At the beginning of ETL401 I had already been to a number of ASLA and ALIA and local network meetings, conferences and training days and I thought that the TL role incorporated the teaching of information literacy skills - preferably collaboratively but any way is better than none - (Davidson, 2005) and library management, including policy writing, budgeting, collection development and curriculum resourcing.
As recommended I started with Topic 6. The need to advocate for the role was a big shock (Weeks, 2009a, blog post, Are we crazy?). I had heard about advocacy before but considered that it was the domain of those very knowledgeable ones in executive positions to which I could never attain. Being so up-front about the necessity of it seems embarrassing. Here I am training for this job but if I don’t learn to negotiate and fight for it, it will probably disappear by the time I’m qualified. As a pacifist by nature and not liking confrontation, I almost gave up there and then! Reading Sanders (2004, ch. 13) on conflict resolution and negotiation was a real turn-off. I tried negotiating with my teenagers in years gone by and while we have all survived I cannot claim to have experienced anything like the win/win scenario eulogized by Reece & Brandt (1993, pp. 355-359 cited in Sanders, p. 129). Lundin (1981) was quite depressing in describing the long hard battle relating to school libraries and the need for appropriate funding and staffing. Although there were many structural positives it felt like there was still too far to go and so in my first draft for Assignment one I wrote:
“Becoming a TL is a bit like climbing Mt. Everest. As you struggle past the frozen bodies of those who’ve tried to scale the heights before, you wonder why you bother, to put yourself through all the pain and frustration, until you hear over the crackling radio the delight of those who’ve reached the summit. Not many really succeed, but we all continue in hope.”
Then came Herring (2007) exhorting us all to be leaders within our schools, taking a pivotal role in developing curriculum. I’m not even a teacher yet – who knows what RBL might be? (Weeks, 2009b, forum post, Resource based learning/Inquiry based learning). Thanks Lyn (Hay, 2009, forum response)! I started to read the forums in an endeavour to gain some insight from the learned ones about these mysterious terms. It was comforting to read that they were confronting lots of new things too! Linda Blake’s (2009, forum post, RBL) post about the challenges to collaboration were of particular interest and helped me to understand the teacher’s perspective on collaboration and RBL – the crowded curriculum and fear of chaos, etc. Then Chaan Wadley (2009, forum post, RBL) on the same day highlighted what real collaborative teaching is – having two teachers in the room to provide better learning through one-on-one interactions. Things were starting to look up – I was learning helpful new things (Pymm, 2007 cited in Weeks, 2009c, blog post, Reflective learning).
I told my boss about the ideals (Weeks, 2009d, blog post, With fear and trepidation) but in my heart I was thinking that it doesn’t matter whether I complete this course of not, I will never have that level of credibility in a school (Weeks, 2009e, blog post, RBL by any other name). Then along came Biskup and the ever present lack of funding and misunderstanding of the role and I could really empathise with Fullan’s (1999, p. 34) “any sense of urgency that teachers have turns to despair as they struggle with the cognitive and emotional dissonance of repeated frustration”. Hazell (1990) and Haycock (2003) rang out ‘we need a paradigm shift and it needs the principal’s support’ but somehow Henri’s (2000b cited in Henri, 2005, p. 12) contention that an information literate school is “a school community that places a high priority (policy, benchmarking, funding, and evaluation) on the pursuit of teacher and student mastery of the processes of becoming informed” relieved the pressure a little. After all, this doesn’t all depend on me – others can share the load if I feed the principal some relevant information which he can use. Then Bruce (1997, p. 34) provided new hope by citing Behrens (1990, p. 357) as saying that “IL gives control over the way one communicates, works and lives – it is a tool for personal empowerment” – that’s something worth fighting for. So while it may require a paradigm shift in my nature – and lots more study and training - I will persevere with these, to me, newly discovered facets of the TL role because nothing gives me greater delight than helping students and teachers to become empowered to learn.
Blake, L. (2009). RBL. [ETL401 Topic 1 – School libraries in Australia Forum posting]. Available from: Saturday, February 28, 11:06 pm.
Bruce, C. (1997). The Seven faces of information literacy. Adelaide, Auslib Press, pp. 20-41.
Davidson, V. (2005). Success, motivation, thinking and self-awareness. Access 19(3), 9-12.
Hay, L. (2009). Resource based learning/Inquiry based learning. [ETL401 Forum posting]. Available from: Tuesday, March 3, 9:30 pm.
Haycock, K. (2003). The crisis in Canada’s school libraries: The case for reform and re-investment. Toronto: Association of Canadian Publishers.
Hazell, A. (1990). School library and information services in Australia. In Promoting learning: challenges in teacher librarianship. Library challenges series: 2. Nimon, M & Hazell, A. (eds.). Adelaide: Auslib Press.
Henri, J. (2005). Understanding the information literate school community. In The Information Literate School Community 2: Issues of Leadership. Henri, J. & Asselin, M. (eds.). Wagga Wagga: Charles Sturt University Centre for Information Studies.
Herring, J. (2007). Teacher librarians and the school library. In Libraries in the twenty-first century: Charting new directions in information services. Ferguson, S. (ed.). Wagga Wagga: Charles Sturt University Centre for Information Studies.
Lundin, R. (1981). School library development in Australia. In School librarianship. Cook, J. (ed.). Sydney: Pergamon.
Sanders, R. (2004). Australian Library Supervision & Management. 2nd ed. Topics in Australasian Library and Information Studies, 21. Wagga Wagga: Charles Sturt University Centre for Information Studies.
Wadley, C. (2009). RBL. [ETL401 Topic 1 – School libraries in Australia Forum posting]. Available from: Saturday, February 28, 11:23 pm.
Weeks, R. (2009a). Are we crazy? [E.A.K. blog post]. Thursday, March 5. Available from: http://expawakno.blogspot.com/2009/03/are-we-crazy.html
Weeks, R. (2009b). Resource based learning/Inquiry based learning. [ETL401 Forum posting]. Available from: Monday, March 2, 9:49 pm.
Weeks, R. (2009c). Reflective learning. [E.A.K. blog post]. Tuesday, March 17. Available from: http://expawakno.blogspot.com/2009/03/reflective-learning.html
Weeks, R. (2009d). With fear and trepidation. [E.A.K. blog post]. Thursday, May 7. Available from: http://expawakno.blogspot.com/2009/05/with-fear-and-trepidation.html
Weeks, R. (2009e). RBL by any other name. [E.A.K. blog post]. Monday, April 20. Available from: http://expawakno.blogspot.com/2009/04/rbl-by-any-other-name.html
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