"This is YOUR library… If there aren’t enough manga books here, whose fault is it?" I asked my 6-8th graders during their visits the first 7 days of school.
When someone hesitantly said, "Yours?" I dramatically reacted with, "How can it be my fault? This is my first week here. This is YOUR library. You’re in charge of suggesting new books. If I don’t know what you want, I can’t go get it."
After a bunch of giggles as the students realized I’m not their sterotypical librarian, these teenagers leaned forward and started to think. I put out a huge blue bag that said @ your library, some post-it notes, and lots of writing tools and GOT OUT OF THE WAY! They worked. They browsed the shelves. They frantically compared notes with each other, scratched their heads recalling titles, and wrote as fast as they could.
They averaged five minutes per class to add to the bag while they checked out their first 2 books for the school year. Everyone HAD to have a book or they couldn’t leave so I wasn’t sure I’d get any feedback at all. Without filtering, cleaning up or commenting on any of their notes, I’m posting their responses so you can see what’s currently interesting them:
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Titles |
Manga / Anime / Graphic Novels |
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P.S. Longer Letter Later by Danziger Island: Shipwrecked series by Gordan Korman Dog Training commands Red Kayak by Cummings Seeing Red Clique series Bluford High Simpson’s Animorphs Eragon – Eldest- the third one House of Night series R. L. Stine mystery books St. Iggy – Goings Fat Kid Rules the World Stuck in Neutral A Child Called It – Lost Boy – all sequels How to Draw Cars Comics – Spiderman/Marvel – Hulk – Ironman – Batman The Red Mask by Edgar Allen Poe Trumpet – Music Instrument Vampire Kisses Diary of Anne Frank The Freedom Writer’s Diary Magazine – Game Informer Chris Crutcher books Sharon Draper books – Tears of a Tiger Cheerleading Books More Origami books More Scary books More Paranormal books A to Z Mystery books |
Naruto Death Note Bleach Dragon Ball Z Yu-Gi-Oh Zatchbell Harcenogo Bone Beat Vampire Knight One Piece Yugioh Shamon King Dragon Drive Hoshinengi Shonen Jump Preist ? Priest |
Now, where to begin….? I plan to pick up sons #2, 3, and 4 to help me examine anime and manga this weekend. They think we’ll be relaxing before attending the Wilson County Fair. Silly boys! They should remember they’re my best guinea pigs. Remember the Life cereal commercials with Mikey? We could make our own with book reading and #3-#4 sons. "They won’t read it. They won’t read anything…" What? They like it?!
Great idea, Diane.
You rock. Love the idea!