PLUG-INs A Student’s Guide to Information Literacy

1. PLUG-INs A Student’s Guide to Information Literacy CALL NUMBERS How to find a book in the library

2. How do you find a book in the library? Where is it ? Which shelf is it on? You look for the CALL NUMBER.

3. What is a CALL NUMBER? It is a book’s address on the library shelf.

4. Look on the thin side (or spine) of a book to see the CALL NUMBER. It is on a small white sticker.

5. At HCT, a call number has both letters and numbers. Letters come first. Of course, the letters are in alphabetical order.

6. Do you remember the Alphabet Song ? A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

7. The letter in a call number is like a neighborhood. Other books on the same subject will be nearby. For example, “D” is for books about history.

8. Sometimes, there are 2 letters. Books with “QA” come before books with “QB” and so on. For example, “QA” are the letters for books about computers.

9. After the letters, there are some numbers. This is not difficult. The numbers are in normal order. But, what happens next is a little confusing.

10. QA 76 .H22 2006 Look at the 3rd line of this call number. You see a dot. This is a decimal. Do you remember decimals from your math class?

11. In decimals, which number is smaller 0.22 or 0.2116 ? Did you guess 0.2116 ? So, on the library shelf, 0.2116 comes before 0.22

12. The letter with the decimal number usually is the first letter of the author’s last name. QA 76 .H22 2006 Sometimes, there is another line of decimal numbers.

13. The last number is the year the book was published. QA 76 .H22 2006

14. Sometimes a call number has the word “Reference” under the year. QA 76 .H22 2006 Reference This means that the book is in a special section called the Reference Section. Reference books must be used in the library only. They cannot be checked out.

15. To conclude, a call number tells you WHERE a book is in the library. It also tells you WHAT the books is about. It tells you about the AUTHOR’S LAST NAME. And, it tells you WHEN the book was published.

16. WOW ! That’s a lot of information in one number. But, what about Fiction books ? What about Graded Readers ?

17. Fiction and Graded Readers do not have full call numbers. Books in the Fiction Section are in alphabetical order by the author’s last name.

18. For example, if the author is Robert Adams, the book will be in the A section. If the author is Brad Pitt, the book will be in the P section.

19. Graded Readers are shelved by level. Yellow is Elementary or beginning. Blue is Intermediate and orange is Advanced.

20. Graded Readers are then filed by the first letter of the title after “the” or “a.” For example, The Long Road is filed by L A Big Secret is filed under B.

21. Only one more thing about finding books in the library.

22. On the side of a library shelf, you will see some letters, for example A- DH. This means that all A books, all B books, all C books and all D books through DH will be on this set of shelves.

23. Thank you for listening. Ask your friendly librarian if you have any questions.

24. HAPPY READING !