Day 7 - Lucky for Some

Right, on day the seventh I have learnt much that is worth the knowing.

Before the morn was gone I delved deep into the world of languages other than English(LOTE). The library service hold within its collection many items in many languages. These are held at different locations. Here, for example, there is a collection of German and Chinese language materials. Customers may place holds on these items, like any other items.

With LOTE items, however, it is possible to simply request a number of items in a particular language, say 10 novels on Spanish. Since the libraries do not hold items in all languages, or not a lot in some, these can be borrowed from the state library collection (PLS? I think) held off-site and serving the needs of libraries around Queensland. The tricky part is that these items are given a special barcode when they arrive that must be matched with the correct catalogue record. This is not easily done when the script is incompressible . All good fun.

Now, before the sun did wane in the west, I was heralded unto the land of reference guidelines. Essentially, this boiled down to the simple fact that people lie, but they don't know they're lying. Put otherwise, it is our job to help the user identify more specifically what information they really want before we advise them on where they can find it. This is called the reference interview. Once this has been established we can search the catalogue or the databases to locate what is needed. It may be that what is wanted is an item held by another  library service and an inter library loan can be arranged for the same price as placing a hold (unless it is at a state or national library - $16.50 apparently).

That about wraps it up for today.

Acquisitions

Just a quick one, before I forget what I was told yesterday (my brain feels like Swiss cheese at the moment!).

So, acquisitions. What have I learned? Basically there are three methods of acquiring new book for the library. Books by particular authors are on a standing order, so for example any new book by James Patterson will automatically be acquired in bulk, although extras can be requested as needs demand.

The second method is the bookseller selecting the books for the library based on a profile. This system has been running for 15-20 years and apparently works well. It also means that all the processing is done before the books arrive and they are shelf-ready upon delivery.

Thirdly, users may request a purchase and, if it is fairly recent and fits with the collection, it will probably be approved.

Simple really.

The Heavy Stuff

Ok, so today I was given a bit if an overview of the collections management for the library. 

It would seem that the issue with a floating collection is that imbalances occur as people borrow in one branch and return in another. The solution is simply to send out an email to say I need more fiction, or I've got too many DVDs and the other branches offer to give/take as required. Not terribly scientific, but essentially getting the job done.

I was also shown the new software being piloted from collectionHQ.com that analyses the circulation figures each month and allows a branch to identify items that are being over/under used and redistribute them to branches where they can work harder. It also identifies items that have been heavily circulated and are therefore probably a bit battered, allowing the library to exchange them for identical items at other libraries that are not being circulated as heavily. This looks impressive and much more effective, but is currently only being used in a selection of test libraries, and with fiction only.

So, what else did we get up to in the magical world of a public library? Well, aside from the two hours supervising children making stuff from Lego, I spent some time hunting for items that we knew we're not on the shelves as a final check before removing them from the system. There is a cool electronic wand that is used to check for missing items, and after it has failed to find them a few times a final human check is done. What I learned is that the wand was right. None of those items were on the shelves, so maybe we should just trust the wand and save a bit of time on wasted human labour. Having said that, apparently there are technical issues with the wand at the moment, so maybe all the checks will be human for the time being. You've got to love technology... It shows you how it can make your life easier before it stops working and you have to resent doing things the old slow way again.

I also was shown how the home library service works. When I'm old and infirm I'll definitely use this, and make lots of difficult demands just for the sake of it. The way it works is that the people say what sorts of books they like, and the library collects some together and sends them out once a month. My favourite was the lady who didn't want any books with pictures of pretty young girls on the cover, or any with pictures of villages. Difficult to assess when searching the catalogue. For some reason they don't include that information in the metadata. Seriously however, this is obviously a very valuable service to these housebound individuals and goes to show how libraries can make a real difference in the lives of the community.

IPad Basics

Day three: today I sat on on the iPad basics class which the library runs twice a month, along with a couple of other iPad classes. The profile of the class was elderly. Most of them had their own iPads but had little idea of how to use them. Saying that, like any class, some picked things up quickly while others felt that they needed to do the class again. Unlike school, however, all the students were self-motivated, having signed themselves up.

The only issue was the lady with the Samsung tablet. She was understanding, but it did highlight the need for everyone to have the same device (remember this for school).

I did even learn something. I now know how to add a me keyboard, and I can add emoticons into my texts. 

Toddlers and Lego

Day two: I spent my morning today joining in with toddler time and a Lego activity for the school holidays. 

Toddler time was much as I remembered it from other libraries. The mums bring their little ones in to get them out of the house and to meet a few others in the same situation. Their children join in some of the time and run around crazily the rest of the time. I'm sure this programme is designed to help pre-school literacy, but I think it is probably more of a service to the mums.

The lego activity was easy to run; just a matter of putting out some Lego and colouring sheets, but the group who had booked it turned up with significantly more children. This showed me that even with the best planning people will always abuse the system and you need to be flexible (not unlike teaching!).

My afternoon was spent mostly opening boxes of new books and checking invoices. This was fairly time consuming, although I got faster once I got a system going. Ultimately there are a number of jobs in the library that are fairly unskilled and repetitive, but that need to be done each day.