InfoSoup Development Blog

I really like the idea of a kids page, but I wonder if it needs to be more narrowly defined. Tumblebooks and an Elmo booklist seem to be for a different audience than Literature Resource Center and AskAway. The preschool and lower grade level materials might be a disincentive for older kids to use the page, and having more targeted pages for different ages would make each age group's page shorter and, perhaps, easier to use. Because I'm a paperpusher who doesn't work with kids, I have no idea how to more narrowly define the intended audience(s). I also understand that creating 2 or 3 different kids pages increases the amount of staff time needed to maintain multiple pages. I look forward to hearing what those who work with youth have to say.

I agree with you, Rick, that the homework help is perhaps not right for the audience that would use the other things on the page. We would like to do a teen page once we have some other booklists in place, so perhaps the homework resources would be better placed there and removed from this page. We don't have loads of staff time to maintain many pages, but certainly we could do one for younger children and one for teens. Would that division make more sense and would it be enough? I, too, want to hear from those working with youth.

The kids page is a nice idea. Focus is a concern, and I would hate to have too many different variations for different groups, with each one requiring maintenance. Maybe a page with age divisions built into the page as sections?

This is really exciting! I am delighted that we are reaching out to our younger patrons! I think a split between children's and young adult is natural and would be easy to maintain.

Rick I agree with you, it needs to be more narrowly defined. What you suggested Beth about putting the homework help on a teen page should do the trick. Too many choices is as bad as giving too little. You are offering something strictly for kids that should draw their attention but not too much that we can't handle the upkeep. Good Job.

I like the concept, and agree that moving the homework to a defined YA page would make sense. This page might target both parents and kids up to grade 4, f'rinstance. The Ebscohost Kidslit page seems aimed at age 10 or 11 and older. By the time children reach 5th grade, they're starting to be interested in some middle school age materials.

The questions come into where to draw dividing lines. Traditionally, it's been either children & adults or children, YA & adults, and that's probably as many gradations as we can get into without becoming confusing or less convenient. The only other option that occurs is to break out anything targeted toward preschoolers and put it into a "parents" or "family" page.

Forgive my ignorance, but I don't understand: "We can't add resources to it (at least not yet) that aren't already included in the catalog (i.e. web sites for kids)."

In answer to Terry's question about not being able to add resources (at least not yet) that aren't already in the catalog (i.e. web sites for kids) -

The development plan for InfoSoup included several preliminary development ideas. The first stage would be to add links to local resources, such as local history resources and library-developed databases. This would be relatively easy to do as the URLs remain pretty stable. (Evan is working on this right now and will have a model ready for discussion soon.) Adding additional enhanced content, such as relevant web sites is also in the plan but requires a greater dedication of staff time to keep links working and some agreement on what should and shouldn't be added. We are developing criteria to help with this process, but aren't there yet.

We may also be limited on what the InfoSoup libraries are willing to have added, as their catalog workstations are all locked down with proxy files. Once we start adding URLs to the proxy files, it will make those workstations open to more than just the catalog and subscription databases used for research. This isn't an insurmountable problem, as we can dictate different proxy level access for each workstation, it simply requires more coordination and agreement by the libraries.

We also learned from Cooler by the Lake that maintaining web site links requires dedicated staff and time, so we'll want to proceed carefully when adding links to resources outside the catalog. We need to develop resources in a manner that makes them easy to maintain.

So, in a nutshell, first we want to focus on adding links to local resources, then we'll consider other web sites but on a limited basis. We have BookLetters almost configured, so that will be another resource we can add to the kids and teens pages (book awards lists) to make this page even more rich without adding content we don't have the time to maintain.

Does that help?

Beth -

Yes, that's very helpful, and puts other InfoSoup development plans into perspective. Good info!

thanks,
Terry

Wonderful idea! Looks Great!