Beyond the Blackboard

Megan Johnston writes in Today's Sydney Morning Herald (Monday, March 28, 2011) about learning in the digital age. I am currently struggling through my resourcing the curriculum area assignment at the moment so it was a flag for me.

The main point of the article is to highlight that 21 century learners now have the opportunity to publish their work in a much more meaningful manner than just "publishing in the classroom". I have in the past organised a book launch for a year 7 class where the Principal was invited to view the latest releases of the class who were working on a series of fracture fairytale stories. But that was last century.

Now students can use wikis (which I have used with another class to publish and critique each others' short stories), blogs, podcasts, online games which allows anyone in the world to view and rate their work. Very exciting indeed.

Schools highlighted in the article were

• Northern Beaches Chrisstian School where they use Real Audience Project (realaudienceproject.com) to publish their work via the web and sell print book via Lulu (lulu.com), Booralie FM broadcasts via podcasts in iTunes
  
• Tara Anglican College year 7 technology students use the Scratch website from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (scratch.mit.edu) to design their simple games and have the tested, commented upon and modified based on feedback.
• Convenant Christian School in Belrose had a Year 12 student design an app for iPhone and iPod Touch for chess. Chess4 app is now available through the App Store for free.
• Redlands in Cremorne use websites to build up a community of gamers to test games designed by student gaming company Chaos Theory Games (chaostheorygames.com)
• Clancy Catholic College at West Hoxton have student media group which have created their online portal to keep the school community up to date. Articles are published, videos uploaded, scrolling Twitter posts all run by year 11 students and moderated by a teacher give it the real life media outlet experience.
• St Monica's Catholic Parish Primary School in North Parramatta have launched a community radio station 92.5 FM which has a 5 km broadcast footprint
• Southern Cross Vocational College in Burwood will open a cafe and restaurant to the public
• Ballina High School runs a marine discovery and resource centre that welcomes tourists and the wider community to use the centre where students pass on information about the marine environment

The potential and variety of meaningful and new learning experiences that can be offered to students is huge. New technologies provided a set of wonderful tools in which students can now apply and see the curriculum content that they are learning as relevant. That can't be a bad thing.

Harmony Day

I suppose that part of a Teacher Librarian's lot is to do displays and use the library as a focal point for whole school celebrations - so this is my first attempt at one. Hopefully it will be a successful day.

The Brave New World is already here

http://www.theage.com.au/technology/technology-news/books-get-the-shove-as-university-students-prefer-to-do-research-online-20110307-1bl8b.html

What is my alma mater doing??? I spent many hours in the UNSW library and loved walking through the stacks, browsing. The "serendipitous discovery" that Dr Golder talks about happened to me on countless occasions.

Whilst I do realise that there are changing needs and the wonderful possibilities that on-line resources provide, but I can't help but feel pangs of sadness and nostalgia. Perhaps a middle path can be struck, so that serendipity can still occur whilst the learning styles and needs for the newer generations of students can be catered for.

Purcell, and the provisional nature of the role of TL

After reading Purcell's article, think about
A) whether you agree with the roles Purcell identifies
and
B) whether you would change the order she identifies e.g. should teacher come first?

Yes - I do agree with the role Purcell identifies, but then I also agree with Herring with the eleven "possible" roles he identifies. I think that the main point that I have taken from all the reading that I have done on the role of the teacher librarian is that is it a huge, complex and not so easily definable role. It kind of reminds of the Barthes and Derrida in their post-structuralist musings on the world and meaning. The concept that comes to mind is that of meaning being "provisional". That it entirely depends on context. The context of the library and the school within which you work , the students and teaching staff you interact and the larger context of being a teacher/librarian in the 21st century. The role is constantly changing, being redefined and therefore it will never be boring (a criterion for any job I take on). But then when do you feel like you have mastered the role - probably never. Which is great for those of us that like a challenge.

And what about part B) of the question?

Some people might like to use the chicken and the egg analogy. Which comes first the teacher or the librarian? But for me the whole thing is too intertwined. At times it feels that trying clarify particular aspects of the role is like trying to unravel a ball of a mad woman's knitting - highly confused and a huge undertaking.
I actually disagree with putting any aspect of the role first, placing particular emphasis of one part of the job over the other. I realise that the whole job is a huge balancing act, one of prioritising identified needs, a large slab of excellent time management skills and people skills. It might seem a bit of a cop out to say that I wouldn't choose an aspect to put first - but at this point there isn't one that I feel passionate enough about to say - it is definitely this or that. That might change when I think about it more.

A Role , a Role, my kingdom for a clearly defined Role

At the end of a huge week in which I began to really miss being "just" a classroom teacher, thinking about the complex, varied and enormous scope that a T/L's job encompasses - it has given me a large headache. In fact a debilitating one. I think my melancholy about not being in the classroom with a class is that I feel inexpert at everything, pulled from pillar to post and thoroughly isolated. I miss the collegiality of the staffroom and the sense of completing something. I know that that is just ridiculous to think that I am not completing something – I am being inarticulate. I suppose that there are aspects of the job I just didn’t consider. So much that I didn’t consider.

I have been overwhelmed the vast amounts of writing on the T/L, both in academia and fellow students. The thoughtful postings on the forum have certainly provided a feast of food for thought. I suppose my biggest struggle with the concept is how to approach it. I swing between being able to see the role in a general sense - of a vital member of staff in a school in the learning hub, collaborating and teaching the vital skills of information literacy, managing access to all the resources and advocating the love of reading. And then get bogged down in the minutiae of the various aspects of the role - of which there seem to be many. The realities of being the one who has to fix the "blooming" photocopier that is jammed yet again isn't something that you really need to forget about - but it does chew up a large part of your day! Some days more than others - and there are also other mundane aspects which seem to be something that a classroom teacher does not really have to deal with. I suppose that what much of the literature suggests is that you need to be proactive, and be an advocate for your role. If you do that then the rest of the staff, students and community aren’t going to view you as someone who puts books back on a shelf and hosts events! The chair wrangling and being on “playground” duty for 1 hour and 45 minutes a day is not what I wanted. I am trying to change the culture and behaviour of the students in the library but it is going to be an uphill battle.

I suppose what I want is for people to have a clear understanding of the role that at Teacher librarian has within a school – but at present that isn’t even particularly clear in be befuddled head. I have to stop basing my idea of what the role is on instinct and traditional views and get with the 21st century program. So here is my attempt to enunciate what I feel the T/L is or should be

An educator that supports students in their learning journey – ensuring that there are equipped with the essential information literacy skills to successfully navigate the terabytes of information accessible in the world in order that they can use and create texts and ideas.

Think it needs work – a lot of work. It will be interesting to see how my view of this changes as the weeks of this session progresses.

message to principals and teachers

How very true! It seems that not only do I wrestle with the beast of the photocopier on a daily basis, I feel like I am a subdivision of Office Works, part printing shop and chair wrangler. It is all in the joy of being a librarian - I just didn't read it in the job description. It must have been in the fine print. But after doing all that we do - it is still a wonderful feeling to have helped - when a student has a question, is stressed about their assignment and needs guidance, or just is able to recommend a wonderful book to curl up with. Not bad, not too bad at all.

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