« When Girl Scouts Attack | Main | Benny Actively Engaged »
March 21, 2009
The Idea Box, or Where REAL Suggestions from the Children's Room are Born
The most frequent compliment I get on this blog is how much people enjoy my regular "REAL Suggestions from the Children's Room" feature (which is kind of ironic, as I report rather than write them, but a compliment's a compliment, and I take them all). I thought some people might be interested to learn where those suggestions come from.
Ever since I started here at WPL, we've had a suggestion box, but back in the day, I only got suggestions from adults, which were fine, I guess, but kind of boring. One day I had a BRAINSTORM and realized that our suggestion forms were completely kid-unfriendly. "Suggestion" isn't necessarily part of every seven-year-old's vocabulary, and our forms featured small lines for writing and even smaller print. That's when I asked one of our staff to create the Idea Box:
Things that make the Idea Box work:
1. It is in the Children's Room, on a child's eye level.
2. It's called the "Idea Box." Most children understand the word "idea."
3. The lightbulb also says "idea" non-verbally (bonus points to the staff there: I didn't think of that one).
4. The Idea Forms themselves are generously-sized with big spaces for words.
5. We give the children REAL pencils, not those hideous golf pencils that one only gives to people one actively disdains. Golf pencils don't encourage anyone to write.
Ever since we put out the Idea Box, I get ideas from kids on a fairly steady basis, particularly on school vacations. If we can decipher the address, we write a response to anyone who writes to us. Whenever possible, we try to take some kind of action, although that's hard when the child asks for, say, a "perade" or a pool.
Posted by adrienne at March 21, 2009 08:12 AM
Comments
Dude I want a library with a pony. Preferably a pony pulling a mobile library. With a pool in the back. We'll be in whatever "perade" you need...
Posted by: tanita at March 21, 2009 01:40 PM
Tanita, I found a pony here today, but I put it in the lost-and-found. I clearly wasn't thinking.
Posted by: adrienne at March 21, 2009 03:34 PM
You ABSOLUTELY can take pride in those compliments---you don't think those reality TV programs just happen, do you? Someone has to plan the setup and get the players to respond. And you've done that wonderfully with your real kid box.
And I love it that every kid gets a response. Corporate America, are you listening to Miss Adrienne???
Posted by: Sara at March 21, 2009 10:02 PM
Truly, I do think that one of the most important things we can teach children is that they can change their worlds and, by extension, the world we all live in. Complacency doesn't get anyone anywhere. And parents do occasionally report back that kids are very excited to get a letter in the mail. I also always enclose a business card, which I know I would have loved when I was a kid. I know this works, too, as I've had more than one kid come in and find me via my business card ("Do you know where this lady is?").
Posted by: adrienne at March 22, 2009 09:59 AM
First of all, YAY IDEA BOX.
Second of all, YAY REAL PENCILS. Kids love pencils. Just look at Judy Moody. :)
Posted by: Little Willow at March 22, 2009 10:46 PM
So true. I always feel good about giving kids pencils.
Posted by: adrienne at March 23, 2009 04:15 AM
See, now this is one of the many benefits to giving children's librarians wiggle-room in their own children's rooms. Your idea box should be something self-evident, but no, when I worked in the library, we had those hideous comment forms and golf pencils. Golf pencils belong at IKEA!
Posted by: Saints and Spinners at March 23, 2009 01:11 PM
Seriously. Everyone totally made fun of me when I banned golf pencils from the Children's Room--I did kind of make a ridiculously large deal out of it--but the regular pencils are so much better. I love those little striped buckets I got for them in the Target bargain bin, too. I almost got these really cute buckets with hearts, but I thought Jason might protest (sometimes he does if he thinks I'm letting things get too girly, which pshaw).
Posted by: adrienne at March 23, 2009 07:17 PM
Funny you should mention requests for a pool: my children's room used to be a swimming pool, 80 years ago. Every time I tell this to a group of kids, the first comment is "Can you turn it back into a pool?"
Posted by: Laura at March 23, 2009 07:46 PM
They would--crazy kids. The funny thing is that I've had the pool request multiple times. I've also had kids suggest that there should be an exercise room for the adults, like they need a place to drop their parents off while they're browsing or whatever.
Posted by: adrienne at March 23, 2009 08:29 PM
This is totally awesome! Ah, if only all children's libraries were actually kid-centered.
Posted by: Candace Ryan at March 24, 2009 03:10 AM
Thanks, Candace! I wish I could say it was total altruism on my part, but, really, sometimes the suggestions from adults were depressing me because there was so much I couldn't really do anything about--but I found the rare ones from kids so highly rewarding. I felt I needed to figure out a way to get more of them. And, you know, parents are too busy keeping an eye on the kids to write something down unless it's really important to them, but kids are much more likely to write down the random thought, like that people should help out picking up more. They also often write thank-you-type notes and draw little pictures--lots of hearts and smiley faces.
Posted by: adrienne at March 24, 2009 07:25 AM