Welcome to the _____ School Library

Is this your first visit? How about a quick tour?

Over here is the circulation desk. You can check out and return materials here. Forget your calculator? Need to use a highlighter? Left your textbook at home today? No problem; just borrow one of ours. There's also a computer here that you can use to access the catalog.

If you take a few steps this way, you'll see our wonderful collection of books. The fiction section is to the left. Feel free to browse or choose some that have been recommended by others -- look for the colored bookmarks. If you'd like to recommend a book, the bookmarks are located here. Non-fiction is the right. We've been expanding our technology, biography, and graphic novel sections, so take a look when you have a chance. Over here are the reference books. If this section looks a bit small, that's because we have lots of great resources you can access online. Which brings us to the Cybrary.

Just inside this room here is the gateway to some amazing sources of information. Every computer has links to a wide variety of verified sites you can use for any school project, or just to learn something for fun. If you ever need assistance with the computers, please don't hesitate to ask. In fact, you can even ask questions from home by using this handy link on our library's home page. The home page also has a number of links to useful resources, including the local public library and other comprehensive reference sites.

If you're looking for an activity to pursue in your after-school hours, you might want to check out our Reading/Writing group, which meets every Tuesday from 2:30-4:30. Or stop in on Wednesdays for Homework Help. Interested in exploring a new topic, such as internet games or podcasting? Come by some time and we can chat. Want someone to listen to you practice your big Social Studies presentation? Sign up for an audience during one of your free periods. Need some help with that PowerPoint presentation? Attend a quick 20 minute session on the Essentials of .ppt. Or Excel. Or Word. Or MLA.

To continue our tour, over in this corner is our portable classroom. That's right, this room can come to you. That's because it is fully equipped with laptops that can go to any classroom. In the library, classes come in to work on assignments that a teacher and I have meticulously collaborated upon to enhance your learning experience.

And that, in summary, is your library. If there's something you are looking for that you don't see, we can get it for you. If you have a change you'd like to recommend, please do so. If you just need a quiet place to spend some time, welcome. We hope to see you often. Bring your friends.

Happy learning!

Library=more than just a room where books are kept

Continuing with the theme of the changing role of the librarian, I think that this is a very exciting time to be entering the field of school librarianship. In the past, such as when I was in high school, the library was a quiet place used by a very limited number of students, occasionally, perhaps during study halls. There were only three computers and I don't recall anyone ever taking out a book. We used the library maybe once for a class assignment, and we were all afraid the 90+ year-old librarian wouldn't make it through the lesson. Now, less than ten years later, things have changed drastically.

In several of the high schools I visited for field experience, the libraries were very busy -- all the time. As the popular destination for study hall, students were limited to visiting the library once a day, and, in some places, the library doors were closed after the occupancy limit was reached. Of course, this wasn't necessarily due to a radical change in the role of the library, but more so because of the access to computers, free printing, and a place to talk with friends. However, there are many more opportunities for libraries to be a central place in the school now that certain technologies exist. I heard at least one librarian talk about how excited she was to try out podcasting with the students in her reading group. She wanted them to produce book talks and ads to play with the announcements. Unfortunately, I was not able to see this implemented, but it was nice to see her enthusiasm for the project. In another school, the librarian monitored several different writing and reading groups that met in the library after school. This would be a perfect opportunity to introduce some of the Web 2.0 technologies that we have covered in this class. Imagine sharing writing on a blog, collaboratively writing a story with Google Docs, or creating a comprehensive wiki for an imaginary world.

There are so many "extras" I can imagine hosting in the library, both using emerging technologies and some of the good old features of the library. Study sessions, presentation previews, test prep, original work publication, talent showcase, creative writing workshop, giant crossword puzzles...

Safety on the Web

Ok, so the internet is a scary place. Watching the iSafe videos and having a child in one of the computer classes I teach this week gave me a new outlook on students using the internet. When I was in high school, I was often annoyed about sites that were blocked on the school computers -- we weren't allowed access to any pages that mentioned alternative religions or beliefs (it was a Catholic school). As a somewhat "experienced" internet user, I tend to forget that I know which sites to avoid...and that there is a lot out there that needs avoiding. The approximately 11-year-old I observed this week clicked on every single ad on every web page she visited, even when she knew they were ads. While this is a relatively innocuous behavior, it does illustrate that younger users have less knowledge of what can happen when you just click on anything that is colorful and a link.

One of my first thoughts while watching the iSafe videos of children actually making plans to meet people from online was that kids are smarter than that. But then, kids have been getting in cars with strangers for a long time, so I guess it's not so easy to say that everyone knows how to keep themselves safe. I can see how setting rules for posting information about oneself on sites that are used within the context of a classroom project would be generally accepted by students, but I'm not sure how well they would react to someone telling them that they shouldn't even put their interests on a profile for another site. Despite what we may teach about internet safety and the dangers of networking sites like MySpace, these sites are too prevalent and popular to expect young adults to just stop using them, even in favor of somewhat more protected sites, such as Facebook (though I'm not sure how protected this site really is...).

Therefore, I think the SLMS can do their best to inform students of the dangers, but perhaps not much more than that, aside from preventing them from engaging in personal information sharing within the school setting (though that may be more up to the school's filtering policy). Maybe if education started at a younger age, before students are ingrained in multiple sites and develop bad habits...

Changing Role of the SLMC

Technologies that fall under the umbrella of Web 2.0 give media specialists a new set of tools with which to connect to their users. While looking at some school library websites, I noticed that there are so many cool features that these sites incorporate, some of which are actually successful at drawing in students, or at least which appear to be successful. Young adults can better appreciate the services and opportunities the SLMC can offer them if they are presented in a way that teens can relate to, which means using the technologies they have grown up with. The prevalence of these new technologies does not necessitate a change in the media center, but it will no doubt be a more used and valued place if these factors are taken into account.

On a related note, the use of the term "media specialist" instead of "librarian" reflects this change in the view of the role of the "library". No longer is the library merely a holding space for books, but rather a laboratory for learning, creating, and participating.

Teaching Information Literacy

All of the reading for this week has definitely given me a lot to think about, and now that I finally have some time, I can maybe even do something about my enthusiasm for planning lessons on the topic of IL. The discussion of the Google Generation is one that is very timely, though a lot of issues regarding SLMCs have been discussed somewhere out there lately. However, just this morning, I demonstrated the usefulness of Google over other search strategies. Not intentionally, but if I'd thought of it, I would have. Google is a great tool, one which keeps adding new features and abilities, many of which I still don't know much about. But since so many students are already using Google and other similar search engines, it makes sense to build on their knowledge in this venue and then extend it to other areas, such as databases. It seems like students would have more respect for someone who lets them use their preferred methods of research (albeit with a few twists) rather than forcing them to use other, "strange" methods. This is not to say that the use of databases should not be encouraged, because there are many resources that can only be found through the use of databases, but that the two methods can work together.

One of the first steps in adding IL training to the curriculum, either in an elementary or secondary setting, is most likely educating teachers and administrators, which in my mind is the harder part of the process. Children and young adults are often more open to trying new things, particularly if they are "encouraged" to as part of an assignment. It's harder to give teachers assignments or even get enough time to try to convince them why they should be supporting what might seem like a major change in curriculum, particularly if the library has previously been seen as a "special" or babysitting. But these are some of the challenges that make this such an enticing and rewarding career, right?

And the adventure continues...

Ok, still a little overwhelmed by everything, but hopefully I will get caught up by the end of the week, as that is when my internship will be done. I can't wait until I have more time to explore some of the cool things I am discovering while visiting the websites. While looking at the different catalogs listed in the syllabus, I found some very interesting sounding books on the topic of blogs and wikis and other technologies one can use in the classroom. Unfortunately none of those titles are in a library system near me, but that's a whole 'nother issue. First I have to get through all the reading for this week, and then I can think about other reading. I'm still waiting for the copyright text to show up, as I ordered it from Amazon last week. I read the first chapter of the other one this weekend, but haven't had a chance to fully process everything. I guess that means there will (hopefully) be a more coherent post later. I'm also still having issues with Google Reader, but I'll keep trying...

Technology Ups and Downs

During one of my first free moments of the week, I am finally getting a chance to put together some of this stuff for class. Fortunately, I am already familiar with most of the sites, so setting up accounts wasn't a problem. However, in the middle of subscribing to people's blogs with Google Reader, something stops working. As seems to be a recurring theme with me and technology, I love it when it works, but when something goes wrong, it leaves me confused and frustrated. Fortunately I live with a household of computer geeks, but they are currently fixing the printer...and I'm hoping it's just a temporary problem with Google. Or it could be my computer, which recently got re-programmed and is back in its infant stage, in terms of having programs, etc. Either way, I guess I'll get back to that later. In the meantime, I guess I should go work on my profile...