Awareness and Use of the Resources and Services of the Children’s Section of Selected Public Libraries in Delta State, Nigeria

Abstract

The objective of the study is to explore the awareness and use of the resources and services of the children’s section of selected public libraries in Delta State, Nigeria. The descriptive research design was adopted for this study. A total of 236 children drawn from six (6) public libraries using availability sampling, constituted the sample of the study. The instrument used in collecting data from the respondents was the questionnaires. 240 copies of the questionnaires were distributed to the respondents; the researcher was able to retrieve 236 copies of questionnaire. Hence, there was 98% response rate. The data collected from the respondents were analyzed using simple percentage and frequency counts. Findings of the study revealed that majority of the respondents have been using the library from 1-2yrs. The study also revealed that there are different means the children became aware of the public libraries, but majority are through friends, parents and teachers. Majority of the respondents use story books, dictionaries, encyclopedia and textbooks. For the services rendered reading promotion is often used by the respondents, respondents encounters different problems in their use of the public library, but the non-availability of internet poses majorities. From the findings, the researches made some recommendation that children should use the public library more frequently to enable them get acquainted to the library. The availability of recent library materials will improve on library’s collection and their services rendered and also the availability of internet should be adequately provided by the government.