Dana's unique perspectives include experiences with service learning, problem-based learning, collaborations with teachers, reading promotion activities, and maintaining her personal blogsite: The Quilted Librarian.
It is great to have the participation of a former student who is now working in the school library field. Learn more about Dana:
http://eduscapes.com/sms/overview/fisher.html
I'm asking Dana the same 'kickoff' question posed to all our blog guests: "What is it that people don't get about your job?"
http://eduscapes.com/sms/overview/fisher.html
I'm asking Dana the same 'kickoff' question posed to all our blog guests: "What is it that people don't get about your job?"
Hi Dana,
ReplyDeleteI am intrigued by your service learning and problem-based learning experiences. It seems that this type of learning is becoming more popular, or maybe it is just getting more attention now? What are some of the adjustments you will have to make to use these learning experiences with elementary ages? You have had experience with these methods in small town and more urban settings, is the impact on students different because of their communities? I guess I am asking if the students take different things away from the experiences because of their prior knowledge, or if the outcome surprisingly universal.
Thanks,
Lisa Smith
I love that you are a blogger as well as a media specialist! What prompted you to continue blogging after Dr. Lamb's class, and how has it impacted you as a media specialist? Have you used your blogging experiences as a teaching tool with your students?
ReplyDeleteThank you!
Casey O'Leary
Hi Dana! We all know that media specialists wear many hats and that we find ourselves swept away from our desks or media centers several times throughout the day. I found myself in this position yesterday as I found out five minutes before school started that I was substitute teaching for the English teacher because the secretary couldn't find a sub. I did this for the first three periods of the day. I teach a class 4th period (which I had no prep time for yesterday) and then 5th and 6th period I was asked by the principal to help the secretary write Purchase Orders for all the money he had to spend before the end of the week. Therefore, I was not at my desk all day. Among other duties that need to be done, I have a pile of books that need checked in, a stack of cards that need checked out, and class websites to maintain. How do we get administration to see the value of our position and to understand that it is more than just taking care of the books in the library?
ReplyDeleteHi Lisa,
ReplyDeleteService to the community by students has been around for a long time certainly, but service learning dates back to the National and Community Service Act of 1990. (Check out the Learn and Serve America website for more information.) The public profile of service learning has been increased, I think, by the growing participation of colleges as well as K-12 school systems.
Real service learning arises from problem-based learning. Teachers (and I'm including teacher librarians in that) present a curricular area for student investigation that includes local community problems. During the inquiry stage, teachers help students to formulate questions regarding this local issue and then in the development of a service project.
One of the best service learning projects that I remember was developed by a 7th grade science teacher I worked with back in Indiana. Her class was studying environmental pollution. This study first focused on the Minamata Bay mercury pollution and then the teacher introduced several local pollution incidents in Sugar Creek in Montgomery County. The class divided into teams that began to research the local incidents. We took them to the public library (within walking distance of the middle school) to look at old local newspapers on microfilm. These students made phone calls to people quoted in the newspaper articles for interviews. They surveyed classmates to find employees of the companies that had polluted for more interviews. They emailed the Indiana EPA for information. They got their parents to drive them to the companies to take photos and measure how far they were from the creek. After presenting their research, the teams worked together to come up with a project--a creek clean-up day (where they netted some three tons of junk, tires, old toilets, etc that had been chucked into the creek) and marking all the storm sewers in Crawfordsville with signs reminding people that the storms sewers emptied into Sugar Creek. It was inspiring to see the affect this learning had on these students. It was definitely life-changing. I think that the level of inquiry involvement for elementary students may not be as intense as it was for these middle school students, but even young children can take away a great deal from a really great service learning project.
Hello, Library Media students. I've established an unofficial tradition by losing the first post when I tried to publish it! Here we go with take two.
ReplyDeleteIn response to Larry's question about what people don't get about my job, I'm happy to say that here at my new school, they really do seem to get it. I have a general assistant who is assigned to the library. She manages circulation and scheduling and lots of other jobs. This makes possible an average, weekly circulation of more than 800 books. the technology teacher handles computer issues, software, and announcements. I have only three classes a day as opposed to six like the other specialists. All of these things show that my principal is aware of what I do and shows it with his staff assignments.
Not everyone is so fortunate. A friend of mine who is a middle school librarian and, as of this year, the only person in the media center AND the technology contact in her building, started going into work about three weeks before school started. Shortly before the first official workday, she ran into a teacher in the hall who looked surprised to see her and asked why she was there? My friend said that she had been coming in every day for the past several weeks. The teacher looked non-plussed and said, "What have you been doing?" Shessh! Talk about not getting it.
There is one huge area in which North Carolina education as a whole doesn't "get" what a media specialist does. Down here most schools have a person who is a curriculum facilitator. In addition to being the test coordinator, administrative liason, and chief training person, this person sends out helpful links to teachers and administrators, helps teachers develop lessons, and models bests practices. Sound familiar? The "top-down" view of media specialists in North Carolina seems to be fixer of technology and keeper of the books. This means that in our corporation, no library media specialist serves in the technology department and library media services is a sub-section of technology. It also means that our positions are much more vulnerable given this limited view of what we do.
Hi Dana,
ReplyDeleteI am a Media Specialist in an elementary school K-4. I am always looking for new reading promotion activities. Can you share some that you have done.
Thank you!
Heather
Hi Casey,
ReplyDeleteThere was actually a gap between my blog for Annette's class and the birth of The Quilted Librarian. When we moved down to North Carolina in 2007, I wanted a way to keep friends and family up on what we were doing. At the same time, I started reading lots of other blogs and thought I could offer a unique perspective from the two worlds of my avocation and my vocation.
The blog is certainly more weighted toward quilting, but I used it recently as a <a href="http://danawarnerfisher.blogspot.com/2011/10/blogging-basics.html>resource</a> when I presented at the North Carolina School Library Media Conference.
I haven't used blogging directly as a teaching tool with students. Our corporation uses Gaggle.net as an email system for students and it has web page and blogging functions. That may be something I can try with my fifth grade students in conjunction with a local history project I want to do with them.
Dana
Hello Kimberly,
ReplyDeleteYou didn't say in what type of school you work, but I'm assuming it's middle if you are being taken from the media center to sub. I must say that this happened to me when I was a middle school librarian and I've heard other middle level librarians complain of the same thing. I think the best thing you can do is just keep pointing out to the principal that taking you from the library media center means, it ceases to function in your absence. If there is one of you, but multiple guidance counselors, is the principal pulling them to cover as well?
The best advice I can give is get involved in all-school administration, keep your principal advised of your work through emails and periodic reports, keep collaborating with teachers--if he pulls you, he will be messing up their days, too.
Good luck.
dana
Heather, when I was in Indiana, my readers loved our Read and Feed events. We would choose a book, purchase lots of copies, do a publicity campaign to get the kids excited, and then let them check out the books. At the same time, we invited community people, school board members, teachers, college professors to join the students in reading. If they passed a little quiz on the book, they were invited to our celebration--a lunch with food and decorations suggested by the book. Our adult readers sat at the table with students and discussed the book they'd all read in common. One year, we read Don't You Dare Read This, Mrs. Dunphrey and Margaret Peterson Haddix made an author visit. We had hamburgers and curly fries and decorated our gym like the drive-in where the main character worked. Another time we read December Stillness and invited Vietnam Vets to read and join us for lunch. This can be as small or as large an event as you choose and is always memorable for everyone involved. I want to try a small version of it at my new school and have a local author join us. You could do something as simple as having students and grandparents read the same book before you have a grandparent lunch. I highly recommend an event of this kind.
ReplyDeleteOur entire corporation was challenged by our superintendent to read one million books last year--that's roughly 17 books per student. They read 1.9 million! This year, he's challenged them to read 2 million. There were no prizes or incentives offered. You might want to think about something as simple as that.
Dana
Hi Dana!
ReplyDeleteDid you have any library experience before you moved into the Tuttle Media Center, or was that move what prompted you to go into library science?
The link on your overview page for "Battle of the Books" was broken, and I am curious to know more about it. Is it the same as the one I found at http://www.battleofthebooks.org/ ?
My only school library experience has been in an elementary school, but I noticed you moved from a middle school to an elementary school. Did you notice a lot of differences when you changed, or was it mostly the same?
I love the ideas for promoting reading. I bet your students loved that the gym was decorated! Did you plan any activities for after school hours with students and parents? If so, how many times a year?
ReplyDeleteThanks!
Hi Liz,
ReplyDeleteMy only library experience before I started at Tuttle, was as a patron. My original training was in the theatre and I started teaching theatre to children when we moved to Crawfordsville in 1978. Next I taught pre-school ( Montessori). I started back to Purdue to work on an art degree and worked for an ink company while taking classes. I had always sewn and made quilts and had shared them in my children's home ec class. When that teacher had to be out of town for a week, she asked me to sign up so I could sub for her to teach the sewing machine. For the next five years, I did a series of maternity leaves at the middle school. When Tuttle became a one-to-one laptop school, the principal asked me to take care of the library so the media spec could deal with 700+ computers. I took care of the library and had on-the-job training from the media spec for five years, then I started library school.
I coached a Battle of the Books team at Southwest Middle for three years. It's a great program that is sponsored by the North Carolina School Library Media Association. (There are BOBs in other states, but I'm not familiar with the .org site.) Each year, two lists of books are compiled--one for elementary (about 12) and one for middle (27 or 28). The lists include new books (usually the Newbery winner from the previous year) as well as classics (like Treasure Island or White Fang) and good time-tested favorites. The kids on the team read the books and in March, twelve of them go to the competition where they are asked questions on the books. The answer is the title and the author. I had a great number of really serious team members, so I had to set goals to winnow down the numbers.
Yes, elementary is VERY different from middle school. I teach three classes each day--all with different preps, but I teach those three grade levels for six days, then we switch to the other three levels for the next six days. For the little ones, my lessons are mostly about library procedure inspired by a picture book. Even though I'm very busy during the day, I love having the students in the library media center on a regular basis. It's so hit and miss in middle school where one depends on teachers signing up to bring in their classes.
Dana
Allison, I did do a few evening events for book fair at Tuttle, but found it was difficult to get much of a turnout. Transportation is an issue in most places these days. At Southwest, I met with my Battle of the Books team in the morning before school. Florence is a different story. We have a very active PTA and very involved parents. I've been to several night events here that have had great turnouts. I think if you tie an evening event to something like a book fair, it will help your attendance.
ReplyDeleteDana
Hi Dana! Thanks for the advice. We are in a middle school. While I understand that we are a small school and fortunate enough to be flexible, I think the administration forgets how much each one of our jobs is important. I think this situation and your advice has really made me think about keeping a log or journal of what I do and how it is benefiting the students. Thanks again! :)
ReplyDeleteDana,
ReplyDeleteThe third grade where I am interning will be starting their Government in Action unit soon. I think there will be many opportunities for the students to identify community problems or needs. Maybe small projects in third grade, but as you point out, the experiences can be rewarding. Thanks for the information and inspiration!
Lisa
Hi Lisa,
ReplyDeleteWhen I lived in Crawfordsville, our mayor and the former mayor were always willing to come in and speak to our classes as they worked on problem-based learning. You might get some school board members or city council people to come, too. Our students usually prepared questions ahead of time for speakers. Many state representatives have regional offices and might be able to send someone, too. We always figured, why not ask? All they can say is no! Good luck with your project.
Dana
Dana,
ReplyDeleteThank you so much for sharing your reading promotions. I love the idea about getting the whole corporation involved.
I saw that you have coached a Battle of the Books. We actually do a Book Battle at the elementary school that I work at. We use the Young Hoosier Nominees. The winning team from my school competes against other elementary schools in our district. It is so much fun and the students love it.
Thanks again for sharing!
Heather
Hello, Heather,
ReplyDeleteI agree. Battle of the Books for me was a way for students to practice so many great skills--passion for reading, first of course, but also working with others, encouraging younger students, being leaders, good sportsmanship, working independently, and so on. One of my students got some of the younger kids involved on the swim team, others encouraged team members to be part of the orchestra, and I loved the fact that they waved and spoke to each other in the hall. Many of them were library helpers and always talked up the books they had enjoyed to their peers.
I'm happy that you are experiencing that fun, too.
all the best,
Dana
Odd, I thought sure I submitted this post on Friday, but it appears to be missing, so I'll type it up again.
ReplyDeleteThank you for your responses. The Battle of the Books looks interesting, I'll have to add that to my collection of resources.
It sounds like your elementary school has set times when classes come into the library. What do you think about the AASL Position on Flexible Scheduling?
Hi Liz,
ReplyDeleteIn my elementary school, "Media" is a class in the specials rotation along with Art, Music, PE, Computer and Guidance. Media and Guidance alternate so that rather than having six classes every day (as do many elementary media specialists), I have only three. This means that I see every child in my school of more than 800 students once every twelve school days. I guess I view the AASL statement on flexible scheduling as an "ideal world" thing. Yes, the library program should be full integrated into the educational program, but practically, when would I plan with the four or five different teachers in six separate grade levels? At least being part of the specials schedule and getting curriculum maps from the CF means that I can deliver information literacy skills using grade level curricular content that supports what students are getting in their classrooms.
After having worked in middle schools with flexible scheduling for many
years, I can say that collaborations only happen with a few teachers. Even though part of my day is structured now, I feel much better about my ability to reach every student in my school, not just the ones whose teachers bring them to the library media center.
All the best,
Dana