Letters

I found “A Dirty Little Secret” (February 2009, pp. 26–30) to be offensive and condescending. I am a PreK–8 librarian, and I have to spend a lot of time carefully reviewing materials for our library. I have always relied on SLJ for reviews, but I find myself questioning your judgment.

Your article takes the stance that self-censorship is unethical. I firmly believe that it is unethical for me not to make an effort to protect our students from content that may be harmful to them. I do not want some first grader browsing through the library and finding a book that includes copious foul language or sexual content. I do have a section of the library dedicated to my middle school readers, which contains books with more mature content, but I’m careful even with those.

It is self-important and condescending of you to pass judgment on librarians who make the effort to protect children from unnecessary exposure to inappropriate language, violence, and sexual content. How dare you assume that you know what’s best for our students and school communities? You say it is unethical? How can I as a human being not take steps to protect a child? I think your judgment and moral compass have gone seriously awry. I no longer trust SLJ, and that is extremely sad.

I was so interested in “A Dirty Little Secret.” Thank you for addressing this important, often taboo subject.

As a middle school librarian, I struggle with decisions about the age appropriateness of certain books. Middle school is particularly tricky because the maturity level is so diverse. However, if every book in our school library is appropriate for the youngest sixth grader, then I will not be serving my more mature eighth graders, who like the edgier books.

What’s interesting to me is how rarely this is a problem. Sixth graders tend to gravitate toward and select books appropriate for sixth graders. The same is true for the other grades. As a librarian, I serve as a readers’ advisor many times each day. I try to guide the students toward books that are appropriate for their age, reading, maturity, and interest levels. Do I witness every book that is checked out of the library? No, but I am a very present figure and work personally with the students in helping them make their selections. We also teach our students that if they don’t like a book, if it bothers or offends them or bores them, to shut it, turn it in, and check out a better choice. When you trust children to do the right thing, they generally rise to the occasion.

I recently performed a Skype book reading and conference with kids from the Fort Plain Jr./Sr. High School in upstate New York, which came about when students at the school chose to read one of my YA novels, Resurrection Men, in their annual Battle of the Books competition.

Using the high school media lab, they opened a free account with Skype and video-called me at my home in New Jersey. I’m equipped with a videocam and Skype account myself, so I was able to see the kids in the classroom, and they were able to see me. In fact, they projected the Skypecast up on a big screen so everyone could get a good view. It took hardly any time to set up... and it was free!

The kids had a great time asking me all sorts of questions about Resurrection Men, and writing in general. I received a kind note thereafter, from the progressive Fort Plain librarian, Mary Van Patten, the first educator in her district to exploit the Web in this way:

“The students were so thrilled with this experience. Fort Plain is a small town, next to Canajoharie, NY; it’s exit 29 off the NY Thruway. There are a lot of dairy farms in the area. Because of the Erie Canal, it was once a prosperous town. The students I work with are great.... Thanks so much for making this happen.”

What a great way to leverage the Net to get closer to readers.

My thanks to Judith Nador for bringing up the idea that teacher-librarian is a less than wonderful title (Letters, March 2009, p. 14). Frankly, it is an ugly title. It doesn’t bring any great mental images of the librarian who helped me find books as a child nor does it remind me of my elementary teacher who taught me to read. I get stuck on it when I try to say it, and I hate reading it. Oddly enough, I almost stopped reading the article (“Flip This Library, November 2008, pp. 46–48), just as Nador mentions, for the same reason.

Can we please not be teacher-librarians? There is really no good reason for using it. Let it go!