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ETL512 Assessment 6: Professional Reflective Portfolio

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Part A: Statement of Personal Philosophy

Effective 21st century teacher-librarians require strong interpersonal skills alongside the pedagogical knowledge to teach a multitude of competencies and literacies across different curriculum areas. Through proficient leadership, strategic planning, resource management, and innovative program design, modern teacher-librarians inspire passion for reading for pleasure and information while supporting learning and wellbeing in our communities.

Modern libraries are about people, not just resources. Our ability to form effective relationships with students, staff, parents, and professional networks allows teacher-librarians to meet the diverse educational, wellbeing, and recreational needs of our learning communities and to advocate for our value in an ever-changing information landscape.

Part B: Critical Evaluation

My very first assessment for this degree required me to reflect on my understanding of the role of teacher-librarians in schools (Lysaught, 2021a). For this task, I discussed the roles I focused on as part of my then-recent job application:

Little did I know, but this visual would serve as a prescient highlight to many of the issues explored throughout this course.

The early work completed in ETL401 introduced me to several roles expected of modern teacher-librarians, and as a result of my continued learnings in this degree I have consolidated these varied elements into three key themes.

Theme 1: Resourcing and Inspiring Reading for Pleasure

The first theme, resourcing and inspiring reading for pleasure, in many ways reinforces pre-existing stereotypes about the work of teacher-librarians as predominantly dealing with books. I discussed this misconception in my early blog posts, noting that these perceptions were largely based on community experiences (Lysaught, 2021a; Lysaught, 2021b). As a result of the readings and learning tasks in this degree, I have concluded that teacher-librarians must therefore ensure that we provide a multitude of different experiences to our communities to shape their perceptions of our roles as varied and valuable in an ever-changing modern information landscape.

However, Herring (2007, p.31) noted that fulfilling all the possible roles expected of teacher-librarians at one time is impossible. Anecdotal evidence suggests many teachers still don’t know what information literacy is, let alone a teacher-librarian’s role in developing student proficiency; those few who do often lack the time for collaborative planning and teaching. Rather than stress myself out by fighting an uphill battle and overhauling community perceptions completely, at the start of my teacher-librarian journey I’ve chosen to draw on my strengths as an English teacher and my pre-existing relationships with this faculty to lean into community expectations and show my value to our school by establishing a culture of pleasure reading. Once trust in my abilities as a teacher-librarian and strong relationships are formed through this Trojan horse, the plan is to leverage my success and branch out into other facets of my role, such as information specialist, to further entrench my value to our school community.

Step one in my plan to channel then subvert community expectations was to create a Wide Reading Program for the Stage 4 English classes. To show the value of this program to our school leaders, I aligned it with our Strategic Improvement Plan, foreshadowing the learnings of ETL504 Teacher Librarian as Leader. This program, inspired by the ETL402 Literature Across the Curriculum readings, aims to create a school-wide culture of pleasure reading. Reading for pleasure has repeatedly been shown to improve student literacies and socio-emotional development (Combes & Valli, 2007; Howard, 2011; Allington & Gabriel, 2012; Kid & Castano, 2013; Gaiman, 2013; Wu et al., 2013; Whitten et al., 2016; Ipri & Newman, 2017; Stower & Waring, 2018; Smith, 2019; Merga, 2021; Merga, 2022). Student reading drops off during adolescence for several reasons, including lack of access to quality texts, lack of positive reading role-models, lack of time, and lack of confidence in their reading ability:

This program aims to address these issues by providing students access to appropriate, self-selected texts and by setting aside a 60-minute period each fortnight to allow students time to explore, share, and value their reading in a socially supported positive learning environment (Gibson-Langford & Laycock, 2008; Krashen, 2011; Fisher & Frey, 2018; Merga & Mason, 2019; Allington & McGill-Franzen, 2021). Through this program I aim to create independent, lifelong readers who are set up for personal and academic success.

This initiative was first trialed in 2022, our first year without a school-wide DEAR program. It initially ran with 4 Year 7 classes which dropped back to 2 due to staffing issues and frequent interruptions. Data revealed that overall, the students who participated enjoyed the experience and found it beneficial, and I reported these findings to our Senior Executive via my Annual Library Report (Lysaught, 2023a):

In 2023 the Wide Reading Program was expanded from one teacher to six and now includes our Support Unit and two Year 8 classes, largely due to word of mouth and positive feedback from participating teachers – proving Bonanno’s (2011) argument that we should build relationships with the staff willing to work with us, since others will choose to follow once trust is developed (Crippen & Willows, 2019, p.173).

A crucial element of successfully inspiring reading for pleasure, especially amongst teens asserting their independence and exploring their identity, is the provision of relevant resources which support self-selection of reading materials (Beach et al., 2011; Allington & Gabriel, 2012; Fisher & Frey, 2018). To ensure a robust collection which meets the needs and interests of my patrons, I drew heavily upon the learnings gained in ETL503 Resourcing the Curriculum. Library hygiene is an important element of ensuring an enticing, relevant collection (Fieldhouse & Marshall, 2011), and thus at the end of 2022 I completed a stocktake and significant weed of our Fiction and Quick Reads collections (Lysaught, 2023a). This was the first stocktake since 2018 and the median age of deselected resources was 1999, necessitating a serious update of our collection to ensure continued relevance. This was followed by subsequent stocktakes of our Picture Book and Graphic Novel collections at the start of 2023. Once these stocktakes were completed I introduced dynamic shelving to make the shelves more enticing and facilitate browsing (Bogan, 2022).

I also implemented patron-led acquisitions to increase circulation and user connection to the library’s resources (Hughes-Hassell & Mancall, 2005, p.9; Kimmel, 2014; Johnson, 2018; Aaron Cohen Associates, 2020, para.6; Crawford et. al, 2020, p.2), with 49% of newly acquired fiction resources specifically requested by staff and students in 2022 (Lysaught, 2023a). Drawing upon my experiences during my practicum, this year I bought 131 Hi-Lo books for our Quick Reads collection, and plan to use them for future Book Club activities during the Wide Reading lessons (Lysaught, 2023b). I am also in the process of genrefying our Quick Reads collection for easier browsing and selection, trialing the learnings gained in ETL505 Describing and Analysing Educational Resources (Lysaught, 2022a) in one of our popular, manageable collections.

Fisher & Frey (2018) argued that interventions designed to increase reading volume should rely on four factors: access, choice, classroom discussion of texts and book talks. The initiatives described above aimed to incorporate these four factors alongside efficient collection development and management. Loans statistics indicate that circulation has increased on the days when the Wide Reading lessons run, and as a result Oliver data shows we are on track to meet or beat our previous loans records since I became the teacher-librarian in 2020, despite our removal of a whole-school DEAR program in 2022.

Theme 2: Resourcing and Developing Reading for Information

As mentioned above, despite the importance of reading for pleasure in developing literacy, the role of a modern teacher-librarian should expand beyond the realm of books and into the crucial realm of information literacy to avoid the misunderstanding that our roles are limited and unnecessary in modern schools. I personally was guilty of this misconception prior to starting this degree, so I can hardly blame time-poor classroom teachers and senior leaders for not understanding our role, especially if they’ve never seen it in action! It is therefore necessary that we provide a variety of different experiences to our communities to shape their perceptions of our roles and ensure they understand our vital importance in developing our students as ethical, efficient users and creators of information. We cannot risk becoming an “invisible profession” (Valenza, 2010; Bonanno, 2011) and resourcing our libraries to develop information literacy is a path forward for teacher-librarians to show our value in a shifting infosphere increasingly filled with mis- and disinformation (Floridi, 2007, p.59; Lysaught, 2021c).

ASLA 2011. Karen Bonanno, Keynote speaker: A profession at the tipping point: Time to change the game plan from CSU-SIS Learning Centre on Vimeo.

The learnings gained in ETL401 Introduction to Teacher Librarianship were crucial in forcing me to revise my misunderstandings regarding the role of the modern teacher-librarian. For the second assessment I focused on how social media platforms affect our relationship with information, and discovered that improved internet access has changed information-seeking behaviours to favour passive information acquisition which uses the path of least resistance (often relying on social interactions), significantly impacting users’ ability to determine fact from fiction (Bates, 2010; Herbst, 2020; Liu, 2020; Kuhlthau et al., 2021). Teenagers are particularly likely to gain information from online, social sources and, far from being ‘digital natives’ equipped to navigate online information, are uniquely vulnerable to misinformation (Combes, 2009; Jacobson, 2010; O’Connell, 2012; Common Sense Media, 2019; Australian eSafety Commissioner, 2021). As a high-school teacher-librarian, I therefore have an ethical responsibility to ensure that my collections and programs equip my students with the skills and competencies they’ll need to be information literate in an increasingly digital world. Anecdotal evidence suggests that for many secondary classroom teachers, the fact that teacher-librarians don’t teach to a specific curriculum demeans our value. The recently released Information Fluency Framework (NSW Department of Education, 2023) offers an exciting way to legitimise our work moving forward, showcasing that we can be the glue which brings learning areas together, and will form the focus of my professional learning after finishing this degree. In the meantime I will continue to run one-off research skill lessons for my colleagues as requested.

Inquiry learning was another key aspect of our role explored in ETL401. While I had been familiar with concepts such as Project Based Learning from my time as a classroom teacher (Lysaught, 2021d), other methods such as Guided Inquiry Design were eye-opening and revealed a new pedagogy full of potential for my students (Lysaught, 2021e), since information literacy is foundational to inquiry learning (Fitzgerald, 2015). I greatly enjoyed reworking our existing Year 7 Shakespeare unit into a Guided Inquiry Design unit and look forward to the opportunity to co-teach it in future (Lysaught, via Guided Inquiry in Australia, 2020), alongside the digital narrative I created for ETL533.

ETL533 Assessment 4 – Digital Storytelling: A Day in Elizabethan England by Danielle Lysaught (Danielle Lysaught)

However, implementing inquiry learning and developing information literacy programs has not been without significant challenges in reality. Early on I identified that high staff workloads and minimal free time would likely hamper potential attempts to implement collaborative inquiry learning (Lysaught, 2021f). As such, there has been limited staff uptake. However, largely due to the relationships and trust developed through the Wide Reading Program, I have finally been asked to work with one of the English teachers and her Year 8 class in Term 4 on a unit exploring suspenseful narratives. The ETL512 Study Visits emphasised the importance of emotional intelligence and persistence as key traits for teacher-librarians, and my personal experience shows that we must be resilient in the face of setbacks and persist in the hope that we can eventually have the opportunity to showcase our value to our colleagues.

Effective collection management is another crucial aspect to developing information literacy in our community. ETL503 Resourcing the Curriculum and ETL505 Describing and Analysing Educational Resources reinforced the importance of efficient resource management for supporting curriculum learning. In 2021 I completed a stocktake of our non-fiction collections – the first since 2018. The shelves were overflowing, messy, and not conducive to easy selection of relevant material:

Prior to this stocktake, the median date of publication was 1981. I weeded 2468 outdated or damaged resources, almost halving the collection and bringing the median date of publication to 2000 – an improvement, but indicating that there is still significant work to be completed to ensure a current, relevant collection which meets the needs of my staff and students. Foreshadowing the learnings of ETL504, I published the findings from this stocktake in my 2021 Annual Report and shared it with the Senior Executive to highlight the complexities of my role to our school leaders (Lysaught, 2022b).

In 2022 we started accessioning English novels to support their resource management, leading to it becoming our third largest collection:

This year, due to the success of this initiative, we have also had requests from the Science Faculty to assist with the management of their Stage 6 resources. While not without challenges, this provides a way for me to showcase my value to my colleagues, support curriculum learning through effective resource management, and interact with students who would otherwise possibly not utilise the library.

Theme 3: Promotion and Advocacy through Leadership

Two of the most used tags on my blog are ‘promotion’ and ‘advocacy’, so it’s only appropriate that the final theme discussed focuses on these issues.

Early in this degree the readings revealed the importance of advocating for our positions (Lysaught, 2021g), meaning that right from the start I’ve developed an awareness of the importance of perception and relationships in our role. This was consolidated throughout this degree in every unit.

In an early blog post for ETL503 Resourcing the Curriculum I noted that, due to the teacher-librarian’s often poorly defined role and lack of clear curriculum direction, we are often utilised in different ways to support whatever the school requires (Lysaught, 2021h). It is therefore crucial for us to collaborate with our colleagues so that they understand our varied roles, ensuring our continued visibility and effectiveness to our school community. As seen through the frequent ‘promotion’ and ‘advocacy’ tags in my blog, so much of our work gives us the chance to increase our visibility; while it can be tempting to give up in the face of colleagues who view us as having the “cushy job”, we need to change our mindset and instead reframe challenges as “chopportunities” (Weisburg, 2020) and look for ways to make our work seen, valued, and understood (Valenza, 2010; Bonanno, 2011).

My final unit, ETL504 Teacher Librarian as Leader, emphasised the different leadership styles that we can leverage to maximise our effectiveness to our colleagues. Effective leadership, regardless of the approach or title, should focus on building strong relationships with others through mutual trust, respect, and effective communication (Holmes et al., 2012, p.271, 276; Moir et al., 2014, p.37; Ezard, 2015; Gleeson, 2016). My very first blog post had outlined my intent to support both staff and students (Lysaught, 2021i), and thus Servant Leadership appealed to me from the start (Lysaught, 2023c). In particular I was drawn to Servant Leadership due to its focus on empowering and developing others, humility, commitment to growth and community building, highly developed interpersonal skills, stewardship, healing, conceptualisation, and foresight  (Arar & Oplatka, 2022, p.83-87; Crippen & Willows, 2019; p.171-172), and found that its guiding questions – ‘do you want to serve or be served?’ and ‘do those served grow as persons?’ (Blanchard & Broadwell, 2018; Greenleaf, 2008, p.36) – aligned well with my personal traits and values, and could help me support and heal cynical, time-poor staff and to act as mentors for both staff and students (Branch-Mueller & Rodger, 2022, p.46-47; Reinsel Soulen, 2020, p.39-40; Uther & Pickworth, 2014, p.21-23).

As a result of the learnings in this degree, I’ve experimented with a variety of different promotions and advocacy methods. I began this degree in mid-2021 when NSW started online learning followed by cohorting, which made collaboration and promotion particularly challenging early on; this has been further compounded by the current teacher shortage and high staff turnover at our school. Some of the early initiatives I implemented to raise the library’s profile include the Student Media Team, a Babble, Books and Breakfast club working alongside the Wellbeing faculty, and a Staff and Student Book Club (Lysaught, 2021j). While the book club fell apart due to lack of interest and time after online learning finished, the other two initiatives are still going strong. My early attempts at strategic planning appear quite amateurish in hindsight, though the alignment of my initiatives to our Strategic Improvement Plan and promotion of my work through Annual Reports foreshadowed the strategies suggested in ETL504 (Lysaught, 2023d). Our school recently experimented with the idea of holding all Stage 6 exams in the library, which if enacted would necessitate its closure for over 2 months of the school year. I was able to successfully leverage leadership strategies and use visitor and loans data collected each day to show the impact library closures would have on our school community, convincing the decision makers to choose another option:

Looking to the future, I will continue to experiment and expand on the learnings gained from this degree. First I will create a library operations folio to ensure effective management and strategic planning moving forward (Braxton, n.d.; National Library of New Zealand, n.d.; Oberg & Schultz-Jones, 2015). I was particularly inspired by the idea of hooking in new and current staff via mentoring (Cox & Korodaj, 2019; Reinsel Soulen, 2020), and building community ownership through a library committee has been a long-time goal of mine (Lysaught, 2021h). Inspired by ETL505 and the ETL512 study visits, I’d also love to create a library website to increase visibility and support teaching and learning by providing easily accessible pathfinders and research lessons. This journey is a marathon, not a sprint, and this degree has shown countless potential pathways to follow in future.

 

Part C Reflection

At the beginning of this course, we were asked to consider what makes a teacher-librarian (Lysaught, 2021a). My understanding of the role has expanded significantly since those early days:

However, despite the complexity of our role, our work is still widely misunderstood. This degree has shown me that to be seen as professionals, we must act as professionals and take every opportunity to advocate for our role through the work we do in our school communities. The professional standards developed by the Australian Library and Information Association (ALIA) and the Australian School Library Association (ASLA) provide a useful framework for evaluating our professional practice and ensuring that we remain relevant and visible to our peers.

As a classroom teacher with experience teaching both the English and History syllabi from Year 7 through to Year 12, including the Extension courses for both subjects, I feel quite confident in my abilities as a teacher with strong professional and pedagogical knowledge who meets the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers, many of which align with the ALIA/ASLA Standards through their similar professional domains (Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership [AITSL], 2022). While I already had a strong understanding of reading practices, assessment, and ICT, this degree introduced me to the wonders of information literacy and collection management which have allowed me to be even more effective in my classroom practice and developed my understanding of how to support my colleagues more efficiently in my library role.

As a relatively new teacher-librarian, I feel that I still have a fair way to go regarding my professional practice, particularly regarding our role as information specialists. While I believe that I have created an environment where learners are encouraged to engage with our resources for understanding and enjoyment, I need to do more to ensure an information-rich learning environment which meets the needs of my community. I’ve worked hard over the last 2 years to build an environment which fosters positive wellbeing and strong reading culture, and due to these relationships and the trust I’ve developed with our teaching staff I’ve finally got the opportunity in Term 4 to collaboratively develop and teach a Guided Inquiry unit. Likewise, while I’ve previously done some strategic planning and budgeting (Lysaught, 2023d), the skills gained in this course will leave me much better equipped to plan for the future and ensure the library’s continued relevance and value to my school. In Term 4 I therefore intend to create a Library Operations Folio, including strategic and operations plans alongside policies for collection development, ICT use, and potential challenges.

I am already a member of several professional organisations, and fully intend to take advantage of their professional development. This will focus on the development and delivery of information literacy programs and wellbeing programs, broadening my understandings further and allowing me to showcase the potential in our practice to our wider school community.

Advocacy through action and alliances is my path forward in what could otherwise be an isolated, misunderstood role. While building my Wide Reading Program I have relied heavily on the action research process to ensure that my practice is evidence-based, innovative, and meets the needs of my staff and students. I have used this research to showcase my professionalism and the potential of my role to my colleagues, particularly to my school leaders. However, evaluating my work against the ALIA/ASLA standards shows that more could be done to develop my leadership capabilities. ETL504 emphasised the importance of leading from the middle by working with staff as well as students, such as through collaboratively teaching, leading professional development, or running key committees (Green, 2011; Wong; 2012; Wolf et al., 2014; Baker, 2016; Crippen & Willows, 2019; Reinsel Soulen, 2020). High staff turnover makes developing relationships with my colleagues a challenge, but also presents a ‘chopportunity’ (Weisburg, 2020) to exhibit both transformational and servant leadership, hook in new staff, and build a culture of library collaboration and appreciation from the ground up.

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Lysaught, D. (2022b). 2021 Annual Library Report. https://www.canva.com/design/DAEwsCALUsI/vyQMXh9an6lLizamxaUW_Q/view?utm_content=DAEwsCALUsI&utm_campaign=designshare&utm_medium=link&utm_source=publishsharelink

Lysaught, D. (2023a). 2022 Annual Library Report. https://bit.ly/3Jg1e7k

Lysaught, D. (2023b, July 13). ETL512 assessment 5: Professional placement report. All You Read Is Love. https://thinkspace.csu.edu.au/allyoureadislove/2023/07/13/etl512-assessment-5-professional-placement-report/

Lysaught, D. (2023c, March 12). ETL504 2.2 leadership theory. All You Read Is Love. https://thinkspace.csu.edu.au/allyoureadislove/2023/03/12/etl504-2-2-leadership-theory/

Lysaught, D. (2023d, April 27). ETL504 strategic planning and setting goals: An amateur’s journey. All You Read Is Love. https://thinkspace.csu.edu.au/allyoureadislove/2023/04/27/etl504-strategic-planning-and-setting-goals-an-amateurs-journey/

Merga, M., & Mason, S. (2019). Building a school reading culture: Teacher librarians’ perceptions of enabling and constraining factors. Australian Journal of Education 63(2):173-189. DOI:10.1177/0004944119844544

Merga, M. (2021). Libraries as wellbeing supportive spaces in contemporary schools. Journal of Library Administration 61(6). DOI:10.1080/01930826.2021.1947056

Merga, M. (2022). School libraries supporting literacy and wellbeing. Facet.

Moir, S., Hattie, J. & Jansen, C.  (2014). Teacher perspectives of ‘effective’ leadership in schools. Australian Educational Leader, 36(4), 36-40.

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NSW Department of Education (2023). Information Fluency Framework. https://education.nsw.gov.au/teaching-and-learning/curriculum/school-libraries/teaching-and-learning

Oberg, D., & Schultz-Jones, B. (eds.). (2015). Collection management policies and procedures. In IFLA School Library Guidelines, (2nd ed.), (pp. 33-34). Den Haag, Netherlands: IFLA.

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Wu, Y., Mallan, K., & McGillis, R. (2013). Reimagining the world: Children’s literature’s responses to changing times. Springer.

ETL533 Assessment 4: Part D – Critical Reflection

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My understanding of digital literature has grown significantly over the last few months. From my early definitions to the creation of my own narrative, I’ve gained a solid understanding of what digital literature is, why it’s beneficial and how it can be implemented to support my school.

My preliminary definitions of digital literature focused on the distinction between the digital and the digitised (Lysaught, 2022, July 19; Lysaught, 2022, July 25). As my research progressed I consolidated these distinctions by combining Unsworth’s (2006, p.2-3) and Allan’s (2017, p.22-23) categories (Lysaught, 2022, August 7). Like my peers (Curtis, 2022, July 19), I believe digital literature should be quality and meet community needs, which led me to consider what makes quality digital literature (Lysaught, 2022, August 14) and to design my own evaluation criteria where I determined three key aspects: multimodality, interactivity, and connectivity (Lysaught, 2022, August 28). Self-evaluations and peer feedback reveals – despite the amateur multimodal features – mine’s an effective, quality text suitable for its intended purpose and audience:

Evaluation of The Shakespeare Chronicles

However, defining digital literature is arguably less important to teacher-librarians than understanding how to incorporate it effectively. Digital literature provides exciting opportunities to move students from passive consumers to active creators of content  (Morra, 2013, para.2; Kitson, 2017, p.66), and as new technologies and communication tools emerge, students require new literacies to ensure they’re critically consuming and ethically creating texts (Walker et al., 2010, p.214-216; Kearney, 2011, p.169; Leu, 2011, p.6-8; Mills & Levido, 2011, p.80-81, 89; Leu et al., 2015, p.139-140; Serafini et al., 2015, p.23; Combes, 2016, p.4). In 2009 students spent an average four hours a day online (Weigel, 2009, p.38); by 2015 US teens consumed between 6-9 hours of media a day (Common Sense Media, 2015, para.6), while Australian teens now spend an average of 14.4 hours a week online (eSafety Commissioner, 2021, p.4). Digital literature therefore harnesses our students’ preferences and familiarity with technological platforms (Figueiredo & Bidarra, 2015, p.323; Skaines, 2010, p.100-104; Stepanic, 2022, p.2; Weigel, 2009, P.38). Digital literature incorporating interactivity, multimodality, and connectivity can develop ‘nöogenic narratives’ wherein personal growth is achieved by viewing our lives as a story (Hall, 2012, p.97), a key element of the English syllabus (NSW Standards Authority, 2019, p.10). Research shows that educators can exploit digital narratives to create meaningful and authentic learning opportunities for students to create personal and academic growth (Bjørgen, 2010, p.171-172; Dockter et al., 2010, p.419; Hall, 2012, p.99; Reid, 2013, p.38-41; Smeda et al., 2014, p.19; Sukovic, 2014, p.222-226).

However, educators must carefully consider the purpose of integrating digital narratives into their programmes. While research reveals digital texts’ benefits supporting young, emerging, or struggling readers and developing transliteracy (Tackvic, 2012, p.428; Cahill & McGill-Franzen, 2013, p.32-33; Matthews, 2014, p.29; McGeehan et al., 2018, p.58), others raise issues regarding reading comprehension, retention, and attention (Cull, 2011, para.35-38; Goodwin, 2013, p.79; Jabr, 2013, p.5-30; McGuire, 2015, para.30-35). Technology should be used as a meaningful tool, not just as a gimmick. Monsen (2016) explored the idea that we are “quintessentially cyborgs” due to the symbiotic relationship between humanity and technology. My research into digital learning frameworks such as the SAMR model (Lysaught, 2022, August 6) revealed that effective implementation of technology should not replace, but co-exist with and supplement existing print literacies. Printed choose-your-own-adventure narratives arguably improve literacy (Chooseco & Hofmann, 2016, para. 8-9) and can be updated using digital features to form powerful digital texts (Farber, 2015, para.1-2). Thus, my own digital narrative was designed as an immersive, interactive, multimodal resource to develop students’ understanding of life in Shakespearean England while supplementing traditional print resources and online information sources.

Throughout ETL533 I have examined how I currently incorporate digital literature into our school and considered ways to increase this in future (Lysaught, 2022, July 31; Lysaught, 2022, August 7; Lysaught, 2022, August 13). As discussed with my peers (Macey, 2022, September 24; Barnett, 2022, September 27; Facey, 2022, September 29) difficulties arise surrounding cost-effectiveness, storage, access, and user preferences that often impede digital literature’s success in schools. Despite these challenges, after creating my own digital narrative I strongly believe that student-created digital texts can enhance their own learning and connections to content, and integrate well with Guided Inquiry units and literary learning (Lysaught, 2022, January 27; Lysaught, 2022, August 14; Lysaught, 2022, September 3; Lysaught, 2022, September 16). Peer feedback also supports this (Lysaught, 2022, September 3). Due to this unit I am more aware of my students’ discussions around digital literature (Lysaught, 2022, July 25; Lysaught, 2022, August 28), revealing these are powerful texts with which students are already engaging. Literature in digital environments allows teacher-librarians to show our value to our school community, as we can support time-poor staff as they include more captivating, rich resources and utilise digital narratives to support our students with various interests and literacy needs.

 

 

Word count: 806

Reference list: https://thinkspace.csu.edu.au/allyoureadislove/2022/10/04/etl533-assessment-4-reference-list/

ETL533 Assessment 4: Part A – Context For Digital Storytelling Project

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The Shakespeare Chronicles is a digital choose-your-own-adventure narrative created using Canva. Also known as a pick-a-path story or a gamebook, these narratives were popular during the 1980s due to their interactivity and appearance of choice for children who otherwise lacked agency (Hendrix, 2011, para.29; Jamison, 2022, para.4). Falling out of favour due to the rise of video games in the 90s (Jamison, 2022, para.46), these printed narratives can be updated for new audiences and technologies in our electronic age by incorporating the digital features which once superseded them (Stuart, 2011, para.1-2; Figueiredo & Bidarra, 2015, p.330).

The Shakespeare Chronicles was designed to support EHS’s Year 7 English Guided Inquiry Design unit ‘Shakespeare’s Bawdy Mouth’. It can also be used to support revision for Stage 5 and 6 English students studying a variety of Shakespeare’s plays. In this narrative, students follow the adventures of an actor in Shakespeare’s theatre company. They are presented with choices to guide the narrative and learn about life in Shakespeare’s time. Utilising interactivity, multimodality, and connectivity – key elements of quality digital literature (Lysaught, 2022, August 28) – it supports students as they explore the following questions:

  1. How different or similar are our experiences to peoples’ experiences in Shakespeare’s time?
  2. Why is Shakespeare considered a significant composer?
  3. How can understanding Shakespeare’s works and the experiences of people living during his lifetime help us understand ourselves and our world?

Due to its historical focus, stage-appropriate language features and dual function as a research pathfinder, this resource allows teachers to meet multiple English and History outcomes, while the inclusion of ICT and the cause-and-effect nature of this interactive narrative allows staff to link to a number of General Capabilities:

This digital narrative taps into what Figueiredo and Bidarra (2015, p.324) call the ‘ludic’ or game-based learning model and draws on students’ predilections towards digital, interactive media (Figueiredo & Bidarra, 2015, p.323; Skaines, 2010, p.100-104; Stepanic, 2022, p.2; Weigel, 2009, P.38). Introduced in the Immerse inquiry stage as a resource to assist student engagement and build background knowledge (Kuhlthau  et al., 2012, p.61-66, 70; Maniotes, 2017, p.8), its secondary purpose as a research pathfinder supports students as they move into the Explore, Identify and Gather stages of Guided Inquiry (Kuhlthau  et al., 2012, p.75-82, 93-98, 109-116; Maniotes, 2017, p.8-9).

Currently the summative assessment for this unit requires students to produce three diary entries from the perspective of someone living during Shakespeare’s time, to be viewed and marked by a teacher. The Shakespeare Chronicles provides a model for students to create their own digital narrative, supporting their digital literacy and social development in interesting and relevant ways with an authentic audience of peers to promote engagement (Dockter et al., 2010, p.419-420; Weigel, 2009, p.40). Multimodal aspects build understanding of life during Shakespeare’s time, supporting students’ use of visual and auditory imagery in their own writing and moving students from consumers to creators of content – a key element of digital literature (Morra, 2013, para.2; Kitson, 2017, p.66).

In designing this resource, I considered the questions posed by Reid (2013, p.41) to ensure my community’s learning needs were being met. EHS is a comprehensive, co-educational public school in South-West Sydney. Enrolments increased 10% in the 2016-2020 period, though decreased in 2021 (Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority [ACARA], 2021a). New housing developments changing our catchment demographics lowered our ICSEA score from 1017 in 2014 to 995 in 2021 (ACARA, 2021a). NAPLAN results are below average (ACARA, 2021b) while Sentral data shows increasing disengagement, with suspensions increasing 96.6% and expulsions 600% since 2014 (Sentral, 2021).

This digital narrative engages students visually and emotionally with the experiences of past people, supporting a variety of literacy needs and growing student independence (Foley, 2012, p.8; Cahill & McGill-Franzen, 2013, p.33, 35-36; Chooseco & Hoffman, 2016, para.8-9; Towndrow & Kogut, 2020, p.4, 14, 147-148). Access to 1:1 devices is limited to shared, bookable banks of often unreliable laptops or iPads, so the resource is accessible on a variety of devices (including student phones) via an easily shared Canva link and can be uploaded to subject learning platforms and the library website for future reference and to support social connection. While our students frequently engage with digital media, they often lack the skills to effectively navigate web content or critically evaluate online information; hyperlinked resources provide students with quality information to use in their own research. Teaching time is limited, as are student attention spans; a short narrative counteracts this peripatetic “grasshopper mind” (Weigel, 2009, p.38), though multiple pathways invite replay and continued enjoyment. Choice encourages interactivity and engagement (Hendrix, 2011, para.19, 29), aiming to overcome disengagement and encourage students to make personal connections with the content (Weigel, 2009, p.40; Bjørgen, 2010, p. 171; Hall, 2012, p.99; Lambert, 2012, p.37-38; Towndrow & Kogut, 2020, p.148).

 

 

Word count: 798

Reference list: https://thinkspace.csu.edu.au/allyoureadislove/2022/10/04/etl533-assessment-4-reference-list/

ETL505 4.2: Subject Heading Lists

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Perform some subject searches on the Library of Congress catalogue, by choosing ‘Browse’ and using the ‘SUBJECTS beginning with’ option.  Conduct a search for any term, such as ‘Cats’ or ‘Libraries’.  You will see a list of headings, with the subject terms on the left and the type of subject heading on the right.  Check those to identify which headings are Library of Congress subject headings.

Note how many headings are ‘strings’ of terms.  Can you interpret them correctly?  Click through various headings to the records that include them, and see if the resources are the kind that you were expecting.

Log into SCISData, choose the SCIS Catalogue, then search by ‘Subject’ repeating some of the searches you did in the Library of Congress catalogue.  Again you will be taken to lists of headings.  Those identified as SCIS subject headings are the ones you are looking for.  What similarities and differences to LCSH have you noticed?

I initially did a Library of Congress search for ‘dogs’, and as Lisa said, there were so many results to the point where it was almost overwhelming.

I then did a search for ‘Pompeii’, where I found the subject headings and strings to be more useful and not quite as overwhelming (perhaps because there’s not as many terms/resources?). I could see this being a useful search strategy to narrow down relevant resources:

When I clicked on the subject heading ‘Pompeii (Extinct city)–Civilization, it brought up the 13 resources relevant to this topic. I found it interesting that when I typed the terms ‘Pompeii civilisation’ directly into the search bar it took me straight to one resource rather than bringing up all the resources that were listed under the subject heading, while the search terms ‘Pompeii civilization’ showed 81 search results. Clearly it’s not a perfect system and the differences in language (e.g. US spelling vs. Australian spelling) create issues. However, I still think that it’s a useful tool for when we need to find information on a particular subject.

I clicked on Joanne Berry’s book “The Complete Pompeii” and saw that there were three different LC subjects assigned to it, which would also be useful for someone looking to find other related relevant resources.

When I conducted the same search on SCIS, there were fewer results but they seemed more relevant to a school search:

To further test the functionality of these subject headings, I then tried a search for the books based on the stories created by Critical Role. This created an extra layer of difficulty for the cataloguers, since these comics are a) based on a Dungeons and Dragons Twitch game, so not exactly traditional media; and b) created by a group of actors before being c) adapted into comic book form. When I searched the LC subject heading ‘Dungeons and Dragons (Game)–Fiction’ a number of titles came up, including one title relating to the Critical Role universe: ‘Kith and Kin’. However, none of the actors in the original Twitch game are listed as authors; considering most fans of this show would search for resources using the names of the original actors/creators, this might make it difficult for users to find this resource. In SCIS the same author issues arose; for one resource the actor who created the world and ran the original game the stories are based on (Matthew Mercer) is listed as a contributor, while for another he’s not listed at all, despite being the first name on the cover:

Plus, neither Dungeons and Dragons nor Critical Role are listed as subject headings!

I guess it just goes to show how complicated cataloguing is, and despite the best intentions of the people designing these systems, sometimes (perhaps due to lack of familiarity or new forms which defy traditional standards) they’ll create a catalogue record which is unlikely to be easily found by users who aren’t familiar with cataloguing standards. It’s another reason why it’s so important to have trained teacher librarians recognised as information specialists in schools!

ETL505 2.1: Tools of Library Organisation – Federated Search Systems

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Conduct a search on Primo or Trove to see the wide range of sources that are brought together by these federated search engines. What have you observed?

Inspired by our recent spate of bad weather, I decided to search for information about Camden’s history of flooding by using the phrase “Camden floods” to search Trove’s databases.

I found it interesting that Trove organises the results by categories. The Newspapers & Gazettes, Magazines & Newsletters, and Images, Maps & Artefacts sections would be very useful for people researching local or family history, but they could be potentially overwhelming for our students (especially those with literacy issues). Each category only shows three resources and while it is possible to click a button to view more results in that category, I can’t see many of my students doing this. Nonetheless, it presented me with some interesting resources which satisfied my curiosity and taught me something about my home town. Some of my favourites were an article dating from 1890, and historic photos from the 40s and 50s. I wouldn’t necessarily be able to find these resources searching via Google!

Because of the apparent usefulness of these resources to genealogists, I decided to type my last name in to see what would appear. The first result was an article from The Sun in 1926 about one of my ancestors’ weddings – a lovely surprise! I can see myself having a lot of fun with this wonderful resource! Clicking through on one article I could see that it had a scan of the original article, next to a transcription which had been indexed into the database. One thing I noticed is that spelling of the indexed resources will make a difference to the search results. Because my ancestors were illiterate Irish convicts there’s a lot of ways our last name can be spelled in the records, as you can see from this article about a rather exciting and tragic thunder storm in 1861:

No wonder our students can feel overwhelmed when they are researching and choose the convenient first options regardless of relevance and quality. I guess it goes to show how important it is for us to teach a variety of search strategies, such as how to use filters and boolean operators to narrow down a search.

ETL505 1.4: Who Organises Information?

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If teacher librarians don’t normally create metadata, such as catalogue records, why do you need to have an understanding of information resource description?

I found it interesting that the module noted that if the most noticeable feature about the catalogue is the number of users who bypass it, then something has gone wrong. It seems like hardly any of our users utilise the catalogue and instead either ask the front desk for resources or browse the shelves hoping for the best. While I’d like to attribute this to either laziness or a preference for personal interaction, clearly this is something I’ll have to rectify! It was good that the module reinforced that the one of the roles of the TL is to teach users how to effectively use the catalogue independently. It’s also an important skill for them to transfer this knowledge to other catalogues, such as public or university libraries.

As a NSW DoE school, we use SCIS as our supplier of catalogue records. I’m very fortunate to have a full-time library assistant who handles most of the cataloguing when we accession new resources but her position is not guaranteed and it’s important for me to know how the system works so that I can maintain our collection and ensure efficient access to our available resources.

I’ve noticed that while the records from SCIS certainly do save time, they aren’t necessarily describing or classifying our resources in a way which suits our students’ needs. For instance, many of our manga series are catalogued under their individual titles rather than the series title + number, which makes it difficult for people like me who are unfamiliar with the series to find whether we’ve got a requested book on our shelves. Series which have multiple authors also face this issue, as SCIS classifies them under each individual author instead of together which means that the books are scattered amongst our fiction shelves. The Australia’s Great War and the Twisted Tales series are the best examples I can think of with this issue. Last year I also undertook a stocktake and discovered a pile of never-borrowed verse novels which had been classified as non-fiction, the land that our students forgot. I’m in the process of reclassifying them as fiction texts, which will hopefully allow them to be found and used more regularly. If I have an understanding of information resource description I can hopefully combine this with knowledge of my users’ needs and preferences to create a more efficient collection.

 

ETL505 1.3: Functions of Metadata

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Determine some elements or attributes that might be useful for the purposes of discovering and retrieving a particular resource of interest to you, for example, the prescribed textbook for this subject. Review these elements in light of the FRBR user tasks – are they all useful for all of the user tasks, or for some tasks more than others?

As information specialists who facilitate efficient access to information, it is crucial that our catalogues are well organised and effectively described. Organising information can be a little bit like herding cats – no doubt that’s why it’s called a catalogue!

I found this list of metadata elements that I feel are a useful overview of the types of elements/attributes that can help libraries organise information effectively:


From my experience, depending on the information need and the user task, not all of these elements/attributes will be useful.

For instance, I think that finding the textbook for this subject was very straightforward. Because we have been given the links via the Resources tab I think that I skipped the first few user tasks. I went straight to Select since I needed to make a choice between the two links, and chose the Cambridge Core item because it was described as having unlimited user access. I then Obtained the item by clicking the link. It was very easy for me as a patron to fulfil my information need in this instance due to the effective organisation and description of the information resource. I did not need to Find, Identify, or Explore because this resource had been found for us by the course organisers who had identified its usefulness. Because these steps were eliminated from my search process, I did not need most of the elements listed in the above table. I only needed the bibliographic description to ensure that I had the correct item and the access rights description.

However, if I was searching for information for another purpose, such as if I was researching a new topic to teach at school, my needs would be different and so too would my process. As an example, I am teaching English Extension 2 this year and have a student whose Major Work involves elements of historical fiction. Looking through the JSTOR databse, together we Found relevant resources by searching specific criteria, then Identified the key ideas and Selected which ones might be more suitable for her needs before Obtaining them via pdf download. Because this search was more vague, more elements/attributes were called upon to make decisions about whether a resource contained relevant information. In this instance we drew upon not only the bibliographic descriptions, but also subject descriptions and item specific attributes to understand whether the resource was relevant or not.

It is therefore important for teacher librarians to understand the information needs of their users and which of the FRBR user tasks they are requiring to ensure that our resources are described using effective elements/attributes. If our resources are not described effectively, we risk our patrons becoming overwhelmed and missing important, relevant resources. Ain’t nobody got time for that.

ETL505 1.1: The Need For Information Resource Description

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Why is it necessary for information agencies such as school libraries to organise information?

One of the key functions of the school library as an information agency is to ensure that our patrons can easily and efficiently access what they need, when they need it. We therefore need to organise our information effectively to:

  • avoid patron ‘infowhelm’
  • provide the right book to the right reader at the right time
  • reduce time wasted spent looking for resources
  • reduce dissatisfaction with library staff, services, and resources
  • support time-poor teachers
  • support reluctant students who might be turned off by inefficient organisation or difficulty locating resources
  • ensure equitable access to information i.e. give all users the skills and confidence to fulfil their information needs
  • ensure effective use of materials and justify costs
  • maintain our professionalism and advocate for our value to the learning community
  • keep up with a changing information landscape and ensure continued relevance

ETL401 2.5 The Teacher Librarian in the Information Landscape

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Why it is important to have an understanding of the broader information landscape?

How you think the information landscape will affect your role as a TL in a school?

This week I fell down the rabbit hole. What started as a seemingly simple search for “most active social media platforms 2021” quickly spiralled into a flurry of pages on algorithms, business models, data use and abuse. Many of these things I’d heard about in passing but had never really had the time to delve into on a more meaningful level.

Technology has obviously had an immense impact on the information landscape. Some of this has been positive – for instance in bringing together marginalised individuals, or making information more accessible to people with disabilities. Yet there are a number of downsides to the digital information landscape that we cannot ignore. Therefore it is crucial that teacher librarians have not just an understanding of the broader information landscape, but that we have a deep knowledge and maintain currency about these evolving issues. If we do not, we cannot effectively fulfil our roles as information specialists. It also struck me with the reading from the modules and my own research this week that people will not be able to enjoy their rights of access to information if they lack the skills to navigate and evaluate these information platforms.

I found it interesting to consider our rights and responsibilities regarding information access. I think that a lot of people focus on their rights (for example, their right to an opinion) but often forget that there are associated responsibilities around our interaction with the information landscape. We have the right to freedom of opinion and expression, and the right to seek, receive and impart information. We have the right to privacy, as well as the right to access the infrastructure which will allow us access to information (though as I discussed in my previous post, this is not always guaranteed!). In this context libraries of all kinds play a crucial role in ensuring that peoples’ rights to access information are being upheld. However, it was interesting for me to consider that these rights could be restricted by law when necessary, if they were deemed to contravene the rights of others, or if they negatively impacted national security or order, or public health or morals. We live in a world which blurs the lines between facts and opinions, and the idea of who gets to determine if something is ‘necessary’ or harming ‘public morals’ was also interesting for me to consider. It is important to remember these responsibilities, especially in times of global pandemic such as ours. Yet the subjective element here leaves it open to potential abuse and censorship, and the fact that our national commitment to these rights and responsibilities is more of an implicit understanding than something enshrined in law is problematic. For instance, what if a family complains that Harry Potter is on the shelves, or content that they see as promoting Black Lives Matter or LGBTQI+ agendas? Or conversely, that there isn’t enough diverse content? The paradox of tolerance is something to consider here, and the response a teacher librarian would get in one school context might differ in another. 

Our right of access to information is further complicated by issues of technological redundancy and convergence. In particular I couldn’t help but think about my own school context and the fact that all too often outdated or damaged technology was not updated, repaired or replaced due to budget constraints. Are funding arrangements, budget allocations and BYOD policies creating what Floridi called “digital favelas” in some schools? I also couldn’t help but consider my own failings with certain technological tools. I normally consider myself pretty tech-savvy, but for the life of me I cannot figure out the 3D printer I inherited when I became the teacher librarian. We’ve recently had a new deputy push for Macs to be integrated into our programs. Heaven help me!

Finally, my research and the module readings this week prompted me to consider the ways that our students are accessing information as digital natives. Modern students are primarily engaging with information (whether for their own entertainment or not) in virtual spaces. In Purcell is correct in her assertion that promotion of our services and resources is vital to our role as teacher librarians, then should we adapt to the online world and utilise social media marketing strategies that will reach and engage them with our content more effectively? Our school community engages heavily with Facebook and we’ve recently created an Instagram page to encourage greater student engagement. However, what are our ethical responsibilities when it comes to using and encouraging the use of these platforms? Are we leaving people in our school community vulnerable to data miners who could potentially sell their information and content to advertisers, politicians or government agencies? Are we pushing them to use platforms which could expose them to algorithms and content which could potentially cause harm? Are we encouraging them to become “unpaid machine trainers” whose data could be used to teach the very machines that might replace them in the workforce? On the surface it appears that having a library Instagram account is a fun way to get students interested, but in reality it is a potential ethical minefield. As teacher librarians we must be mindful of our interactions with these platforms and their function in the information landscape, and as information specialists encourage our school community likewise to maintain awareness of their behaviours.

ETL401 2.3 The Information Landscape

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Are your ideas developing about the information society?

What do you think this term means?

Why is it important for the TL to have an understanding of the information landscape?

For me it was interesting to consider the concept of the Information Society as one which contrasts to earlier agrarian or industrial societies. These earlier ‘revolutions’ had a drastic impact on the lives of people at the time, and I absolutely agree that for many of us changing and emerging IT is impacting our lives too. The fact that I can engage in this degree completely in the “virtual world” while at the same time teaching online would have been incomprehensible even as recently as my years in High School during the early 2000s. Add to the mix the fact that I am getting notifications on my smart watch about my online banking and I’m able to ask Google Home questions about my calendar, the weather, or what an “information society” is. That reminds me, I’ve got to add milk to my online Woolies order … We are well and truly on our way to becoming Floridi’s “inforgs”, if we’re not there already.

I would love to see what someone like Karl Marx would make of our relationship to the current means of production though. Perhaps it’s time for us to write another manifesto dealing with what Floridi called “the tragedy of the digital commons”? “A spectre is haunting the world – the spectre of information technologies!”

The concept of digital poverty absolutely stood out to me as a result of this module and its associated readings. The idea that some people have access to technology and its associated infrastructures and some don’t has really hit home for me during online learning. I teach at a school in the South West of Sydney and we have a very diverse student population, including some students who come from families who are quite affluent and others who are in social housing. We therefore have a number of families that we have had to provide laptops, wi-fi dongles etc. to in order to support their learning online. However, technological infrastructure also plays a part in the concept of the “information-rich” and the “information-poor.” Some of our more wealthy families live in areas that are black-holes for internet reception, which has severely impeded several of our students (especially in Year 12!) from accessing the same information and learning opportunities as their peers. Digital poverty in an information society therefore doesn’t necessarily always follow the same lines traditionally reserved for economic considerations of the term (don’t even get me started on “alliterate” individuals, or individuals who for whatever reasons choose not to engage with authenticated, reliable sources of information. That is a separate rant).

I think that it is absolutely crucial for teacher librarians to not just have an understanding of the information landscape, but to maintain currency in ways of ethically and effectively navigating this complex and ever-changing world. Purcell argued that our role as “information specialist” was one of five key elements to the teacher librarian’s function within a school community. Even though she separated it into its own category (and placed it third in her list) I would argue that our role as information specialists is inherent to our other roles as leaders, instructional partners, teachers and program administrators. If we don’t maintain a deep understanding of the changing infosphere, how can we lead others in designing and implementing curriculum that is relevant to the needs of our students? How can we effectively ensure that our students leave our care as engaged, critical thinkers who will be not only effective workers in this changing world, but also digital citizens that can help mitigate some of the issues caused by unethical tech company policies (Amazon, Facebook: I’m looking at you) and lagging Government action? Our role is also to provide equitable access to quality information to overcome the potential effects of digital poverty.