I like wikis........................

I keep a series of folders containing booklists of Popular and Recommended Reading for Children and Teenagers. These resources were first established to provide Information Desk staff with a guide to help them find titles suitable for children or teenagers upon request if the Youth Services Librarian was not available. These files are kept on the book shelf at the Information desk and are available to both staff and patrons.

The file is divided into sections, each dealing with a particular issue, popular series or simply titles recommended by Youth Services staff for different age groups. In order to help the Information Desk staff feel confident in assisting parents look for possible items, each section consists of a series of booklists that not only supply the title and author, but also a short synopsis so that parents, children and young adults are able to make informed decisions before borrowing or making a reservation. Each title has been crosschecked with the catalogue to ensure that the item is held by WMRLC. The file is active, in that it is regularly checked in order to have new titles added or old ones removed.

As you may imagine - this is a labour intensive task. Also, sometimes thankless as some staff and parents are not always aware of the folders when looking for suitable books. These two points may change with the possible introduction of wikis.

If wiki software is introduced to the library service’s website, the Popular and Recommended Booklists would be readily available to all staff and families. Links to this information would be provided on the Parents, Children’s and Teenage web pages. The task of maintaining this resource would be easier as, instead of one member of staff adding and editing this information in a hard copy format, each Youth Services Librarian would be able to contribute to an electronic document. In turn, everybody would be able to benefit from this shared knowledge.