ETL501 Assessment 2 Part B: Critical Reflection
In terms of technology and the role of the TL in creating resources and learning objects, I have learned so much over the course of this unit that I need to consider, assess and implement in my own practice in the future.
Teacher librarians typically have three main roles within school contexts: they are information specialists, curriculum leaders and information service managers (Laretive, 2019), all three of which relate to the use of technology in supporting effective 21st century teaching and learning. This is particularly significant when thinking about 21st century learning from a school library perspective, as teacher librarians not only provide information literacy skill development for students but also have the opportunity to provide meaningful learning experiences and to guide lifelong learning when properly resourced (Quezzaire, 2018). Furthermore, teacher librarians are experts in the fields of knowledge and information; there is no one tool or technology that will provide students with all their information needs such that we are required to go above and beyond to provide our stakeholders with the most effective tools for learning (Gilbert, 2013). Through engagement with the unit content I have come to realise that this ultimately requires librarians to create their own resources and learning objects to fulfil these specific information needs, whether it be for library lessons, in the classroom or in collaboration with other teachers in the school (Johnson, 2020a). Especially in the current COVID-19 climate where there is a trend towards digital resourcing, school libraries are focussing now on providing online access and support for stakeholders (Dearnaley, 2020). This will inevitably result in the creation of a multitude of learning objects to support student, staff and parents in navigating this online environment, as well as engaging and participating in online learning, and supporting the learning itself.
As I have reflected previously, digital materials and learning objects should be created for specific purposes and their usefulness evaluated to investigate their effectiveness (Johnson, 2020b). This has been nowhere more relevant than in making the research guide for this assessment. Throughout my teaching career I have created a number of specific learning objects to achieve all manner of different ends, although my evaluation of these, as well as my collaboration with other staff to use these objects, has certainly been lacking in the past. As such, I began this assessment by approaching staff I would be co-teaching with next term to see which topic areas needed the most support, as well as to identify specific learning needs of individual students across Year 7. Following this, the process of finding digital resources for this research guide was thorough. This was due to my own strict criteria as all web tools and learning objects should be assessed against specific learning needs (Laretive, 2019), such that I initially rejected a number of informative websites in favour of more interactive resources that would support individual research processes. As a result, I believe the resources used are highly effective, although the time that went into searching and selecting these as opposed to creating and designing the website have let me down in terms of presentation and useability. In future, I will aim to address both of these crucial elements in a more balanced manner, especially now that I have developed a framework for future resources.
References
Dearnaley, M. (2020). A snapshot of a school library during COVID-19. Access, 34(2), 22–25.
Gilbert, K. (2013). What we hold in our hands: Teacher-librarian, knowledge manager [online]. Synergy, 11(2).
Johnson, T. (2020a, September 15). Learning Objects: A Quick Reflection. Retrieved from https://thinkspace.csu.edu.au/tomthetl/2020/09/15/learning-objects-a-quick-reflection/
Johnson, T. (2020b, August 3). Reference Materials – Print or Digital? Retrieved from https://thinkspace.csu.edu.au/tomthetl/2020/08/03/reference-materials-print-or-digital/
Laretive, J. (2019). Information literacy, young learners and the role of the teacher librarian. Journal of the Australian Library and Information Association, 68(3), 225-235.
Quezzaire, P. (2018, February 23). Libraries in the 21st century: the struggle between perception and reality | IB Community Blog. The IB Community Blog. https://blogs.ibo.org/blog/2018/02/23/libraries-in-the-21st-century-the-struggle-between-perception-and-reality/