In
order to make our resources, including the Happily Ever After Collection, as
accessible as possible to our wide range of users, Imagining Literacy has
invested in a highly flexible search interface for our online catalog[1].
This discovery system should feel instantly familiar to patrons who are
used to navigating the Internet. A single search box and faceted
navigation facilitate both browsing and specific searches.
Users
can search for materials by title, Library of Congress Subject Heading or
simpler Children’s Subject Headings, author, illustrator, author of original
story (for adaptations), ISBN, publisher, and publication date. Natural
language detection, a “Did-you-mean?” function, and a drop down menu populated
with names and subject headings from our records will help users perform
searches that yield relevant results.
In
addition to being able to populate a results list with relevant items based on
the data in each item’s MARC record, the search interface is also able to find
materials based on user assigned tags. Users who have created a member profile
are encouraged to write reviews, rate items, and tag items in three general
categories: genre, tone, and theme. Once a list of results has been
generated, users will be able to further narrow their search using facets
including: story’s country of origin, story location, language, awards (e.g.
Caldecott, Geisel, etc.) and reading level (AR, Lexile, Reading Counts).
To
provide further interactivity to our patrons, both staff and users may create
reader’s advisory guides, share item records and guides via email, Facebook,
Twitter, and other social media sites, follow other users, and create
personalized recommendations for users with similar interests. It is our
hope that the catalogue will act as more than a simple search and discovery
tool; we envision it as a means to connect users to the wider community.
We
value the safety and privacy of our patrons, and provide a system mediated
message system so that no personal information is shared between users.
We also include a “Report This” function on all reviews, tags and guides that
is monitored by Imagining Literacy Staff.
It
is our hope that by providing our users with a wide range of access points to
our collection, they will be better able to search, find, learn, share and
create in meaningful ways.
[1] The
description of our search interface’s capabilities is based on BiblioCommon’s
BiblioCore.
Resources
Adkins,
Denice and Jenny E. Bossaller. “Fiction access points across computer-mediated
book information sources: A comparison of online bookstores, reader advisory
databases, and public library catalogs.” Library & Information Science
Research. 29.3 (2007): 354-368. Web. 18 Nov. 2012.
“Children’s
Subject Headings (CSH) List.” The Library of Congress. 4 Jan. 2012. Web.
19 Nov. 2012. http://www.loc.gov/aba/cyac/childsubjhead.html
Spiteri,
Louise F. “Social discovery tools: extending the principle of user convenience.”
Journal of Documentation. 68.2 (2012): 206-217. Web. 18 Nov. 2012.
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