Speedbooking - book promotion

Here is a post from the list serv from Clenda Wockner, Director of Library & Information Services, Waimea Collegewr@waimea.school.nz

"Found an idea on OZTL-Net a while ago and decided to give it a go. It is a heap of fun and has resulted in great borrowing. We have offered the option to our English teachers with their reading classes and so far have had 6 classes of Year 9 and 10 students participate – all successfully. It’s called speed booking – a bit like speed dating with books. We put out about 25-30 titles on each of the tables in the library (we have 8). The books are a combination of fiction, non-fiction and true story type titles. The class comes in and sit 4 to a table. They have a look at the books on the table and after about 3 minutes we ring a bell. They all then move to the next table. We allow them to carry one book with them to the next table which they can then continue to carry or change for another book. They don’t have to carry books on of course. We usually go through about 4 or 5 table changes and then they can borrow a book they have found or sit and read or continue to peruse the tables.
We have found that the kids enjoy the experience. The magazine borrowing in those sessions has been hugely lower than usual. I have no problem with magazines but it’s good to see kids finding a book! I think it’s having books in front of them that they may not normally pull off the shelf. They can see a much wider variety of books in one session than if they are trawling the shelves too. Now all we have to do is find a way for the left over books to find their own way back to the shelves! Having said that, I firmly believe that it is worth the work. It is interesting to put out books that have not moved off the shelf and have them borrowed. "

There have been many good follow-up posts about how effective this technique is, at all ages... This sort of information is a good reason to join the school library list serv if you haven't already ! See the post in this blog for directions, or go to the SLANZA website www.slanza.org.nz