Library Work with Children

by Alice Isabel Hazeltine

The Janesville Public Library is so arranged that the desk attendant has almost no supervision over the Reading and Reference Rooms. The matter of discipline in those rooms was a source of considerable trouble until an attendant took charge there in the evenings. We find it necessary to have this attendant only during the winter months, when more High School students use the library than at other times.

It is not the policy of the Library Board to enforce any strict rules as to quiet in the rooms. Rules are very lenient and the enforcement more by inference than in any other way. An attendant if she has the requisite personality, may, simply by her manner ensure quiet and orderly conduct, at least that has been our experience during the past year.

Various other means were tried before the one which we now find so successful. Talks were given in the High School by the superintendent, and at one time a police officer had the Library on his regular beat. None of these methods were permanently successful.

Miss Jeannette M. Drake, Jacksonville, Ill.

I have never hesitated to take what measures seemed necessary to have a quiet library, otherwise how near can we come to fulfilling the purpose of a library?

Since the first few weeks that I was here as librarian I have had no trouble in regard to the discipline. I feel sometimes that I am too strict, but I cannot have patrons say "I cannot study at the library because of the confusion, etc." The only solution of the problem that I know of is to ask every one not to talk, unless he can do so without disturbing others in the least. When it is necessary for people to talk about their work, except to us, we give them a vacant room in the building and often have people in every vacant space and the office at the same time. We encourage such use of the rooms; try to be courteous in our demands; interested in all; do everything in our power to get material for patrons and the result is that they feel that the library is a place of business.

The boys who used to come "for fun" come now and read for several hours at a time and are always gentlemanly and are our friends. I know of none who ceased to come because of the order we must have. At first, if we had spoken to anyone and they still were not quiet, we asked them to leave the building and to come back when they wanted to read or study. We always saw that they left when we told them to do so, and no one has been sent from the building for unruly conduct for two years. If I needed help I would call on the police as I would not want either teachers or students to feel that we could not manage our patrons when they were in the library. Of course we are always on the alert as we realize that the matter would get beyond us if we were careless for a time. It is not easy for librarians to carry out these rules, but it pays in the reputation of the library.

Mrs. Alice G. Evans, Decatur, Ill.

We have had very little trouble with discipline since moving into our own building, the rooms being so arranged that excellent supervision over them is possible from the loan desk. Then too, the children's and reference rooms have their own attendants and any disturbance may be quickly settled.

Perhaps the most disturbing element comes from the boys preparing debates, who often forget and talk somewhat above a whisper, and it is sometimes necessary to request them every fifteen minutes, to lower their voices.