PART C A critical synthesis of my reflections on how my view of the role of teacher librarian has been changed over the course
My concepts of the roles, duties, kudos and expectations of teacher librarians has been altered, addended and amended by my readings and growing understandings throughout the duration of the ETL401 course. Of necessity, because of concurrent studies, wide reading and pseudo intellectual debates with other, equally pretentious people, my changed opinions will be informed by more than merely the readings of texts, papers and forums of ETL401, but I will attempt to focus my comments on the substance of the six topics.
I am a reluctant writer who loves writing, a voracious reader who watches far too much television and a thinker who prefers to vegetate.
With a flurry of enthusiasm, a modicum of technical ability and a willingness to try anything that won’t actually break my computer, I created my blog. I wasn’t completely working in the dark as I’d already created a blog for my library at school – BUT – I’d actually not saved anywhere, and had consequently lost, the URL. [I’ve recently accidently found it when looking up my own name on Google – I don’t have a life!!)
I posted once or twice but it was usually irrelevant ‘claptrap’, only tangentially related to the course.
I did set myself the task of creating a directory of all the course blog sites – but even this, I posted on the forum rather than my blog. I have yet to train myself to use a blog as a day-to-day log and reflective tool. I don’t know about others of my generation [used in its loosest sense] but I still find it easier to scrawl notes on lined A4 paper, using dot points, circling, underlines, connective arrows, etc.
The aspects of the course which, for me, held the most significance in reference to the learning and teaching process, were those concerning;
– resource-based teaching [I prefer to think of it as resource-based learning],
– lifelong learning, information literacy and the information process,
and
– the role of the teacher librarian.
This course has heightened my awareness of a broad range of aspects related the importance of the learning environment and in particular the library environment. This seemed to me to be demonstrated most noticeably in the use of resource-based teaching (RBT). At the beginning of this semester I saw the library as a place where students could retreat to read and research quietly; a repository for books, videos, DVDs and a few student accessible computers connected to the internet and those bits of the school archives that weren’t wanted for display in the entrance foyer. It was an alternative venue for some teachers to bring their classes if they wanted them to look for information outside their set texts or for wide reading in English periods. I was also aware that it was the place where Year 7 were brought early in the year to be taught the rules and administration of the library and where Year 11 were sent for a four-period burst on referencing sources and plagiarism – requirements that classroom teachers then seemed to ignore for the remainder of the cohort’s time in the school.
From an initially superficial understanding of the Information Process and only “lip service” to its implementation, I have come to the opinion that students should be introduced to a variety of different information process models and that teachers should encourage them through the development of an adaptation most appropriate to their personal learning style – and then further encourage them to refine, amend and adapt as they grow cognitively. Teachers then need to program resource-based learning activities so that students practice and internalise these processes which will lead them to become lifelong learners. Teachers can then utilise their awareness of Kuhlthau’s anxiety/mood levels throughout the information process, to smooth the knowledge acquisition journey for their students – and for themselves in their own learning.
Further I have come to see from the readings, that “teachers” in the previous paragraph really means “teacher librarian” because, unfortunately, classroom teachers have ‘. . . far too much to teach the kids to afford to waste time on such things . . .’ I now believe that it is upon the shoulders of the teacher librarian that the responsibility of disseminating these ‘multi-faceted literacies’ to both students and staff, must, by default, fall. As a consequence the teacher librarian must become an advocate for the important, pivotal and valuable nature of the library and the teacher librarian.
This semester’s work has expanded my view of the library’s environment as incorporating both the real, virtual, informational and felt; which may be in a building, in a computer on the kitchen table at home or in a sense of certainty that information is worthy of seeking.
The necessity for teachers to conceptualise resource-based teaching rather as research-based learning – where the paradigm shifts from the teacher using resources to ‘teach’ to the teacher providing appropriate resources for students to exploit, (with guidance) in their learning. In other words relating to students less as a ‘teacher’ and more as a ‘facilitator of learning’. Subconsciously I think I always held to that belief but to see it in print was a consolidating factor and as Hazell points out, the challenge of the teacher librarian is to produce information-literate students. Herring’s advocacy for the library as the centre of learning with an increasing development in digital resources has also enthused me to move in this direction, but without allowing digital resources to supplant those traditionally there but rather to develop in tandem.
Finally, and most importantly at a personal level, I have found that the writings, discussions and focus on the role – or rather roles – of the teacher librarians have stimulated my thoughts and motivated my intentions. The multiplicity of roles from school leader to curriculum expert to library advocate.
