The integration of the real world with the online has changed the teacher librarian’s role dramatically, in terms of the class content that students now need, along with a shift in education to teach thinking skills, rather than the ‘knowing’ of facts. The online world has effectively created new jobs, new ways of working, as well as making some industries obsolete, as demonstrated by effect of online flight and hotel bookings on travel agencies. The Teaching Librarian must now have proficiency in diverse media formats that correspond to the curriculum and are pertinent to the goal of ensuring access to culturally rich materials. This involves granting access to information resources beyond what is currently available in the school library or within the current experiences of library users. 

This shift would also dictate that were is now there is an identified need for teacher librarians to apply evidence-based methods to the work they perform in schools (Hay, 2005; Combes, 2016). Additionally, the lack of Australian data with students within this trend would suggest that there is a demand for TLs to perform their own research in this field. The commissioned review “Impact of School Libraries on Student Achievement” by the Australian School Library Association (ASLA), Lonsdale stresses the importance of conducting local research instead of solely relying on the majority of research findings from the United States (Hay, 2005). 

Hay’s (2005) 3 main criteria for change also dictates the need for TLs to work alongside course teachers to support learning and teachers by successfully integrating the development of information literacy and ICT literacy, and working with teachers to support the learning needs of students. Having the teacher-librarian collaboratively plan, implement and evaluate with classroom teachers to expose students to resource-based inquiry, and process learning through thinking and problem-solving activities. By providing training opportunities for teachers in the use of new information resources and ICTs and their use in curriculum contexts. 

Hence, the concept is that a Teacher-Librarian (TL) is an accomplished and highly specialized educator. As per the findings from studies conducted by Lipman (1998) and Payne (1994) cited in Sternberg & Subotnik (2006), an effective teacher exhibits the following traits: dedication, awareness of students’ needs, attentiveness to all students in class, consistent intellectual and emotional engagement, high expectations for students, and the ability to recognize both the weaknesses and strengths of students. 

Combes, B. (2016). literacy matters! literacy, advocacy and the teacher librarians. Synergy, 14(2). https://www.slav.vic.edu.au/index.php/Synergy/article/view/v14220163/14  

Hay, L. (2005). Student learning through Australian school libraries part 1: A statistical analysis of student perceptions. Synergy, 3(2). https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/document?repid=rep1&type=pdf&doi=034e820dd6f2230672da4982f80a7c8228fd8f0c  

Sternberg, R. J., & Subotnik, R. F. (2006). Optimizing student success in school with the other three Rs : reasoning, resilience, and responsibility. https://ci.nii.ac.jp/ncid/BA82395877 

Changing role of the TL and adoption of constructivist teaching principles could be exacerbated in response to the technological advancements (such as chat GPT), which aim to increase productivity by completing routine tasks within industries once requiring substantial formal education (Anton et al., 2020) while allowing more time for the completion of higher order thinking tasks by humans. Additionally, the alleged shortage of creatives due to a large-scale digital disruption of the job market has essentially created new professions which demand inquiry skills. The wave of digital disruption that platform-based labour (Hawamdeh et al., 2023) has affected the labour market in terms of workers’ required skill set, thus demanding a focus by schools on the teaching of inquiry processes for the development of analytical/cognitive, decision-making, and management skills (Kadir, 2018). Many argue that mastering this learning process is crucial for learners (Burton and Lyon, 2017; Rayner & Papakonstantinou, 2015; Tomlinson, 2008; Trilling and Fadel, 2009; Wartzman, 2014). The knowledge economy theory (Drucker, 1969) where ideas, knowledge and creativity are counted as the new goods and services of Industry 4.0 (Schwab, 2017) and Florida’s (2002) much-touted accompanying assertion that the job market is dominated by a ‘creative class’, portray a future with diminished employment opportunities due to automation and AI. In conclusion, this suggests the need for humans to develop social and creative skills which AI currently cannot replicate (Frey, 2019). This would also mean that there is a moral obligation to teach students from disadvantaged backgrounds, the group who suffers the most when job markets fluctuate, along inquiry learning methods.  Particularly because studies have shown that the main barriers to information literacy currently involve a lack of proficiency in electronic information research skills, challenges in English proficiency during searches, and restricted access to electronic information databases and digital libraries. (Mahdian & Shahram, 2012).  

These learners frequently originate from educational backgrounds where errors are not appreciated or viewed as chances for learning, leading to a reluctance to venture beyond their comfort zones, which inquiry learning demands, due to the fear of making mistakes and potentially feeling embarrassed. Much of Industry 4.0 has directed corporations to look at how they can re-design themselves to enhance the creative productivity of workers, and it is easy to see how this philosophy of effective learning environments would be beneficial in schools especially in relation to encouraged student agency and independence over their learning. Especially as information literacy and learning inquiry models seem to be designed for flexibility as they can be easily adapted for students and learners to follow an investigative process, or for teachers to plan a unit or provide a holistic overview to a curriculum.  

A key issue within the industry is the education budget, not only of the actual schools, but in the suitable training of teachers. The question of how to better prepare quality teachers is often asked and as yet still unanswered. The TEMAG (2014) report surmises that teacher quality is deteriorating and the solution is to intensify accountability regimes through increased levels of control. Why not train teacher to work with TL? Or the education of both to include inquiry learning in-depth, especially since historical expertise processes can differ greatly from one ideal for a science class.  

There remains a great need for appropriate training and development (which is appropriately scheduled and renumerated along with academic staff’s other commitments!) (Fang et al., 2021). Obstacles linked with inquiry-based learning include the intricacy of assessing achievements, tackling issues of low student involvement, recognizing overlaps in the curriculum, navigating classroom dynamics, and dealing with the overall challenging nature of this learning method. The approach remains difficult to integrate effectively due to the complexity of assigning grades based on students’ inquiry skills. Comprehensive training in these aspects would be beneficial, as my teacher education focused on curriculum content, pedagogical knowledge, and assessment without providing an opportunity to delve into effectively utilizing the library with students.  

References: 

Anton, E., Behne, A., & Teuteberg, F. (2020). The humans behind Artificial Intelligence – An operationalisation of AI competencies [Jun. 15–17, 2020.]. In Proceedings of the 28th European Conference on Information Systems (ECIS), An Online AIS Conference. 

Burton, M., & Lyon, L. (2017). Data science in libraries. Bulletin of the Association for Information Science and Technology, 43(4), 33–35. 

Drucker, P. F. (1969). The age of discontinuity: Guidelines to Our Changing Society. New York : Harper & Row. 

Fang, G., Chan, P. W. K., & Kalogeropoulos, P. (2021). Secondary school teachers’ professional development in Australia and Shanghai: needs, support, and barriers. SAGE Open, 11(3), 215824402110269. https://doi.org/10.1177/21582440211026951 

Florida, R. L. (2002). The rise of the creative class: and how it’s transforming work, leisure, community and everyday life. New York, NY, Basic Books. 

Frey, C. B. (2019). Technology Trap: Capital, Labor, and Power in the Age of Automation. Princeton University Press. 

Hawamdeh, S., Jeonghyun, K., & Wang, X. (2023). Chapter 3: Technology Innovation and the Information Professions – Foundations of the information and knowledge Professions. In Foundations of the Information and Knowledge Professions. University of North Texas Press. https://openbooks.library.unt.edu/information-knowledge-professions/chapter/chapter-3-technology-innovation-and-the-information-professions/ 

Kadir, M. A. A. (2018). An inquiry into critical thinking in the Australian curriculum: examining its conceptual understandings and their implications on developing critical thinking as a “general capability” on teachers’ practice and knowledge. Asia Pacific Journal of Education, 38(4), 533–549. https://doi.org/10.1080/02188791.2018.1535424 

Mahdian, M. J., & Shahram, S. (2012). Barriers and Challenges, Taking Advantage of New Technologies in the Field of Information Literacy from the Perspective of Faculty Members. Procedia – Social and Behavioral Sciences, 69, 2092–2095. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sbspro.2012.12.170 

Rayner, G. M., & Papakonstantinou, T. (2015). Employer perspectives of the current and future value of STEM graduate skills and attributes: An Australian study. The Journal of Teaching and Learning, 6(1). https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Employer-perspectives-of-the-current-and-future-of-Rayner-Papakonstantinou/6e2300798dd5a8a31c59e4bd59636e8fdf149bd9 

Schwab, K. (2017). The Fourth Industrial Revolution. Penguin UK. 

Teacher Education Ministerial Advisory Group. (2014). Action now: Classroom ready teachers. Canberra: Department of Education. 

Tomlinson, M. (2008). ‘The degree is not enough’: students’ perceptions of the role of higher education credentials for graduate work and employability. British Journal of Sociology of Education, 29(1), 49–61. https://doi.org/10.1080/01425690701737457 

Trilling, B., & Fadel, C. (2009). 21st century skills: Learning for life in our times. Jossey-Bass/Wiley. 

Wartzman, R. (2014, November 5). What Peter Drucker knew about 2020. Harvard Business Review. https://hbr.org/2014/10/what-peter-drucker-knew-about-2020 

Discussion 7.1 Write your opinion on the coverage of the role of the TL as presented by Valenza, and the importance of lobbying activities such as this one. 

I think people would be surprised by the list provided in this video of all that the school library provides students. On reflection, it would seem necessary for students to have at least one scheduled session in the library a week. I especially liked the observation that the school library is ‘A place where they (students) do not get graded’ (Valenza, 2023). This in itself I believe would create a conducive atmosphere to foster deep learning, which is argued to depend on the development of intrinsic learning motivation: learning driven by the joy and satisfaction of learning itself (Muñoz & Ramirez, 2015) in contrast to its opposite, extrinsic motivation, with subcategories of identified, introjected and external regulations in descending order of self-determination (Bakar et al., 2010). 

I am surprised that one report I read divided schools into Catholic, Government and Independent schools (Softlink, 2022) so there is clearly a major difference in the library facilities of the three groups. However, the report also has a section describing the typical Australian school which states that the majority of school libraries are understaffed with inadequate budget. 

Clearly there is a need for some level of equality between school libraries in different institutions, as a school library is described as critical to the literacy of a school’s students (Hughes el al, 2013). 

References: 

Bakar, K.A., Sulaiman, N.F., & Rafaai, Z.A.M. (2010). Self-determination theory and motivational orientations of Arabic learners: A principal component analysis. Journal of Language Studies, 10(1), 71-86. 

Hughes, H., Bozorgian, H., Allan, C., & Dicinoski, M. (2013) School libraries, teacher-librarians and their contribution to student literacy development in Gold Coast schools: Research report. School Library Association of Queensland, Queensland University of Technology, Australia. 

Muñoz, A., & Ramirez, M. (2015). Teachers’ conceptions of motivation and motivating practices in second-language learning: A self-determination theory perspective. Theory and Research in Education, 13(2), 198-220. https://doi.org/10.1177/1477878515593885 

Softlink. (2022). The 2022 Softlink Australian and New Zealand School Library Survey Report. In softlinkint.com. Retrieved January 7, 2024, from https://www.softlinkint.com/downloads/2022_Softlink_School_Library_Survey_Australian_NewZealand_Report.pdf?vgo_ee=hVuZR6EDQ0QrPaN%2BdBEnPtiIL90AS4DyPEKfIJOsKAnzdA8%3D%3AoSro1%2BpcnUnolBTlJQt1jdBaskjyz3dM  

Valenza, J. (2023, October 18). School Library story [Video]. Vimeo. https://vimeo.com/82208025 

Make the library a social space for teens 

To attract teens into the library and to encourage reading, libraries need to be social spaces, along with relevant, diverse, and appealing fiction and non-fiction and magazines. Examining both traditional print reading and online reading technologies to explore how they can synergistically contribute to fostering reading habits among adolescents within the reading environment of a school. Pleasure remains an important motivation for adolescents, and students are motivated to read when they have a wide variety of books to choose from and see value in reading (Moje et al., 2008). Research has shown that reading is also very much a social activity for adolescents. Adolescents are motivated to read when they have good reasons to, which includes reading to interact with others in their social networks (Moje et al., 2008). Adolescents are also more likely to talk about books when they have been frequently exposed to books and have peers who are similarly interested in reading (Merga, McRae, & Rutherford, 2018). Moreover, students with reading peers find it easier to locate reading materials because they are more likely to receive recommendations from their friends (Ivey, 2014).

This sociability around books is not limited to face-to-face socializing. Technology can afford opportunities otherwise unavailable in physical spaces. In a study of adolescents’ reading habits in Poland, Zasacka (2017) found that adolescents used the internet to search for information about books not required for school, second after peer recommendations. For example, recommendations on Goodreads  and shared highlights on Kindle’s Popular Highlights function allows individuals who do not know each other personally to engage in dialogue around books. 

Moje, E. B., Overby, M., Tysvaer, N. M., & Morris, K. (2008). The complex world of adolescent literacy: myths, motivations, and mysteries. Harvard Educational Review, 78(1), 107–154. https://doi.org/10.17763/haer.78.1.54468j6204x24157 

This sentence has made me think a lot: ‘The Teacher Librarian should have a thorough understanding of the broader information landscape.’ 

What would a secondary school student understand the ‘broader information landscape’ to be? And I started to consider the cultural status of different types of information, and would this mean that a high school student’s idea of the types of information in a ‘broader information landscape’ would be grossly different from mine, or say, their first-choice university or future employer? 

What would this mean for the teacher librarian? I revisited French sociologist, Pierre Bourdieu’s work on the concept of cultural capital – where the non-financial social assets (which includes the ‘type’ or status of information that a person is familiar with) influences a person’s social mobility and success. This information can range from education credentials, knowledge, skills, talents, abilities and cultural awareness.  

Regarding information, Bourdieu recognises that certain types of information can be associated with cultural capital, influencing individuals’ social standing and opportunities. I would argue that with so much of an Australian students’ future lying on the ATAR score, the most pertinent to Australian schools, and TLs would be the distinction between information from high vs low culture. High culture would include classical literature, art and philosophy often associated with higher social classes. Whereas low would include pop culture and I would like to also add the trends and memes on which much understanding and enjoyment of social media would depend. 

With this in mind, I wonder if it is important for a TL to be concurrent with both high and low culture, and would it be advisable for students to have an awareness of such a classification system? 

Medvetz, T., & Sallaz, J. J. (2018). The Oxford Handbook of Pierre Bourdieu. In Oxford University Press eBooks. https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199357192.001.0001 

The role of teacher librarians (TLs) has for a long time been recognised as a promotor of literacy (Lance, 2023). Meanwhile, the internet was predicted by many to lead to the demise of the library as an academic source (Odlyzko, 1995) or a supplier of paper books (Kinney, 2010) but it seems instead that it has just differentiated the TL’s role. After reading through the modules, I asked Chat GPT if the role of the TL would end up being susceptible to automation. The bot suggested that AI is unlikely to replace TLs as it acknowledged that AI cannot offer the personalized service that librarians provide (Chat GPT, personal communication, 2023).  

Online texts have expanded the TL’s responsibilities in working with different formats as school libraries often house more digital than physical resources (as could be argued of many households) leading to an evolved meaning of the concept of ‘literacy’ in the digital age. This shift has given ‘literacy’ a whole new meaning in the digital era. According to reports, academic librarians are expected to dive deeper into digital services and online resources by 2030 (Merga, 2020. Scholars have been talking a lot about the new roles TLs are taking on, from being advocates to managing all sorts of things like content, knowledge, and even web design (Halder, 2009; cited in Momoh and Lanre, 2019). It’s like the job got more complex, demanding extra skills to keep up.   

Effective search strategies now extend beyond the Google search bar to include advanced techniques, while resource-based learning encourages students to gather and compare information critically. Anderson’s analysis (2006) emphasizes the importance of these key concepts in upskilling learners for success in a knowledge-driven society, highlighting the need not only for knowledge acquisition but also an understanding of how knowledge is socially organized. I was struck by Floridi’s (2007) point that now the idea of common knowledge has arguably grown in size because so much information is available. I would argue that this evolution of information literacy concepts, paralleling advancements in information technologies, will continue to be affected by chat GPT, which is depending on online content for its output (Saravanan, 2023).  

The obvious link between chat GPT and plagiarism has been the most recent point of the discussion (Perkins, 2023; Halaweh, 2023; Cotton, Cotton and Shipway, 2023; Azouley, Hirst and Reches, 2023).  However, I would argue that the advancement of study aid tools could very quickly introduce another new role for the TL as not only do TLs need to address the use of AI chatbots in assessments and research, moving away from mere plagiarism detection toward fostering constructive relationships with technology but also to foster an appreciation for creativity and originality.   

My current work on a university preparatory course has highlighted for me students’ dependence on technology. The students initially were shocked to be asked to write their assessments without their suite of translation tools, chat GPT, predictive text and other extensions and plug-ins. The general consensus was that this type of writing was common practice at education institutes in Asia (my students are Chinese international students.) Therefore, TLs also need to promote the creation of honest, original and creative texts.  

Word count: 530  

References  

Andersen, J. (2006). The public sphere and discursive activities: information literacy as sociopolitical skills. Journal of Documentation, 62(2), 213–228. https://doi.org/10.1108/00220410610653307  

Azoulay, R., Hirst, T. and Reches, S. (2023). Let’s Do It Ourselves: Ensuring Academic Integrity in the Age of ChatGPT and Beyond. [online] www.techrxiv.org. doi:https://doi.org/10.36227/techrxiv.24194874.v1.  

Chat GPT, personal communication, 2023.  

Cotton, D.R.E., Cotton, P.A. and Shipway, J.R. (2023). Chatting and cheating: Ensuring academic integrity in the era of ChatGPT. Innovations in Education and Teaching International, pp.1–12. doi:https://doi.org/10.1080/14703297.2023.2190148.  

Floridi, L. (2007). A look into the future impact of ICT on our lives. The Information Society, 23(1), 59-64. https://doi.org/10.1080/01972240601059094  

Halaweh, M. (2023). ChatGPT in education: Strategies for responsible implementation. Aau.ac.ae. [online] doi:https://doi.org/1309517X.  

Lance, K. C. (2023, March 15). Why school librarians matter: What years of research tell us – kappanonline.org. kappanonline.org. https://kappanonline.org/lance-kachel-school-librarians-matter-years-research/  

Kinney, B. (2010). The internet, public libraries, and the digital divide. Public Library Quarterly, 29(2), 104–161. https://doi.org/10.1080/01616841003779718  

Merga, M. K. (2020). What is the literacy supportive role of the school librarian in the United Kingdom? Journal of Librarianship and Information Science, 53(4), 601–614. https://doi.org/10.1177/0961000620964569  

Momoh, E. O., & Lanre, F. A. (2019). The evolving roles of libraries and librarians in the 21st century. Library Philosophy and Practice. https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/libphilprac/2867/?utm_source=digitalcommons.unl.edu%2Flibphilprac%2F2867&utm_medium=PDF&utm_campaign=PDFCoverPages  

Perkins, M. (2023). Academic integrity considerations of AI Large Language Models in the post-pandemic era: ChatGPT and beyond. Journal of University Teaching and Learning Practice, 20(2). doi:https://doi.org/10.53761/1.20.02.07.  

Odlyzko, A. (1995). Tragic loss or good riddance? The impending demise of traditional scholarly journals. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 42(1), 71–122. https://doi.org/10.1006/ijhc.1995.1004  

Saravanan, A. S. (2023). The Limitations of Chat GPT. Medium.  https://medium.com/@asarav/the-limitations-of-chat-gpt-8b73f5859bb4