I was born in 1974 in North Carolina USA. I studied Psychology and English Literature before I met my (now) husband and subsequently immigrated to Australia in 1997. I became a teacher in 2007 and an Australian citizen in 2018. We are both Primary school teachers (my husband is a principal) and we have two boys and a Beagle here in Merimbula. I am in my second year of studying my Masters of Education in Teacher Librarianship.
My two top thoughts following these modules is that there are a lot of issues that could arise from hoarding, weeding and censorship and thus clear policies and procedures are imperative.
As it is very likely that, should I be fortunate enough to get employed as a TL, I will have to write a collection development policy, I am worried I might struggle with it. I will certainly be the first to put up my hand and ask my colleagues and library network for assistance!
What I know about myself is that I struggle looking at an example of someone else’s work as a means to produce my own. I struggled to look at colleague’s work when preparing my accreditation, I struggle modifying other people’s teaching and learning units of work to suit my class or context…and critical analysis of the St Bede’s CDP, a school context in which I have very little understanding, has been very challenging. So it is unlikely that I will take much stock in using a different school’s CDP as a guide…
Alternatively, I prefer to look at professional industry recommended templates, which I’ve found more helpful personally.
As to the future of school libraries and trained school librarians, being an information literacy specialist, curriculum expert and keen marketing amateur is going to play a big part in our success. I am hopeful that I can make a difference.
Hold your horses cowboy! I’ve just been triggered!
Let’s begin with learning to read and reading to learn. The (ETL401) 5th module jumps straight to reading to learn and doesn’t really mention learning to read, but it is my belief that the two are intrinsically combined and that the education system currently fails students in separating the two (Robb 2011).
Learning to read: This separation of ‘learning to read’ (for some purposes, abbreviated to ‘decoding’-although it is sometimes not referred to as this, the focus has shifted to phonics and decoding) and ‘reading to learn’ (for some purposes, abbreviated to ‘critical thought'(CILIP 2016)) has been directly witnessed and practised by me and my colleagues for at least 5 years (I started in 2014), as part of the Early Action for Success (EAfS) funding program.
This program, in phase 1, poured money into (and continues to do so to some degree) several things like ‘Instructional Leader’ Deputy Principal level positions and ‘mentoring’ time off class, and a large portion of the money has gone towards training teachers in Targeted Early Numeracy (TEN) the ‘Language Learning & Literacy in the Early Years‘ (L3) narrow pedagogies for teaching kindergarten to year 2 students foundational literacy and numeracy skills.
[Sidebar 1: Originally, the TEN program was, in my opinion, almost completely a spin off of the Count Me in Too(CMIT) program (in which I am trained) and Developing Efficient Numeracy Strategies (DENS), using the Schedule for Early Numeracy Assessment (SENA) 1 or 2. Once trained in TEN, teachers, including myself, utilised CMIT, DENS and SENA to effectively teach the TEN math group games and lessons. Similarly, the L3 program is a spin off of Reading Recovery, linked to Best Start and focussed on kindergarten children (Howell & Neilson 2015).
Later, L3 teacher training was revised to suite ‘stage 1’ or year 1 & 2 students (which is where I joined the training). Currently, the EAfS program is in ‘Phase 2’ and has embraced micro-level data collection and the new National Learning Progressions …I am being critical here about L3 but not without foundation (Howell & Neilson 2015 p.8).
And don’t even get me started on the fact that the (now defunct) NSW Literacy Continuum provided for EAfS schools meant that we didn’t even crack open the NSW English Syllabusall year-much less the National Curriculum–we simply taught to and reported on the NSW Literacy and Numeracy continuums! Roar! Outrage! Sirens! Remind anyone of the teaching to the test arguments against NAPLAN? Well hello new Learning Progressions, which have replaced the previous continuums…but I digress…]
What all of this means to me at the moment, in terms of teachingInformation Literacy / ‘Reading to learn’, is that, in my current context, half of any given school is focussed on ‘Learning to read’/decoding using L3 guided reading groups, using decodable/phonics/guided readers, teaching students ‘how to read’/decoding without any thought into teaching students ‘reading to learn’/critical thought.
In fact, until a student reaches a particular level of knowing ‘how to read’ (measured in our schools as reading a PM Reader level of 15, based on a 95% success benchmark or ‘running record’ of their reading of a PM Reader that they’ve read at least once before) they may then begin learning skills of ‘reading to learn’/critical thought. For some students, particularly in schools in low Socio Economic Status areas (who, coincidentally, have low NAPLAN results that qualify them for EAfS funding) they don’t reach the PM Reader level of 15 until they are 8 or 9 years old (year 3 or 4) and thus, by that point, reading (so purely focussed on ‘how’ rather ‘why’) has lost all value.
Teach Information Literacy From the Start: What I propose is to teach students, regardless of their age or decoding ability to think critically about texts, using quality texts. It is very difficult to think critically about a (commonly fiction) text that is lacking depth like the little decoding readers that are all the rage at the moment (Adoniou, Cambourne & Ewing 2018). And there isan aspect of L3 that I thought did this particularly well, called ‘Initial, Modelled and Shared readings (IMS),’ However, I was the only teacher at one school who was making time for it amongst the time-heavy requirements of ‘guided reading groups’/how to read lessons. Let’s let that sink in for a moment: nobody had time for information literacy because teaching students how to decode boring levelled readers was taking up all of their time.
Information Literacy is teaching how to think critically and this is a key part of comprehension and reading for enjoyment. In L3 IMS for stage 1 students (the kindergarten version do something similar but not to the same degree and they call it ‘Reading to’ or similar), is not exclusively the rights of L3 (see this link for further reading) and so I will go into how to run the IMS lessons and how they relate to Information Literacy and a year one (age 6-7) classroom:
Quality texts: First, the teacher first picks a quality book like The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr Morris Lessmore (2012) by W.E. Joyce. (This was also adapted as an award winning short film (Joyce 2011)- which I just watched for the 20th time and was reduced to tears AGAIN, because I just realised the importance of Information literacy and Teacher Librarians! If you watch it, try to think of the grey people are ‘learning to read’ and the colourful ones are ‘reading to learn’).
In the world of the story: The teacher reads the book and nobody (including the teacher is allowed to comment).
Quality Talk Question Prompts: The teacher critically analyses the book and creates a list of possible ‘critical thought’ questions that will be expected from the students in the third reading of the book and has those ready as a reference for the second reading of the text to the students. (For an example of this, see one of my teacher prompt sheets.)
Modelled reading(s):The teacher reads the book aloud again, possibly even a third time to the students (who are not allowed to comment) but this time the teacher can either explain the meta-language or ‘difficult’ words in the text and then model thinking critically about the book with thoughts based on the prepared list of questions (without actually saying those questions out loud).
Shared reading: The teacher reads the book a final time and then releases the students to comment freely about the text in a round table / dinner scenario. For younger students, I use a behaviour management / talking technique of a smiley ball that gets passed to those who want to speak and if you have a turn speaking you put a popsicle stick in front of you. If you don’t have a turn speaking about the text, I can see clearly and offer prompts based on my prepared question sheet to help reluctant students.
Writing: I like to link this to writing lessons, sometimes filming the students
My AL Sentence Board for the Fantastic Flying Books of Mr Morris Lessmore
and typing their discussions (or using my Accelerated Literacy sentence board to work on writing conventions), so that they can use what they said about the text in their writing but this is just something that I do and not really related to IMS reading/L3.
So what this all means for me in practice as a TL,is that I need to continue to read to my students and continue to utilise information literacy / critical thought strategies (CILIP 2016) that are proven to improve literacy outcomes for students (regardless of their reading ‘levels’), including aspects of L3 and aspects of Accelerated Literacy because student access to quality (fiction and non-fiction) texts and the ability to practice Information Literacy skills is a key component to learning how to read AND reading to learn.
Next post: Information Literacy for reading to learn and inquiry teaching models…I promise…
References
Adoniou, M, Cambourne, B. & Ewing R. (2018). What are decodable readers and do they work? Retrieved from: https://theconversation.com/what-are-decodable-readers-and-do-they-work-106067
Howell & Neilson (2015). A critique of the L3 early years literacy program. Learning Difficulties Australia, Volume 47(2). pp.7-pp.12. Retrieved from https://www.ldaustralia.org/client/documents/Bulletin%20Winter%202015.pdf
Joyce, W. E. (2012). The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr Morris Lessmore. London: Simon & Schuster.
Joyce, W. E. [Screen name] (2011, January 30). The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr Morris Lessmore. [Video File]. Retrieved from: https://youtu.be/Ad3CMri3hOs
The New Paradigm: Let’s do both inquiry based learning and outcomes
In the previous post, I discussed collaboration and the steps that I think might be needed to get to a point where I can collaborate with the majority of teachers.
I’ve looked at the research and looked at the *information literacy inquiry models (particularly those more suited to primary and infants classes, such as Big6 and Super3) and okay, I’m in. Where do I sign?
*References in support of Inquiry based teaching and learning:
Bonanno, K. (2015). F-10 Inquiry skills scope and sequence and F-10 core skills and tools. Eduwebinar Pty Ltd, Zillmere, Queensland. Retrieved from: https://s2.amazonaws.com/scope-sequence/Bonanno-curriculum_mapping_v1.pdf
Kuhlthau, C., Maniotes, L. & Caspari, A. (2015) GI: Learning in the 21st century, 2nd edition. Santa Barbara, California: Libraries Unlimited.
Global Education Leadership Programme (GELP, 2011). We wanted to talk about 21st Century education. Retrieved from:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nA1Aqp0sPQo
(Reflection ETL401 Module 4 – The Teacher Librarian and the Curriculum)
(RSA Animate 2008) This is a very powerful video that offers a dichotomous view of an ‘education paradigm’.
Throwing the baby out with the bath water: While I agree that there has been (or in some cases, needs to be) a shift in the Australian education system, I am hesitant to throw out the baby with the bath water and dispose of outcomes. I have had great success with my students by utilising the NSW syllabus document outcomes and indicators. These have been regularly updated and rearranged over the years and each update, in my opinion, has improved the approach.
Similarly, so have approaches such as ‘play based learning’ or the ‘Reggio Emilia Approach’ / the environment as the ‘third teacher’ (Wein 2015), integrated units such as COGS and inquiry based learning (IBL) such as The Big6 or the Super3 / project based learning (PBL) models evolved over time and have been accepted and used by teachers to varying degrees and with varying degrees of success.
A Breath of Fresh Air: Anyone in the education system for more than 5 years will have seen enough new ideas blow in to the educational sphere to know that they generally blow straight back out to make room for the next big breeze, and leave very little in their wake in terms of real change.
I don’t think this ‘New Paradigm’ is a situation of ‘outcomes based learning’ vs ‘inquiry based learning.’ I don’t think the two need to be pitted against each other in an argument reminiscent of the recent arguments about how to teach literacy as seen in media and other outlets, for example as per this 2017 blog post by Eleanor Heaton about phonics versus the whole language approach.
I see no reason why we can’t have both and simply be more flexible in the application of outcomes to meet real individual student needs.
The real issues with outcome based teaching are based in 1. a lack of authentic growth mindset (Dweck 2006) in adults and students – an inability to see mistakes as part of learning, 2. the social debate regarding reporting to parents and telling the students themselves or their parents that their child has or has not met stage outcomes based on a ‘letter’ mark or tick in a box. Far better, according to Hattie & Peddie (2003), for the system to simply say, ‘this is what sorts of things you/your child can do well, these are things that they are still learning or here are the learning goals for the future.’ It isn’t the outcomes at fault, it is how we’ve applied them to our practice as educators.
[Sidebar 1: To this end, I am extremely interested in the Quality Teaching Framework to improve the structure of lesson delivery (if this is done through inquiry based teaching then so be it) and reading more about ability/interest/friendship grouping of students as opposed to age/year/stage grouping of students.]
[Sidebar 2: If you think Outcome based teaching is holding students back, don’t even get me started on the ‘Learning Progressions,’ ‘NAPLAN’ and the ‘Our Schools’ Website / league tables which have resulted in ‘teaching to the test’ and ‘school shopping.’ Gah.]
[Sidebar 3: If outcome models are so flawed and inquiry models are so perfect, why aren’t universities scrapping outcome based marking criteria and using inquiry models?]
Making assumptions about students: How students find information and their level of ability, particularly when it comes to electronic resources varies widely – much more so than adults realise and according to Coombes, “The basic premise of the Net Generation theory, that familiarity with technology equates with efficient and effective use and these achievements are only applicable to a specific group because they have grown up with technology, is flawed” (Coombes 2009, pp.32).
Technology is a tool, rather than a solution (Coombes 2009). Society has a new ‘digital age’ environment in which we live and we are expecting students to learn how to navigate it simply by being born amongst it. We have a new set of digital expectations in our society but have neglected to update our education system of our students to enable them to meet those expectations.
Information Search Process (ISP) skills / information literacy: Being able to recognise functions of a digital device does not automatically mean that students are able to access, process and absorb information on that they come across on said device (Coombes 2009). Students are overly reliant on the internet, have limited ability to search effectively, and are rarely able to critically evaluate information that they find (Coombes 2009).
The Role of Teacher Librarians (et al.): Educators have responsibility to lift their game when it comes to teaching students information literacy / searching skills such as collecting, managing and evaluating information (particularly when they believe the first thing that appears in their search is the most relevant or most accurate when in fact the first thing that comes up is based on their prior searches and the search engine’s popularity algorithms), finding the information again at a later date, and storing information for future use (Combes, 2007b in Coombes 2009).
Evidence and Assessment within the library: I like the list of ideas in ETL401 Module 3 (based on Valenza 2015) for evidence that the library program is of benefit to the school teaching and learning programs and curriculum. However, I am wary of introducing something that is trivial or that will not stand the test of time or that might sit in a filing cabinet – lost and forgotten.
For that reason, I will use the Quality Teaching Framework and the subsequent evaluation sheet (that I modified on GoogleDocs) to evaluate my lessons or units of work professionally, and will also use the (yet to be created) school library website or more private/access restricted photo/video-based programs (where accepted by the school) for evidence of student engagement or achievement such as ClassDojo, Seesaw or ClassCraft. The benefit of these applications is that they are also able to be used by students themselves, with any device (at home or at school).
I’m looking at you, teachers who profess to be techno-phobes! As Coombes’ 2009 work was written 10 years ago, and research within her article is based on the 10 to ‘teen’ age range, most of the students in her focus are now adults and quite possibly, teachers themselves. Those who are from current and previous generations, as educators, need to be aware of our own gaps in information literacy so that we can stop the cycle of poor information seeking skills!
The Blame Game: What I’ve also seen in education, in varying degrees based on context, is a lack of personal and professional reflection. A lack of ‘mindfulness’ and being in the moment. A wish for the utopian environment and an unrealistic desire for perfect students who fit into a mould and live up to unrealistic expectations and students who are compliant rather than collaborative (Goss & Sonnemann 2017).
This results in a filtering down of ‘blame’ for the poor foundational (primarily literacy and numeracy) skills that students have when they arrive into high school. The high school teachers blame the stage 3 teachers. The stage 3 teachers blame the stage 2 teachers. The stage 2 teachers blame the stage 1 teachers. The stage 1 teachers blame the kindergarten/prep teachers. The kindy/prep teachers blame the preschools. (And everybody blames the RFF teachers and the parents and finally, the students themselves).
What I’d like to see is every person involved in education taking a look in the mirror and reflecting daily on their pedagogical practice. What I’d like to see is everyone practising mindfulness–thoughtfully doing what they can with the students and contexts that they have in the moment in time in which they are living, and authentic growth mindset–appreciating that mistakes are part of learning.
[Reflection of ETL401 & ETL503 (The TL Role in Collaboration)] (*addendum 16 September 2019 for ETL504)
I think I’ve been pretty clear in my stance on the impact of temporary and casual work environments to the collaborative climate. If not, then I suppose I should mention here how much it wears away at collaboration to have individuals fighting for the renewals of their contracts: completely and utterly.
The casualisation of the teaching workforce, particularly in my personal working context, is not something I am able to change as an individual. Helping create a collaborative climate (despite the political climate) however, I can try to change.
Before we jump head first into collaborating with classroom teachers on an inquiry unit of work, let’s take a step back. I mean, yes we want to design and implement inquiry learning and literature programs and we certainly want to help embed digital formats. But we need to confront the elephant in the room in stead of simply shrugging our shoulders and saying ‘some teachers just don’t want to collaborate.’
I would argue that some teachers haven’t had positive collaborative experiences in the past (experiencing – much like a lot of students must experience – forced compliancerather than collaboration) or some teachers expect judgement in disguise rather than collaboration.
We ran into this in a school where we were trying to roll out Quality Teaching Rounds (QTR). We surveyed the staff to identify their concerns and these were the results:
Q. Why do we have to? (Comfort Zones: Not comfortable being watched / observed / critiqued; Doubt ‘teamwork’ capabilities; Criteria for involvement unclear; Feel pressured to do it).
A. (summarised) Be the change you wish to see in the world. Also, the NSW DET require a colleague observe you once a year so it might as well have a clear structure and limits and offer real improvement to your teaching.
Q. What’s the benefit? (Is there follow up; What do ‘we’ get out of it; Evidence of benefits; How does it improve the school; How valuable is it versus mentoring which we do already).
A. (shown QTR training slides proving benefits based on research)
Q. How could we possibly do it? (Logistics / Resources: What types of lessons have to be observed, eg 1:1, whole class, small group; Time off class; Casuals; Time required for prep work outside school hours).
A. (Thankfully, the principal had budgeted for the resources and did not have a set idea of what sort of lessons were required for observation).
The QTR team did our best with the resources and research provided by the QT Framework training to answer these concerns in a specially allocated staff meeting. We then surveyed the staff to determine their level of interest, which was about 70% in favour, and a few other teachers joined the second ‘Quality Teaching Round.’
Furthermore, in this process and in the readings for ETL401 Module 4, it occurred to me that an aspect of (primary) teaching that impacts collaboration is an ingrained and embedded culture of isolation. A teacher, predominantly alone in a room of students (or a Teacher Librarian on their own in the library) cannot effectively collaborate with other teachers as well as someone working in an office filled with cubicles or a group of engineers on a building site.
Another aspect of collaboration are the social norms of either Australian culture, or the culture of a town or city, or the culture of a school context. An immigrant and possible ASD person myself, I struggle with social norms on a daily basis.
I am also struck by the massive gap in the expectations of our TL role as collaborators, where we are expected to just jump in there and collaborate with teaching and learning programs with people who don’t know anything about us and of whom we also know very little…it is a bit ‘chicken before the egg’!
The OECD-UNICEF (2016) Education Working paper’s ‘dimensions of learning’ for organisation transformation touches on this (developing and sharing a student centred vision, having a culture of support for staff learning opportunities, promoting team collaborative professional development and embedding systems that support it, establishing daily expectations or ‘culture’ of inquiry, innovation and exploration–including staff in leadership roles, and learning with and from larger learning systems outside of the school context or direct governing body).
Logistically though, what does this look like? I love the idea of the ATSI community’s ‘yarning circle’. But how do I help create a ‘yarning circle’ or gathering spot where we can get to know each other and our contexts and socialise professionally? How do I help draw people out of their shells and into the safe environment of a collaborative climate?
Creating a Collaborative Climate (The triple C’s):
I can’t do it alone. There are things the executive must do to help improve the collaborative climate and things that they will need from me as well. However, once I’ve developed a rapport with the principal by helping them achieve their ideas, I will liaise with the principal to allow for time and budget amounts to be determined and allocated to enable some or all of the following of MY (8) ideas for creating a collaborative environment each year as follows:
In an allocated staff meeting or staff development day, we sit in a ‘yarning circle’ and discuss ourselves, our school and any concerns openly and freely, using the ideas from this link as a guide: ATSI community’s ‘yarning circle’.
Everyone completes the School Context Survey (draft version also in links on the right side of this blog) either collaboratively or on their own in time provided.
Everyone takes the VIA Character Survey and shares their top 5 / 10 character traits for the year (they can change slightly each year).
A photo of the teacher is either created or supplied with their permission (see #7 below for format ideas) using the Photo Permission Form Template created by the American Library Association (or similar).
The results of the school context, VIA, and philosophy surveys can then be sent electronically to the TL to be added to a electronic photo of the teacher(s) (with their permission), &/or collated and presented on an intranet or school website (which, unfortunately I do not have at present as I am not attached to a particular school).
I even have ideas (I have a marketing background, don’t forget!) on what the end result would look like and have pinned these ideas onto my Teacher Spotlight Pinterest board. (This board could also, theoretically, be made available for all of the school staff to edit).
And finally, (and this is where it gets a bit heavy), introduce Quality Teaching Rounds (in which I am an advocate and trained to deliver) to the school at least once a year if not twice, depending on budget and time allowances.
From here, collaborating on programming and teaching collaborative inquiry units are a walk in the park.
*16 September 2019 ETL504 addendum: See the template link on the left of the blog for initiating a collaborative inquiry unit with a classroom teacher Created by Christy Roe, based on suggestions from Carr, J. (Ed.), (2008) p.13-14; 28; 39; and Bishop, (2011) p.7.
WHEW! Its a big task. I hope I’m up to the challenge!
Carr, J. (Ed.). (2008). Leadership for excellence: Insights of the national school library media program of the year award winners. Retrieved from iG Library.
OECD-UNICEF. (2016). What makes a school a learning organisation? A guide for policy makers, school leaders and teachers. Retrieved from https://www.oecd.org/education/school/school-learning-organisation.pdf
Thoughts that occurred to me while reading about Copyright laws, the SmartCopying assistance website and Creative Commons:
The NSW Department of Education (DET) are said to ‘own’ the ‘intellectual property rights’ to my yearly teaching and learning program documents, which I have created either: at home or at school or at a training facility and either: off my own back or because of training the DET have provided for me. We must also attribute or reference items that we get from our schools (or the DET) or items ‘created as part of your duties’ because this applies to the Crown Copyright laws. But does this mean that the ‘crown’ own the material and that we must therefore leave a copy of our programs at the schools in which we’re employed (by the crown)? In my LGA, schools have interpreted these laws to mean that they must collect a printed version of my yearly teaching and learning program and store it on sight, because – in the view of the executives of the LGA schools – the DET ‘own’ the rights to the contents of my program. Do they really? Did I sign something giving over my copyright protection when I joined the DET as an employee? Are the executives in my LGA misinterpreting the DET’s policy on Copyright and infringing on my rights as the author of the program? Where then does this impact on me when I do my program completely electronically on the cloud, e.g. do the executives have the right to force me to print it or share it permanently with them electronically, so that they can store a copy indefinitely? Doesn’t this bring into issue the rule that copies of resources in my program cannot be stored indefinitely? This is, on the whole, a problematic policy…to which, I simply reply: “no. “
While copyright infringement is obviously hard to police in the classroom, it can be easily monitored by online applications that search things like library catalogues for ‘pirated’ material. So, it might not be a good idea for schools to hoard digital/cloud collections of teacher’s work or programs, which might have been pirated?
Programming is also becoming very collaborative. Some teams of teachers even share their program freely to the public on the Internet or on social networking platforms such as the string of FaceBook groups: ‘On Butterfly Wings English’ / Mathematics / Science / Creative Arts / etc. I understand that the work must be co-referenced if it was created collaboratively. However, if work is shared to the greater teaching community for use educationally, how is this to be referenced or does it have to be referenced according to Copyright law? Is it even legal to share it so broadly given that the employer presumably ‘owns’ the rights to the work?
Teachers are not meant to be profiting from the work that they’ve created while employed with the DET. This is meant to stop teachers from ‘selling’ their programs or resources that they’ve either created or obtained for profit, as they ‘belong’ to the DET. Is this because of the Statutory Text and Artistic Licence Permit that the DET holds as teachers selling possibly copyrighted materials would null the DET’s yearly permit?
Regarding the music that schools in my LGA generally upload from iTunes or YouTube for end of year concerts…these events are open to the public and as a performance of the music to the public, should we make sure we have Copyright permission – or is this covered by the Statutory Licenses? When I checked the DET website, I am still unclear if the yearly licences for playing films, TV or radio for non-educational purposes are paid for by the DET or the schools themselves.
Is the Australian Copyright law’s lack of a requirement to register copyright and lack of requirement to list the copyright on a piece of work, the reason why copyright infringement is rife in Australian society? Would it be more rife if the laws were more strict? Who has more copyright infringement, the USA or Australia? How would we ever be able to research this and really know when it is usually an underground / blackmarket issue?
Is lack of transparency or knowledge regarding the special licenses granted to schools enabling schools to teach students (inadvertently) that they, by default, don’t have to worry about Copyright?
If all websites need to be accessible by people who have disabilities, (Flynn 2016) shouldn’t alternate modes of communication be mandatory based on the needs of the people in every school context? What about ‘bridging the gap’ for ATSI communities? How effective is a school with an entirely digital form of communication, when the majority of the community are illiterate or too poverty stricken to afford access to a computer or internet facilities? I am keen for Australia to take the lead in website accessibility as a social justice issue rather than waiting for Americans to pull their fingers out and make a change. An American by birth myself, I am horrified that their greatest solution to the injustice is to teach their students with disabilities to be advocates for change for themselves. While I appreciate that students should be taught to self-advocate, this is a bit of a ‘flick pass’ on behalf of educators who should beadvocates for their students as well (IFLA 2012).
This is a great PowerPoint for schools to use to help educate students (and teachers) on the use of Creative Commons: Creative Commons in the the classroom.
Some important links that all TL need to keep bookmarked from SmartCopying.com (National Copyright Unit n.d.):
Coates, J. (2013). Creative Commons in the the classroom. [slideshare]. Retrieved from http://www.slideshare.net/Jessicacoates/creative-commons-in-the-classroom-2013
International Federation of Library Associations. (2012). IFLA code of ethics for librarians and other information workers. Retrieved from http://www.ifla.org/files/assets/faife/publications/IFLA%20Code%20of%20Ethics%20-%20Long_0.pdf
(Reflection on ETL503 Module 3.1 Funding the Collection):
“Should teacher librarians have the responsibility of submitting a budget proposal to fund the library collection to the school’s senior management and/or the school community? Or should such proposals come from a wider group such as a school library committee?
Is it preferable that the funding for the school library collection be distributed to teachers and departments so they have the power to determine what will be added to the library collection?” (Giovenco 2019).
Well, here we go again. I thought when I got out of marketing (where I was given a budget amount and had to account for all expenditures within that budget) that I had seen the last of tight budgets. Tsk Tsk. Welcome to the world of being a Teacher Librarian!
The responsibility for budgeting for the library is possibly best done collaboratively with the teacher librarian and the school executive and possibly the school’s P&C (who also have access to funds). As per the CSU Module (Giovenco 2019) a TL should be a budget collaborator, steward and thinker. Moreover, having never been in charge of creating a budget, I would be hesitant to take on a budget on my own and would be reliant on someone with expertise to help me.
I have not mentioned classroom teachers intentionally. Should we collaborate with teachers about resources they might need? Yes of course. Should teachers have a say in the budget? Perhaps, yet I am leaning towards no. After all, why would teachers have a say in the budget for the library when they don’t have a say in any way what-so-ever in any other area of the budget? Teachers in some schools are given ‘classroom budgets’ and I think that spending that money is enough for them to worry about. Just do a Google search for ‘What should I spend my classroom budget on?’ and you will get 55,600,000 results. As soon as you ask for input, the assumption will be that what is asked for will be received and that is dangerous ground. Better to survey the teachers and ask what sort of resources they were thinking of or if they had any ideas and leave the budgeting to an executive committee that includes the TL.
In order to have a balanced (or at least one that fits) budget and a fully resourced curriculum I believe it is important to start with a clear policy in the Collection Development Plan.
There are loads of resources on how to do this (Such as Lamb & Johnson 2012, & Australian Library and Information Association (ALIA) Schools et al 2017, pp.20-25) and I intend to make good use of them!
Good Idea: Let’s make sure that a ‘perfect fit’ or balanced budget remains the goal as opposed to being in surplus…we don’t want to behave like or be perceived as politicians do we? Well, speaking for myself, I certainly do not.
To show the ‘balance’ (or presumably the lack thereof) I most certainly agree to having a section for the library in the School Annual Report in the format suggested by the school or using a template such as the one below:
ALIA Schools & Victorian Catholic Teacher Librarians. (2017). Budgeting policies and procedures. In A manual for developing policies and procedures in Australian school library resource centres. Retrieved from https://www.alia.org.au/groups/alia-schools
Lamb, A. & Johnson, H.L. (2012). Program administration: Budget management. The School Library Media Specialist. Retrieved from http://eduscapes.com/sms/administration/budget.html
When I first started this course, my thoughts on information was that it was important to me that everyone have access to all information (Moody 2005), individual limitations such as disability, geography, financial capability/internet access not-withstanding, (as this is a more complex social justice set of issues). I believed information was not something that any person or corporation should own.
In that sense, I suppose I have the heart of a hacker. Not the sort of hacker who wants to steal a person’s private information in order to rob them, I’m not talking about being a person who commits cyber crime. I am more thinking along the lines of civil liberties and protesting the rise of stringent ‘intellectual property law.’ (Coleman 2012).
Thoughts: in fact, can anyone really own information? … Similarly to the indigenous community beliefs: Does anyone really ‘own’ land: Aren’t people simply custodians of information in varying degrees?
However, as I am studying the Teacher Librarian as information specialist role, I am fine-tuning my beliefs and perceptions. I can now see how curating and resource selection can benefit students (and society) by narrowing down the playing field to a more manageable and relevant space. I am understanding my own motivations better!
Censorship, a historically relevant concept, is motivated by either overt, covert (Moody 2005, pp.145) control, social engineering and seeking proof of weaknesses in information of a whole text – negating any strengths that the information might contain (Ashiem 1953, pp. 63).
Curation (aka resource or information ‘selection’) is motivated by democratically believing in an information seeker’s ability to think, providing others with the freedom to think and read, the freedom to value information within the context in which it was writtendespite any perceived ‘flaws’ within the minutia of the information (Ashiem 1953, pp. 63, & Lukenbill 2007 pp.28).
When pursuing the path of ‘selection’ of resources or ‘curation’ of resources, TL’s or school resource selectors must then demonstrate ongoing and diligent and consciousness of their (possibly overt or covert) bias and motivations as well as the (possibly overt or covert) bias and motivations of other stakeholders (including ‘community standards’ arguments which seek to take content out of context or limit the range of information available to information seekers, for the purpose of censorship) for selecting or de-selecting resources in order to ensure that they do not cross the line from curation into censorship (Jenkinson 2002 pp. 23, & Moody 2005, pp. 142).
Moreover, rather than be motivated to select or deselect resources based on ‘community standards’, TLs need to focus on providing a range of information and views (Moody 2005, pp. 143) as per Australian ‘industry standards’ such as those provided by ACARA, NESA or AITSL and appropriately curating the library collection to suit the curriculum and the point of need in our individual contexts (Moody 2005, pp. 146, & Lukenbill 2007 pp 26).
Furthermore, if the school library has aformal Collection Development Plan and / or procedure for resource selection/curation/censorship policy section or survey questionnaire for challenges or complaints, then it will offer some protection from external or internal bias and censorship (Jacobson 2016, & ALA 2016).
References
ALA (2016), “Challenge Support” Retrieved from http://www.ala.org/tools/challengesupport
Asheim, L. (1953). Not censorship but selection. Wilson Library Bulletin, 28, 63-67. Retrieved from: http://www.ala.org/advocacy/intfreedom/censorshipfirstamendmentissues/notcensorship
Coleman, E. G. (2012). Coding freedom: The ethics and aesthetics of hacking. Princeton University Press.
Jacobson, L. (2016). Unnatural selection. School Library Journal, 62(10), 20. Retrieved from https://search-proquest-com.ezproxy.csu.edu.au/docview/1825615756?accountid=10344
Jenkinson, D. (2002).Selection and censorship: It’s simple arithmetic. School libraries in Canada, 2(4), 22. Retrieved from http://ezproxy.csu.edu.au/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=lih&AN=7277053&site=ehost-live
The final selection of storybooks for 2019 by author
Recently I weeded (deselected) my personal library. (Most of the books in the attached images had lived their lives previously in either mine or my husband’s classrooms, which had to be packed up at the start of this year and put into storage as neither of us are ‘on class.’)
I had a box of romance novels from my late teens early 20’s and a collection of crime fiction from my early 20’s and 30’s that I thought I would want to keep forever but in fact, following moving house twice, they simply took up storage space. [IN FACT, fair disclosure: don’t be misled by how organised it looks now–the room pictured was previously a toy room and the books were in a different room packed floor to ceiling with boxes!]
In accordance with Marie Kondo’s (2019) KonMari method (originally a book, now a series on Netflix), many books did not ‘bring me joy.’ It was liberating to get rid of them–except for my collection of Sue Grafton mass market books, as her A-Z series hasn’t finished yet, let’s not get crazy! [Sidebar: Marie doesn’t say you have to get rid of any particular number of books. Relax.]
I decided to weed out some of our student fiction books. I kept some ‘classics’ and all books with matching CDs or automated reader capabilities (hugely popular). I kept all books by known authors and those that were part of a series (breaking a series or getting rid of a series hurts my heart – was I feeling guilted into keeping them? Possibly). But a lot of the books that I got in Scholastic book fair mixed author ‘packs’ or at Scholastic ‘box of books for $40’ warehouse sales got the axe with no regrets.
The final selection of non-storybooks for 2019 arranged by genre
Asking myself, ‘does this book bring me joy?’ the main cull of books also came from my non-fiction shelves. My husband (also an educator) and I managed take about 10 boxes of books to Lifeline. Our reasoning: the information inside them was available online and a lot of the information in the books that we owned had gone out of date.
However, when we took the books to Lifeline, a parent from one of our local schools wanted all of them. In our area,most families are living below the poverty line and don’t have access to a lot of books and many don’t have a home computer.And, to be fair, these books have been read so often in our classrooms that they were falling to bits. The parent took them to the local ‘toy library’ facility where they will hopefully be loved and utilised as a means to teach young children initial literacy skills and surround them with literature.
So I’ve been reading the modules for ETL503 again and I’m asking myself now, which do students in our area need/want/prefer: Fiction or Non-fiction? What is the difference between a need vs want and does it really matter when resourcing the curriculum? Why do teachers (and TLs) keep resources, is it because of guilt or joy?
Fiction vs Non-fiction: Which one students prefer depends on the students themselves and what they are doing in any given point in time. To pit one type of text structure against the other is comparing apples and oranges. In my classrooms, students select non-fiction if they are only allowed a short amount of time for reading. If they are given more time, they select a trending fiction text. If they are new readers, they select storybooks we’ve studied in class (and invariably want to read them out loud to someone – preferably an adult!) If they are sharing a book with a friend, they go for the Joke books, Search and Finds, or books like the Guinness Book of World Records.
Sometimes, as students get older, they might think fiction books are for babies (or maybe they find them too romantic or disconnected from their lives –anyone tried to study Romeo & Juliet in high school? Was that fun for the majority of the boys in the class…?) and they might prefer non-fiction for a time. My husband and his younger sister profess to have never enjoyed reading fiction texts for pleasure, however, they have always enjoyed reading biographies or “non-fiction personal narratives” (Mosle, 2012).
In fact, the question of fiction vs non-fiction is the wrong question.
A better question would be: What is the library’s (and in fact, the school’s) main goals? What are students trying to achieve and what kind of resource would help them meet their personal and educational goals?
Are students reading for pleasure without an intentional or identifiable goal other than pleasure, and what do they identify as pleasurable–fact or fiction? Are students reading for obtaining information or skills that will enable them to achieve a particular goal or pursue a particular interest in their educational journey, and what will help them meet these goals–fact or fiction?
Need vs Want: Adults can be so presumptuous when deciding what children need vs want! Why does it have to be one or the other? Have you ever been in a school where they prohibit children from playing ‘shooting’ games using sticks or lego built ‘guns’? This is part of their ‘kinder culture’ and social development and isn’t indicative of future violence as adults (Alexander 2015). Have you ever worked in a setting where Barbie dolls weren’t allowed because of the presumed negative body image ideas that these dolls might encourage?
The lines between reality and imagination are very blurred for young children. There is, theoretically, no harm in this behaviour because adults have been using it to their advantage for centuries: by reading texts about fictional characters, children learn societal norms and preferred moral behaviours (Sekeres 2009). Children connect with fictional characters in a similar fashion to how they connect with real people and have a sub-culture that is entirely their own.
“Notions of childhood are more complex, more pathologized (sic) and more alien to adults who educate and parent” (Steinberg 2018, pp.2).
In this world of trying to ascertain what students at a given context NEED, it is important to recognise our own bias and preconceived notions before we acquire resources.
When looking at stages of development and trying to identify student NEED, we must not be fooled into thinking that these are a fixed, unchangeable means with which to view our students. When matched with an incongruent benchmark, students of today will be falsely judged as not ‘making the grade’ and could in turn have low expectations of themselves (Steinberg 2018). Students who believe they’ve ‘measured up’ to adult expectations may believe it due to their ability when in fact their success is more closely related to race and privilege (Steinberg 2018, pp.4).
Students can tell us what they WANT and that will simply have to take precedence over what we as educators think they NEED.
Once students have been asked and their voice has been heard, we can pursue our own agendas, as identified by Kimmel (2014):
“The school library collection serves the mission, goals, and objectives of the school, the school system, and the state. Our first consideration should be our learners— both present and future. The clientele of the school library and the curricula should inform identification of the ideal collection. Curricula, including local, state, and national standards, are important considerations. Identifying gaps also requires knowledge of the current collection. A needs assessment, therefore, develops a vision of the ideal collection needed to meet the needs of students and the mission of the school, and then measures this ideal against data about the current collection.” (Kimmel 2014, pp. 25).
Guilt vs Joy: Let’s not keep resources simply because we feel guilty getting rid of them. Let’s not be hoarders…has anyone else gone into a school library and thought: Does anyone actually read any of these old books? Why is this still here? What is that pile? What is in this filing cabinet? Why are there 10 old radios on this shelf? Do we even have computers that could read all of these floppy discs any more? I have been into a library like this, and it was traumatising.
We can’t keep things just because we think someone MIGHT need it in the future. We need to recognise what WILL be used in the future and what HAS been used in the recent past.
When weeding a collection, including equipment, Kimmel (pp. 67-68, 2014) recommends we ask ourselves and survey as required: In our school context and given our goals and curriculum needs, is (any particular resource): in good condition and / or appealing? Is it current? Is it relevant to stakeholders?
When I am a TL and/or next time I move house, I will continue to consider my collection as it relates to my learning in this course…possibly hanging on to those non-fiction texts a bit tighter. Until then, on to the next module!
Me, during my first Masters of Education Teacher Librarian ‘online meeting’ March 2019
References
Alexander, S. (2015). Superheros and Weapon Plan for Fun and Learning. MyECE Experts. Retrieved from: https://www.myece.org.nz/activities-for-childhood-learning/254-superhero-play-weapon-gun
Kimmel, S. C.. (2014). Developing Collections to Empower Learners, American Library Association. Retrieved from: ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/csuau/detail.action?docID=1687658.
Kondo, M. (2019) KonMari. Retrieved from: https://konmari.com/
National Library of NZ. (2014). Non-fiction. National Library of New Zealand Services to Schools. Retrieved from: https://web.archive.org/web/20160729150727/http://schools.natlib.govt.nz/creating-readers/genres-and-read-alouds/non-fiction
Mosle, S. (2012, November 22). What should children read? [Blog post]. Opinionator: The New York Times. Retrieved from: https://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/11/22/what-should-children-read/?_r=0
[Reflection on ETL503 Module 2.2 The Balanced Collection]
Okay, I get it. I’m a fish out of water in my current local government area (LGA) of schools. As a (recent) day to day casual relief teacher, I am increasingly finding myself filling in for ‘New Scheme’ temps who are fresh from University. As a seasoned educator who has worked in upwards of 15 schools, over 12 years, in a variety of full time, part time, contract and casual positions, I should be be helping teachers who are starting out in the profession.
I WANT to help!
When I first started teaching, the more seasoned educators helped me too. They guided me on how to teach grammar when my generation was left behind in an era where grammar wasn’t explicitly taught. They gave me behaviour management ideas and resources for successfully delivering guided reading literacy groups. They came in to my class and taught lessons while I observed. They suggested training courses and organised my attendance. They gave me formats for planning and in some team situations, whole units of work complete with required resources already printed and ready to go. They did these things because they wanted me to succeed in the goal we all shared: improved student outcomes.
Now, in my current LGA context where the number of temporary teaching positions outweigh the number of permanent or seasoned teachers, sharing isn’t done willingly. Competition for positions is the number one game. As a casual (this year) I am happy to not be an active part of that. However, it still has an impact on me when I want to help but I’m seen as either a ‘substandard’ teacher filling in for more capable teachers or competition for contracts for next year. Or maybe people just don’t want to share because they are afraid of what I might say…
I say all of this because I am struggling to understand why the hell everyone here is so obsessed with using Teach Starter (2019) (https://www.teachstarter.com/) to program for their classes?
Teach Starter (2019), in my view is for that little gap in the unit of work where the resource is outdated or unavailable, for finding more diverse resources to differentiate a program, or perhaps for people who don’t know how to program or create or collaborate to create units of work or resources. It is for schools who don’t already have scope and sequence documents. In 2019, what schools don’t have programs, units of work or scope and sequence documents? I am utterly horrified.
And heaven help me if I, a mere casual, ask to see someone’s teaching and learning program. You’d think I’d asked to see the inside of their bedside table. Seriously, if you can’t stand behind your program proudly you need to lift your game.
Another issue that I have with Teach Starter (2019) is that it costs money to be a member and access the (very basic and ‘cutesy’) resources that any teacher worth their salt could whip up in five minutes.
Fine if the school have purchased it for the teachers to use based on collaboration and discussion with all stakeholders and the program fulfils a context need. Not fine if the teachers have to pay for access themselves. Not fine for casuals (like myself) who are left a sentence or two as a teaching and learning program for the day: e.g. “go into Teach Starter and teach the powerpoint on ‘communication-then and now.'” Oh my god, please kill me now.
Furthermore, just because the resources are digital, doesn’t mean the delivery isn’t the same as ‘chalk and talk.’ (For a resource to truly be a useful digital learning tool, it needs to offer more than just a digital version of a chalkboard!)
So let’s program effectively hey? Let’s start with the point of need for our individual students based on suggested syllabus outcomes, meet as a team to discuss a scope and sequence, share ideas and resources for the lessons and make sure those lessons meet the Quality Teaching Framework standards (Collins, 2017). Let’s ensure that the lessons can then be delivered effectively no matter what teacher turns up on the day, by making our programs easily accessible and truly collaborative.
If Teach Starter (2019) is a part of that, then so be it. So long as we keep in mind that programs full of resources and websites or applications full of resources shouldn’t be the only avenue that we use for programming.
In the meantime, I think we, Teachers and Teacher Librarians et al, need to get out of Teach Starter (2019) and stop starting at resources, and instead we need to start at the point of need for our students. Perhaps the only way for look for this to occur is to first getimproved executive leadership skills in our LGA…or maybe fewer ‘New Schemers’…Now there’s an idea.
References
Collins, L. 2017, ‘Quality Teaching in Our Schools’, Scan, 36(4), pp. 29-33. Retrieved from: https://education.nsw.gov.au/teaching-and-learning/professional-learning/scan/past-issues/vol-36,-2017/quality-teaching-in-our-schools
