Demonstrate your understanding of the
role of the teacher librarian with regards to the convergence of literacies in
the 21st century.
There
is consensus among experts that the role of a teacher librarian or library
media specialist (Harvey, 2009) is multi-faceted. According to Purcell
(2010) and Cooper and Bray (2011) the four key roles of the school library
media specialist are defined in Information Power (1998) as teacher,
instructional partner, information specialist and program administrator.
According to Lamb (2011) the role is more diverse than this and also
incorporates the roles of promoting school volunteerism, curriculum director
and government and grant officer.
The
clearest depiction of the role of a school librarian is seen in the circle
diagram of Herring (2007). Relying heavily on the Australian School
Library Association (ASLA), the Australian Library and Information
Association’s (ALIA) Standards of Professional Excellence (2011) and the United
Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) School
Library Manifesto Herring incorporates “budget manager” and “staff manager”
into the role of teacher librarian. He also adds “website developer” to
the role which goes above and beyond the position of website administrator or
contributor offered by other authors.
In
all of these role descriptors the teacher librarian is expected to “have the
state-of-the-art technical and pedagogical expertise to engage 21st century
learners” (Gaver, n.d., p.3) while also providing students with the ability to
“develop critical thinking skills”, “evaluate and analyze (sic) the information
at hand” and perform the mental process required to “change knowledge from
information to concept” (Bomar, 2010, p 72).
When
looking at the word “Transliteracy” we
understand it to mean that teacher librarians are responsible for the
relationship between people, technology and the social meaning of literacy in
past, present and future modalities (Ipri, 2010). They are also responsible
for bringing together the old and the new in an establishment where they and
their colleagues never experienced the sort of school library program the
profession advocates today (Lance, 2010).
The school library media centre has
drastically changed over the last decade and so has the school library media
program. Concurrently, the role of the school library media specialist has
evolved in significant ways (Farmer, 2005). The twenty-first century
teacher-librarian now has electronic and digital resources, Internet and
web-based resources, as well as a considerable number of technologies that
serve as purposeful tools, not just entertaining add-ons. LCD projectors,
document cameras, video- conferencing units, interactive whiteboards, assistive
technology devices, and scanners give “more credibility and seriousness to the
library’s technology-enhanced program”. Not only are today’s teacher-librarians
information generalists, but also information media specialists (Murray, 2000)
In
short, I understand my role as a teacher librarian to be varied and
diverse. ) As a Teacher Librarian I will be responsible for crafting
challenging learning opportunities for my students while helping them to use
the virtual world, as well as traditional information sources so that the
students of today are prepared for living, working and learning in the world of
tomorrow. (Gaver, n.d).
References:
Bomar, S. (2010). A
school-wide instructional framework for evaluating sources. Knowledge
Quest, 38(3), 72-75.
de Groot, J.; & Branch, J. L (2011). Looking toward the future: competences for 21st-century teacher
librarians. Alberta Journal of Educational Research, 57(3), 288-297.
Farmer,
L. (2005). Technology-infused instruction for the educational community: A
guide for school library specialists. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press, Inc
Gaver, M. (n.d.) School
libraries, now more than ever: A position paper of the center for international
scholarship in school libraries. Retrieved from
www.nmm.net/TheImportanceofSchoolLibraries.pdf
Harvey, C. (2009). Hands
on handout: What should an administrator expect a school library media
specialist to be? Library Media Connection, October, 45.
Ipri T. (2010) Introducing
transliteracy. College & Research Libraries News, 71(10), 532–567.
Herring, J. (2007). Teacher
librarians and the school library. In S. Ferguson (Ed.), Libraries in the
twenty-first century : Charting new directions in information (pp. 27-42).
Wagga Wagga, NSW : Centre for Information Studies, Charles Sturt University.
Lamb, A (2011). Bursting
with potential: Mixing media specialist’s palette. TechTrends, 55(4), 27 –
35.
Lance, K.C. (2010). The
Mind of a Researcher. Teacher Librarian, 37(4), 81-82.
Mackey, T.P., & Jacobson, T.E. (2011). Reframing information literacy as a
metaliteracy. College & Research Libraries, 72(1), 62–78.
Murray,
J. (2000). Librarians evolving into
cybrarians. MultiMedia Schools, 7(2),
26-30.
O’Connell, J. (2012) Learning without frontiers: School
libraries and meta-literacy in actionAccess, 26(1), 4-7.
Purcell, M. (2010) All
librarians do is check out books, right? A look at the role of a school library
media specialist. Library Media Connection, November/December, 30 – 33
