When our library created its strategic plan, many of the goals concerning the Children’s Room fell under the category of “Create Young Readers”, so we’re always looking for ways to engage our youngest patrons and the adults who work with them.
I’ve posted before about our School Collection program where we circulate boxes of books to teachers for classroom use. This year, we have debuted another facet of our School Collection program: circulating felt stories.
We had gotten requests for circulating felt stories from teachers over the years, and this year we decided to go for it. I have a particularly crafty staff person and I made this one of her goals this year to create felt stories to add to this collection.
Photo by Abby Johnson
Each felt story/rhyme is housed in a simple ziplock bag. A piece of cardboard in the bag helps give them shape.
Photo by Abby Johnson
On one side of the cardboard we print the words to the rhyme or story, the contents of the bag, and we place the barcode for checkout.
The felt stories are a special perk for teachers, so only teachers with a School Collection card may check them out. We have tried to provide a good selection and have made multiples of felts that fit popular themes (seasonal, etc.).
As the felt stories circulate and come back, our staff check the bags to make sure all the pieces have been returned. If we’re missing something, we can contact the teacher to see if it’ll turn up or we can pretty easily make a new piece.
We’re still growing our collection, but hoping that this will entice more early childhood teachers to check out School Collections and use them with their students!
Do you have any special circulating collections that are popular with your patrons?
— Abby Johnson, Youth Services Manager
New Albany-Floyd County Public Library
New Albany, IN
http://www.abbythelibrarian.com
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