, in the end, I was only looking at about 16 sources in depth, which of course made the process of evaluating the resources much easier. This was my process:
 * 1) I examined the books visually before I took any other factors into account. The books that I thought wouldn’t appeal to students because of their layout or illustrations I set aside first. Some of the books contained drawings of artifacts rather than photographs, which I feel will not be as attractive to children. Photos of dig sites and how the artifacts are found, are more relevant to the construction of meaning that a book which shows the objects out of context and placed in an artist’s rendering of an ancient settlement.
 * 2) Having decided to eliminate these titles: //The first Civilizations//, //the First Settlements//, //Stones and Bones//, //Dating Dinosaurs and other old things//, I looked at duplicated titles and so I eliminated the oldest of the three editions of //Early Man//, and //Tomb & Treasure.//
 * 3) I then looked at the age and circulation statistics of the collection, eliminating all titles over 15 years old which is the high end of the 10-15 year range, or the 5 year circulation that is recommended by Kay Bishop, (Bishop 2007). I did this for the larger Ancient Civilizations collection as well as the more specific Archaeology selection.
 * 4) If I were the TL in this library my next steps would be to mark these titles as weeded in the Destiny Library System, and dispose of them according to district policy (black out any barcodes and schools stamps and donate or throw out.)
 * 5) As I am not the TL I will send these recommendations to Eleana Percevault, Citadel Middle School's Teacher-Librarian, for her consideration. Because 62% of the collection are 16 years old or older, it seems unlikely that all titles could really be weeded at one time, unless funds are available to replace them and provide sufficient materials for 12 classes of grade 6s and 7s to use. Upon further reflection, however, such a thorough weeding would certainly make the need for new materials very clear, with several bare shelves just waiting to be filled! This report could be brought to the administration or the pact to support a quest for more funding.

Bishop, Kay. //The Collection Program in Schools: Concepts, Practices, and Information Sources,// 4th edition. Westport, Connecticut: Libraries Unlimited, 2007.