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Tambra SingletaryCollection Development AssignmentFRIT 7134Spring 2012February 12, 2012

DESCRIPTION OF SITE AND LEARNERS

Mossy Creek Middle School is located in Kathleen, Georgia, which is a suburb of Warner

Robins, Georgia. It is part of the Houston County School System which is made up of 23

elementary schools, eight middle schools, six high schools, and an alternative school. Mossy

Creek Middle School opened in August of 2007 as one of the smallest middle schools in the

county, and because of rapid changes in the economy and real estate markets, we have not grown

much since. There are currently 691 students enrolled in our school with 11% of our student

population qualifying for the Free Lunch program and 8% qualifying for the Reduced Lunch

program. There are 61 certified teachers, three administrators, and 27 classified staff members

employed at Mossy Creek Middle School. Our schools media center is located at the front of the

school directly across from the office and houses a collection of 8,778 books which gives the

school an average of about 13 books per student. Because we are a relatively new school which

opened at the beginning of a nationwide economic downturn, our resources have been quite

limited especially where the purchasing of books and resources is concerned. We have been

fortunate to participate in the Young Adult Choices Project which is sponsored by the

International Reading Association. Our participation in this program for the past two years has

allowed us to add an additional 158 copies of both fiction and non-fiction books to our

collection. Unfortunately, we are not able to select the topics and titles of these books. We also

have thirteen computers available for research which also contain access to our Accelerated

Reader program and our library catalog software, Safari, where students are able to search for

materials within the library. The Safari program is only available on these computers. There is

also an LCD projector connected to a laptop and a large computer screen which is available for

use by teachers and the media specialist for demonstrating for large groups. In addition to these

items, our media center also houses the school-wide distribution system which allows us to show

videos throughout the school with the use of closed-circuit channels.

Mossy Creek Middle School is located between Warner Robins, Georgia which is

primarily a military community and Perry, Georgia which is primarily an agricultural


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community. Because Robins Air Force Base is one of the largest employers in our area, many of

our students are transient. We also gain a large Hispanic population as a result of local

agricultural programs which hire migrant workers. For the past two years, Mossy Creek Middle

School has been one of four locations for the ESOL program for middle schools in our county.

This means that students who qualify for this program are bused to our school. The students are

provided with special assistance as they are also mainstreamed into the regular education

classroom. For this reason, I feel that our library must address the need for multicultural books

and resources to support this program.

There are two teams for the 7th

grade students at Mossy Creek Middle School this year.

The students who are in collaborative special education classes are located on one team, and the

students who are in the ESOL program are on the other team. There are two special education

resource classes, three ESOL resource classes, and four gifted resource classes. There are a total

of 233 students in this grade level. There are 85 gifted students, 28 special education students,

and 8 ESOL students mixed throughout the grade level. The ethnic breakdown of the 7th

grade is:

African American: 42Caucasian: 164Multi-racial: 4Hispanic: 14Asian: 9

In the area of ESOL, there are 8 students who are in the 7th grade. One is a non-speaker of

English. The others are at different levels in their English proficiency. The students are from

Korea, Vietnam, Philippines, India, and Mexico. I asked our ESOL resource teacher what types

of resources she would like to see in the media center relating to this curriculum. She mentioned

that she really would like to have non-fiction books that are written on a lower reading level with

more pictures and visual cues. She also mentioned that she didnt see the need for bilingual

books written in both Spanish and English for this subject area because we have such a varied

language base in our 7th

grade ESOL group. For this reason, I will look for materials that provide

visual cues and a lower reading level to meet the needs of this particular group.


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CURRICULUM REVIEW

The standards I have chosen to focus on for this activity are 7th grade Social Studies

standards. There is one section of these standards that focuses on Southwest Asia and the Middle

East. The standards are as follows:

SS7G7 The student will explain the impact of location, climate, physical characteristics,

distribution of natural resources and population distribution on Southwest Asia (Middle

East).

a. Explain how the distribution of oil has affected the development of Southwest Asia(Middle East).

b. Describe how the deserts and rivers of Southwest Asia (Middle East) have affected thepopulation in terms of where people live, the type of work they do, and how they travel.

SS7G8 The student will describe the diverse cultures of the people who live in SouthwestAsia (Middle East).

a. Explain the differences between an ethnic group and a religious group.b. Explain the diversity of religions within the Arabs, Persians, and Kurds.c. Compare and contrast the prominent religions in Southwest Asia (Middle East): Judaism,

Islam, and Christianity.d. Explain the reason for the division between Sunni and Shia Muslims.e. Evaluate how the literacy rate affects the standard of living.

In reviewing the standards, I also spoke with our 7th

grade Social Studies teachers in

order to get an idea of what materials they currently use and how they plan instruction forthese standards. During the instruction of this unit, students are required to research the

Middle Eastern culture and religions and create thinking maps in preparation for creating a

comparison/contrast essay. They also work on an extended layered curriculum unit which

involves several products that come from research of the religions, areas, and cultures of the

Middle Eastern people. Right now, they have very few DVDs and hands-on resources. They

mentioned that they would love to have more resources that appeal to the students visually

because most of these students have little background knowledge of the area. They also

wanted more fiction books related to the area so that they could incorporate read-alouds in

their classrooms and work with the language arts teachers on allowing the students to read

books with characters from these cultures.

After speaking with my principal, I discovered that we are incorporating a gifted Social

Studies class into our curriculum groups next year. We have a large population of gifted


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students in our school, and I think they would benefit from higher level materials that

challenge them. In addition, all content areas are focusing on writing both expository and

persuasive essays. I would like to find some resources that provide information that students

can use for these essays in their language arts classes.

COLLECTION REVIEW

Because our school is only five years old, our collection is rather small compared to other

middle schools in our area. We are also faced with the challenge of the economic downturn

which began shortly after our school opened. We have applied for some grants and received

some money, but we still have a long way to go to build up our collection.

Our media center is organized with the computers lining the wall on the left side and the

magazine area, reference area and Young Adult Choices Project area lining the right side of

the media center. On the back wall of the media center you will find the professional

collection and classroom sets of books that are currently available for teachers to check out

and use in their classrooms. Most of these class sets are focused for social studies and science

classes. There are also some math resources available there as well. In this back shelving area

is where our small collection of picture books is housed. These are organized in the same

way as the fiction and non-fiction books with call numbers and Dewey decimal numbers for

the appropriate areas.In the middle of the media center, you will find the fiction and non-fiction shelves. The

fiction shelves include the regular collection of fiction books organized by last name of the

author from A-Z. On the first shelf in this area, you will also find the graphic novels and the

books that are classified as 8th grade only. The books classified as 8th grade only are

available only to 8th graders unless the media specialist receives a permission note from the

parents of 6th and 7th graders. The reason for this is that these books have certain qualities

that make them more suitable for a mature reader such as references to sex, drugs, or alcohol

and other mature situations. The remaining books in the fiction section are marked by a

colored label to identify the genre (mystery, action, romance, science fiction, historical

fiction, etc.). The books also have a blue label to indicate if they have a test available on the

Accelerated Reader (AR) program. The books in the non-fiction section are clearly labeled

using the Dewey decimal system on the end of each shelf. These books are also marked with


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blue labels if they have an Accelerated Reader test available. By providing the AR option for

our non-fiction books, we are able to meet the needs of the students who enjoy these books

also. I hope to be able to incorporate some new AR books into our collection as well.

There are large tables in the center area of the media center which are close to the

reference area and the computer area on either side of the room. These help students by

providing an area for them to begin their research as they move around in the library. In our

reference area, we have four sets of encyclopedias including one set which is a Nations of

the World set.

The computers in the library have internet access, and they are connected to the library

printer. If students are doing research with a class, the teacher provides access to the printer

at no charge. If the students are doing research on their own time, they must pay $.10 for

each page printed. We are connected to the Galileo system through our local school district.

The password is conveniently located for our students to use as they complete their research

in the media center.

In my review of our collection, I decided to do a direct examination of the materials

available for the standards I selected. Using the Safari cataloging system offered on the

computers in our media center, I searched using the keywords of Middle East, religions,

and cultures all together. I was only able to locate two books using these words. I decided

to break them up and use them individually. When I researched Middle East, I was able to

locate 35 books in different sections of the non-fiction section ranging from 290-World

Religions to 950-Asian and Middle Eastern countries. In the fiction section, this search

brought up an Alex Rider series which took place in the Middle East, so I noted that we do

have some possible titles that might have the setting but not the characters. Finally, I

searched religions, and I was able to find 118 items. Unfortunately, only 16 of them related

to the topic for my standards.

I also decided to visually browse through the biography section just to see what might be

available there that related to my topic. We have very few biographies in our media center of

which I located fewer than ten that were relevant to the standards addressed for this activity.

That is an area that I need to focus on for my purchases.

I decided to broaden my search for fiction books that related to my topic, and I was able

to find 10 fiction books using the keywords Middle East and Cultures. One of these


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books, The Kite Runner , was located on the 8th grade only shelf due to mature content.

One of the books was a picture book, The Shadows of Ghadames. We did not have any

graphic novels with Middle Eastern characters or settings. Fiction novels, picture books and

graphic novels are other items that I plan to purchase for our media center.

After searching with the Safari computer program, I decided to visually browse the

shelves to assess the condition of the books. Considering the fact that our media center

opened in 2007 with all newly-purchased materials, I was not surprised to find that the oldest

copyright date on all of the books that I found was 2000. The age of our collection is

certainly not a primary concern. The condition of the books is also not a primary concern.

Although most of these books are available for checkout by the students, the teachers prefer

to schedule time in the media center to allow access for all students during the research

process. The reason for this is that we do not have a large enough collection to allow every

student doing the research to take books home for extended periods of time. For this reason,

the books are generally only used within the media center or the social studies classrooms.

Another weakness of our media center is the fact that we have very few DVDs relating to

these standards. The media specialist indicated that we purchased a copy of Ghandi last

year at the request of one of the teachers, but we do not have any other videos relating to this

area. In my discussions with the social studies teachers, this was a primary request that they

had. They felt that if they had more visual resources, they could help the students with

background knowledge that would prepare them for the research activities that they were

required to complete through the layered curriculum and other units. Fortunately, our school

does have access to United Streaming, so that is an option for videos that is also available. I

will consider this when making my purchases.

In evaluating the collection, I decided to look at the circulation activity in our media

center. As I mentioned earlier, teachers generally take their students to the media center to do

research because we do not currently have enough titles to support the number of students

completing the research. We currently have 8,778 print items in our media center. These

items have been checked out for a total of 18,689 times this year for a checkout average of 2

times per book. Our media center is very heavily weighted on the fiction side with 15,876 of

the items checked out falling under the fiction area. The checkout number for books that fall

within the Dewey decimal system is 1,687. The number in the areas that support the


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standards I am reviewing is 392. We currently have 5,784 fiction books and 2,994 non-

fiction books in our collection. For this reason, I will focus most of my purchasing on the

non-fiction materials. I will also look for e-books that allow for more than one student to

check out the book and view it from home electronically. Because of rules set by our

board, we are not in a position to allow students to bring e-readers to school yet, but we do

hope that this changes in the near future.

I decided to review one more area of our media center, and that was magazines. In

speaking with our Special Education lead teacher, I found out that she has had great success

with the SCOPE magazine series that is sponsored by Scholastic. I plan to look for some

programs like this that will allow me to purchase high-interest, low reading level materials

that will encourage reluctant readers to join in on the learning process. We currently do not

offer any magazine resources in the area of social studies.

Summary of collection needs:

1. Choose books and resources that address the ethnic and religious groups inSouthwest Asia.

2. Choose fiction books with characters from the different cultures of the MiddleEast.

3. Choose videos which show life in the Middle East from religion to culture of thepeople.

4. Because our Social Studies classes run the gamut from Special Education toGifted, choose resources that fall in multiple reading levels to providedifferentiation for layered curriculum.

5. Choose mostly non-fiction and resource books since our media center is lackingin that area.

6. Look for high-interest, low reading level magazines that will benefit ourstruggling readers.

BUDGET SUMMARY

In researching resources to meet the standards addressed, I used nine different vendors. I

believe that I spent the $4000 on materials that will be used both within the media center and in

the classroom and homes of our students. In providing information about religion and the Middle

East, I had to address different regions of the Middle East along with the different ethnic groups.


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I located resources on the Kurds, Persians, and Arabs along with information on the three big

religions that are studied with this standard: Christianity, Islam, and Judaism. I tried to locate

materials that ranged from 3rd grade reading level to 12th grade reading level in order to cover all

areas of interest for differentiation. I found several fiction books and picture books that will

provide the visual cues for our ESOL students and assistance for our struggling readers. By

nature of the topic, most of these books present a multicultural view, so I did not highlight this

area.

One certain area that I would like to address is the purchase of materials that provide

opposing viewpoints. I was able to locate six different non-fiction books that provide opposing

viewpoints from the Perma-Bound company. Because one of the focus areas for writing in 7th

grade is persuasive writing, I felt that these resources would provide options for arguments for

our students to use in their writing. I also found a book titled, Is Islam a Religion of War or

Peace?, from the Perma-Bound company. This title should also offer some valuable information

for debates and arguments in the classroom.

Another weakness of our media center that I decided to address with my purchases is the

area of biographies, memoirs, and autobiographies. I was able to locate some biographies of

famous leaders of the Middle East along with memoirs from people who actually lived there.

In order to help our lower level readers feel successful with this standard, I located a

magazine published by Cobblestone and Cricket. I was able to purchase past issues rather than

subscribing to the entire collection. I selected several issues that relate directly to our standards.

These magazines offer the following features:

High 5: Relates the magazines themes to the 5 themes of geography

Growing Up In: First person accounts of kids daily lives around the world

Dear Tommy: A real cultural email exchange between kids

Folktale: Exposes students to different genre while teaching about a culture

Finally, I was also able to locate some graphic novels that pertain to this standard.

Graphic novels are generally good tools for getting reluctant readers on board with the learning

process. These novels should improve on a weak area of our media center by providing another

option for struggling readers.


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Budget Summary Chart:

I ordered more than the $4,000 budget in order to compensate for materials that might not be

available due to being out of stock, etc. I feel like I reached my goal of ordering a variety of

materials while leaning more towards the non-fiction areas of the media center. I also included a

large variety of fiction books at inexpensive prices from Amazon. I found several titles with both

female and male characters in order to appeal to all readers. Finally, the picture books, graphic

novels, and magazines will round out the order to appeal to struggling and reluctant readers.

Materials Purchased Budget amount used

Non-fiction $2727.76

E-books $394.57DVDs $330.83

Biographies and Memoirs $295.95

Picture books and Graphic Novels $171.03

Fiction $119.32

Magazines $66.50

TOTALS $4105.96

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