LIBRARY SERVICES

a National Library Service Board for Kenya whose executive members include representatives from the Ministry of Culture and Social Services and the Nairobi City Commission. The Board was to play this role:

(a) Development of reading habits among the people from an early age. (b) Provision of adequate and relevant material to the new literates and school leavers. (c) Survey of users' needs to determine their requirements and thus enable the Board to provide an improved service. (d) Encourage local people to write books. (e) Functioning as cultural centres where through such activities as literacy discussion, lectures etc. the habit of reading could be developed. (f) Provision of suitable libraries in both primary and secondary schools.

The official function of KNLS include the following:

(i) To promote, establish, equip, maintain and develop libraries in Kenya. (ii) To advise the Government local authorities and other public bodies on all matters relating to library, documentation and related services in Kenya. (iii) To provide facilities for the study of and training ln the principles, procedures and teaching of Liberianship and such other related subjects as the Board may from time to time decide. (iv) To sponsor, arrange, provide facilities for Conferences and Seminars for discussion of library and related services. (v) To carry out and to encourage research in the development of library and related services. (vi) To stimulate public interest in books and promote reading for knowledge, information and enjoyment. (vii) To participate and assist in campaigns for the eradication of illiteracy. (viii) To acquire books produced in and outside Kenya and such other materials and sources of knowledge necessary for a comprehensive national library service. (ix) To publish the national bibliography of Kenya and provide bibliographical and reference services.

KNLS opened its doors to the public in 1969 with a book stock of about 40,000 having inherited about 25,000 books from the Kenya branch of East African Literature Bureau. It had a skeleton staff of one chief librarian, one librarian, three library assistants, one administrative officer, a few clerical, secretarial and subordinate staff. By 197643 the stock had increased to 220,000 with 700,000 registered borrowers. In 198244 the stock was about 500,000 with a total membership of over 120,000.

2.5 THE APPROACHES UTILIZED BY PUPILS AND TEACHERS IN PUBLIC LIBRARY SERVICES

There are two bibliographic devices prepared specifically to facilitate the retrieval of documents from a library. These are the arrangement of documents on the shelves and the catalogues recording the documents.

John Horner, defines a library catalogue as: The record of the stock of whole bibliographic items of the library. It should be within defined limits a complete record and a record arranged in a useful order, or more usually in several useful orders, or with several approaches.

Needhem, defines it as: "An arrangement of entries representing documents, each entry is in two parts. Bloomberg, definition does not differ with those two because he says: "The catalogue is one of the most important and useful reference tools in the library. It is a systematic list of the books and other materials in the library collection. All these scholars agree that a catalogue is a list of the holdings of a library and should be arranged in some definite and recognized order. According to Cutter (1876), the objectives of 'a library catalogue is: 1. To enable a person to find a book of which: A. The author or B. The title or C. The subject is known 2. To show what the library has D. By a given author E. On a given subject F. In a given kind of literature 3. To assist in the choice of a book: G. As to its edition (bibliographically) H. As to its character (literary or topical).

From these objectives, a catalogue plays the role of a finding list for specific documents, serves as a finding list for groups of documents and enables the library user to be able to distinguish between different editions of a given document and assists the user in the choice of a document by providing enough information about its distinctive features.