(BC Teacher: 2006 March) by Kalen Marquis
Einstein stated that, "Imagination is more important than knowledge." This celebrated man of science knew that knowledge—whether acquired as facts or applied as skills—is not nearly as significant as what learners do with it. Einstein, who did his most important thinking visually, trusted the expansive and abundant imaginative process that transforms, transcends, and creates anew. He knew the importance of metaphor.
As a teacher-librarian, the picture I would like to paint is the school library as the ocean, the salt chuck, the sea. In its abundance, it is a marvel of sensory wonder, a book and resource collection that yields many timeless treasures. Whether archetypically "deep, dark, and mysterious" or meek, mild, and shallow, it mirrors the values and sensibilities, the wishes, wants, and dreams of each beholder. With each term’s beginning and ending, with every daily and weekly ripple created by staff and student borrowers, a sea of books and resources rises up, depositing carefully selected words and images in classrooms and in staff and student homes. One book at a time, borrowers literally bring home the school library sea.
In waves of fiction and non-fiction, the school library sea ebbs, pulses, crashes, erodes; it deposits and builds, creating and recreating each school’s cultural and educational heritage, the broadest and best of "old" and "new." From republished classics to the increasingly commercial contemporary, each book, poster, CD, and DVD advances and retreats, riding lunar tides of wind and water, before returning home—very often requiring a teacher-librarian’s replacement or repair.
Whether that teacher-librarian is perceived to be a meticulous seaside groundskeeper, a stealthy lifeguard, a knowledgeable ocean-park interpreter, a remote yet luminary lighthouse keeper, or even a much more fanciful, star-struck storyteller, depends upon the needs and priorities, the values and sensibilities of each school community.
Admittedly, after generations of decline that has left teacher-librarians on duty for just over one day a week in the average Canadian school, it is difficult to imagine a teacher-librarian with the time and resources to respond thoughtfully and lovingly to the minds and hearts of learners.
While current generations of students are trained in the narrow, equidistant lanes of highly chlorinated lap pools, complete with coaches, timers, and scoreboards to put them through their competitive paces, there is a growing call from the wisest, most seafaring families and educators: When will our children return to the more treasure-laden folds of the school library sea? Will we, with warm, daily welcomes and some requisite hand-holding, help children from land-loving families to move beyond smooth-bottomed wading pools and the narrow, directed confines of the lap pool? Will our children have the opportunity to seek the majestically shifting plains of sand and sea where they can venture out, swimming widely, deeply, and joyfully in every direction in the school library sea?
Setting sail in ships marked "Coalition for School Libraries" those bold seafarers know that the tide has been out for several decades and they must navigate in deep, dark, increasingly distant waters with the competing allure of a landlubber’s paradise. Their mission, on a nationwide scale, is to bring back the school library sea.
While teacher-librarians might be lured onto makeshift wharves to await these docking ships, their time is precious. As groundskeepers on litter patrol, lifeguards doing first aid, and interpreters preparing self-guided tours, their time is fragmented. They are distracted from their role as lighthouse keepers who salvage handfuls of fine books from across Canada and around the world—souvenirs of the Renaissance in children’s literature that no longer reaches school library shores.
As star-struck storytellers, they are often unavailable—too harried or hardened from hoping against hope that this year will mark the lowest ebb.
Like those on ships marked "Coalition," they are witness to a generation of seaside learners set loose with modern metal detectors to find treasures of a tinny kind, or lined up for a turn on high-powered hovercraft that skim across barren shores to reach a more distant worldwide sea. These exciting vessels do not come equipped with form-fitting life jackets, all-weather navigation equipment, or the depth sounder of a human mind and heart. They do not, as indeed they cannot, recognize the wisdom in Omar Bradley’s saying, "We need to learn to set our course by the stars, not by the light of each passing ship."
While study after study shows the importance of an abundant library sea with innovative, flexibly scheduled programs provided by an accessible and enthusiastic old salt, few decision-makers champion them. Knowledge, as Einstein knew, is not enough. Imagination—a starry-eyed picture and a lifelong educational vision—is desperately required.
Kalen Marquis is a fanciful, star-struck storyteller at Kanaka Creek Elementary School, Maple Ridge, and editor of Mr. Marquis’ Museletter, kwilville@shaw.ca.
Wednesday, March 1, 2006
Wednesday, February 1, 2006
The graphic novel
(BC Teacher: 2006 January/February) by Darinka Popovic
"I don’t want to read." "Reading is boring!" "There is nothing in the library that I like."
Do you hear this from your students? Unfortunately these are the type of comments drifting through every school library, classrooms, and in many homes. So move away from the traditional novel and try introducing a graphic novel!
Graphic novels are a combination of illustrations and words that are designed to appeal to the reluctant reader or the lover of comic books. Think of the graphic novel as the still version of a video clip with closed captioning.
There are three groupings of graphic novels. Most of us are familiar with the first type, a comic strip that has been compiled into a book. These include titles such as Calvin and Hobbs, Garfield, and Peanuts. Then there is the true graphic novel, a story with a continuous plot, which is supported by graphics and captions. The Pulitzer Prize-winning book Maus: A Survivor’s Tale by Art Spiegelman, which relates to the Holocaust, brought the graphic novel into the mainstream in 1991. The third format is the Japanese manga style of graphic novel, which is read from right to left. There are thousands of manga titles, often featuring a superhero.
Graphic novels are both educational and fun, but they can be very complex to decode. It is important that the reader take the time to look, absorb the images and then read the words that are presented. Children must read the words, and through the sequential artwork decode the meaning behind the illustrations and special effects such as the word bubbles. Illustrations can be colourful or are produced in black and white. The visual stimulation creates a situation where the reader must focus on the page to decode the necessary information. If a child or adult is having difficulty focusing on the coloured graphics try a novel that has black and white illustrations.
Teachers are able to use the graphic novel to encourage reading and writing in the school. You are able to use the graphic novel to teach literary techniques, create writing assignments and build bridges to the classic novel. For the child who desperately wants to read The Hobbit but is daunted by the length and readability, the graphic novel version opens a new world.
Though titles may be limited, there are graphic novels for every age group. For the younger child check out the books by Raymond Briggs such as The Snowman, Father Christmas or Ug: Boy Genius of the Stone Age. The Comic Adventures of Boots by Satoshi Kitamura and Little Buggy by Kevin O’Malley will appeal to children aged five and up.
The following titles will appeal to children ages nine and up: the Bone series by Jeff Smith, the Ultimate Spider-Man series by Brian Michael Bendis, the Akiko series by Mark Crilley, and Leave It to Chance by James Robinson. Delight the girls in your household with Jimmy Gownley’s Amelia Rules!, Amy Unbounded: Belondweg Blossoming by Rachel Hartman, and WJHC: on the air by Jane Smith Fisher.
If you want your child to delight in the joy of the classics then turn to copies of The Hobbit, Wind in the Willows, or The Adventures of Robin Hood.
For the older student check out the following titles: The Hobbit by David Wenzel, The Tale of One Bad Rat by Bryan Talbot, The amazing true story of a teenage single mom by Katherine Arnoldi, Persepolis 1 & 2 by Marjane Satrapi, Meridian 1 & 2 by Barbara Kesel, Promethea I & 2 by Jeromy Cox, The Books of Magic by Neil Gaiman, and Ghost World by Daniel Clowes.
The world of non-fiction is also available in a graphic novel format. A couple of examples included Jay Hosler’s, Clan Apis that tells about the world of bees or the biography by Raymond Brigg’s parents, Ethel and Ernest: a True Story.
Visit your teacher-librarian to see the wide array of product available for students of all ages. Graphic novels are available in a wide variety of genres such as science fiction, fantasy, historical, science, superheroes, and social studies. As you browse through the collection you need to be aware that not all graphic novels are suitable for the younger reader. Most graphic novels produced are geared for teenagers and adults. The material may be excessively violent, language may not be appropriate, and some books have an adult content. To assist the public, some publishers have a ranking system that is listed on some of the books. Age suitability may be listed but be aware, that there is no standardized method of rating material.
Looking for information on the web for children’s graphic novels? There is a site specific for the review these materials is called Sidekicks (for the younger reader) and No Flying No Tights (for the teen reader) at http://sidekicks.noflyingnotights.com/core.html.
Remember, the best way to raise literacy, is to expose your students to the wide variety of materials available. Have them read whatever interests them. Graphic novels might just do the trick!
Darinka Popovic is a teacher-librarian at Rock Heights Middle School, Victoria.
"I don’t want to read." "Reading is boring!" "There is nothing in the library that I like."
Do you hear this from your students? Unfortunately these are the type of comments drifting through every school library, classrooms, and in many homes. So move away from the traditional novel and try introducing a graphic novel!
Graphic novels are a combination of illustrations and words that are designed to appeal to the reluctant reader or the lover of comic books. Think of the graphic novel as the still version of a video clip with closed captioning.
There are three groupings of graphic novels. Most of us are familiar with the first type, a comic strip that has been compiled into a book. These include titles such as Calvin and Hobbs, Garfield, and Peanuts. Then there is the true graphic novel, a story with a continuous plot, which is supported by graphics and captions. The Pulitzer Prize-winning book Maus: A Survivor’s Tale by Art Spiegelman, which relates to the Holocaust, brought the graphic novel into the mainstream in 1991. The third format is the Japanese manga style of graphic novel, which is read from right to left. There are thousands of manga titles, often featuring a superhero.
Graphic novels are both educational and fun, but they can be very complex to decode. It is important that the reader take the time to look, absorb the images and then read the words that are presented. Children must read the words, and through the sequential artwork decode the meaning behind the illustrations and special effects such as the word bubbles. Illustrations can be colourful or are produced in black and white. The visual stimulation creates a situation where the reader must focus on the page to decode the necessary information. If a child or adult is having difficulty focusing on the coloured graphics try a novel that has black and white illustrations.
Teachers are able to use the graphic novel to encourage reading and writing in the school. You are able to use the graphic novel to teach literary techniques, create writing assignments and build bridges to the classic novel. For the child who desperately wants to read The Hobbit but is daunted by the length and readability, the graphic novel version opens a new world.
Though titles may be limited, there are graphic novels for every age group. For the younger child check out the books by Raymond Briggs such as The Snowman, Father Christmas or Ug: Boy Genius of the Stone Age. The Comic Adventures of Boots by Satoshi Kitamura and Little Buggy by Kevin O’Malley will appeal to children aged five and up.
The following titles will appeal to children ages nine and up: the Bone series by Jeff Smith, the Ultimate Spider-Man series by Brian Michael Bendis, the Akiko series by Mark Crilley, and Leave It to Chance by James Robinson. Delight the girls in your household with Jimmy Gownley’s Amelia Rules!, Amy Unbounded: Belondweg Blossoming by Rachel Hartman, and WJHC: on the air by Jane Smith Fisher.
If you want your child to delight in the joy of the classics then turn to copies of The Hobbit, Wind in the Willows, or The Adventures of Robin Hood.
For the older student check out the following titles: The Hobbit by David Wenzel, The Tale of One Bad Rat by Bryan Talbot, The amazing true story of a teenage single mom by Katherine Arnoldi, Persepolis 1 & 2 by Marjane Satrapi, Meridian 1 & 2 by Barbara Kesel, Promethea I & 2 by Jeromy Cox, The Books of Magic by Neil Gaiman, and Ghost World by Daniel Clowes.
The world of non-fiction is also available in a graphic novel format. A couple of examples included Jay Hosler’s, Clan Apis that tells about the world of bees or the biography by Raymond Brigg’s parents, Ethel and Ernest: a True Story.
Visit your teacher-librarian to see the wide array of product available for students of all ages. Graphic novels are available in a wide variety of genres such as science fiction, fantasy, historical, science, superheroes, and social studies. As you browse through the collection you need to be aware that not all graphic novels are suitable for the younger reader. Most graphic novels produced are geared for teenagers and adults. The material may be excessively violent, language may not be appropriate, and some books have an adult content. To assist the public, some publishers have a ranking system that is listed on some of the books. Age suitability may be listed but be aware, that there is no standardized method of rating material.
Looking for information on the web for children’s graphic novels? There is a site specific for the review these materials is called Sidekicks (for the younger reader) and No Flying No Tights (for the teen reader) at http://sidekicks.noflyingnotights.com/core.html.
Remember, the best way to raise literacy, is to expose your students to the wide variety of materials available. Have them read whatever interests them. Graphic novels might just do the trick!
Darinka Popovic is a teacher-librarian at Rock Heights Middle School, Victoria.
Thursday, September 1, 2005
Put a teacher-librarian on your team
(BC Teacher: 2005 September) by Karen Lindsay
All over the world, companies are reaping the benefits of collaborative effort. Automobiles are created by teams and job interviews are done in collaborative group settings. Can’t make it as a team player? You won’t get into McMaster’s School of Medicine. It’s not just a fad; it’s a recognition that results improve where many minds, skills, and perspectives are brought to bear. Shared responsibility improves performance, unleashes creativity, and broadens skills while reducing stress and building relationships.
Teaching, especially at the secondary school level, has not embraced this concept. Teachers spend much of their day planning, delivering, and assessing lessons in isolation. It is not unusual for a beginning secondary teacher to enter the profession facing four different lesson preparations per day, difficult classes, and five months of teaching without a preparation block!
There is no opportunity to observe more experienced teachers, and no time to work collaboratively with anyone. Over time, we become inured to, proud of, and perhaps even happy with our isolation. However, it is not the healthiest, most productive approach to teaching students.
Enter the teacher-librarian. Here is the one person on staff whose prime function is to support teachers in unit planning and lesson delivery. Teacher-librarians are committed to collaboration.
We work best when we work closely with individual teachers in the critical areas of designing authentic learning tasks and integrating the research and technological pieces required by various IRPs. Did you know that next to socio-economic issues, the single greatest factor affecting student achievement is the school library? Research undertaken and replicated over the past 60 years indicates that students whose teacher-librarians take active planning and teaching roles tend to achieve significantly higher test scores. In schools where teachers and teacher-librarians work together to plan, implement, and evaluate lessons and units of study, student results improve by between 5 and 20%. No teacher would wittingly deprive their students this opportunity for improvement, but for it to occur, classroom teachers need to make teacher-librarians a part of their planning, teaching, and evaluation routine.
No one needs to tell you that the demands of teaching are constantly increasing. Our students have so many more needs, and need so many more skills than they once did to be successful.
Curricular change seems like the only constant along with increasing class sizes. Nevertheless, it is important that students receive research assignments that teach them how to locate, evaluate, and use today’s information, both in school and beyond. No one person can be expected to have the experience, knowledge, and time to teach information literacy and technology skills, while continuing to teach the child, and the curriculum. Teaching in today’s school demands a team approach. Lean on your teacher-librarian.
During the planning of a unit, your teacher-librarian will focus on incorporating challenges that will call upon students to access, evaluate, and use information from multiple sources in order to learn to think, and to create and apply new knowledge. Intelligent decision-making relies on accurate and complete information. Through their collaboration, teachers and teacher-librarians, can provide students with specific opportunities to develop skills in information literacy and information technology, skills that they will need more and more both in school and outside its walls.
Co-planned lessons generally do not rely on textbooks, preferring to teach students how to locate and use resources that will meet the needs of the task. Frequently the products of a co-planned lesson might be PowerPoint presentations, mock trials, virtual seminars, or poster sessions, rather than pen and paper activities. Teacher-librarians often take responsibility for assessing the students’ process through the unit, as well as marking their reference list/bibliography.
Karen Lindsay is the teacher-librarian at L’École Secondaire Reynolds Secondary School, Victoria
All over the world, companies are reaping the benefits of collaborative effort. Automobiles are created by teams and job interviews are done in collaborative group settings. Can’t make it as a team player? You won’t get into McMaster’s School of Medicine. It’s not just a fad; it’s a recognition that results improve where many minds, skills, and perspectives are brought to bear. Shared responsibility improves performance, unleashes creativity, and broadens skills while reducing stress and building relationships.
Teaching, especially at the secondary school level, has not embraced this concept. Teachers spend much of their day planning, delivering, and assessing lessons in isolation. It is not unusual for a beginning secondary teacher to enter the profession facing four different lesson preparations per day, difficult classes, and five months of teaching without a preparation block!
There is no opportunity to observe more experienced teachers, and no time to work collaboratively with anyone. Over time, we become inured to, proud of, and perhaps even happy with our isolation. However, it is not the healthiest, most productive approach to teaching students.
Enter the teacher-librarian. Here is the one person on staff whose prime function is to support teachers in unit planning and lesson delivery. Teacher-librarians are committed to collaboration.
We work best when we work closely with individual teachers in the critical areas of designing authentic learning tasks and integrating the research and technological pieces required by various IRPs. Did you know that next to socio-economic issues, the single greatest factor affecting student achievement is the school library? Research undertaken and replicated over the past 60 years indicates that students whose teacher-librarians take active planning and teaching roles tend to achieve significantly higher test scores. In schools where teachers and teacher-librarians work together to plan, implement, and evaluate lessons and units of study, student results improve by between 5 and 20%. No teacher would wittingly deprive their students this opportunity for improvement, but for it to occur, classroom teachers need to make teacher-librarians a part of their planning, teaching, and evaluation routine.
No one needs to tell you that the demands of teaching are constantly increasing. Our students have so many more needs, and need so many more skills than they once did to be successful.
Curricular change seems like the only constant along with increasing class sizes. Nevertheless, it is important that students receive research assignments that teach them how to locate, evaluate, and use today’s information, both in school and beyond. No one person can be expected to have the experience, knowledge, and time to teach information literacy and technology skills, while continuing to teach the child, and the curriculum. Teaching in today’s school demands a team approach. Lean on your teacher-librarian.
During the planning of a unit, your teacher-librarian will focus on incorporating challenges that will call upon students to access, evaluate, and use information from multiple sources in order to learn to think, and to create and apply new knowledge. Intelligent decision-making relies on accurate and complete information. Through their collaboration, teachers and teacher-librarians, can provide students with specific opportunities to develop skills in information literacy and information technology, skills that they will need more and more both in school and outside its walls.
Co-planned lessons generally do not rely on textbooks, preferring to teach students how to locate and use resources that will meet the needs of the task. Frequently the products of a co-planned lesson might be PowerPoint presentations, mock trials, virtual seminars, or poster sessions, rather than pen and paper activities. Teacher-librarians often take responsibility for assessing the students’ process through the unit, as well as marking their reference list/bibliography.
What to bring to a collaborative planning session:
- A unit you’ve already taught or an idea for a new unit.
- Your expert knowledge of the curriculum and your students.
- An open mind.
What the teacher-librarian might teach, using a task that requires critical thinking and problem solving:
- How to formulate critical questions to guide the research process.
- How to select the most appropriate resources to accomplish a given task.
- How to search the library’s catalogue and locate resources in the library.
- What a database is and how to use it.
- How to search the Internet effectively.
- How to check web sites for reliability.
- How to use information ethically.
- How to take notes and track sources effectively.
- How to use process management tools for assigning responsibilities, tracking tasks, and setting deadlines.
- How to organize, integrate, and present findings in effective ways.
If your school does not have a fully trained teacher-librarian, ask your principal why. If your teacher-librarian’s time is largely taken up providing preparation time and supervising book exchanges so that collaborative planning and teaching become impossible, ask your principal why. If information literacy skills are not fully integrated into your curriculum, if you and your teacher-librarian are not equal partners who plan, deliver, and assess work together, figure out why and do what you can to change that. Every school deserves an effective library program.
For most of the Western world, January heralds the New Year. Not so for teachers. September is our time for new beginnings and resolutions. This year, why not make one of them to plan at least one unit with your teacher-librarian?
Karen Lindsay is the teacher-librarian at L’École Secondaire Reynolds Secondary School, Victoria
Wednesday, June 1, 2005
Whither literacy?
(BC Teacher: 2005 May/June) by Maureen L. MacDonald
I chased my dream to be an elementary music teacher, and it was good. But when I taught from 1969 to 1971 in a school with a marvelous library program and a dynamic teacher-librarian named Doris Fuller, I knew that I would make a change. I quit my job and returned to UBC to take a year in teacher-librarianship, and I have never regretted that decision.
When I was first a teacher-librarian, times were exciting for school libraries. Budgets were sufficient to allow the purchase of many new books each year—perhaps two or three per student. Walls were knocked down so that the one-room libraries could expand to the size of two or three classrooms to meet the demand for shelf and student space. Collections expanded to include more than books. Teacher-librarians practiced Co-operative Program Planning and Teaching (CPPT) with colleagues. Students borrowed books and tapes and, in my school, stuffed animals to read to.
The point of the library program always was, and still is, to enhance literacy. Long before the days of mission statements and school growth plans it was understood that literacy was our goal. No one said "improve literacy" and "slash the staffing and materials budgets" in the same breath. Not until just after the provincial election of 2001.
Is it any wonder that the members of the educational community are scratching their heads in amazement at the ridiculousness of the juxtaposition of the partial closure of libraries and the admonishment to keep up high standards? Scholars, parents, teachers, students, newspaper columnists, and members of the public fail to see any logic in the plan of the Gordon Campbell-led provincial government to underfund the public education system. Perhaps the benefit of this plan is only seen by the operators of private, for-profit schools that advertise to attract well-off students to their big libraries and their small classes.
BCTF members have dealt with the library crisis in a variety of ways—endless fundraising activities to stock the libraries, calling on volunteers to pitch in where there used to be staff, relying more on student monitors. Why do we try to fill the gaps left by deliberate underfunding? You know why! We don’t want the students to lose any opportunities to learn. We add to our own workloads until we can stand no more.
The breaking point for teachers has come. We cannot do more with less. We cannot even do the same with less. We can only do less with less.
Let’s stop covering up for the deficiencies in the system. Let’s let the public and the school community have a taste of reality. How will they know if we don’t show them? Wouldn’t a knowledgeable public want to see the restoration of the library programs cut by the Liberal government since 2001?
Literacy is the cornerstone of democracy. Our urgent and immediate job as teachers in this democratic society is to protect literacy. One way to do this is to recognize the changing social and economic conditions in society and to reflect that in public school libraries. In other words, provide students with well-stocked libraries staffed by professional teacher-librarians and learning will ensue. That, my friends, is common sense.
When I see the school library in the big picture, I notice that the outline has been erased and the image is getting smaller. Multiply this times a thousand schools. The picture is not pretty.
The stripping of teachers’ bargaining rights, the elimination of class-size and class-composition clauses from our collective agreement, the mockery of assuming that libraries can run without teacher-librarians, and the slashing of budgets for staff and materials was highly detrimental to the learning conditions of our students. Success is not achieved by supplying fewer resources.
We have a different set of MLAs to educate now. Let’s tell them what a good library program would do to enhance literacy. It is false economy to reduce educational opportunities because today’s students are the most valuable assets of our future.
Maureen MacDonald is a teacher-librarian at Elsie Roy Elementary School, Vancouver.
I chased my dream to be an elementary music teacher, and it was good. But when I taught from 1969 to 1971 in a school with a marvelous library program and a dynamic teacher-librarian named Doris Fuller, I knew that I would make a change. I quit my job and returned to UBC to take a year in teacher-librarianship, and I have never regretted that decision.
When I was first a teacher-librarian, times were exciting for school libraries. Budgets were sufficient to allow the purchase of many new books each year—perhaps two or three per student. Walls were knocked down so that the one-room libraries could expand to the size of two or three classrooms to meet the demand for shelf and student space. Collections expanded to include more than books. Teacher-librarians practiced Co-operative Program Planning and Teaching (CPPT) with colleagues. Students borrowed books and tapes and, in my school, stuffed animals to read to.
The point of the library program always was, and still is, to enhance literacy. Long before the days of mission statements and school growth plans it was understood that literacy was our goal. No one said "improve literacy" and "slash the staffing and materials budgets" in the same breath. Not until just after the provincial election of 2001.
Is it any wonder that the members of the educational community are scratching their heads in amazement at the ridiculousness of the juxtaposition of the partial closure of libraries and the admonishment to keep up high standards? Scholars, parents, teachers, students, newspaper columnists, and members of the public fail to see any logic in the plan of the Gordon Campbell-led provincial government to underfund the public education system. Perhaps the benefit of this plan is only seen by the operators of private, for-profit schools that advertise to attract well-off students to their big libraries and their small classes.
BCTF members have dealt with the library crisis in a variety of ways—endless fundraising activities to stock the libraries, calling on volunteers to pitch in where there used to be staff, relying more on student monitors. Why do we try to fill the gaps left by deliberate underfunding? You know why! We don’t want the students to lose any opportunities to learn. We add to our own workloads until we can stand no more.
The breaking point for teachers has come. We cannot do more with less. We cannot even do the same with less. We can only do less with less.
Let’s stop covering up for the deficiencies in the system. Let’s let the public and the school community have a taste of reality. How will they know if we don’t show them? Wouldn’t a knowledgeable public want to see the restoration of the library programs cut by the Liberal government since 2001?
Literacy is the cornerstone of democracy. Our urgent and immediate job as teachers in this democratic society is to protect literacy. One way to do this is to recognize the changing social and economic conditions in society and to reflect that in public school libraries. In other words, provide students with well-stocked libraries staffed by professional teacher-librarians and learning will ensue. That, my friends, is common sense.
When I see the school library in the big picture, I notice that the outline has been erased and the image is getting smaller. Multiply this times a thousand schools. The picture is not pretty.
The stripping of teachers’ bargaining rights, the elimination of class-size and class-composition clauses from our collective agreement, the mockery of assuming that libraries can run without teacher-librarians, and the slashing of budgets for staff and materials was highly detrimental to the learning conditions of our students. Success is not achieved by supplying fewer resources.
We have a different set of MLAs to educate now. Let’s tell them what a good library program would do to enhance literacy. It is false economy to reduce educational opportunities because today’s students are the most valuable assets of our future.
Maureen MacDonald is a teacher-librarian at Elsie Roy Elementary School, Vancouver.
Tuesday, February 1, 2005
Is it a library or a bookstore?
(BC Teacher: 2005 January/February) by Chris Bocking
My elementary school library has been closed for almost a week. Why? Well, a huge transnational corporation based in the United States has been using it as a profit centre. Yes, Scholastic Corporation has set up its books, pencils, stickers, and posters in attractive displays, and the students have been encouraged to bring money to school to support this "book" event.
Teachers who see Scholastic as a benign presence like being able to purchase books and stickers for their students. They argue that book sales raise money for the library. I suggest that these reasons are insufficient and that teachers should not support commercialism in the public school system.
Richard Robinson, who is not only chair, but also president and CEO of Scholastic Corporation, says on his company’s web site that his company is "dedicated to helping children around the world to read and learn." How noble.
That mammoth company had revenues of $2.23 billion in 2004. Elsewhere on the web site, we learn that the good people at Scholastic are "helping children learn, grow and be happy."
Staggering profits could not be achieved without willing support and tireless efforts of the teachers who volunteer tens of thousands of hours promoting Scholastic’s products to their students, collecting the forms, filling out papers, supervising book sales, and so on.
Scholastic is excited about the Internet’s possibilities for bringing future growth. In May of 2004 alone, Scholastic’s teacher web site had 1.26 million unique visitors. I have heard from teachers about the ease of ordering products online or using Scholastic’s phone service.
Does anybody still want to consider the library the heart of a school? Closing it down and turning it into a private, for-profit book and junk-item store to raise money is wrong. That should not happen. And teachers’ time could be spent in better ways than padding the profits of the largest book company on the planet.
For information on the upcoming Public Education Not For Sale II conference, February 18–19, 2005, go to http://bctf.ca/notforsale/PrivatizationConference.
Chris Bocking teaches at Keating Elementary School, Saanich.
My elementary school library has been closed for almost a week. Why? Well, a huge transnational corporation based in the United States has been using it as a profit centre. Yes, Scholastic Corporation has set up its books, pencils, stickers, and posters in attractive displays, and the students have been encouraged to bring money to school to support this "book" event.
Teachers who see Scholastic as a benign presence like being able to purchase books and stickers for their students. They argue that book sales raise money for the library. I suggest that these reasons are insufficient and that teachers should not support commercialism in the public school system.
Richard Robinson, who is not only chair, but also president and CEO of Scholastic Corporation, says on his company’s web site that his company is "dedicated to helping children around the world to read and learn." How noble.
That mammoth company had revenues of $2.23 billion in 2004. Elsewhere on the web site, we learn that the good people at Scholastic are "helping children learn, grow and be happy."
Staggering profits could not be achieved without willing support and tireless efforts of the teachers who volunteer tens of thousands of hours promoting Scholastic’s products to their students, collecting the forms, filling out papers, supervising book sales, and so on.
Scholastic is excited about the Internet’s possibilities for bringing future growth. In May of 2004 alone, Scholastic’s teacher web site had 1.26 million unique visitors. I have heard from teachers about the ease of ordering products online or using Scholastic’s phone service.
Does anybody still want to consider the library the heart of a school? Closing it down and turning it into a private, for-profit book and junk-item store to raise money is wrong. That should not happen. And teachers’ time could be spent in better ways than padding the profits of the largest book company on the planet.
For information on the upcoming Public Education Not For Sale II conference, February 18–19, 2005, go to http://bctf.ca/notforsale/PrivatizationConference.
Chris Bocking teaches at Keating Elementary School, Saanich.
Wednesday, December 1, 2004
But I changed the words around! Preventing cheating and plagiarism in the classroom
(BC Teacher: 2004 November/December) by Diane Gallagher-Hayashi
You have handed out a math test to your class. You have arranged the desks to make copying difficult. You watch the class closely. A boy in the back row catches your eye. You stand up, stretch, and wander around the room. You can see nothing wrong in what he is doing, so you go back to your desk. He keeps checking his watch, but you figure he is just nervous about getting the test done on time. When you mark the test, you find that he has done all the questions correctly. Obviously he knew his stuff—you were worried for nothing. Or were you?
Changes in technology outstrip our abilities to keep up. Perhaps the boy in the math class really did know his stuff and passed the test fairly. Or perhaps he had downloaded all the formulas into his digital watch. Sound outlandish? Not according to Ann Lathrop and Kathleen Foss, who wrote Student Cheating and Plagiarism in the Internet Era. "Students today enjoy the challenge of discovering what they can accomplish with each new high-tech toy. Unfortunately, many are quick to see the possibilities of using the new technologies to cheat on tests and homework." (Lathrop et al., p. 10). Hand-held computers and programmable calculators can store and send information and questions to other devices (and other students) outside the classrooms. Pagers and cell phones can be set on vibrate, and text messages can be sent quietly to students writing tests. Access to the Internet has changed student research. The Internet has become a valuable tool for students, but it has also become a supermarket of term papers for students who wish to cheat.
The problem is not just accessibility to tools allowing students to cheat and plagiarize. Attitudes about cheating have changed too. Studies on student cheating show a marked increase in frequency and tolerance. A 1998 study of the academically top 5% of American students showed that 80% cheated (Lathrop et al., p. 30). Another 1998 study by the Josephson Institute of Ethics surveyed over 20,000 middle- and high-school students and found that 70% of them had cheated within the past year (Lathrop et al., p. 31). More disturbing is the change in attitude. Schab’s longitudinal study on cheating showed that in 1969, only 34% said yes when asked if they had ever cheated on a test; whereas in 1989 a full 68% said yes. In 1969, when asked if they agreed with the phrase, Honesty is the best policy, 82% said yes, but in 1989 only 60% said yes. For many students today, the issue is not, Should I cheat or not? but How can I avoid getting caught when I cheat? (Lathrop et al., p. 30).
The change in attitude and the increased access to technology that will allow students to cheat has teachers trying to create situations that make cheating and plagiarism difficult AND policing students’ assignments after they are done. Classroom teachers are not alone in their battle against plagiarism. Every school with a teacher-librarian has a ready-made expert in research. Giving assignments that are generic or using the same assignment year after year invites plagiarism and cheating. Trained and experienced, the teacher-librarian can help develop research units and assignments that are difficult to plagiarize. Compare these two assignments: 1) Describe Hamlet’s state of mind just before his death. 2) You are Hamlet’s psychiatrist. Write an entry in his file for the day before his death.
Both assignments would have the same criteria. A paper matching the first assignment would be very easy to find on the Internet. A paper matching the second assignment would be much more difficult to find.
The teacher-librarian can help the classroom teacher when a suspicious paper has been submitted. The teacher-librarian has an arsenal of tactics that can help find papers that have been plagiarized. The simplest is to take a doubtful line from the assignment and search for that line, enclosed in quotation marks, in a search engine such as Google, Yahoo, or Dogpile. If the student could find the assignment on the Internet, so can the teacher-librarian or the classroom teacher.
Working with the teacher-librarian to teach students good research and note-taking skills, and to require students to follow every step of the Ministry of Education’s Research Quest when they research will make plagiarism difficult and unnecessary. To become lifelong learners, students must know where to find information, how to evaluate and use that information, and how to evaluate their research performance. Once students become comfortable with this process, the temptation to plagiarize will be much less.
Diane Gallagher-Hayashi is a teacher-librarian at Stelly’s Secondary School, Saanich.
Resources Lathrop, Ann, and Kathleen Foss. Student cheating and plagiarism in the Internet era: A wake-up call. Englewood: Libraries Unlimited, 2000
You have handed out a math test to your class. You have arranged the desks to make copying difficult. You watch the class closely. A boy in the back row catches your eye. You stand up, stretch, and wander around the room. You can see nothing wrong in what he is doing, so you go back to your desk. He keeps checking his watch, but you figure he is just nervous about getting the test done on time. When you mark the test, you find that he has done all the questions correctly. Obviously he knew his stuff—you were worried for nothing. Or were you?
Changes in technology outstrip our abilities to keep up. Perhaps the boy in the math class really did know his stuff and passed the test fairly. Or perhaps he had downloaded all the formulas into his digital watch. Sound outlandish? Not according to Ann Lathrop and Kathleen Foss, who wrote Student Cheating and Plagiarism in the Internet Era. "Students today enjoy the challenge of discovering what they can accomplish with each new high-tech toy. Unfortunately, many are quick to see the possibilities of using the new technologies to cheat on tests and homework." (Lathrop et al., p. 10). Hand-held computers and programmable calculators can store and send information and questions to other devices (and other students) outside the classrooms. Pagers and cell phones can be set on vibrate, and text messages can be sent quietly to students writing tests. Access to the Internet has changed student research. The Internet has become a valuable tool for students, but it has also become a supermarket of term papers for students who wish to cheat.
The problem is not just accessibility to tools allowing students to cheat and plagiarize. Attitudes about cheating have changed too. Studies on student cheating show a marked increase in frequency and tolerance. A 1998 study of the academically top 5% of American students showed that 80% cheated (Lathrop et al., p. 30). Another 1998 study by the Josephson Institute of Ethics surveyed over 20,000 middle- and high-school students and found that 70% of them had cheated within the past year (Lathrop et al., p. 31). More disturbing is the change in attitude. Schab’s longitudinal study on cheating showed that in 1969, only 34% said yes when asked if they had ever cheated on a test; whereas in 1989 a full 68% said yes. In 1969, when asked if they agreed with the phrase, Honesty is the best policy, 82% said yes, but in 1989 only 60% said yes. For many students today, the issue is not, Should I cheat or not? but How can I avoid getting caught when I cheat? (Lathrop et al., p. 30).
The change in attitude and the increased access to technology that will allow students to cheat has teachers trying to create situations that make cheating and plagiarism difficult AND policing students’ assignments after they are done. Classroom teachers are not alone in their battle against plagiarism. Every school with a teacher-librarian has a ready-made expert in research. Giving assignments that are generic or using the same assignment year after year invites plagiarism and cheating. Trained and experienced, the teacher-librarian can help develop research units and assignments that are difficult to plagiarize. Compare these two assignments: 1) Describe Hamlet’s state of mind just before his death. 2) You are Hamlet’s psychiatrist. Write an entry in his file for the day before his death.
Both assignments would have the same criteria. A paper matching the first assignment would be very easy to find on the Internet. A paper matching the second assignment would be much more difficult to find.
The teacher-librarian can help the classroom teacher when a suspicious paper has been submitted. The teacher-librarian has an arsenal of tactics that can help find papers that have been plagiarized. The simplest is to take a doubtful line from the assignment and search for that line, enclosed in quotation marks, in a search engine such as Google, Yahoo, or Dogpile. If the student could find the assignment on the Internet, so can the teacher-librarian or the classroom teacher.
Working with the teacher-librarian to teach students good research and note-taking skills, and to require students to follow every step of the Ministry of Education’s Research Quest when they research will make plagiarism difficult and unnecessary. To become lifelong learners, students must know where to find information, how to evaluate and use that information, and how to evaluate their research performance. Once students become comfortable with this process, the temptation to plagiarize will be much less.
Diane Gallagher-Hayashi is a teacher-librarian at Stelly’s Secondary School, Saanich.
Resources Lathrop, Ann, and Kathleen Foss. Student cheating and plagiarism in the Internet era: A wake-up call. Englewood: Libraries Unlimited, 2000
Friday, October 1, 2004
You and your teacher-librarian
(BC Teacher: 2004 October) by Lynn Turner
Are you looking for new ways to interest your students in reading? Would you like some unique resources for your classroom? Do you want to include research or enrichment in the curriculum? Are you looking for a different way of presenting information?
Your teacher-librarian can help.
Teacher-librarians are aware of the importance of free voluntary—recreational—reading and its role in the development of reading skills from Kindergarten through Grade 12. To that end, teacher-librarians can help students with their choice of library books--with appropriate reading levels, with favourite genres or authors, or perhaps with bibliotherapy.
Your teacher-librarian is your partner in promoting reading at all grade levels. While you are working on an individual basis with students, the teacher-librarian’s approach encompasses groups, classes, and frequently the entire school. Throughout the school year, teacher-librarians engage in a variety of activities, all with the goal of promoting reading, of encouraging students to become aware of and interested in books. From the most basic of promotions, such as bulletin boards and new book displays, to organization and implementation of long-term reading programs, teacher-librarians are constantly encouraging reading. Through story reading, storytelling, book talks, and book fairs, they present quality literature to the students.
Are you planning a thematic or curricular unit? Do you need posters, pictures, maps, or charts for your classroom to help with that unit? Ask your teacher-librarian, as most school libraries have a poster file that is available to teachers as well as to students.
The development of a quality collection is another aspect of a teacher-librarian’s role. That involves the selection of literature to promote recreational reading, the addition of resources in a variety of media to support the curriculum, and the elimination of outdated information and seldom-used materials. Declining budgets and increasing costs of resources make developing a quality collection a very challenging task.
Your teacher-librarian works co-operatively with classroom teachers to plan, teach, and evaluate units of study. The units might be organized around a central theme or might arise directly from a curricular topic. Co-operative planning and teaching, a central focus for teacher-librarians, involves several main steps.
Planning
During planning, the teacher-librarian and the classroom teacher meet to determine the topic to be studied, the learning objectives to be addressed, the procedure for the unit, responsibilities of the teacher and of the teacher-librarian before and during the presentation of the unit, the form of the final product, and evaluation. Planning meetings are not always lengthy or formal; many take place over lunch in the staffroom.
Gathering resources
The teacher-librarian ensures that there are enough resources in a variety of media and at a variety of reading levels for the group or class participating in the unit of study.
Teaching or presenting the unit
This is a team-teaching effort, with both the classroom teacher and the teacher-librarian assisting students with the unit of study. The classroom teacher will be oriented toward the subject material, and the teacher-librarian will be assisting students with the research process.
Evaluating
Both members of the teaching team can and should be involved in evaluating the research process and the final product.
Teacher-librarians are specialists in information literacy, usually referred to as the research process. This involves training students to access relevant resources, to evaluate the selected resources, to take notes from all types of media, to organize information into a logical sequence and present it in the student’s own words, and to cite sources of information and write bibliographies.
As school libraries become more computerized, and as the Internet becomes an increasingly important resource for research, teacher-librarians—exemplifying lifelong learning—have developed technology skills. In many schools, it is the teacher-librarian who is the computer expert.
In addition to the roles they fulfill in school, teacher-librarians provide leadership roles in education. Many have served on district and ministry committees. Some have been responsible for the development of curriculum, either at the local or at the provincial level. And many have made presentations to parents, to teaching colleagues, to administrators, and to student teachers.
In a number of districts in British Columbia, staffing of school libraries has been drastically reduced over the past few years. The cuts have made it difficult for teacher-librarians to do the job to the standard they would like. Nevertheless, they have worked through the challenges to try to accommodate staff and students.
If you would like more information about the roles of a teacher-librarian, or about the ways in which you and your teacher-librarian can work together to enhance students’ learning and perhaps make your job a little easier, speak with the teacher-librarian in your school. The B.C. Teacher-Librarians’ Association can also assist with any requests.
Lynn Turner is a teacher-librarian at Thornhill Junior Secondary School, Terrace.
Are you looking for new ways to interest your students in reading? Would you like some unique resources for your classroom? Do you want to include research or enrichment in the curriculum? Are you looking for a different way of presenting information?
Your teacher-librarian can help.
Teacher-librarians are aware of the importance of free voluntary—recreational—reading and its role in the development of reading skills from Kindergarten through Grade 12. To that end, teacher-librarians can help students with their choice of library books--with appropriate reading levels, with favourite genres or authors, or perhaps with bibliotherapy.
Your teacher-librarian is your partner in promoting reading at all grade levels. While you are working on an individual basis with students, the teacher-librarian’s approach encompasses groups, classes, and frequently the entire school. Throughout the school year, teacher-librarians engage in a variety of activities, all with the goal of promoting reading, of encouraging students to become aware of and interested in books. From the most basic of promotions, such as bulletin boards and new book displays, to organization and implementation of long-term reading programs, teacher-librarians are constantly encouraging reading. Through story reading, storytelling, book talks, and book fairs, they present quality literature to the students.
Are you planning a thematic or curricular unit? Do you need posters, pictures, maps, or charts for your classroom to help with that unit? Ask your teacher-librarian, as most school libraries have a poster file that is available to teachers as well as to students.
The development of a quality collection is another aspect of a teacher-librarian’s role. That involves the selection of literature to promote recreational reading, the addition of resources in a variety of media to support the curriculum, and the elimination of outdated information and seldom-used materials. Declining budgets and increasing costs of resources make developing a quality collection a very challenging task.
Your teacher-librarian works co-operatively with classroom teachers to plan, teach, and evaluate units of study. The units might be organized around a central theme or might arise directly from a curricular topic. Co-operative planning and teaching, a central focus for teacher-librarians, involves several main steps.
Planning
During planning, the teacher-librarian and the classroom teacher meet to determine the topic to be studied, the learning objectives to be addressed, the procedure for the unit, responsibilities of the teacher and of the teacher-librarian before and during the presentation of the unit, the form of the final product, and evaluation. Planning meetings are not always lengthy or formal; many take place over lunch in the staffroom.
Gathering resources
The teacher-librarian ensures that there are enough resources in a variety of media and at a variety of reading levels for the group or class participating in the unit of study.
Teaching or presenting the unit
This is a team-teaching effort, with both the classroom teacher and the teacher-librarian assisting students with the unit of study. The classroom teacher will be oriented toward the subject material, and the teacher-librarian will be assisting students with the research process.
Evaluating
Both members of the teaching team can and should be involved in evaluating the research process and the final product.
Teacher-librarians are specialists in information literacy, usually referred to as the research process. This involves training students to access relevant resources, to evaluate the selected resources, to take notes from all types of media, to organize information into a logical sequence and present it in the student’s own words, and to cite sources of information and write bibliographies.
As school libraries become more computerized, and as the Internet becomes an increasingly important resource for research, teacher-librarians—exemplifying lifelong learning—have developed technology skills. In many schools, it is the teacher-librarian who is the computer expert.
In addition to the roles they fulfill in school, teacher-librarians provide leadership roles in education. Many have served on district and ministry committees. Some have been responsible for the development of curriculum, either at the local or at the provincial level. And many have made presentations to parents, to teaching colleagues, to administrators, and to student teachers.
In a number of districts in British Columbia, staffing of school libraries has been drastically reduced over the past few years. The cuts have made it difficult for teacher-librarians to do the job to the standard they would like. Nevertheless, they have worked through the challenges to try to accommodate staff and students.
If you would like more information about the roles of a teacher-librarian, or about the ways in which you and your teacher-librarian can work together to enhance students’ learning and perhaps make your job a little easier, speak with the teacher-librarian in your school. The B.C. Teacher-Librarians’ Association can also assist with any requests.
Lynn Turner is a teacher-librarian at Thornhill Junior Secondary School, Terrace.
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