Assignment+6

=Assignment 6 - Final Reflection =

When my copy of the course textbook arrived in the mail in April, it did little to inspire my interest in what I was about to learn. The picture of a woman's back on the cover, the lack of photos and diagrams in the text, and the list of contents screamed, "I'm dry and boring! Keep out!" I'm not sure that I ever really warmed to Bishop, but as I listened to the course podcasts, worked through the recommended readings and, in particular, completed the course assignments, I developed an appreciation for the intricacies of collection development and management. I realized that tasks such as collection evaluation, which I initially assumed would be mundane and robotic, are rather enjoyable intellectual exercises. As the course progressed, I learned more than how to prepare a community analysis or how to weed a collection. In the process of developing those skills, I picked up on some key concepts and trends that will stick with me long after my copy of Bishop works its way from the corner of my desk to the corner of my bookshelf.

One of these take aways is that it is important to be knowledgeable about curriculum. We were lucky enough in this course to be able to focus on a subject and grade area that we're interested in or familiar with. Because I'm comfortable with the Science 10 curriculum, it was relatively easy to determine whether or not a given resource was appropriate. When evaluating, weeding, and selecting new resources for an entire media centre, not just one small section, it is important to have the same amount of knowledge in all of the courses offered at your school. For example, it is difficult to determine if the collection adequately supports students learning about Canada before Confederation if you don't know the time frame studied, or even what grade level it's studied in. Clearly it's not possible, or advisable, for me to try to teach every class in every subject area in the school for enough years to become an expert in the curriculum, but the curriculum documents are all available online to read. I can also talk to department heads and other colleagues on staff to find out what is being taught, as well as how they are using the library with their classes.

A second thing I'll remember from the course is that collection management needs to be a continuous process. For each of the assignments completed, there were tasks involved that could easily become overwhelming if not done regularly. As mentioned above, it is difficult enough to become familiarized with the content of all of the courses offered in a school. As curriculum changes, it is important to keep up-to-date on those changes so that the collection can evolve at the same time. When I completed the analysis of the school and community, I was able to look at past statistics and projections for the future. While some neighbourhoods and schools have more stable populations, others are going through constant changes. In order for the collection to continue to support the current student population, it is necessary to update the community analysis regularly if you're working in a more transient environment. Collection evaluation and weeding also need to be done on a continuous basis. It takes time to accurately and adequately assess the resources existing in a collection. Our school's collection has over 15,000 items. Even if I look through 100 of those each week, it would take three to four years to complete a full assessment. If the task is put off, it becomes even more unmanageable. Selection of new resources should also be done regularly. Although there are likely only a few times per year that I will be putting in orders, it is important to read reviews regularly and keep a list of things that I'd like to order when the time comes. There would be little worse than an administrator telling me that there is $500 available for the purchase of new resources when I have no idea what the collection may need.

The third big idea I'll take away from the course is that all other aspects of media centre management will effect my ability to manage the collection itself. The most obvious one is budget management. As print resources become dated, and new technologies emerge, it is necessary to have money available in the budget to update the collection. It is important to spend wisely and spread available funds over different areas of the collection. If the furniture in the library is looking ratty and in need of replacement, I will have to weigh the costs and benefits of replacing it. Money for furniture takes away from money that could be used to update the collection, but if the library isn't welcoming or comfortable for students to use, they may not come to access the collection anyway. It is also important to maintain positive working relationships with students, staff, and administrators in order to maintain an effective collection. Encouraging students to visit the library helps circulation numbers, which in turn helps justify the existence of the library itself. Talking to students about what they're reading and what their interests are allows me to know what types of materials to add to the collection. Staff members can recommend resources they would like to see added to the collection, and collaborating with them on lessons in the library also increases circulation number. The administrators at my school, in part, control the budget. The more positive impacts the media centre has on student success, the more likely they are to fund the programs being offered. While none of these concepts were directly covered in the class, working through the assignments made me think about how collection management fits into the bigger picture.

A fourth take away of the course may seem like a small one, but will have the biggest immediate impact. When working on the resource selection assignment, I finally had an excuse to sit at my computer for a day and look for digital resources that support Science 10. There were a couple that I was already using, but I found many more that I had never heard of before. This is a course that I've taught many times before and will be teaching again next year, and I was both ashamed and excited by how many excellent resources are out there that I've never integrated into my own teaching. I realized that, both as a teacher and an aspiring teacher-librarian, it is important for me to spend a little time each week familiarizing myself with all of the digital resources that are available. By visiting reliable blogs and library websites, as well as talking to teachers and librarians, I can get some ideas of what's working, and how to use them to serve my own students.

Finally, I learned that other librarians are an invaluable resource in developing, managing, and updating the school library collection. Other school librarians, who may be experts in different instructional fields, can assist in familiarizing myself with curriculum, can recommend resources, make their collections available for interlibrary loans, and share subscriptions to databases, professional journals, and book review journals. Librarians at the local public library, in addition to the services listed above, may also be able to provide data for community analyses. Librarians across Canada, North America, and the world are writing articles and blogs, and posting to online discussion forums. They offer booklists on assorted subjects, review materials, offer advice on how to be an effective weeder, provide instructions on how they undertake a collection evaluation, and make themselves available to questions from those new in the profession. Even though I didn't feel I had enough experience or wisdom to create my own posts on the course discussion forum, the advice from my fellow classmates on tools and strategies they found useful were helpful to me when I was stuck or frustrated. It's exciting to be entering a career where there is such a sense of collegiality and openness.

The job prospects in my current district are not strong for teacher-librarians in secondary schools, but in the next five to ten years, I hope to be able to apply what I've learned in this course to my own school library. I will need to remind myself of the importance of staying up-to-date on changes in the curriculum and school community, collaborating with colleagues, reading reviews and articles in professional journals, and conducting regular assessment and weeding sessions. This will have to be done consciously at first, setting aside time in my weekly schedule for each of these tasks. Over time, I hope that the benefits, in terms of a collection that motivates, inspires, and engages students to learn, will make it all worth it!

Over the last three months, my opinion of collection management and development has evolved from thinking it was the most dry aspect of a teacher-librarian's job, to realizing it is the most important. I feel much more prepared to undertake the tasks involved on a much larger scale, and more capable of running a media centre program based on an effective collection. Because of this course, my list of excellent digital resources has grown, my bookmark folders for book reviews and teacher-librarian blogs are full, and my binder full of notes and articles has a prominent place in my personal library. There's even a little place beside it for my copy of //The Collection Program in Schools//.