iSchool Capstone

At the Right Time: Materials for Children Experiencing Divorce

Project tags:

digital youth & youth services

Project poster

Divorce, for children, can have strong emotional and behavioral repercussions, and can cause lasting mental health issues. Therapists work diligently to help families through this, but aren't experts in publishing. This can lead to a reliance on dated materials that may lack depth, currency and accessibility. Armed with an understanding of some of the issues that divorce causes children, Megan and Chelsea worked with therapist Carol Mapp to create an annotated bibliography of high-quality, accessible titles. It addresses issues beyond divorce, including anxiety, grief, moving to a new home and academics. The structure was designed to enhance usability, and is broken down by issue and age range. This project creates a clear, concise resource of supportive texts that can be browsed or searched with ease. This list can be used to guide decisions on materials used in specific bibliotherapy sessions, as a collection development tool, and even shared with clients.

Project participants:

Chelsea Pemberton

MLIS

Megan Barnes

MLIS