Weeding the 400s

Good news! This is a section that will be easy to weed. This is the language section. Believe it or not, kids love this section. Discard books that are too tattered and torn to mend and replace them with bright new copies.

If you don’t have much in this section, ask the students what languages they are interested in having in the library. We have a family with Filipino roots and they asked for Tagalog, so I have a couple of books with Tagalog.

Here are some suggestions for your library Language collection.

The Usborne First Thousand Words in . . . . by Heather Amery and Stephen Cartwright. These come in many different languages. Basic languages such as Spanish, German, and French are good to have in your library. But you might like a little exotic flavor and bring in Russian, Italian, Japanese, or Arabic, too. The Usborne series has drawings that may seem childish to some. You can find easy language books with photographs, too. I happen to like the Usborne series.

Don’t forget the English language! Books on grammar, dictionaries, a thesaurus or two; all these will enhance this section. I have a book called Ox, House, Stick The History of our Alphabet by Don Robb. This book is deceiving because it has the appearance of an ABC book, but the information inside is more appropriate for the upper elementary grades and possible into high school.

Eats, Shoots, and Leaves by Lynne Truss. You may remember when this book was on the New York Times bestseller list. Well, they came out with a kid’s version. There are at least two more by Lynne Truss, too. Girl’s Like Spaghetti and Twenty-odd Ducks.

Brian P. Cleary has written a number of language books on different parts of speech. One of his first books was Stop and Go, Yes and No What is an Antonym? Check his website or Amazon for a more complete list if you are interested in these. They are written in humorous verse and illustrated in full color cartoons. Teachers like using these when they study the different parts of speech.

This section is small but can be very powerful and useful. Take a look at your library and see how you might pump your 400s up.

Have a good week,
Audrey
Sdalibrarian.blogspot.com