Teamwork

According to Beck & Yeager (1994) a team is people coming together to work towards a shared mission. And it’s certainly true; when a team is working well they are capable of achieving great things. In schools and particularly in school libraries we find ourselves working as a team, however sometimes our mission is not a shared vision. Ensuring the team members are on the same path towards a combined goal is essential. Personally I find time constraints affect the ability that we as teachers and librarians have of working closely as a team. Time needs to be made available for teams to meet and work and ensure that teamwork is realised as an essential element of any organisation.

Law & Glover (2000) explore different roles of people in teams. The table they sourced from Belbin (1981, 1993) lists characteristics, qualities and weaknesses of different types of people. I could identify myself as an ‘Implementer’. Qualities include: gets on with the task, organising ability, hard working. This table would help people to understand other people in the team and their own role and participation in the team.

Beck, J. D. & Yeager, N. M. (1994). Making teams work: an underused window of opportunity. In The leader’s window: mastering the four styles of leadership to build high-performing teams (pp. 183-206). New York: Wiley.

Law, S. & Glover, D. (2000). Leading effective teams. In Educational leadership and learning: practice, policy and research (pp. 71-86). Buckingham, England: Open University Press.

Defining Vision Statement

Defining ‘Vision statement’

Before attempting to begin the task of creating a vision statement for a school library I began with some research into what a vision statement is. I asked the deputy principal of the school I work at for a copy of the school vision statement to peruse. I also googled ‘Library’ and “Vision statement” to see what other libraries were doing.
I found a great blog by Dr. Steve Matthews who defines :
“What will you dare to dream that your library can become in the 21st Century environment? Whatever it is – DREAM IT! – and make it your Vision Statement.”
http://21stcenturylibrary.wordpress.com/2010/07/15/21st-century-library-strategic-plan-%E2%80%93-vision-statement/

And so the task begins; St.Patrick’s School Library is about to be dreamt into the future.

Part A done- now for Part B

ETL504 has begun and with it a collaborative project involving me and supposebly four other students. (The number dwindled down to a group of three after two groupees pulled out). The task was to create a slideshow that "sells" an article we believe is important to publish to a specified journal. We targetted executive staff and our aim was to convince them of the importance of the role of the TL in strategic planning. My idea was for us to create a model and flowchart to show principles and methods of strategic planning. Our slideshow then defined each concept and specified how the role of the TL was important to this stage of planning. The collaborative work was really great, especially because I spend so much time working on my own, it was great to discuss the work and share the load a bit.

These were the principles for strategic planning for change we identified from our readings:

• Engaging people's moral purpose


• Building change culture


• Leadership for change


• Identifying priorities - internal and external


• Innovative influence on learning and teaching

These were the methods for strategic planning for change we identified from our readings:

• Define change/direction


• Build capacity


• Coherence of strategies


• Implement plan


• Evaluate and review strategic plan

For now I am on to Part B; an annotated bibliography and self-assessment of part A. I'm learning lots about working as a part of a team. Will post more when I'm done.

Here we go again!!!

I have been putting off this day. When I actually accept that yes - the uni trimester has started and I need to stop ignoring it and get cracking. I am probably about two weeks behind everyone else- ignorance is bliss though isn't it?
So I finished off EER500 the social research subject and I have to admit I really quite liked it. It was only a tester of social research but it was great and the lecturer Beverly Moriarty was excellent. It would be really great if we could read some of the work of other students to see how other people went.
This year my teaching load has changed to include teacher librarian hours. It has been fabulous to work in resourcing the curriculum and working with teachers to provide great assignments and effective and engaging research in the library. Some of the learning I did in ETL501 and 401 has been essential in ensuring I am effective as a teacher librarian. Whenever I create a research assignment I include information literacy tips and advice and have presented to the staff on Boolean Logic and Website Evaluation Criteria. My teaching load has also changed to include a role in leadership in the school and so this year has been crazily busy so far- another reason why it's taken me until now to get started.
I have however gotten a great headstart on my ETL507 subject and have organised and locked in my placement for ten days in the July school holidays at the State Library of Victoria. I have also locked in my four day study placement for the October holidays in Melbourne. I am really excited about the placement opportunities and being amongst other like minded people.
One thing I find so difficult about this form of study is feeling very isolated and spending so much time on my own. It's always better to be with people and talking through with others the themes and issues that come up.
I am enrolled for this session in ETL504 Teacher Librarian as Leader. I think this unit actually involves some group work and so it will be interesting to see how that goes.
Well it's time for me to get cracking. I need to read the 504 subject outline, the intros and forum postings and then work out a bit of a study plan for the unit.
Wish me luck.

Social Research & Resourcing the Curriculum

Dear Diary,

I am in a fairly excited, albeit, relieved mood. I got my marks back for the first assignments for EER500 and ETL503 and hurrah- I passed with colours- not quite flying- but with colours.

EER500's theme is social research. The assignment involved posing a draft question for research, after gathering and reading research articles, concerning a chosen topic. I chose boys and their overall underperformance in literacy. After the draft question it was time to analyse our choices and another students- I found it quite easy to be critical on myself, the other students work was more sophisticated than mine and her question stemmed from the research and was not simply reinventing someone else's research like mine. I found my approach to the work I do was not fit for social research. I need to be more specific, more analytical, more well-read and more thorough. The next assessment continues on from the first part and so more work on posing a research question and how to research it!

In ETL503 our first assessment task was an assignment on resourcing the curriculum. I quite enjoyed this work. I chose an area of the curriculum I am familiar with and the assignment was very practical and useful to my teaching. The assignment involved analysing the current resources available and the learning needs of the students and proposing ten new resources to aid the unit of study and student learning.

I have just finished the second assignment in ETL503 and it involved rewriting a collection policy for a school library. It took me a while to get into it, but I actually quite enjoyed it once I understood it and now the modules I have been working on all make more sense. I have learnt about Selection, Acquisition, Budgeting, Contested Materials, Collection management, Policy and Deselection. Some really great terms to know and use.

I am off to the cricket- I need a break from study.

Its Summer holidays and the rain just wont stop. At least it's easier to sit inside and work all day when it's raining outside.

Toodleoo

Here we go again....

This trimester I am enrolled in EER500 and ETL503. It was with great trepidation that I printed off subject outlines and started trawling through and attempting to get my head around the tasks involved in the units of work.

Last semester I completed ETL401 and ETL501, only just scraping through ETL401.

Even though the subjects were challenging, the new learning felt amazing. Creating a wiki and a blog has informed my ICT knowledge and I have incorporated this into my own teaching.

http://shakespeare-stpats-yr9.wikispaces.com/

I have found the start of this semester easier as I already have an understanding of how to use the my.csu website, and also having completed 401 and 501 I have some prior knowledge.

I am awaiting a text book, have started an assignment, completed module one and made introductions. I'm exhausted and it's only day one.

Part C: Critical Synthesis & Reflection of Teacher Librarian

As a result of my engagement in readings, web forum discussions, research, discussions with members of the school library and other staff from the school I work at, formal and informal discourse with members of ETL401 and ETL501 classes, and completion of assessment tasks in both ETL401 and ETL501, my view of the role of the teacher librarian (TL) has changed. Some of the major things I discovered were the level of expertise in ICT required by the TL, the leadership required to complete the role, commitment to creating an information literate school community, the high level of collegiality with staff, students and parents, the depth in pedagogical understandings, the relationship with the Principal, and the understanding of information literacy.

My understanding of the role of TL was extremely limited at the start of this subject. This is because my involvement in the school library had been in coordinating a reading program and student research. My focus on the library and the role of TL was organising books and finding resources. It was not until Module Two "The Role of the Teacher Librarian" and the direction to the Australian School Library Association (ASLA) (2004) standards of excellence for TLs that I realised the depth to the profession (Fitzgerald, 2010). This was further developed by forum discussion and consolidated more recently in a post by Joyce Valenza (2010) in library magazine VOYA, "it is clear that the concept of modern teacher librarian practice is not clear".

In readings by Henri (2005), I realised the TL role required a great amount of collaboration and collegiality. My view of the TL role had been that they worked in some isolation, in a different office space and area of the school. As I am not always in the library at school I do not see the relationships TLs have with other staff and the work they do together. The role of the TL requires active collaboration and collegiality with all staff, administrators and school Principal. After discussion with the TL at my school, and readings by Oberg (2006) and Haycock (2005) I have learnt that the support needed from leadership is vital. When applying for future roles as a TL I will be aware of the Principal's support for the library, as this impacts on the depth of the TL role.

It was early in the subject that I was introduced to the 'Information Search Process' by Carol Kuhlthau (2004). This was in the form of a PowerPoint and an analogy of a river produced by Laycock and Fitzgerald (n.d.) I enjoyed the analogy and could relate this approach to my students; however I did not at this stage relate this process to my own learning journey and role as TL. This is because like Oberg and Henri (2005) suggest, teachers need to see the benefits of new tools before committing. Looking back now I can see the value of the process and utilising this resource may have assisted in owning, and understanding, the new information literacy skills I was developing. The role of the TL requires a deep understanding of pedagogical and information literacy knowledge, not only to teach, but to model. This is the part that I find most difficult; changing and implementing new ideas to my own practices. Due to time constraints and pressures to complete other jobs I don't take time to learn new ways and change old habits.

A significant realisation for someone who is not very ICT savvy has been the great amount of ICT knowledge the TL requires for the role. I did not understand the level of expertise expected in the role. This is because I had always focused on the library as a place for reading and borrowing books and gathering resources. The role of the TL requires being an expert in the ICT field "Comprehensively understand the role of information and communication technologies in lifelong learning" (ASLA, 2004). My learning in this area has been enormous and a critical part of my developing TL skills. I can now create a blog and a wiki and I have developed my search strategies and knowledge of search engines. The more I see the benefits of these new skills, and the more I read about, the less I am using Google to search for everything. Herring (2004) suggests "no single search engine should be used for all types of searches" (p.27).

Recommendations to join wikis, blogs and listservs, and ideas generated from discussion on forums and the Head Librarian at my school, has further contributed to my new understanding of the role of the TL. In the Topic Six Forum I mention that I aim to "start challenging thinking and provide new opportunities and change within the curriculum" and I hope that my understanding of the role of the TL and the new learning it has created will assist this development (Coffey, 2010).

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References



Australian School Library Association, (2004). Standards of professional excellence for teacher

librarians. Retrieved from http://www.asla.org.au/policy/standards.htm



Coffey, R. (2010, September 5). 'Management', (Online forum comment). Retrieved from http://interact.csu.edu.au/portal/site/ETL401_201060_W_D/page/8237b4dd-9365-44b4-0005-acf4adb0f580



Fitzgerald, L. (2010). The Role of the Teacher Libarian (ETL401Module2.2).

Retrieved September, 2010, from Charles Sturt University website : http://interact.csu.edu.au/portal/site/ETL401_201060_W_D



Haycock, K. (2005). 'Systems issues and the information literate school community', in J.Henri and M. Asselin (Eds.), The Information Literate School Community 2, pp. 177-186, Wagga Wagga, NSW: Centre for Information Studies, Charles Sturt University.



Henri, J. (2005). 'Understanding the information literate school community', in J.Henri and M.Asselin (Eds.), The Information Literate School Community 2, pp. 135-145, Wagga Wagga, NSW: Centre for Information Studies, Charles Sturt University.



Herring, J. (2004). 'The internet', in The internet and information skills a guide for teachers and school librarians, London: Facet Publishing, pp. 21-43.



Kuhlthau, C. (2010). Information Search Process. Retrieved from http://comminfo.rutgers.edu/kuhlthau/information_search_process.htm



Laycock, D. & Fitzgerald, L. (n.d.). The Information Search Process: The Research River (Power Point slides). Retrieved September 2010, from Charles Sturt University Website: http://interact.csu.edu.au/portal/site/ETL401_201060_W_D/page/32cf7837-3570-4c34-003a-cf763dbbea27



Oberg, D. (2006). 'Developing the respect and support of school administrators', in Teacher Librarian: The journal for school library professionals, 33 (3), 13-18. Retrieved from http://proquest.umi.com.ezproxy.csu.edu.au/pqdweb?did=989412481&Fmt=6&clientId=20957&RQT=309&VName-RQD



Oberg, D., & Henri, J. (2005). 'The leadership role of a Principal in an information literate school community', in J.Henri and M.Asselin (Eds.) The Information Literate School Community 2, pp. 78-92, Wagga Wagga, NSW: Centre for Information Studies, Charles Sturt University.

Valenza, J. (2010). 'Manifesto for 21st Century School Librarians', in VOYA Magazine. Retrieved from http://www.voya.com/2010/09/15/tag-team-tech-october-2010