9: Internet

From Google, I searched for “international school libraries” (without the quotation marks). Even though my interest area is in the relationship of the school library to instruction, my aim is to work in an international school library. In an international school, the library should play a central role in teaching and learning, functioning as a “window” to the world for a school, an English-medium environment in a non-English-speaking country. Additionally, most of my teaching experience has been in international schools. They are usually vibrant places serving students of a number of different nationalities. The library I envision would be a central point for all members of the school community, including students, teachers, administrators and parents.

After searching Google and (oops!) misspelling the word “international” in my search term, the first hit I received was for the International Association of School Librarianship (IASL). (The results of this "fuzzy search" from Google are above. The "Did you mean...?" feature is very handy in retrieval.) Besides the word “international” in its title, IASL's mission statement was striking. Here it is in its entirety:

The Mission of IASL:
The mission of the International Association of School Librarianship (IASL) is to provide an international forum for those people interested in promoting effective school library media programs as viable instruments in the educational process. IASL also provides guidance and advice for the development of school library programs and the school library profession. IASL works in cooperation with other professional associations and agencies.

Membership is worldwide, and includes school librarians, teachers, librarians, library advisers, consultants, educational administrators, and others who are responsible for library and information services in schools. The membership also includes professors and instructors in universities and colleges where there are programmes for school librarians, and students who are undertaking such programmes.

IASL publishes School Libraries Worldwide, a refereed journal published twice a year. A quick look through its titles showed issues devoted to improving the role of the library in teaching and learning. While the publication may not deal solely with international school libraries, the librarian teaching and living outside of the U.S. would be able to read about libraries around the world and the challenges faced in different areas. The wide range of articles about international contexts does not rule out readership by librarians based in the U.S. Instead, the publication accepts articles about school libraries everywhere.

IASL also has an Advocacy page containing links to International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA), International School Library Day, a host of resources for the school librarian, School Librarians Make a Difference (with different research on school libraries and their role in learning), and, finally, the UNICEF Rights of the Child. By following these links, the international school librarian—or, really, any school librarian—would receive ample information on topics pertinent to working with students and becoming a more active, informed instructional partner.

For a librarian already a member of the American Library Association and perhaps already a subscriber to the School Library Journal, joining IASL would be a perfect way to become more “international.”

8: Research Visuals

Unsure of what a Research Visual/Multimedia for an international school librarian interested in improving student learning would entail, I began my search at Google Images with the search terms “international school libraries” (without quotation marks). The second image on the first page of results was published on a blog. Further research revealed that the image belongs to the Australian School Library Association (ASLA). It is the top image on this page.

The image offers the perfect research visual because it places student learning at the center of a school library’s reason for existence. On the outer part of the circle, the library works in a cyclical manner to assess needs, conceive and deliver programs to address those needs, and evaluates the effectiveness of the programs delivered. As needs change, programs will change. Research in the form of a needs analysis for a particular international community could lead to the implementation of numerous programs, which could then be evaluated for their use and efficacy.

Additionally, the image contains four “tracks” surrounding and influencing the central core constituency of “learners and learning”: teachers and teaching, resourcing the curriculum, developing the physical environment, and providing access to information. Each of these areas offers a myriad of research opportunities. A quick scan of the titles of School Libraries Worldwide or School Library Journal articles and issue themes reveals a great deal of attention paid to these areas.

Copyright information: Australian School Library Association (ASLA), 2004. No further information was provided on the image, nor did the website mention any restrictions regarding the use of the image.

For the second image above, I used the search terms “international school libraries and instruction” (again without quotation marks) on Google Images. On the second page of results was a chart that had accompanied an article in the School Library Journal. Entitled “The SLJ Spending Survey” and written by Marilyn L. Shontz and Lesley S.J. Farmer, the article appeared in the January 1, 2007 issue and provides a snapshot of school libraries based on research conducted in the 2004-2005 academic year.

Pertinent to the digital age, Table 10 is based on research into school library computer use for teaching and learning. This research spurred thinking in two areas: how to assess computer use accurately and how to target certain areas, such as increasing the use of school-provided databases. Assessing computer use could be problematic in that student and teacher self-perceptions of their use of library computers may not correspond to their actual use. Additional instruments would have to be created to harvest more objective data.

As for the difference in the percentages of web searching and using school databases (82% and 39%, respectively), information received here would allow the librarian to begin designing and implementing programs to increase the use of school databases. If we combine this with the four “tracks” mentioned in the discussion of the first image above, it is possible to conclude that a small action research project would involve teachers and teaching, resourcing the curriculum and providing access to information.

Each of these visuals could form research areas for the school librarian, either for conducting his or her own original research or for accessing published research on these topics.

Copyright information:
Shontz, M.L. and Farmer, L.S.J. (January 1, 2007). The SLJ spending survey. School Library Journal. Retrieved March 21, 2009 from http://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/article/CA6403260.html.

7: Image

While searching for the reputable website connected to my interest area (Competency 9: Internet), I found the International Association of School Librarianship (IASL). That was actually the first hit after a search on Google. On its Advocacy page, there was a link to International School Library Day celebrated on the fourth Monday in October each year. Clicking on that link brought up this image.

Interestingly enough, as I researched more about this image through the IASL site and also on Google Images, there were numerous references to October as International School Library Month.

Day or month? Does it matter? Here, the concept matters, a day (or even a month) to celebrate school libraries around the world. In my international school, this celebration could take the form of displays, author visits, book talks, and activities to promote the use of the library as a research center. Since the date comes early in the school year, the library could begin planning for the month early. Having a month-long celebration would allow for a wider variety of activities and events.

With my interest area in influencing instruction through the library, I envision this event and the activities surrounding it as designed to place the library firmly in the minds of all international school constituents: students, teachers, administrators and parents.

As for the image itself, my interpretation is that the strands of different colors represent cultures or library stakeholders in an international school, joined at the center by the school library. That all of the strands “meet” at the center of a book binding could suggest that the library “holds everything together” on campus.

Whatever interpretation the image brings to mind, the key for the international school librarian—or for any librarian, for that matter—is to showcase the library as a partner in instruction to benefit students as well as the entire campus community.

Copyright Information: The International School Library Day logo was designed by Peter Rugendyke for the International Association of School Librarianship (IASL), the holder of the copyright. An exact copyright date was unavailable on the IASL website, although the logo was not used for the first International School Library Day announcement in 1999. It did appear on the 2006 online announcement. However, since there are no announcements after 1999 or before 2006, determining when it first appeared is difficult. The webpage with downloadable copies of the logo was last updated in 2003, so perhaps that provides a clue.

6d: Citation Pearl

Results after searching for the new text...

Descriptors for the new text...

Text found after following descriptors in Citation Pearl...

Database: WorldCat

First, I went to Amazon.com and checked a text I’d cited in Competency 5: Information Power: Building Partnerships for Learning published by the American Association of School Librarians. While there, I noticed that others had bought Assessing Learning: Librarians and Teachers as Partners (2005), by Violet Harada and Joan Yoshina. Since I did not want to use the same book for this competency that I had used before and because the word “partners” appeared in the title, this book fit well.

Then, I went to WorldCat and searched for the new text. One of the index terms on the record was "school librarian participation in curriculum planning," exactly the subject heading for which I’d been searching. (School librarian participation in instruction is, after all, the purpose of this Blog.) With this term, I did two things. First, I clicked on it and received 41 results. Second, I broke it down into two component pieces “school librarian” and “curriculum planning,” which returned 127 results.

On the first page of each set of results (after sorting by date) was a book entitled The Collaboration Handbook by Toni Buzzeo, published by Linworth in 2008. Again, as with the other book, the word “collaboration” appears in the title and “professional relationships” is an additional index term. “Group work in education” is also an index term.

Reflection on the Citation Pearl: Of the four searches, this was perhaps the easiest, primarily because it began with a known entity. When searching, knowing whether a database contains a specific item emerges more quickly than undertaking a blind search. If WorldCat did not have that book, I could have continued entering titles until one was returned. Using the index terms to create new search terms required very little time as well, especially after doing it for the other searches. The link on the index terms discussed previously also simplified the retrieval process. “School librarian participation in curriculum planning” was specific and retrieved generally strong and useful results.

6c: Successive Fractions

Database: Academic Search Complete

I chose the following list of facets, from broadest to most narrow: school library, school library media center, curriculum, instruction. Here are the list of results retrieved:

School library: 141904
School library + school library media center: 468
School library + school library media center + curriculum: 37
School library + school library media center + curriculum + instruction: 6

The most pertinent article retrieved from the list of 37 results was "Creating Partnerships" by Pamela Chesky and Martha Elaine Meyer, published in Knowledge Quest in 2004. This article struck me because it involves librarian education programs and the need to train school librarians to collaborate.

Reflection on Successive Fractions: Getting accustomed to this search took a bit of time, but in the end the results were manageable. On the final page of results, only one article seemed to be pertinent, but it dated from 1983. Therefore, I returned to the third set of results to find my hit for this search strategy. With practice, especially at attempting to think like a database and determine which is general and which is specific, searching with Successive Fractions could be an excellent mechanism for trimming unwanted results quickly. This time around, I did not use search limiters. (The search facets from general to specific accomplished the limiting themselves.) If I had done so earlier in the search, I probably could have retrieved a more relevant list of results. The list after the third facet still had many unwanted items. On the positive side, with only 37 results, it was easy to assess them quickly.

6b: Specific Facet First

Database: Library Literature

With my search terms already organized from my Building Block search, I added "NOT higher education" to my first set to reflect the fact that I did not want to receive results about university or college libraries.

Set 1: school librar* OR school librar* media center OR secondary libr* NOT higher education
Set 2: curriculum OR instruction OR instruct* planning

For my specific facet, I chose "school library media center" because it seemed to be the most specific of the individual facets. (Each was fairly general.) The Library Literature Help page referred to the use of quotation marks as a "bound phrase" search, meaning the whole phrase would be retrieved. As I did on ERIC for the Building Block search, I chose to first search without any search limiters, what Library Literature refers to as "All -Smart Search." Once I did that, I subsequently searched four more times using Keyword, Title, Subject and Abstract as my limiters. Here are the results, without and with limiters:

Without: 323
Keyword: 323
Subject: 2 (without quotation marks)
Title: 257
Abstract: 156

The first item retrieved on the "All-Smart Search" was a result for an article entitled "Guided Inquiry Curriculum and the Role of the School Library Media Center," written by Tom Adamich and Beatrice Gibbons and published in Library & Media in 2008. It places the librarian and school library in a crucial and central role in the teaching and learning process.

Reflection on Specific Facet First: The results were a mixture of useful and irrelevant. Some of them were articles for how libraries could help improve literacy. Others dealt with physically designing and constructing a school library media center. For a basic search, the Specific Facet First returned comparatively fewer results than the Building Block search without any limiters. The challenge here is finding the "most specific facet first." Finding and searching for a facet is simple, but the "most specific"? Was "school library media center" the most specific? This search strategy relies on clarity and (obviously) specifity in identifying the search terms prior to beginning the search. Once the search begins, winnowing the results is a matter of choosing the right combination of search limiters.

6a: Building Block Search

Database: ERIC/EBSCO Host

First, I organized my search terms into three sets:

Set 1: school librar* OR school librar* media center OR secondary libr*
Set 2: curriculum OR instruction OR instruct* planning
Set 3: school librar* OR school librar* media center OR secondary libr* AND curriculum OR instruct* OR instruct* planning

Set 3 is obviously the full "search string" combining Sets 1 & 2. I chose to do this for reasons that should become clear later.

On the ERIC search page, I entered each set into a row and did not try to limit the search at all to subject descriptors, abstracts or titles.

Without any type of search limiters, 2512 results appeared. As I became more adept (or experimental) at searching this way, I decided to apply the following search limiters in an effort to narrow my list of results. I chose not to use "All Text" because that would have given me journal titles in addition to every other appearance of my search terms. I did, however, ask ERIC to sort by relevance as an additional limiter.

Search Limiters:
Subject Descriptors (Sets 1 & 2): 1289 results
Abstracts (Sets 1 & 2): 811
Title (Sets 1 & 2): 51 (becoming more manageable)
Title (Sets 1 & 2) & Abstract (Set 3): 39 (definitely manageable)

The article I retrieved, "Resource Alignment: Providing Curriculum Support in the School Library Media Center" by Karen Lowe, was published in 2001. Its abstract envisions the school librarian as a manager of a library closely tied to instruction.

Reflection on the Building Block: The search was surprisingly easy once the search terms were nailed down. Since I had never truncated before, I was not sure how it would work, but it worked well. Further limiting by date and article type (peer-reviewed, for example, or available as a .pdf file) could have narrowed the list of results even further. Using Row 3 allowed me to fiddle around with the search limiters. Most of the received results in the last group were fairly useful, or they looked that way. Interestingly, one of the results was an article comparing a purely online with a hybrid online/face-to-face delivery method in two LIS programs. This was an indication that perhaps I should have used the Boolean operator NOT. Still, though, the Building Block search combined with search limiters was very effective.

6: Database Searching

Since my interest area is on involving the school library (and librarian) more closely in teaching and learning, my overall Search Problem can be expressed as follows:

• School Library Involvement in Curriculum and Instruction

Component Facets:

• School Library
• Curriculum and Instruction

Terms for Each Facet:

• School library, K-12 library, school library media center, elementary, middle school and secondary school library
• Curriculum, instruction, instructional planning

The first thing I did was to eliminate "k-12 library" and reduce "elementary, middle school and secondary school library" from my terms above in order to eliminate elementary school libraries from consideration. I then added "secondary library" to the terms.

Next, since I wanted my terms to cover "librarians" in addition to "library" and "libraries," I truncated that term as "librar*". Similarly, I did the same for "instruction," turning it into "instruct*". To these, I added the Boolean operators AND and OR.

My search terms thus became: school libr* OR school libr* media center OR secondary school libr* AND curriculum OR instruction OR instruct* planning

At this point, I was ready to use the following search strategies: Building Block, Specific Facet First, Successive Fractions and Citation Pearl.

5: Tagging/Cataloging

Back to basics. My primary interest area is integrating the school library into the curriculum more closely. This week, on LibraryThing, two books surfaced, each of which looked interesting. First, a reference such as The Whole School Library Handbook, a collection of articles on school librarianship edited by Blanche Woolls and David Loertscher, provides an overall background on being a school librarian. According to the review on Amazon.com from the School Library Journal it is a “useful reference tool” with articles by “in-the-trenches school librarians.” A review from Booklist on the same page is a bit negative, saying that literacy-building articles could have been included but still describing the book as a useful reference.

The tag cloud suggests that a limited number of LibraryThing members have read or reviewed this book:

Chapters(1) education(2) irls(1) libraries(1) library(1) non-fiction(2) office(1) Orange County Public Library(1) professional(1) Professional Library(1) school library(1)

The second “Book of the Week” is Information Power: Building Partnerships for Learning published by the American Association of School Librarians. According to the Amazon.com page, the book offers 12 lesson plans on guiding student research and talking with fellow teachers. The review speaks of a student-centered learning program, exactly the type of library I’d like to promote in the future.

Its tag cloud is a bit more extensive, perhaps indicating that the book is more useful for school librarians:

aasl(2) advocacy(1) apt(1) ed(1) education(6) education standards(1) info literacy(1) information literacy(11) information literacy standards.(1) information power(1) information science(1) irls(1) learning(1) lib(1) lib services(1) librarians(1) Librarianship(2) libraries(3) library(6) Library Administration(1) library literacy(1) library media specialist(1) library science(9) library standards(1) library text(1) library textbook(1) lms(3) location-harvey(1) nf(2) non-fiction(11) outstanding school library resource(1) own(1) read(2) reference(3) school(2) School Librarian(1) school library(5) school library media(3) school library media standards(1) school media(2) schoollibraries(1) standards(2) teaching(3) text(1) textbook(3) wishlist(1) work(1)
(1)

The use of tags to "describe" these two books is simultaneously peculiar and instructive. Something like "non-fiction" is not very descriptive for the first book, and it is unclear what "location-harvey" is for the second. Perhaps, to echo the sentiment on this week's Discussion Board, tagging is potentially a useful social networking tool but can be limited if the tags are too obscure or general to help in the information search.

Nevertheless, each book seems to be worth a look, potentially handy references for graduate students and for the practicing school librarian. Sounds like a summer reading project…

4: RSS Feed

Without much background information on how to get an RSS feed, I searched Google with the terms “RSS feeds school library.” On the first page of results, feeds for School Library Journal appeared. Once I figured out how to access the feeds on the School Library Journal site, I found a list of 50 or so topics. Due to its timeliness and connection with our Module 4 learning, I chose the feed for Web 2.0 News. Plus, it’s one area where I have yet to process the technologies and their potential use in a library.

Clicking here, I scrolled through the list of articles (are they called “feeds” too?) and found an interesting title: “We’ve Got the Technology: But Are Today's Schools Ready for a Radical Transformation?” The XML article I read there reminded me of a professional development day at school last year, when our school director showed a video by Sir Ken Robinson called “Do Schools Kill Creativity?” (Just in case, this YouTube link is also posted on my list of websites.)

Anyway, one of Robinson’s points was that we are educating students for an unknown world, and that our focus on “traditional” education may not be what students will need. He suggests that a focus on arts and creativity in general will better prepare students for this uncertain future. If you have yet to see this presentation, and you’re an educator or interested in education, see it now.

How does all this relate to a student in an LIS program? Perhaps it’s a gentle reminder that we need to stay flexible and as up-to-date as we can. We may make mistakes along the way, but flexibility and a willingness to develop libraries and library services in this new world still present an exciting prospect for the future.

If like me you have difficulty opening the link for Sir Ken Robinson’s presentation in Internet Explorer, here’s the link to paste into Mozilla or Safari: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iG9CE55wbtY

3: Podcast

As an English teacher for Grades 7 & 8 and future school librarian, how could I not acknowledge the Isinglass Teen Read Award from the Hopkinton (New Hampshire) Middle and High School? This has what any school librarian or English teacher would want, in that books important to teens end up discussed or excerpted in podcast booktalks. The Isinglass Award originated in Barrington, New Hampshire's Public Library, for which a link has also been provided. Once you enter the BPL site, click on the Teen Zone tab to find the podcasts and more information about this endeavor.

I accessed both the Hopkinton and Barrington sites after finding them through Google with the search terms "school library podcasts." On the Hopkinton site, teachers and librarians seemed to be the primary readers and ones talking about the books.

Four years ago, I began an outside reading program at my school where students set reading goals for the year, usually in the range of 15-20 "extra" books. Researching what other middle schools do for reading, I limited the number to that because students at our school take eight classes and can get bogged down with homework. International schools are busy places for students, with arts, sports, academics and other activities competing for their attention. Therefore, 15-20 seemed to be a realistic number, given the time constraints. (Some schools were "requiring" 30-35.)

In order for students to receive "credit" for a book in my class, they have to write a review of it. If they reach their reading goals, they get a prize at the end of the year. As for the book reviews, since I'm looking for uniformity in style and want similar information on all of the reviews, I give students a format guideline for them.

Over the last four years, I've accumulated five three-ring binders bursting with reviews. (The strange thing is I only keep reviews for the "4- and 5-Star" titles.) Though I have these reviews in my room, easily accessible to my students, they generally go unread. Only the most enthusiastic readers even bother to look at them. Although I have yet to research this with a use study, I suspect the paper format of the review is to blame.

For our school, interested students could easily record their own reviews and post them as podcasts on our library portal (once we create one). This could increase student access to the reviews because they could listen to them on their own. They wouldn't have to wait to come to my room or for me or the librarian to recommend books. Their peers could do it for them, and they could listen to the reviews at their leisure. Other teachers and even parents could do their own podcasts on books for that age group. The possibilities are endless. For storage, we'd have everything available on the Web through the library portal, eliminating the need for paper copies.

Here's a sample podcast, for Runaway by Wendelin van Draanen. Enjoy it...a teacher reads and shares her feelings on the story. Its url is:
http://www.hopkintonschools.org/hhs/library/podcasts/Runaway.mp3

2: Related Blog

For my Related Blog, I selected one by the librarian at the Kodaikanal International School in Kodaikanal, India (Tamil Nadu state, South India). Here's its url: http://kislibrarian.edublogs.org/2008/10/

I had two main reasons for choosing this blog. First, it is by a school librarian in an international school, exactly the context in which I hope to work in the future. (Currently, I teach English in an international school.) Second, the Blog is wide-ranging, as the three entries for October 2008 listed below demonstrate.

Each of these three topics, brainstorming tools, students and reading, and technology in instruction and libraries, shows the eclectic nature of the Blog and the willingness of the KIS librarian to become involved in different areas of the school's curriculum. Another unexpected connection is the bit about Michael Wesch and "The Machine Is Us/ing Us." I just looked at this yesterday.

Brainstorming tools
Friday, October 31st, 2008

Maybe some of you, like myself, like to work with mind maps when brainstorming for something. I used to used this software, Mind Manager, and if you want to try it you can register for a free trial subscription. But I also found a quite nice free softwhere, Free Mind. I tried that out when working on the new library web structure, and it works well enough for me at the moment. Here is the result as it looks now. Will probably change in the future.

What kind of reader are you?
Friday, October 31st, 2008
What Kind of Reader Are You?
Your Result: Dedicated Reader

You are always trying to find the time to get back to your book. You are convinced that the world would be a much better place if only everyone read more.

Literate Good Citizen
Obsessive-Compulsive Bookworm
Book Snob
Fad Reader
Non-Reader
What Kind of Reader Are You?
Quiz Created on GoToQuiz


Brave new classroom 2.0
Wednesday, October 22nd, 2008

I am definitely going to follow this blog forum, Brave new classroom 2.0, over at Britannica.com. There will be debate, posts and comments from both tech-lovers, and those who highly question the importance of technology in the classroom, and those in between.

I found it through Asst Prof. Michael Wesch, whose “an anthropological introduction to YouTube” I would like to show all staff some time. Those of you who came to my repeat session of web applications for web 2.0, have seen his famous video “the machines are us/ing us” already.

My final reason for choosing this Blog is that my wife worked at the Kodaikanal International School just before we met. In 1992, we visited the school and her friends there. It's a beautiful spot, located in a former British hill station.

To find this Blog, I used the GoogleBlog search engine: http://blogsearch.google.com/

1: Blog's Purposes

This blog will serve two related purposes. First, and more immediately, it will serve to fulfill the LS 5013 course requirements, specifically those related to researching aspects of information retrieval in school libraries. Second, it could also serve as an ongoing piece of professional development. After my first course in the TWU program, I collected interesting articles and websites, each of which could be linked to this blog for easy future access. In this sense, the blog could become a handy online resource. Right now, my specific area of interest for school libraries lies in connecting the library more closely to classroom instruction. This would combine my teaching experience with my library learning. While that interest could change, it seems like a solid place to start.