Rational
The following assignment will look at the purchasing process. This will include looking at possible vendors, searching methods, my approach to the project, book selection, and show my growth.
Vendors
There are many different types of vendors. The power point slides points out distributors (United Library Services), Publishers (Scholastic), Producers, Jobbers (J. Appleseed), and Bookstores (Amazon). For this project and for my job I make an effort to try to buy from a wide variety of the possible sellers. From my past experience I feel it is better to make sure the library has materials from many different sources, as you do not want your library to become a place that is all one brand. If this was to happen the library could become a mini Scholastic or mini ULS store. These companies do not carry everything and if the TL buying the materials only went to one source the TL would be unfairly censoring what the students can read.
Searching
When I start looking for materials to buy I often start at Amazon.ca or Amazon.com or Chapters Online, depending on the book I am looking for. I find these three sources give me very quick answers on what might be out there. These webpages are more user friendly for searching a topic. They will give many answers on that topic or something around that topic.
For example: With my project of community helpers I can search that topic on Amazon and get many different answers. But when I search that topic on Kidsbooks or ULS there are not always book found in the search. On Amazon there will be titles around that topic such as “My Neighbors” or “In my Community.” Then I can take the information from those series and search places like Scholastic or ULS online.
The other route I go when searching for new materials is to look at the various catalogs sent to me from places like Nelson, ULS, Scholastic and many others I have mailed to me on a regular basis.
Often when I am buying new books I have already have a wish list of what I want to purchase. This wish list will be made up from recommendation from other TLs or classroom teachers that would help me as well as request from teachers, students, or administration.
Project
For the purpose of this project, the resources I am buying here are trying to replace the weeded materials that were taken out of my library for assignment 4. We have $4,000 to spend on buying materials. I thought it would be better served if I tried to keep it more realistic. For my library I do plan to take the weeded books in assignment 4 off of my shelves. However, I do not wish to spend my entire year’s budget on one section. What I have done here is looked for smart selections that will fit the needs of my users (teachers and students) and a reading level from K-3. Community helpers are done throughout all these grades now and a grade 2/3 class will have low readers needing lower books, just like a k/1 or 1/2 will have higher readers needing hard materials. I have also found materials in different formats for a range for my users. By keeping my list realistic I believe I will actually buy the items on my purchase list this fall when the budget money arrives.
Selection
In making the selections for the books I have tried to find collections of books that would have 4-10 copies for one price. The reason for this is it is easier to list them off in chart form for the project. If I were really searching for these materials I would either call the company and order each book as needed to make up the collection from one series or use online ordering to do this. However, since I was looking for series to buy I did manage to find some I would have not found if I had used my regular methods. I will keep this in mind for the next time I go to purchase books on a subject area. By spending some time digging a little deeper I found some books series I think would be great books to buy. These are the ones from Learner Books that are on the Book Purchase chart.
Growth
This project has taught me a few important lessons. I have learned to really look at the reviews. In the past I would listen to people in the field for advice. TLs love to share information on good books. I would also look at the reviews on Amazon, but of course I would be cautious when taking in that information. I have purchased from Amazon many times in the past for personal and work items and the reviews were usually correct. However, this course has taught me to have a look at recognized published reviews such as the School Library Journal. This was a good process for me. When I found a book I liked and I would then Google some reviews. It was an interesting learning experience. The book series on my purchasing list from Learning Books were given positive reviews from School Library Journal.
I have learned to spend more time searching and go past my usual methods of searching for books. This project has shown that there are different options available for buying books and what might be out there could be better then what I would have bought.
Finally, this part of the course and project has taught me about uploading my inventory to Follett and they can show me the gaps that I have in my library. I am looking forward to trying this in the fall.
