In the second place,many libraries are making the mistake of trying to do too many things with the story telling tool.They forget that the school tells stories,that it can give the child thereby plenty of facts in science,history,geography,and what not;that it teaches him by means of stories,morals and politeness.They forget that the city does not pay them for doing this school work or for doing the work of the playgrounds and parks in keeping children off the streets.Much can be done by the library in all these ways;but it happens that the work which belongs peculiarly to the library and which no other institution can at present do for it,is to give good books to all the children in the city--a task which of itself is enough for any library to hope to do.Therefore we should discard from our story telling all the lessons we are trying to teach,our Christmas tree,our May poles,our fancy costumes and whatever pretty games we play,and simply tell the children stories from books.
Fortunately a good story from a book is enough to delight a child without any accompanying frills,so that the time we save by discarding them does not in the least detract from its efficiency.
And we must tell the stories to children.It has been said of one library and,moreover,with some pride,that the story hour was so popular that many grown people came to it;indeed sometimes there was little room left for the children!
Thirdly,the average library does not sufficiently consider whether in its particular case,story telling is the best tool at its command.What is a good tool in one case may not be in another and a given library may be sacrificing much better work when it takes time,as it must always do,from something else for the story hour.
Often a small library has no story teller upon its staff,but it may be doing effective work with children through its work with teachers,its visits to schools and its children's room.It has a small staff and no room adapted for telling stories at the library.Obviously such a library has no need for the story telling tool,yet many libraries like this are struggling hard to use it.Once a week or oftener they are allowing all the usual routine of the library to be upset to accommodate the Story Hour,the story teller has spent many hours of preparation and is under a strain that is little short of misery,and the children,because of the general difficulty of the whole situation,are deriving no greater love for books nor respect for the library.
Such a library would do better to give up story telling and put its energy into what it could do more effectively.
But here let me say that often the small library thinks it has no use for story telling as a tool when as a matter of fact it has.
Children's librarians in large or small libraries count school visiting as part of their work.The school visit offers the best of opportunities for the work of the Story Hour.A story told at the end of an informal little talk about the library will bring the children flocking to the library the minute school is over.
The small library which has no Story Hour room but which has a story teller can take advantage of this opportunity and do much with it.The story teller can visit three schoolrooms on different days,tell stories to forty children each time,and because the story telling is distributed over the three days,manage with comparative ease the influx of 120children who may come for books as a result.More than this,the story teller can have told three stories instead of one,so that only one-third of the children will clamor for the same book.This last point is important as all who have had story-hour experience know.
