ACRL News Issue (B) of College & Research Libraries


July/August 1 9 9 6 /4 2 5

Take this book and 
sh elve it!

By Paul H eller and Stuart K oh ler

An interactive instruction 
program fo r student shelvers

A cademic libraries rely increasingly on stu­dent assistants (often participants in the 
federally subsidized work-study program) for
everything from stack maintenance to basic ref­
erence services. At Norwich University in Ver­
mont as many as 60 new employees must be
trained annually.

Training students, who may only work as
few as six hours a week, is labor intensive and
exhausting for supervisors. Because o f their
class schedules they are seldom available in 
large groups. C onsequently, each student
worker must be trained individually. This has 
usually been done by means of a tutorial— a 
one-on-one session where library staff invest 
considerable time in basic instruction of rudi­
mentary library concepts. It is not unusual to
make a significant invest­
ment o f staff time in the 
training of a worker who 
may never again show for 
a work assignment.

Typically, our new stu­
dent workers are assigned 
stack maintenance respon­
s ib ilitie s — sh elv in g  and 
shelf-reading comprise the 
greater portion of their time 
in the library and their per­
formance is, naturally, di­
rectly related to the ability 
o f our patrons to find ma­
terials in the stacks. A book 
that is misshelved is, for

 

 

 
 
 

 

 

practical purposes, inaccessible to library us­
ers, even though its status is indicated as avail­
able in our library’s OPAC. Further compro­
mising this situation is the difficulty o f quality 
control. It is extremely inefficient to ensure 
shelving accuracy by spot-checking or other 
follow-up procedures. It is far more produc­
tive to instill basic stack-maintenance concepts 
with a training program that does not require 
burdensome tutorials for regular library staff.

“Take This Book and Shelvelt!” is an inter­
active instructional program for student shelvers 
developed at Norwich University’s Kreitzberg 
Library by Stuart Kohler. The program covers a 
basic introduction to call numbers (both Dewey 
Decimal and Library of Congress) and then pre­
sents an interactive exercise sorting “virtual 
books” on a “virtual shelf.” The screens shown 
here are examples from the Windows version 
(there is also a “Shelvelt!” for Macs).

The introductory screen offers three options: 
a student worker can get an overview o f the

P a u l H eller is d ire c to r o f  lib ra r ies a t  N orw ich University in  N orthfield, Vermont, e-m a il: p a u l @n orw ich  ‚edu; 
Stuart K o h le r is in fo rm a tio n  tech n olog y  lib r a r ia n  a t  Norw ich, e-m a il: stu artk@ n orw ich .ed u

mailto:stuartk@norwich.edu


4 2 6 /C & R L News

tutorial, an explanation of why accurate shelv­
ing is important, and explanations of basic con­
cepts.

The student is then presented with the vir­
tual bookshelf and may click on a book and 
then an arrow to arrange the call numbers in 
correct order. After arranging the books to his 
or her satisfaction a click on “Check Me!” will 
reveal the accuracy of the order.

After five correct repetitions the user is con­
gratulated for five consecutive successes, then 
reports to the stack supervisor for a brief intro­
duction to the collection, and turned loose with

a book truck. Anecdotal experience confirms 
that our student shelvers are more reliable and 
our spot inventories reveal fewer shelving er­
rors. Clearly, our stack supervisor has found 
relief from the tedious task o f training 60 new 
faces a year, and she is convinced that our 
shelvers’ knowledge and attention to detail is 
greater than before.

“Take This Book and Shelvelt!” is shareware 
available at the Norwich Libraiy’s Web site. For 
the W indows or Mac version, point your 
browser at www.norwich.edu/library/fonul/ 
shelveit.htm. ■

http://www.norwich.edu/library/fonul/