We need Diverse Books! - September is Hispanic Heritage Month

"Imagine a world where all children can see themselves in the pages of a book." This is the slogan for a movement that is growing in our libraries called "We Need Diverse Books."  Because Hispanic Heritage Month runs from September 15th to October 15th this is a good time to do a diversity audit to see how well your collection represents your Latinx student population.

If you have the Follett Destiny circulation system, you can easily do a diversity analysis of your collection using Follett’s Titlewise collection analysis feature. If you want to do a more in-depth study of your collection, Kelsey Bogan’s Blog “Don’t Shush Me” has a Diversity Audit: Practical Guide with detailed instructions.  

 

Even if you don’t have time to do a full analysis, you can do some simple catalog searches to identify areas of your collection that have relevant books.  

Make this Display:

To make a quick display, print this “Displays by Dewey” sign and search these Dewey numbers for books you may have in your collection:  

For fiction books, a catalog search using “Hispanic American” as a keyword.  Gathering these books for display can be a quick way to assess the condition of your collection in this area.  Ask yourself, Are these titles recent?  Are they high-interest?  Should any be weeded due to age, condition, or dated content? 

Don’t forget your FREE Online Resources!

If you find that your collection is in need of a refresh, TeachingBooks.net has its resources grouped by collections of Cultural Experiences.  Check out their Latino/a/e/x (Global) Collection which can be filtered by grade level and year published to find up-to-date books for your ordering wish list.  

All Schools in the state of California have access to TeachingBooks.net through the California K-12 Online Content Project.  This is also a great resource to do Author Studies.  For example, Pam Muñoz Ryan’s Author Page contains unique content such as Author’s Name Pronunciation, Meet the Author Movie, and a virtual Book tour of Mañanaland that are created exclusively by TeachingBooks.net.  

Don’t forget to feature our other online resources such as CultureGrams by Proquest if your print collection is out of date.  My country books are so old, that I weeded most of them and placed a sign on the shelf where they once were:

For fiction books, a catalog search using “Hispanic American” as a keyword.  Gathering these books for display can be a quick way to assess the condition of your collection in this area.  Ask yourself, Are these titles recent?  Are they high-interest?  Should any be weeded due to age, condition, or dated content? 

Don’t forget your FREE Online Resources!

If you find that your collection is in need of a refresh, TeachingBooks.net has its resources grouped by collections of Cultural Experiences.  Check out their Latino/a/e/x (Global) Collection which can be filtered by grade level and year published to find up-to-date books for your ordering wish list.  

All Schools in the state of California have access to TeachingBooks.net through the California K-12 Online Content Project.  This is also a great resource to do Author Studies.  For example, Pam Muñoz Ryan’s Author Page contains unique content such as Author’s Name Pronunciation, Meet the Author Movie, and a virtual Book tour of Mañanaland that are created exclusively by TeachingBooks.net.  

Don’t forget to feature our other online resources such as CultureGrams by Proquest if your print collection is out of date.  My country books are so old, that I weeded most of them and placed a sign on the shelf where they once were: