h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Ok - that was a BIG title! Basically, I'm looking for a place where I can come in and ask questions, give answers, share experiences and work out solutions together.....about the Dewey Decimal system! In our UK junior schools!

Reason I ask is I volunteered to help move my 6yr old son's school library before summer hols. When I first went in, they had kids packing the old library up....just throwing books into boxes. Everything got confused.

Now I'm charged with sorting out the new library and I DO actually understand the Dewey System categories. I've unpacked every box myself! And I've sorted out fiction from non-fiction and reference. And I've subsorted fiction into picture books and early readers and competent readers and then into proper fiction, author surname alphabetically. I've also only just spent 2 days looking at the Junior Librarian(3) system. To me, that's easy cos of my computer literacy!

I won't say much else until I'm sure I'm in the right place....for now, just to say I need as much help and advice as I can get to set this library up. I'm just a voluntary parent helper and there's practically no dedicated librarian...it's just me, trying to sort it all out. (The dedicated librarian is a part time teacher - she only works 2 days a week (Mon/Tue) and is so busy with her teaching responsibilities, she can't spare any time in the library!

I'm putting in a fair few hours....cos I want to get it right. I'm computer literate and an ex Training Manager for a large financial company so I have skills that are either over and/or underused in this project.

I just need to make contact with UK based school librarian types who can guide me and don't mind answering lots of questions!

Anyone up for it?

My first question is this....
I want to input the Dewey Categories into the school library's database. The system is called Junior Librarian 3. Firstly, I need to obtain the most up to date list of Dewey categories and classifications, ie not just the overall category numbers, but the sub categories and sub, sub categories!
Most of the sites I've looked at only provide an overview, but I haven't gotten through all of them yet. Maybe someone out there already knows where I can find this?

Thanks again....Celine

I've replied to your other thread, but have just realised... How much detail do you really want to go in to in categorising books in the library, given the age range involved? Key factors are the age and ability of the kids, how many non-fiction books there are in the library and how specific the topics covered in the books actually are. For the most part, I'd have thought that the first three digits of the numbers are sufficient for your needs, but there may be areas where this is not the case.

A list of the categories' numbers
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Dewey_Decimal_classes

A list of the categories' numbers
http://www.oclc.org/dewey/resources/summaries/deweysummaries.pdf

I think that somewhere on the internet there "should" be an option (probably not free) to input an ISBN book number and get out a Dewey Decimal Library reference No.

The part after the "decimal point" is a bit more tricky if it is not on the book already. If it is I believe all books with the same number get filed in alphabetical order of the Authors Surname.