Enter the Blog

This blog was created as part of my studies - MTeach (teacher librarian) -hopefully here you may find some musings on education, libraries, life and studying along with generally witty and insightful comments (if i can manage any!).

Please add comments along the way. I'll be glad for any input, especially from fellow students and library lovers

Kylie




Tuesday, August 5, 2014

Professional Placement Reflection

As part of ETL507 I have been required to undertake a 10 day professional placement. I have just completed my 2 weeks in a large regional independent secondary school. I was able to do it here as I am not currently working in a school environment.

Reflection
The placement confirmed my desire to work in a school library and while on placement I was able to put into practice many of the ideas and skills learnt throughout the MEd course. It was exciting to be able to apply ideas, knowledge and skills in a school library setting and to have these affirmed and appreciated by an experienced teacher-librarian. It confirmed many of my ideas about the potential of the teacher-librarian role and the dynamic and friendly disposition required of an effective teacher-librarian. It also highlighted the need to be abreast of any and all technology utilised within the library and the challenges that problems with hardware and software can create and the need for the teacher-librarian to be responsive to these. In this respect it gave me a better understanding of the level of technical knowledge and support that librarians are often expected to be able to provide and the need to ensure that as a librarian you are aware of current trends in technology and hardware and software.

The opportunity to take part in the acquiring and processing of resources lead to not only a greater understanding of these aspects and the opportunity to discuss the impact of these processes and the need to ensure that the users’ needs are always at the forefront. This was a valuable reminder of this aspect of the role which sat well with those experiences gained on the study visit and the Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records (FRBR) (IFLA, 1998) approach.

Along with gaining insight into the running of the library, I was able to see the way in which teachers perceive the library and the role of the teacher-librarian and how this impacts on the ability of the teacher-librarian to gain traction to collaborate and or co-develop resources. It was clear that the ability to perform this was reliant of the personalities of the teachers and the area in which they teach. This suggests the need for advocacy and the importance of librarians in providing professional development or ‘how I can help you’ sessions to raise awareness and increase collaborative opportunities.

The placement also highlighted the specialist knowledge that librarians possess in regards to resource and information provision and the management aspects of the library role. Having a non-trained teacher replacing the teacher-librarian demonstrated that this role is perhaps undervalued and misunderstood but again reinforced the need for teacher-librarians to be proactive. This clearly tied in many aspects of the MEd course in terms of being a leader, leading change and using research and policies as a way of being proactive in advocating the importance of the library and appropriately qualified staff.


REFERENCES

      International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) (1998). Functional requirements for bibliographic records: Final report. Munich: K.G. Saur Verla. 2014 

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