Library Work with Children

by Alice Isabel Hazeltine

PROBLEMS OF DISCIPLINE

The Wisconsin Library Bulletin for July-August, 1908, is given up to the presentation of widely varying experiences in regard to discipline, in a report by Mary Emogene Hazeltine and Harriet Price Sawyer, who sent a list of ten questions to 125 librarians, and incorporated the replies.

Mary Emogene Hazeltine was born in Jamestown, N. Y., in 1868, and was graduated from Wellesley College in 1891. She was librarian of the James Prendergast Free Library in Jamestown from 1893 to 1906, when she became Preceptor of the Library School of the University of Wisconsin, the position she now holds. She has given much help to small libraries.

Mrs. Harriet Price Sawyer was born in Kent, Ohio, received the
degree of B. L. from Oberlin College: was an assistant in the
Oberlin College Library 1902-1903; was graduated from the Pratt
Institute Library School in 1904; was librarian of the State
Normal School at New Paltz, N. Y., 1904-1905; a student in the
University of Berlin, Germany, 1905-1906; Library Visitor and
Instructor, Wisconsin Library Commission, 1906-1910. Since that
time she has been chief of the Instructional Department in the
St. Louis Public Library, including charge of the training class.
In 1917 this class was expanded into a library school, with Mrs.
Sawyer as principal.

In March, a list of questions concerning the problem of discipline in the library was sent out to 125 librarians. The answers show a most interesting variety of experiences and conditions. A few report that it is no longer a "vexed" problem, and one librarian thinks that it is "only a well-maintained tradition," but most of the writers agree with Miss Eastman of Cleveland, who says: "You will note that while conditions vary somewhat in the different branches, discipline is a question which we have always with us whenever we work with children. I do believe, however, that each year places the library on a little higher and more dignified plane in the minds of the children as well as the public generally; and that the question of discipline becomes more and more a question of dealing with individuals."

As to disturbance without the library, there is but one opinion, viz., to turn the matter over to the policemen, and this is reported in every instance to have put an end to the trouble.

Any serious misbehavior within the library has been treated by the suspension of library privileges, ranging in severity of sentence from one day to a month or, in a few cases, even longer. The variation, however, in the manner of carrying out the sentence forms an interesting study, from the lightest form reported, at Chippewa Falls, where the child may draw a book, but remains in the library only long enough to secure it, to the drastic measures taken at Sheboygan where the students were ordered out of the library en masse even in the midst of preparation for a test in history.

Miss Wood's plan is an interesting one, but the tactful helpers are difficult to find.

The card system at Kenosha will no doubt solve the difficulty for many librarians who find the initiative in the disciplining of the older visitors at the library most difficult to undertake.

In some communities, the personal letter or visit to the parents has proved most helpful, and, doubtless, the plan reported by Miss Lord of asking the boy to sign his name will find favor in the larger libraries.

The aim of discipline, according to educators, is the moral foundation of character. The library as well as the school has to make up for the lack of moral training in many homes, and good conduct must be taught by the librarian as well as by the teacher. The whole matter is very well summed up by Miss Dousman of Milwaukee.

"It seems to me that order and good behavior are absolutely imperative in the library. Good manners, that outward and visible sign of the respect for the rights of others, should be expected of children. How? By never failing yourself to treat them with respect, courtesy and justice. To distinguish between unavoidable disturbances and those made with mischievous intent. To see and hear only the things you can prevent, else your nerves will get the better of your judgment.

"Allow children as much freedom as possible, consistent with the rights of others—and don't nag.

"In case of bad behavior, make a tactful and pleasant appeal to the child first, thereby giving him a chance to reinstate himself. This appeal failing, reprimand in no uncertain terms. Dismissal from the room is the natural punishment for refusal to obey regulations. Obedience as a virtue has not entirely gone out of fashion. Suspension for a definite or indefinite period, according to the offense is necessary for the maintenance of good discipline. Limitation as to the number of times a week a mischievous child may visit the library has a good effect. A suspended sentence of permanent dismissal on failure to behave has a most salutary effect. Reinstate as soon as there is an evident desire to improve.

"In our zeal to control the child, some have lost sight of the fact that it is quite as important to teach the child to control himself; that if he is to become a good citizen, he cannot learn too early to respect the rights of others."

At a meeting of the Massachusetts Library Club, reported in Public Libraries, v. 12, p. 362 (Nov. 1907), Miss Harriet H. Stanley of Brookline said of "Discipline in a Children's Room," that unnatural restraint was to be avoided, but the restraint required for the common good was wholesome, and that children were more, rather than less, comfortable under it, when it was exercised with judgment and in a kindly spirit.

"Judgment comes with experience. … As far as you are able, be just. If your watchfulness fails sometimes to detect the single offender in a group of children and you must send out the group to put an end to some mischief, say so simply, and they will see that they suffer not from your hard heartedness, but from the culprit's lack of generosity or from the insufficiency of their devices for concealing him. Be philosophical. Most disturbance is only mischief and properly treated will be outgrown. Stop it promptly, but don't lose your temper, and don't get worked up. To the juvenile mind, 'getting a rise' out of you is no less exhilarating than the performance which occasions it. Habitually deny them this gratification and mischief loses its savor.

"Talk little about wrongdoing. Don't set forth to a child the error of his ways when the 'ways' are in process of being exhibited, and the exhibitor is fully conscious of their nature. Choose another time—a lucid interval—for moral suasion.

"When children are intentionally troublesome, the simplest means of discipline is exclusion from the room; when necessary, formal exclusion for a definite period with a written notice to parents. The authority of the library should be exercised in the occasional cases where it is needed, both for the wrongdoer's own good and for the sake of the example to others.

"Provided you are just and sensible and good-tempered, your patrons will respect the library more and like you none the less for exacting from them suitable behavior. We talk a good deal about the library as a place of refuge for boys and girls from careless homes, and they do deserve consideration from us, but to learn a proper regard for public law and order is as valuable as any casual benefit from books. The children of conscientious parents whether poor or well-to-do also deserve something at our hands, and we owe it to them to maintain a respectable standard of conduct for them to share. Let us be hospitable and reasonable, but let us be courageous enough to insist that the young citizen treat the library with the respect due to a municipal institution."

It has been impossible to publish in full all of the replies to the circular letter sent out, but as much as possible has been incorporated in this report, believing that each situation delineated may give helpful hints toward the solution of this general difficulty. The list of questions is given in the synopsis appended to the admirable and helpful report contributed by the chief of the children's department in Pittsburgh.

Miss Frances Jenkins Olcott, Pittsburgh

After ten years of experience we find our most difficult question of discipline arises when the older boys and girls come into the library. They usually come in the evening and we have the greatest trouble with the boys. Sometimes we suspect that our trouble with the boys is due to the influence of the girls, who know how to keep quiet and yet make confusion!

The question of discipline depends largely on the district in which a branch is placed and also on the planning and equipment of the children's room—in fact of the whole branch building, and on the personal attention of the branch librarian toward the children.

In answer to question ten I might say that everything depends on the children's librarian's judgment and also on the children. Some children come into the library to be sent home. They wish to see how many times they can make mischief, and it is really a pleasure to them to have you send them out. In other cases children are much mortified by being sent from the room. It is necessary that the children's librarian and her assistants should know the children individually, especially their names and something of their home conditions wherever possible. The handling of "gangs" takes a great deal of tact and sympathy with boys.

On the whole, given a well-planned and equipped children's room, plenty of books, a sufficient number of the right kind of children's librarians who are firm, tactful and sympathetic (having a sense of humor and a wide knowledge of children's books) and by all means a sympathetic branch librarian, the question of discipline will usually smooth itself out. We have one room in a crowded tenement district where the right young woman has produced unusual order. The children come in and go out happy and interested in their books, and there is little need for reproof. This is due largely to the fact that we started in with a determination to have reasonable order and the children learned that to use the room it was necessary to be orderly, and they are much happier and get more from the library.