Make America Great Again

If you know me in any format, you know that I am not very political.  I never share who I vote for but I have voted in every single election that I was eligible to vote in since the age of 18.  As an American, I believe it is not only a right and a responsibility but also a privilege.

Our President-elect ran on a platform of making America great again.  This morning there has been much discussion and "Monday Morning Quarterbacking" about yesterday's general election.  Tempers have flared, names have been called, feelings hurt, hopes crushed, bad behaviors displayed and a general feeling of disappointment throughout this election process in all party lines.

But that is not what I want to share.  I want to share that I am hopeful and excited even.  Why?  (Glad you asked!)

For many years, voter turnout has been low.  I breezed in and out of my polling place that was, at most, a 10 minute wait to vote because so few people were there.  The same was true for my husband and son - and we were all there at different times.  But this year, I had to wait almost 2 hrs. to cast my vote and I was ok with that.  The lines were there all day.  Some folks waited up to 3hrs. to vote. The point is not that there was a lack of scanners or incompetence or fraud.  The point is that they waited and waited and did so peacefully.

This thrilled me.  People are voting.  People once again, for whatever reason, believe that their vote matters and that they have a voice in our government and how it is run.  The apathy that has plagued American is waning.  And it wasn't just in my little corner of Maryland but all across America.  Voters turned out in record numbers.  I watched the TV moderators sharing the significant increase in state after state after state.

I also saw children, lots of children, coming to vote with their parents.  Children seeing their parents vote for the first time.  Children seeing democracy in action.  Again, so powerful.  We know that kids reflect what they see at home.  I have strong memories of stepping inside that curtained booth and watching my mother flick levers to vote.  I have beloved memories of doing the same with my own child.   Because I live and work in the same community, many of my students saw me voting yesterday as well.  (And they let me know it in the hallways today!)  The adults in the lives of these children sent a powerful message without ever saying a word.  They showed that this is important.  This is meaningful.  This is my privilege as an American and I value that.

We have a precious opportunity today and in the upcoming days, weeks, months and years.  We have the opportunity to build upon this momentum and keep engaging our students in the political process by making sure that they understand why our founding fathers chose a democracy for our country and making sure that they understand the importance of this and the role they play in it. 

We are grooming future adults who will be American citizens who will have the power to affect change with their vote or even by running for political office.

We have the opportunity to make America great again and it has nothing to do with Donald Trump or Hilary Clinton. It starts today with every educator, parent and adult reflecting civility, compromise and hope for the future of our country and our children.

It's Election Day!

Did you get your sticker today?  Did you vote?  I did!  It's such an important right that we have and, even if my candidate isn't the winning one, I feel like I had input and I made a difference.  I think my students are going to need to feel like they had a say in this reorganization of our library.  I need to make sure that THEIR voice is heard and appreciated.  After all, this is their library too! 

Yesterday the emails were flying as I realized that I only had 11 days to get my space prepped and ready for the shift to genrefication in the fiction section of the library.  I am blessed to have autonomy in this process, to have my decisions supported and to have resources made available to me. I am also blessed to have suggestions, questions and the opportunity to "defend" my choices and flesh out my thinking.

The Fiction Categories have been chosen!  They are:

Action/Adventure
Humorous Fiction
Historical Fiction
Mystery
Science Fiction/Fantasy
Sports Fiction
Just Like Me
Graphic Novels

Chimere and I had discussions about the combination of Science Fiction (one of her favorite genres) and Fantasy.  The two are closely related and my rationale, for combining them, is that having these books all together in one place will expose readers to both genres and an expanded set of books that fall in the categories. 

Fran mentioned a category "Just Like Me" and originally I thought, "what?!" but the more I think about it, the more I like it.  I like the approachability of "Just Like Me" versus Realistic Fiction.  I perceive this category being contemporary Realistic Fiction. 

I've printed reports from Titlewave showing my Collection Statistics and aged titles in my Fiction section.  I've also begun to curate Resource Lists in Destiny, using MARC record fields, to have a starting point for classifying the books in the Fiction section.

Reports, reports and more reports!



If you look at the photos of my library, you will see that many popular fiction titles are already housed in the Series section or in baskets for quick and easy access.  I am considering moving some of these back into the new "genrefied" fiction sections to expose students to other similar titles.  I am still thinking on this although I need to speed up my thinking as this big shift is occurring in just 10 days!

As all this is occurring, at the beginning of this post I mentioned having the students give input into categories for the nonfiction section.  Since this is a shortened week, due to a half day Professional Development on Monday and closed for Election Day today, I am going to have the 3rd through 5th grade classes for the rest of this week break into groups and create lists of categories they would like to see in the nonfiction section.  By introducing the concept of genrefication and sharing the process of transformation for out library in the upcoming months, I hope to ease any anxiety some may have about where their "favorite" book is now residing in the library. :-)  Don't worry, the Titanic book will still be there!

My plan is to break the classes into 5 groups and allow them to generate categories they would use, in their kid friendly language, and that they think others might be interested in using. Then I want to look at the categories that consistently appear across classes and grade levels and compare them to the categories floating around in my head and on the many pieces of paper that I write notes upon.  (I admit it!  I am a Post-It Junkie!  The more the merrier and the more colorful and quirky the better.)

Getting this input from students is something for the PLUS side of doing a mid-year shift.