This file is part of the following reference:
Clyde, Laurel A. (1981) The magic casements: a survey of school library history from the eighth to the twentieth century. PhD thesis,
James Cook University.
Access to this file is available from:
http://eprints.jcu.edu.au/2051
'CONCLUSI ON
Each of the five ,c o ncep t s of the school library which have been discus sed in Chapters Six to Nine - the school library as a curriculum suppor t unit , the scho o l library as a so urce of recreational reading , the school/ communi t y library, the school library as a schola r s '
,l i brary, the school library as a memorial - has been a significant, if not always dominant , one in the history of school li b r a r i e s at some time and in at le a st one country during the last twel ve hundred yea r s. From as early as the ei ghth century in Great Britain, schoo l libraries whic h clos ely reflect the school curri c ulum and prevalent instructional ideas have be en es tabl i s hed in ma ny schools. Large numbers of English grammar sc hoo ls in the Reformation period developed suc h libraries, as sc hools both in Eng l a nd and in other countries have continued to do to the,pres ent day. During the late Middle Ages chantry libraries were establis hed as memorials; in the nine t e enth and twentieth centurie s .memorial libraries of various typ es were aga i n being built. Scho larl y libraries, serving the needs of a small group within a school·or co l lege, were popul a r in the fourt e e nth century; even in th e nineteenth ce ntury they stood o~t as a signi f i - cant scho o l library typ e in the ev idence produc ed by the Schools Inquiry' (Taunton) Commission. In the sixteenth and seventeenth
"cent ur i es many school libraries; particularly in British grammar
school s; offered a service to the local community. Sunday schoo l libraries and elementary school libraries also offered th i s ser v ic e in nineteenth century Britai n and Ameri c a• .With the development of rate-suppor ted public libraries in bot h countries from the mi d-
specially-designed joint school/community library facilities are being established in response to demands for greater economy in
public spending and for greater community access to school facilities.
In the late eighteenth century, and especially in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries,. school libraries designed to meet pupils' recreational reading needs came into existence, their growth
paralleling the increasing availability of non-didactic literature designed primarly to give children pleasure.
Each of these concepts of school library service has been changed and modified over the centuries. The curriculum-related school libraries have altered in character as both the school curric- ulumand the methods of·instruction employed have changed in response to new theories and developments in education. While the centralised school library resource· centres of the twentieth century have little physical resemblance to the chained libraries of the sixteenth
century English grammar schools, they still share essentially the same purpose: to support the teaching and learning activities of the school. Memorial libraries have also undergone a change. The chantry libraries of the pre-Reformation period have their nineteenth and twentieth century successors in the war memorial libraries and the libraries built, at least partly, to commemorate the life·and work of a person associated with the school. Such libraries have tended, in the later part of the twentieth century, to become more functional, with the commemorative features kept to a minimum; in many cases one suspects that the association of a person's name with the building is simply a means of raising additional funds. In the
twentieth century , wit h an increasing emphasis in education on democratic idea s and on equal opportunity for all , scholarly libraries in scho ols and co lle ge s have been opened up to a wi de r range of us ers, though their original function, of providing a sound
. ~a s i s for the intellectual·lifeofthe·institution , remains paramount.
School/community librar ies·and li b r a r y service s have also undergone a change, from the sixteenth century when community library se r vice s .wer e often·of fe r ed from sc hool.librarie s, to the present empha sis on
joint services.
Individual school libraries, es t abli shed to ser ve a par t i c ula r pur pose, have cha ng ed and.developed over the yea rs , so that many have come to ser ve other purpo ses tha n those for which they were founded. In the nineteenth century in Britain and America, Sunda y school
librarie s, esta bl ishe d to suppo r t the teaching in those schools , with collections clos e l y rela t ed to clas sroom ins t r uct i on, gradually
changed in char a ct e r , with their colle ctions wi dening in sco pe to inc l ude fiction and general recrea t i ona l re ading material s . On the other hand , in a reverse process, large numbers of primary and seco nda r y schoo l libraries.originally establ ished in the late nine - te enth or ea r l y twentieth centurie s to provide for the pupils' recreational readi ng ne eds, had so altered in character by the la t e 1930s that they.were predomi nant ly a ·s our c e of support and enrichment for curriculum-related teaching and learning activities in the
school . Li br a r i e s established primarily as memorials have come to serve the need for recr eational rea ding for pupils or for curriculum- relat e d materi als for teachers and pupils;
The currently popular concept of the scllool library in English- speak i ng countries is that of the school lib rar y resource centre
source of recre a tional re ading is ev i d ent in the fiction co l lec t ions , of vary i n g size, usual ly incorpo rated in present-day school
libraries. And in th e last fift een. year s , in Great Britain , the Uni ted States of America , and in Aus t r al ia , ne w in i t i ativ e s have been ta ke n in th e development of var iou s forms of joint school / community library servi c e .
