Skip to Main Content

Curriculum Materials Collection (CMC)

CMC

Map of Curriculum Materials Collection

Note: PZ 7.1, 7.3, and 7.7 come AFTER PZ 7. Those are all on the tall shelves towards the windows, not the short shelves. 

How Are the Books Organized?

The books are organized by Subject using the Library of Congress Classification system (a different system than what most school and public libraries use). 

Most fiction will be located under PZ7 and from there, most of the books are sorted by the author's last name. 

Books in our children's literature section are not separated out by age group. 

There is not a separate section for Award Winners (see list in this guide to find award winners in NoveLIST or Search at UW).

 

Note: Newer books are often classed under a new set of numbers. PZ 7.1, 7.3, and 7.7 come AFTER PZ 7 and are located on the taller shelves, not the shorter ones.

 

Need help finding something? Check out the map above to see how the shelves are laid out. 

What's the Stuff Underneath the PZ7s in the Call Number?

Almost all of the books in the CMC are under the PZ7 call number because that's the number for children's literature. That means that the numbers and letters underneath the PZ7 are important for finding them on the shelf! 

 

Underneath the PZ7 call number is usually the first letter of the author's last name and then a series of numbers that represent the other letters in the author's name. Remember that you're usually looking for the author's last name, not the title of the book. You'll start to see patterns browsing the shelves when you see it that way!

For example, Rowling is   R79835.   The R stands for the first letter of her last name and the other numbers stand for the other letters in her name based on a chart created by Library of Congress. 

The letters underneath that are usually an abbreviation of the title, since many authors have written more than one book. For authors like Dr. Seuss who have many books on the shelf, that helps us to keep things in order! 

Underneath that is the year the book was published. Sometimes we have more than one copy of a book so the year will help you to make sure that you're taking the right copy.