According to Harry Potter, it's your soul. According to movies, it's your life. According to a teacher, however, the greatest sacrifice one can give is . . . I can barely confess I've done it! . . . giving away books.
Yesterday, I sat in the middle of my reading area surrounded by books. I had a problem. I had too many books. "Too many books!" you exclaim in authentic horror. "That's just not possible." Actually, it IS possible, and I was able to reach such a point. It happened because a) I am a children's book hoarder, b) I am a Scholastic whore, c) I cannot say no to a book. My classroom library has books from my own childhood, from warehouse sales, from used bookstores and Friends of the Library monthly sales, leftover from the teacher who had resided in my classroom before me, and from many helpful teachers in California who saw me as a beneficiary of all the books they no longer had want or need for.
Our school librarian (and the husband of another third grade teacher) came in and saw me panicking as I sat like a human island in a sea of books. "Help me!" I cried pathetically, and he allowed me to wail out my problem: basically that I had too many books and my classroom library was starting to swallow my classroom whole; a colleague joked that I could keep all my books, but a couple of students would have to sit outside. I picked up a book at random to demonstrate the problem. The book happened to be from an ancient series featuring a character named Calico Cat. "Calico Cat goes to the Zoo": a boring, story with bland pictures about a cat who sees animals at a zoo (what a creative idea!). "What about this?" I said, manically. "I would never recommend this book to someone; I hate this book! But it might have some significance to an ELL or someone just beginning to read."
"Have you ever seen a student reading one of these?" he asked, patiently.
"Ummm... I think I saw Bianca reading one once."
"Is it worth keeping a book you hate, that you wouldn't recommend, just because one student picked it up and read it ONCE?"
"I don't know! Am I hired to be a teacher or a book critic?" I asked, anger rising in my voice.
He told me quietly, slowly, and calmly (appropriate for a librarian, but it may have been fear that I would attack him for making such a suggestion), "Erica, why would you keep a book that lacks quality, when you have plenty of good books waiting to be picked up? Taking out some of the books that are disinteresting and boring will only increase the chance that a student will pick up a book that he actually will enjoy."
Of course he was right. I started going through my books and pulling out books that had no place in my classroom. I took out copies of "Leo and the Butterfly" (BOR-ING), a 70s book asking the question, "What Are Drugs?" (my kids can already tell you that), a couple of books f
rom the series my grandmother bought us when we were growing up with titles like "The Truth About Tattling", "picture" books with no pictures and miniscule print, etc. Although it was possibly one of the hardest things I ever had to do, I ended up with a large box full of rejected books.
I can now look through my library and not find one book that I wouldn't be glad to recommend. There's a great feeling in that! Also, my classroom library now only takes up four bookshelves (still a lot, but about twelve cubic feet less of space than my books were taking up before). It looks good and I feel good about it. I am still struggling with the book critic within, but I get most of those needs out from my child_lit e-mail ring to which I belong. It comes down to this:
I hold my students to an expectation when they come into my class; my books should meet high standards as well.
Yesterday, I sat in the middle of my reading area surrounded by books. I had a problem. I had too many books. "Too many books!" you exclaim in authentic horror. "That's just not possible." Actually, it IS possible, and I was able to reach such a point. It happened because a) I am a children's book hoarder, b) I am a Scholastic whore, c) I cannot say no to a book. My classroom library has books from my own childhood, from warehouse sales, from used bookstores and Friends of the Library monthly sales, leftover from the teacher who had resided in my classroom before me, and from many helpful teachers in California who saw me as a beneficiary of all the books they no longer had want or need for.
Our school librarian (and the husband of another third grade teacher) came in and saw me panicking as I sat like a human island in a sea of books. "Help me!" I cried pathetically, and he allowed me to wail out my problem: basically that I had too many books and my classroom library was starting to swallow my classroom whole; a colleague joked that I could keep all my books, but a couple of students would have to sit outside. I picked up a book at random to demonstrate the problem. The book happened to be from an ancient series featuring a character named Calico Cat. "Calico Cat goes to the Zoo": a boring, story with bland pictures about a cat who sees animals at a zoo (what a creative idea!). "What about this?" I said, manically. "I would never recommend this book to someone; I hate this book! But it might have some significance to an ELL or someone just beginning to read."
"Have you ever seen a student reading one of these?" he asked, patiently.
"Ummm... I think I saw Bianca reading one once."
"Is it worth keeping a book you hate, that you wouldn't recommend, just because one student picked it up and read it ONCE?"
"I don't know! Am I hired to be a teacher or a book critic?" I asked, anger rising in my voice.
He told me quietly, slowly, and calmly (appropriate for a librarian, but it may have been fear that I would attack him for making such a suggestion), "Erica, why would you keep a book that lacks quality, when you have plenty of good books waiting to be picked up? Taking out some of the books that are disinteresting and boring will only increase the chance that a student will pick up a book that he actually will enjoy."
Of course he was right. I started going through my books and pulling out books that had no place in my classroom. I took out copies of "Leo and the Butterfly" (BOR-ING), a 70s book asking the question, "What Are Drugs?" (my kids can already tell you that), a couple of books f
rom the series my grandmother bought us when we were growing up with titles like "The Truth About Tattling", "picture" books with no pictures and miniscule print, etc. Although it was possibly one of the hardest things I ever had to do, I ended up with a large box full of rejected books.I can now look through my library and not find one book that I wouldn't be glad to recommend. There's a great feeling in that! Also, my classroom library now only takes up four bookshelves (still a lot, but about twelve cubic feet less of space than my books were taking up before). It looks good and I feel good about it. I am still struggling with the book critic within, but I get most of those needs out from my child_lit e-mail ring to which I belong. It comes down to this:
I hold my students to an expectation when they come into my class; my books should meet high standards as well.
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