Building Bridges

In the elementary library that I am currently student teaching at, there is a constant controversial book. But it is not the parents that are challenging it, it is ironically the teachers. Now, I can understand the “uncomfortabliness” of the book. It is a very graphic book about where babies come from in cartoon form. There is even a drawing of mommy and daddy doing the “deed”. But I have a hard time saying it should be out of the library. If I was a parent, I am really not sure how I would react if my child came home with this book, but as a librarian….Well, I can’t really argue it should be banned. With the ever rising rate of teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases, this is a great opportunity to open the dialogue with kids before they fall in that trap that our society is constantly luring them in. But what I find interesting about the whole situation is how the teachers are handling their views. Instead of taking the proper and professional steps of challenging a book, they will either hide it in the library or just take it from the library and hide in their classroom to prevent any student from checking it out! The librarian that I am working under is very good at doing some investigation work at figuring out who has it and sneaks the book back. I have even witnessed first hand a teacher take the library book out of a student’s hands after they have checked it out. But this all seems very silly to me. I would expect more from other educators. I am just curious what other may think.