Having public library materials requested by your students and staff delivered to your door allows you to address the demand for current, high quality fiction and informational texts in ways you never imagined possible.
Research shows that when students can get books more easily, they spend more time reading. When they spend more time reading, research shows they read and write better. When they read and write better, students have larger vocabularies and are better at grammar. They also spell better; read faster; and know more about literature, science and social studies. They also know more about how things work in our changing world and can often figure out how to do things for themselves1.
Shared System school libraries:
Extend the shelves beyond school walls. Students using Shared System school libraries have access to the average collection of 7,000 books on their own shelves, but also to the 2.1 million books on the Public Library's shelves.
Check out books – lots of them. Using their public library card at their elementary school libraries, each child borrows an average of 46 books a year, 24 percent of them from IndyPL. While high school students don’t borrow as much, more than half of what they borrow comes from IndyPL.
Teach library concepts. Students learn not just how books are organized, but how they are shared. They're encouraged to return books as soon as they've finished so someone else in the school or in the city can read the book next.
Develop self-discipline skills. Staff ask students to check out only as many books as they can read between visits to the library. Students learn what enough means for them, and it's different for every student.
Encourage responsibility. Students learn how to take care of the library materials on their card, how to find a safe place to keep them, and how to look for them if they are misplaced. Families and students are asked to pay for material that becomes lost.
Foster good reading practice. Student readers find good books their friends recommend, use the IndyPL website to track favorite authors, and follow popular series on the IndyPL KidsBlog.
How does it work?
School library items are cataloged and barcoded and searchable in the IndyPL online catalog. School staff and students can see what's in the building, and request what they need if the school doesn’t own it.
Students use their IndyPL cards to check out and request materials. The school library will make a copy of each student's card. If they can't find it or don't have one, they will make one.
Families help students learn to be responsible readers and library users. Families talk with their students about what they are reading. They get email notices when items are coming due. They can also check their child's account at www.indypl.org, or can keep track of the receipts they get when they check out books. Each family will do what works best for them!