Advocacy for Tweens

On a YALSA blog, March 3, 2010 , Jen Waters, a teen services librarian in Canada, posted an entry entitled “The Trouble with Tweens”. She was feeling that the 10 to 12 year-old tweens are too young for the teen programs in her library and also too young to hang out on the teen floor. She provides good reasons for this: “many of them are not mature enough to be part of the conversations that take place in our No Boys Allowed Club, watch PG 13 movies (that their parents often object to), or discuss novels of the Ellen Hopkins variety”. And, the tweens don’t want to participate in programs designated for 6 to 12 year-olds. Waters is trying out ideas. Her first, to only allow kids to use the teen area if they had a teen card was unsuccessful. Now she’s trying a club only for the 10-12 year olds with ‘teen-ish’ activities, such as Wii, crafts, and movies. Waters is actiely thinking about the developmental issues and needs of the tweens coming to her library and working to provide activities that will be appealing to them. It's useful to see a librarian thinking and working through her process to provide effecting programs.

In Children and Libraries, Summer/Fall 2009, The ALSC News has a feature article entitled "Phase 2 of Kids! Campaign Target Tweens". It provides an overview of ALSCs campaign to help librarians promote services to tweens, grades 5 to 8. Campaign information can be found at ALSC KIDS! @ Your Library. The 'Cool Cash Contest Winners' link provides a list of activities libraries implemented to promote activities to tweens. The Best Practices Wiki has links to initiatives and marketing tools. Helpful information and resources for librarians.

In her Children and Libraries essay "Betwixt and Between: Tweens in the Library" (Spring 2009), Crystal Faris suggests that libraries consider incorporating information learned from the Roper Youth Report Survey and a study by the Gepetto Group to advertise and market to tweens in the library. The Roper Survey indicates "marketers associate this group with the social phenomenon of kids getting older younger because tweens want to be seen as older, to be as cool as the teens they admire". “Roper Youth Report is a syndicated database of tweens (ages 8-12) and teens (ages 13-17) in the US. It has been fielded since 1993 and has 1,000 face-to-face interviews that are balanced to the most recent census by gender and ethnicity.” (http://www.gfk.com/group/services/instruments_and_services/contact_dates/00173/index.en.html)
The Gepetto Group focused on "understanding tweens' reactions to advertising". Faris directly relates this demographic and marketing information when she provides a couple of suggestions for a couple of activities, one focusing on fantasy literature and another - a breakfast club. Unfortunately, Faris only offers these two ideas, with a note that more research is needed.