My previous library had a storywalk, which basically meant that now I had a storywalk. A storywalk, for those unfamiliar, is a storybook that is outside the library, usually along a path. Families walk from station to station, or from frame to frame, to read each section of the book.
There are so many positives to this program. It’s a great way to provide a literary service year round, in a different environment. It’s a great way to create awareness of your library that may not use your service otherwise–think of it as passive outreach. And most importantly to me, it’s a great way to highlight great picture books that you would not normally use in a storytime. For instance I displayed “Eyes That Kiss in the Corners” by Joanna Ho in my storywalk–I didn’t think it would work for one of my storytimes, but knew that it was a great book with great pictures and important message. This was also during the pandemic and so I also picked it as I read about racism directed Asian Americans due to Covid-19–so a storywalk is a great way to do some passive advocacy.
But then there’s the downsides. Your storywalk will be a puppy. It’s going to enrich your life but it’s A LOT of work! Because books HATE being outside. Shocker. So all your book pages need to be laminated because of the rain, so that takes time. If you have frames, they need to be cleaned because birds LOVE sitting on them, so that takes time. Taking everything out of the frame, wiping out the glass because dirt still somehow gets in, placing the new pages in, and screwing it all back into place, takes time. We have 19 stations, and the whole process takes about 4-5 hours.
Then there’s the sun. Since it’s outside, the sun is constantly beating down on the book. The pages will start to fade in a matter of weeks. Here’s some examples, keep in mind these photos were taken about a month apart:
Your blues seem to stay the same, but everything else fades in the sunlight. In 2-3 months, the book will be close to unrecognizable.
So that’s the reality. We would try to change it every 3 months or so, but ideally it should be every 2 months, maybe sooner since your books will fade so fast. This is Wisconsin, so we kind of get ALL the weather, so your results may vary, but I don’t feel your results will be too far off.
Let me walk you through my process from start to finish:
Choosing a Book
Like I stated above, sometimes I picked a book based on advocacy, like “Eyes That Kiss in the Corners” or I would try to pick books with minority characters, or by authors and artists. Or if there’s a current event, I would pick a book that way. I picked “Tea with Grandpa” by Barney Saltzberg during the start of quarantine in 2020, since the end is about a grandfather and child staying in touch over Zoom. The last book I picked was “Real to Me” by Minh Le, since it’s about losing a friend and I knew I would be going to a new library. But other times I would just pick books that had an interactive element to them, since I think it’s fun to do what the book says, and then run to the next frame and see what you have to do next.
Do you need author permission? From what I’ve found, no. Because if you needed their permission, you would need permission to have EVERY book in your library. BUT you do need to have two copies of the book, and you do need to display it in full, meaning all the pages gotta be out there. Otherwise, it might be considered a derivative work and against copyright.
Prepping the Book
Originally I was told to get only paperback books, since they are easier to destroy. But only so many books come out in paperback, so I quickly got hardcover books for my storywalk. Again two copies, since you ‘ll need to post the front and back of every page.
So dissecting a book is pretty simple, I just open it up to the middle, take a book cutter, and slice down the middle seam. Do that again about 1/4 of the way through the book and 3/4 of the way through the book. Then get everything out, cutting off the fringey, gluey bits to make each page crisp and square.
Make sure you laminate, to keep out the rain. And make sure that you keep the pages in order, picture books are often unnumbered so keeping everything in order will make things run better later.
Switching Out the Book
Some of this may seem obvious, but here’s what I usually do. First, plan out your stops. I had 19 stands, so I made sure to separate the pages into 19 separate piles. This might seem unnecessary, but given how much time it takes to change, it would be REALLY bad to have to take everything out and start all over again.
We have metal frames so I start by unscrewing the bottoms. Are metal frames worth it? It depends. They definitely look more professional than just putting your pages on yard signs. But they are obviously expensive, and they don’t really do anything to protect the book. My opinion, is if you are going to do something, do it right, so the metal frames are the way to go.
From there I clean out the glass, the backing mat and I always throw out my old pages. In theory, you could save them and use the reverse, non-sun damaged side, but: A.) They’re probably gross from being out in the elements, B.) People have already seen this story for months. So not worth saving in my opinion, if it seems like a waste, you could consider trading books with another storywalk. But again, the pages will still probably be gross and dirty, so just get rid of them.
From there you put everything back together. For the frames, it’s a lot like prepping microscope slides in high school. Your back will be a sheet of plexiglass, then your backing mat, then your book pages, then the top sheet of plexiglass. In theory you would just need one sheet of plexiglass and a backing mat, but two sheets of plexiglass will keep a lot of the water and dirt out. Don’t worry–water and dirt will STILL find a way in there somehow, but it at least provides a tighter seal.
That’s basically it, but problems will come up. Sometimes the plexiglass will start to warp and it will be incredibly difficult to get out of the frames. I recommend cycling them every time you change out the book, meaning your top piece of glass becomes your bottom piece, so that way it alleviates some of the stress on the material. Hopefully your library has a good relationship with your DPW–we had a snowmobile hit one of our frames and it had to be bent back into place. Our DPW was also kind enough to replace all of the wooden posts and concrete over the summer, so having a community partner is key for upkeep.
Programming Ideas
Since this is already a passive program, I never really did a whole lot of programming with it. You can provide critical thinking questions or interactive prompts inside the storyframes along with the book pages, to spark conversation or movement. You can also consider some sort of art project, for example I was planning on doing an imaginary friend drawing/photo project for “Real to Me” before I left my library, where kiddos could pose next to the imaginary friend they drew.
But I found a lot of success in author questions. For my Summer 2023, I reached out to the author to see if the kids could ask him a few questions. The author was incredibly happy to do it so I made a half-sheet where kids could write in questions about the book or the author’s process. I emailed him the questions and he wrote back answers that we published on Facebook. It was a really cool project and just a great way to interact with the book.
I feel that about covers it, but add to the “Comments” if there’s anything I didn’t cover 🙂 Here’s a list of all the books I’ve used:
“Real to Me” by Minh Le
“The World’s Longest Licorice Rope” by Matthew Myers
“Eyes That Kiss in the Corners” by Joanna Ho
“How to Find a Fox” by Nilah Magruder
“I Got the Rhythm” by Connie Schofield-Morrison
“From Head to Toe” by Eric Carle
“I’m Bored” by Michael Ian Black
“Tea with Grandpa” by Barney Saltzberg
“Harold Loves His Woolly Hat” by Vern Kousky
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