After completing the first module for this subject it appears that it will roll on nicely from ETL503. This subject will focus on the field of Information Organisation.

One of the first questions that was asked was ‘Why is it necessary for a school library to organise information?’ Without some form of organisation our students and or teachers wouldn’t be able to find the resource that they were looking for. And when we go to put the resource back on the shelf, how would we know where to put it? It would be a total mess and nobody would know where anything was. This would also relate to online resources and having previously learnt about resource lists, this is a great way to keep resources organised whenever a teacher requires it.

The module states that the teacher librarian’s role is “to ensure that appropriate and efficient means of retrieving the information held within the collection are in place and meet user needs” (Rowe, 2022).

After reading chapters 1,2 and 4 of the text, there is lots of descriptions about information resources and in particular ‘metadata’ which is essentially data about data but it is only effective if people understand it and use it.

It was interesting to read how over a period of eight years, the rise of the metadata librarian and the fall of a cataloguing librarian. This may apply in bigger or more commercial libraries where this is predominately their job. A library technician in a school may be involved in more than just cataloguing. I know in our library, they are partially involved in the deciding and purchasing and also the budget. There is also the borrowing and returning of books.

I am always a little apprehensive about the start of a new uni subject but the fact that this one follows on from the subject I completed last semester, it will be rather interesting and may give further information into the role of the teacher librarian.