Last Thursday, the
HVLA librarians gathered at Collegiate for our spring meeting and heard from a
wonderful panel on "Innovative Uses of Library Spaces." Thank you to our panelists, Karen Grenke (Williamsburg Northside School),
Annah Jones (Marymount School), Karyn Silverman (Elizabeth Irwin High School),
LaShawn Ross (Riverdale) and moderator, Kerry Roeder (Professional Children's
School.) While all of our panelists used different strategies based on their
own school culture, each demonstrated innovation in their own way.
Karen Grenke, our
sole lower school panelist, spoke about utilizing the art studio next door as a
collaborative partner. When deciding how to decorate the front windows into the
library, she elected to ask the kids.
Giving the kids ownership over the space resulted in great ideas and a
fantastic display. Karen has moved
spaces before and is looking for innovative ideas since she will be again
moving into a new library space.
Annah talked about
adding faculty resources to her library space in order to bridge the gap of
support services the kids need. With a learning specialist in the library and
spaces for reading, writing, or math labs, kids have their learning teams
working together in the same space. There is a Maker Lab across from the
library, and Annah talked about the importance of being nearby but having separate spaces because of all the equipment, noise, etc.
Karen Silverman is constantly questioning how to be innovative within the space given to her, which is
considerably smaller than many other HVLA libraries. Exciting tools they have added to their
library include board games, tea service, knitting baskets, a 3-D printer, legos,
coloring books, sudokus, and brain teasers. The entryway and main space of her library is
purposefully set into collaborative tables with no screens and technology driven work
occurs toward the edges of the library. Karen also uses the interactive
bulletin board outside the library to connect with patrons that may never set
foot inside the space.
When LaShawn came
into her library, she saw room for improvement and decided to speak with her
Head of School about it. Together they looked at the space with fresh eyes and
the help of a set of students from Pratt Institute. Ultimately, it was decided to give the kids
more ownership over the space. Resources
like a writing center and language center were also added to give students
additional support.
Our moderator Kerry Roeder also
spoke about keeping maker kits behind the desk at her library that kids could
check out. When kids are getting antsy and need a project, she comes over and
invites them to make a banana piano.
Overall, it was a stimulating conversation with many ideas shared and questions asked. If you had an additional takeaway from the meeting, please share in the comments what resonated with you.
