School Libraries as Secret Spaces
Wednesday, June 17th, 2009
I’ve been in a big Twitterversation with Beth about the role of school libraries in writing, and I mentioned our “writing castle.” The writing castle evolved from a writing center: basically a sorter of pens, envelopes, and writing implements. But parents took it way bigger and turned our existing “cube,” a collection of bookshelves inside which we stashed our professional development and leveled readers collection, into a veritable palace.
As a teacher resources area, there was no real reason for children to go into it, but we still lost a lot of square footage that could have been used for kids. So we curtained off the bookshelves to hide away the teachers’ stuff, left two sets of shelves open to hold student supplies, moved in inexpensive IKEA parsons’ tables and stools, and parents who run a graphic design firm designed and installed the archway. (Later on, we eventually moved the leveled readers into a rolling bookcase in the 1st grade ‘wing’, though I wasn’t savvy enough to call it a ‘branch library” as Carl Harvey has done in the latest issue of Knowledge Quest).
With its unveiling came a conscious paradigm shift: it became a children-only area. There were no adult-imposed rules about the number of students who could be in the castle at one time, nor were there restrictions on what could happen there. Adults weren’t even welcome in the castle unless they were invited in by children either by request or by acting outside our school rules.
The castle evolved into something we hadn’t expected. Older children used it to meet with their production groups during video club or as a private lunch space. Younger children used it to play school, to play bank, to draw, to create books (no kidding, we went through 6 plastic staplers as kids cut up paper to make their own blank books before we got smart and ordered high-end staplers), to write letters to one another (our “green school” parents would donated their unused business reply envelopes — kids didn’t care - they just wrote on top of the pre-printed address), and more. Sometimes, kids on one side of the castle would borrow puppets from the puppets area and put on a play for the kids on the other side. One day, an entire first grade class (except for one child intent on a quiet activity) sat inside harmoniously.
Yes, sometimes there was trouble, and I’d step in. And yes, they made a huge mess in there. But it was their mess, and they would take turns cleaning it up, or we’d just let it stay messy. (Even our diligent custodians reluctantly agreed to keep it a mess … unless there was a school visit or a meeting scheduled for the library. They even scrounged and found a recycling bin and an extra trash can to encourage kids to clean up themselves.)
It wasn’t until after we launched at the castle that I read Brian W. Sturm’s article in the Maps issue of Knowledge Quest and realized that we had accidentally created what he calls a “secret space.” Here’s the abstract (from Worldcat) for his article “Imaginary ‘Geographies’ of Childhood: School Library Media Centers as Secret Spaces”:
Secret spaces serve as mirrors in which children can explore themselves and play with identities, while at the same time they act as windows to the real world through which children develop an understanding of social interactions and societal norms and expectations. The understanding of secret spaces has important implications for the physical design of school library media centers (SLMCs). What more creative space exists than the room in the school that is filled with the world’s knowledge and the endless possibilities that knowledge creates. However, libraries tend to be built with close attention to easy sightlines to avoid blind spots where children can cause mischief. In this article, the author contends that if SLMCs are to function as secret spaces, designers should reconsider this practice and allow children some spaces to hide. Children need small spaces, nooks and crannies, and areas not in the direct sightlines of adults if they are to feel sheltered enough to imagine freely.
Oh … that’s what we had made. A secret space. A nook where the shelves created a separation between adults and them.
Even in a high-tech world, people yearn for what futurist John Naisbett called a “high-touch” environment. Does your school library have a secret space? Do you have conference spaces that used to be for adults-only to check out that could be opened up for children to sign out? I know, I know, some of you are high school librarians, and a secret space could be an invitation for hanky-panky, but think about how furniture can be clustered out in the open to create high-communication zones that feel cozy even if they’re in your sightlines.)
Vintage bumper stickers proclaimed, “Lead, follow, or get out of the way.” The more I work toward student-centered learning, the more I want my bumper sticker to say, “Sometimes, leading means getting out of the way.” Sometimes, student need the comfort of knowing that we trust them to work and create on their own and that we’re just a few paces away when they need us.
I’ve been in a big Twitterversation with Beth about the role of school libraries in writing, and I mentioned our “writing castle.” The writing castle evolved from a writing center: basically a sorter of pens, envelopes, and writing implements. But parents took it way bigger and turned our existing “cube,” a collection of bookshelves inside which we stashed our professional development and leveled readers collection, into a veritable palace.
As a teacher resources area, there was no real reason for children to go into it, but we still lost a lot of square footage that could have been used for kids. So we curtained off the bookshelves to hide away the teachers’ stuff, left two sets of shelves open to hold student supplies, moved in inexpensive IKEA parsons’ tables and stools, and parents who run a graphic design firm designed and installed the archway. (Later on, we eventually moved the leveled readers into a rolling bookcase in the 1st grade ‘wing’, though I wasn’t savvy enough to call it a ‘branch library” as Carl Harvey has done in the latest issue of Knowledge Quest).
With its unveiling came a conscious paradigm shift: it became a children-only area. There were no adult-imposed rules about the number of students who could be in the castle at one time, nor were there restrictions on what could happen there. Adults weren’t even welcome in the castle unless they were invited in by children either by request or by acting outside our school rules.
The castle evolved into something we hadn’t expected. Older children used it to meet with their production groups during video club or as a private lunch space. Younger children used it to play school, to play bank, to draw, to create books (no kidding, we went through 6 plastic staplers as kids cut up paper to make their own blank books before we got smart and ordered high-end staplers), to write letters to one another (our “green school” parents would donated their unused business reply envelopes — kids didn’t care - they just wrote on top of the pre-printed address), and more. Sometimes, kids on one side of the castle would borrow puppets from the puppets area and put on a play for the kids on the other side. One day, an entire first grade class (except for one child intent on a quiet activity) sat inside harmoniously.
Yes, sometimes there was trouble, and I’d step in. And yes, they made a huge mess in there. But it was their mess, and they would take turns cleaning it up, or we’d just let it stay messy. (Even our diligent custodians reluctantly agreed to keep it a mess … unless there was a school visit or a meeting scheduled for the library. They even scrounged and found a recycling bin and an extra trash can to encourage kids to clean up themselves.)
It wasn’t until after we launched at the castle that I read Brian W. Sturm’s article in the Maps issue of Knowledge Quest and realized that we had accidentally created what he calls a “secret space.” Here’s the abstract (from Worldcat) for his article “Imaginary ‘Geographies’ of Childhood: School Library Media Centers as Secret Spaces”:
Secret spaces serve as mirrors in which children can explore themselves and play with identities, while at the same time they act as windows to the real world through which children develop an understanding of social interactions and societal norms and expectations. The understanding of secret spaces has important implications for the physical design of school library media centers (SLMCs). What more creative space exists than the room in the school that is filled with the world’s knowledge and the endless possibilities that knowledge creates. However, libraries tend to be built with close attention to easy sightlines to avoid blind spots where children can cause mischief. In this article, the author contends that if SLMCs are to function as secret spaces, designers should reconsider this practice and allow children some spaces to hide. Children need small spaces, nooks and crannies, and areas not in the direct sightlines of adults if they are to feel sheltered enough to imagine freely.
Oh … that’s what we had made. A secret space. A nook where the shelves created a separation between adults and them.
Even in a high-tech world, people yearn for what futurist John Naisbett called a “high-touch” environment. Does your school library have a secret space? Do you have conference spaces that used to be for adults-only to check out that could be opened up for children to sign out? I know, I know, some of you are high school librarians, and a secret space could be an invitation for hanky-panky, but think about how furniture can be clustered out in the open to create high-communication zones that feel cozy even if they’re in your sightlines.)
Vintage bumper stickers proclaimed, “Lead, follow, or get out of the way.” The more I work toward student-centered learning, the more I want my bumper sticker to say, “Sometimes, leading means getting out of the way.” Sometimes, student need the comfort of knowing that we trust them to work and create on their own and that we’re just a few paces away when they need us.
