Building An Effective School Library Website

What is a School Library Website?

It’s a 21^st century tool that organizes and communicates information.

A) Target Audience

· Students & Teachers

· Parents & Administration

· Diocesan school community

B) Purpose

“It is an indispensable 21^st century instructional tool that supports teaching, learning, and research.” (Pam Berger, “Keeping Your Library Web Site Vital”)

· To develop a virtual reference collection to guide student research on the worldwide web

· To help students build information literacy skills

· To organize all library resources in a central place

· To access school library resources from anywhere--school or home

· To share library information among the school community--students, parents, teachers

· To collaborate with teachers on cross-curriculum projects

C) Content

Homepage:

· Information about who you are: school library’s name, address, phone, fax, e-mail, staff

· Identify the author and title of the website and give contact information

· Identify the library’s mission statement and services

· Establish an organizational structure

Organizational Structure: Content-rich and Curriculum-connected

· Virtual Reference Collection

· Virtual Briefcase

· Combination of external links (world-wide web) and internal information links(created by librarian, teachers, students)

· Flowchart is constructed – Links are identified

Content Should Include: (See sample flowchart)

· Links that support the curriculum including primary source documents

Links should be age-appropriate, evaluated by librarian or teachers before publishing, and annotated

· Links that reflect what’s happening in the global community

· Links that reflect seasonal events

· Reading Program Information: reading lists, author studies etc.

· Information Databases

· Librarian-produced resources: instructional guidelines, assignments, bulletin board-type information

· Description of the library’s information literacy program

· Search Engines with searching tips and evaluation guide

· Library activities and clubs

· Links to community libraries and union catalog

· Teacher Professional Resources: standards, lesson plans, curriculum resources

· Collaborative Lessons between librarian and classroom teacher

· Student publishing: PowerPoint presentations, WebQuests

D) Navigation & Design

· Kid-friendly

· Does it meet the needs of all students?

· Consistency in format from page to page/screen to screen

· Layout is logical and simple to follow

· Is the navigation bar on every page?

· Is it simple to navigate?

· Are the links active?

· Is there a way to know whether or not you are on the library’s page or outside on the web?

· Does the page load easily?

· Is the font easy to read? Do the colors make it easy to read the text?

· Use thumbnail photos for quick loading

· Can the pages and photos be easily printed?

E) Publication and Maintenance

· Design work can be done using Microsoft Front Page Software

· Registered domain name is required for publishing

· Host server is required for publishing

· Verio at http://www.verio.net provides domain and hosting services with a variety of packages

· Make sure service provider supports Front Page extensions if you are using Front Page

· Make sure service provider offers tech support

· Website should be kept up-to-date