Management Matters. Adding Arts to Library Management

by Lori E. Donovan, October 2018

Being creative and flexible is part of being a school librarian. The AASL National School Library Standards state, "The school library is a unique and essential part of a learning community…[which provides] an approachable, equitable, personalized learning environment necessary for every learner's well-rounded education" (2018, p. 11). How a librarian sets up the library's physical space and programming plays into the arts and the Standards' domain of Create.

Physical Space

The library is a place that supports all of the school community. To make the library bright, work with the art department to do a project-based learning (PBL) challenge to paint a mural on the walls. Challenge students to create a monthly bulletin board about literacy or library activities. Have student art displayed in the library for a low-cost decoration or have a gallery area for larger pieces that can become part of an instructional lesson on primary source documents using the students' own works.

Does the library space allow for student performances? Is there an area for students to present research findings, share their creative writing, or small musical or dramatic performances? Here is an opportunity to bring in students who might not otherwise visit the library on their own. Hosting Poetry Slams or Comic Open Mics are other ways to incorporate the arts.

Collections

Doing a bit of weeding? When I was a building librarian, I was in a high school that was a specialty center for the visual and performing arts. Our drama teacher would take our old books and use them for set decoration. Our 3D art teacher would take the books that were sewn bound, and students would turn them into art that we could then display around the library. What a model of how to reduce, reuse, and recycle. Some of our math teachers like to take old math theory books to show how math instruction has changed over time.

If your school has a specialty focus area, providing resources specific to that specialty is important in collection development. Even if it doesn't have such a focus, making sure your collection covers the arts (both visual and performing) is important to create well-rounded, global citizens.

The library can act as an archive of the arts. If your school's performances are filmed and sold (under a mechanical license, of course), a copy for archival purposes could be housed in the library. To help students' understanding the past times of their parents and grandparents, play music on a record player. To merge time periods, create virtual field trips to famous museums and opera houses all over the world with Google Arts and Culture.

Programming

When libraries host authors and/or illustrators, they are inviting the arts into the library. Students can see how an author or illustrator works on their craft—through countless drafts and revisions—in order to express themselves through words or art. Hosting a writers' workshop in the summer with local authors allow students to work with a professional and develop their own artistic craft.

Is your school a project-based learning school/district? How about working with the art and music teacher in planning a PBL project? Evan Michael Bush in a recent ALSC blog post talked about an artist workshop he does in his public library (2018). Taking his idea to another level, have students research an artist, a musician, a time period of music or art and then have them take the learning and apply it in the music and art classes. Afterward, for an authentic audience, host a gathering of the students' learning in the library with their work on display around all the resources students used in the sustained inquiry piece of the project. Digital citizenship lessons on copyright also impact the arts; the National Association for Music Education has great resources on music and copyright (https://nafme.org/my-classroom/copyright/).

There are many ways to support the arts in the library. What better way to introduce inquiry and curiosity than through the arts with resources and programming in a space where every learner goes!

Works Cited

AASL. National School Library Standards. American Library Association, 2018.

Bush, Evan Michael. "The Iridescence of Words and Pictures: Using Picture Books to Create Artist Workshops in Your Library." ALSC Blog May 26, 2018. http://www.alsc.ala.org/blog/2018/05/the-iridescence-of-words-and-pictures-using-picture-books-to-create-artist-workshops-in-your-library/.