The Reference Section - A Little Less Conversation A Little More Action
The Reference Section - A Little Less Conversation A Little More Action
Cooperation
Over and over again we have heard throughout this theme that we cannot go this alone. Cooperation is key. Beginning with our students is a great place to start. Finding out what our students are interested in helps the process of stocking a well used reference/non fiction elementary library. The reference interview is a great place to start. At the elementary level a student does not have the abilities yet to find appropriate text via google so "it is vital to remember that school librarians bring students and information together." (Reidling, 2013). After much reflection it seems to me that in the past TLs purchased the academic texts that sourced out a wide breadth of information. To some extent we still do that, but instead of a light resource about many things we can go deeper with resources. If a student wants to know why some animals don't have teeth we can outsource books for them on specifically that topic. The interview process is vital in keeping up to date with what is happening currently in the learning. Thank goodness for Amazon Prime!
One of the standards of practice for School Library Learning Commons in Canada is to "facilitate collaborative engagement to cultivate and empower a community of learners." (Leading Learning, 2014). As TLs we can help support the classroom teachers by jumping into their inquiry projects, adding to their classroom libraries, and inviting students in to the LLC to research.
It can be paralyzing to think of all of the learning that is going on in our schools coupled with all of the resources we could buy and then add on the expectation to cooperate with students and teachers when purchasing reference/non-fiction materials. It helps me to just go for it! Using our best judgements and keeping track of our budget we will buy some duds, but we will buy some amazing and fun resources that our students will gravitate towards. Not only will it answer some of their questions, but is will also generate more. Here is one of my favourite splurges from last week and it is part of a collection. The students love them!
Managing the Collection
We are only as big as the sum of our parts is what we say on the volleyball court. The same is true of our resources. We need to start looking towards our district tech teams to help us support our online reference collections. It seems to me that the tech team is moving towards supporting the learning in promoting movements in our district such as teams that come out to mentor us in using virtual field trips, and teams that manage the tech in our buildings. Although the personal presence is appreciated, teachers are voicing their opinions on the loss of tech apps and programs that they used to support the learning in their classrooms such as Learn 360 and World Book online.
That being said, the Acheiving Student Literacy document does offer some guidelines to the purchasing of materials. Also, they offer a reason for keeping our LLCs stocked with the resources our students require. "Access to information and ideas is essential for students to become critical thinkers, competent problem solvers, and lifelong learners who contribute productively and ethically to society. The collection is to be designed to encourage free inquiry and to provide multiple points of view. " (Acheiving Information Literacy, 2003). When providing students with the resources look at it through the lense of their uses as fitting into the AIL's point form criteria.
Resources available in and/or accessible through the school library support:
- Resource-based teaching and learning
- Individual and group research
- Individual and group reading/viewing/listening
- Development of lifelong learning skills
- Development of information literacy skills
- Development of technological skills
- Development of media literacy skills
- Development of the love of reading and appreciation of literature
- Implementation and enrichment of the curriculum
- Diverse needs and interests of students.
Evaluating the Reference Section
Ultimately, the work never ends in the LLC and the TL continually assesses the reference section for its relevance to the users. It is always a balance trying to decide what to spend the budget on, but ultimately the TL needs to use their best judgement in the end to determine the value of the texts. "Demand selection is providing patrons with what they request and want. Quality selection is based on what patrons should have." (Lamb, 2013). Of course we want books that are appealing on our shelves and we want to satisfy the need for the most popular titles. That being said, it is our responsibility to use our LLCs as classrooms where students can both be entertained and answer their burning questions. We place the junior non-fiction books right in front of our carpet gathering area, we place non-fiction texts on display, and we book talk them. Every library promotional poster seems to highlight the most inspiring characters in novels. It's time to make our reference/non fiction sections appealing to our students as well. As teachers we are engaged in the inquiry based learning that is happening in all of our schools in 2019. Let's just start buying these books our students need with the little funds we have. Little by little we will have robust reference/non fiction sections. We've got this!
Works Cited
Canadian Association For School Libraries (2003). Achieving Information Literacy Standards for School Library Programs in Canada.Ottawa ON, The Canadian School Library Association and the Association for Teacher-Librarianship in Canada.
Canadian Library Association (2014). The Leading Learning: Standards of practice for school library learning commons in Canada Ottawa ON, Canada: Canadian Library Association’s Voices For School Libraries Network and the CLA School Libraries Advisory.
Lamb, A. (2013). Electronic Materials for Children and Young Adults. Eduscape. Retrieved from eduscapes.com/electronic.17.htm
Riedling, Ann, Shake, Loretta & Houston, Cynthia. (2013). Reference skills for the school library media specialist: Tools and tips, (Third Edition). Santa Barbara, CA: Linworth.
I love the idea of doing a book talk for the reference section-or just finding a way to make them more appealing all around. As I wrote about in the discussion this past week, my students don't even want to bother with the reference materials (databases/books). They just want to google! Google will always be the flashy friend you have to compete with, but hopefully with some creativity, like you suggest, the reference section could get some better cred! ;)
ReplyDeleteThe best I can do is use those reference materials in my own teaching when students are in the library. I'm hoping that the more we use the non-fiction the more accessible it will become! It can be hard because I myself gravitate more towards fiction. I'm learning to engage all of the learners though. Plus those non-fiction books are expensive! I want kids reading them. Thank you for your comments, Laura!
DeleteWell done reflection post that captures many of the challenges, new insight, successes and most importantly, key learning moving forward. You are so correct to point out the ways that the district teams need to enable, support and provide, so that our communities can grow stronger and have better access. Well done, positive, motivational post that highlights and showcases the learning of the past few modules.
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