Library Work with Children

by Alice Isabel Hazeltine

Not the least important contribution of club work to the library is the direction of the reading of boys and girls of the intermediate age—always such a difficult problem. Most of the children of the age when clubs begin to appeal to them strongly —from 12 years on—have reached a stage of mental development at which they should be reading, under direction, books from the adult as well as the juvenile collection. In the Cleveland Public Library clubs books from the adult collection are used whenever possible in connection with the club programs, and the leaders are encouraged to recommend books from that collection for the personal reading of the children. The result is that the children are gradually made acquainted with the adult department, and come to feel as much at home there as in the children's room.

The club very seldom fails to establish a feeling of friendliness and personal interest in the library among its members. It has proved itself, in this way, a very decided aid in reducing the librarian's "police duty." Moreover, the club is a privilege, and as such not to be enjoyed by those who habitually break the law, so that what it fails to accomplish in one way may be brought about in another.

As this paper is based on experience gained in the Cleveland Public Library, it would not be complete without mention of one important phase of the club work there.

To a very great extent the club work in the Cleveland Public Library owes its growth in size and efficiency to the time and interest given to it by the volunteer club leaders, of whom, during the year 1910, there were 60. Looking over the work of the boys' clubs for the year, it is interesting to note the influence of the leader's interests upon the boys. All but one of the boys' clubs whose leaders are attorneys devoted their club meetings to debating, mock trials and parliamentary drill. Among the clubs under the leadership of students in Western Reserve University (and these represent more than half of the total number of boys' clubs) the predominant interest is in the discussion of current events, the subjects for occasional debates being suggested by these discussions. In two or three clubs too young for such discussion, the leaders, who were especially interested in civics, were able to interest the boys in the study of the work of the various departments of our city government. In another instance a leader, a business man, deeply interested in the history of Cleveland and its industries has succeeded in holding the interest of his club boys in this subject for three months, though these were boys whose indifference to anything but "Wild West" stories was proverbial in the branch library.

Clubs for boys and girls in the Cleveland Public Library are under the direction of a club supervisor, who organizes the clubs, secures the services of the volunteer leaders, and helps them in preparing programs for the clubs. The work has been conducted in this way for three years, and has become a vital part of the work of the library as a whole.

LIBRARY READING CLUBS FOR YOUNG PEOPLE

The successful development of reading clubs by the New York Public Library is evidenced by the fact that at the time the following paper was written, in 1912, there were reported twenty-five boys' clubs and seventeen girls' clubs. The paper is by Anna C. Tyler, and was read before the New York meeting of school librarians in Brooklyn, N. Y., May 25, 1912.

Anna Cogswell Tyler was born in Detroit, Michigan, and was graduated from the Hartford, Conn., High School in 1880. She attended Mrs. Julie Goddard Piatt's boarding school in Utica, New York, from 1880 to 1882, and Mademoiselle Taveney's school for girls at Neuillysur- Seine near Paris from 1883 to 1885. She was graduated from the Pratt Institute Library School, taking the two-year course, 1904-1906. She was an assistant in the Pratt Institute Free Library from 1906 to 1908. In 1908 she was made assistant in charge of story-telling and library reading-clubs in the New York Public Library.

The library reading clubs have sprung into being as a natural result of the library story hour, and for two very potent reasons —the boys and girls of from twelve to fifteen years old, however much they enjoy listening to a good story, are extremely afraid of being classed as children. Therefore when such a boy or girl comes to the branch library which he uses and sees a very attractive little notice reading "Story hour this afternoon at four o'clock for the older children" he shakes his head and goes his way saying, "Oh, they don't mean me, that's for the kids!" But when he sees a notice reading "The Harlem Boys' Club" meets such a day and hour his attention is immediately arrested, and he asks, "What do you have to do to join this club?"

This is the first reason for the rapid growth of these library reading clubs, the magic contained in merely the sight or sound of the word "club"—the spur it gives to the imagination of even the apparently unimaginative child, and the stigma it removes from the mind of the adolescent boy or girl of being considered a child. By conferring upon him the dignity of membership in a club we can make it possible for him to enjoy to the extent of his capacity the pleasure the majority of children so delight in—the listening to a good story well told or well read. His mind is at peace, his dignity unquestioned, for, since no stripling likes to be taunted with his green years, his being a member of such a club or league has forever precluded such a possibility.