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Savannah Porter
Collection Development Assignment
FRIT 7134 – Spring 2010
March 3, 2010
Description of Site and Learners
Jefferson Elementary School is located in Jefferson, GA and serves pre-kindergarten
through second grade. Jefferson Elementary School is in the Jefferson City School
System, along with Jefferson Academy (grades 3-5), Jefferson Middle School (grades 6-
8), and Jefferson High School (grades 9-12). Jefferson Elementary is made up of
approximately 750 students, 52 certified teachers, 22 paraprofessionals, 2 administrators,
1 instructional lead teacher, and 1 media specialist. Of the 750 students, only 29% of
them are economically disadvantaged, 5 % of them are English language learners, and
9% of the students have a disability. Jefferson is located in Jackson County and the
population is growing at a rapid rate.
As far as resources go, Jefferson Elementary School is trying to keep up with the ever-
changing technological offers. So far, every classroom is equipped with at least six
student computers as well as an LCD projector and screen. As far as school-wide
resources go, there are two laptop computers available for checkout as well as two
classroom sets of student response clickers. In the media center, there are three computer
workstations for students, one LCD projector, and a media room, or production room,
which houses all of the equipment for live video announcements presented daily by the
students. Aside from technology, the media center at Jefferson Elementary has
approximately 12,000 books, which gives the school an average of about 16 books per
student. There are also about 400 video titles in the media center, most of these are VHS
tapes, but there are some recent DVDs as well.

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The grade I am focusing on is kindergarten. This year, at Jefferson Elementary, there
are eleven kindergarten classrooms. One of these eleven classrooms is a special
education collaboration room. Total for this grade level, there are approximately 220
students, 11 regular education teachers, 1 special education teacher, and 12
paraprofessionals. Due to the students in this grade level being so young in age, there are
no students who have been labeled as gifted or who have been diagnosed with a
disability. There are two students in the special education collaborative classroom who
are severely disabled, and there are five others who are currently in the POI process. The
ethnic breakdown of these 220 students is as follows: 167 Caucasian, 32 African
American, 13 Hispanic, and 8 mixed races.
Curriculum Review
For this assignment, I have chosen to focus on Space. I chose this topic because it is
covered in so many different grade levels. Since this school only serves second grade
and below, I will only be addressing the standards for Kindergarten and 2nd
grade. They
are as follows:
Kindergarten:
SKE1. Students will describe time patterns (such as day to night and night to day)
and objects (such as sun, moon, stars) in the day and night sky.
a. Describe changes that occur in the sky during the day, as day turns into night, during
the night, and as night turns into day.
b. Classify objects according to those seen in the day sky and those seen in the night sky.
c. Recognize that the Sun supplies heat and light to Earth.
Second Grade:
S2E1. Students will understand that stars have different sizes, brightness, and
patterns.
a. Describe the physical attributes of stars—size, brightness, and patterns.
S2E2. Students will investigate the position of sun and moon to show patterns
throughout the year.

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a. Investigate the position of the sun in relation to a fixed object on earth at various times
of the day.
b. Determine how the shadows change through the day by making a shadow stick or
using a sundial.
c. Relate the length of the day and night to the change in seasons (for example: Days are
longer than the night in the summer.).
d. Use observations and charts to record the shape of the moon for a period of time.
Kindergarten:
Standard Concept Tasks/Activities Resources
SKE1
Day and Night
Objects in the
Sky (daytime
and nighttime)
1. Identify and explain
daytime and nighttime
2. Identify the sun, moon,
stars in the sky
3. Distinguish which items
are seen in the daytime
and in the nighttime
1. Personal
observations
2. Nonfiction
picture books
3. Easy picture
books
4. Space
magazines
5. Videos
Second Grade:
Standard Concept Tasks/Activities Resources
S2E1
Physical
Attributes of
Stars
1. Understand that all stars
are different
2. Find ways to describe
attributes of stars – sizes,
brightness, patterns, etc
1. Personal
observations
2. Nonfiction
picture books
3. Constellation
maps
4. Space
magazine
5. Videos
S2E2
Position of Sun
and Moon
1. Produce and explain the
existence of shadows
2. Describe the position of
the sun at various times
of the day
3. Observe time changes as
seasons change
4. Track and observe
phases of the moon
1. Personal
observations
2. Nonfiction
picture books
3. Globes, maps
4. Videos

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Collection Review
The JES media center has recently weeded a large portion of its collection. The media
specialist told me that the "space" section (523) was in terrible shape as far as copyright
date goes. She said the average age of the books in that Dewey range was much
improved after weeding - from 1979 to 1997. Although the collection on specific planets
is a little aged, I plan on adding to the 523s by buying books that are specifically aligned
with the content standard for Science - Kindergarten. The content standards require more
general books on space rather than specific information on planets and other bodies.
Surprisingly, the fiction and easy fiction sections are also rather lacking in books on
space. Although there are literally hundreds of books to choose from, I think I will focus
on those receiving favorable reviews from School Library Journal, Teacher Librarian,
Booklist, or the Horn Book. In addition to this, I noticed that there are no books for non-
English readers that relate to this topic. With this being said, purchasing a selection of
Spanish books about space will be added to the list of collection needs.
There are only a few videos on space in the video collection and they are VHS.
Several of the classrooms do not even have the ability to play VHS any more. I plan on
spending a large portion of money improving the video collection and to begin changing
over to DVD rather than VHS.
Here is the link to my Google Docs Page: http://docs.google.com/Doc?
docid=0ASMbtotqgJDxZGNucXJjbTVfMTRndmNrc2Nmdg&hl=en. Here, you can see
web resources available to students that go along with the topic of space.

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