Teacher Librarian Feature Article

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Volume 29, Number 4, April 2002

Promoting Library Advocacy and InformationLiteracy from an “Invisible Library”

Kathy Lehman

How does a new teacher-librarian keep visible when the collection is boxed up in an auxiliary gym and the school library resource center will not be ready for months? This was the question facing me at the opening of the 2000-2001 school year. Arriving at Thomas Dale High School in Chester, Virginia after 25 years as an elementary teacher-librarian, I immediately heeded the advice of retiring librarian Marjorie Clark and began an information campaign to keep library news and services alive.

FYI’s

Faculty Meetings

Whenever possible I made announcements and demonstrated, with laptop and LCD projector, the emerging virtual library and its potential for providing students with information resources while the library remained closed. I asked to be on the agenda at Advisory Council meetings (a monthly meeting of department heads and administrators) and invited myself to department meetings. It took months to get on the agenda for some departments, but I never gave up. Not only did I present the online resources available, but I used modules built into the web site to illustrate Boolean searching, research models, copyright guidelines, collaborative planning and student research guides. Teaming with assistant librarian Nancy Stough, I ventured into classrooms and labs to demonstrate research strategies with students.

More significantly, I drew on my experience as a technology trainer in my previous school and offered teachers assistance to complete their final projects for a county-mandated technology portfolio. These projects, referred to as technology integration units, demonstrate a teacher’s competence in nine strands of computer/technology applications including word processing, electronic research, multimedia production, pedagogy and curriculum/job specific tools. By collaborating with me to create a web site for their class, teachers could fulfill any of the above categories. With every project, teachers completed a requirement for renewal of their state teaching license, I added another page to the virtual library, and students gained a guided research project online. These web pages are available to students 24 hours a day, seven days a week. It’s a win, win, win situation. If the teacher needed a database or spreadsheet project, no problem. We researched data online to enter into Access or Excel. As a technology trainer in my previous school, I had experience teaching all Office products, so I was able to help teachers incorporate any technology project they proposed into a web-based research unit.

The Virtual Library Takes Off

As with all web sites, ours began one page at a time. I looked at model sites, talked to colleagues for suggestions and began collecting sites on electronic notepad pages as I surfed the Internet. I started the web site with links to fee-based subscription sites. Our school system subscribes to ProQuest periodical service and Grolier’s online encyclopedias. Our state legislature provides SIRS through the Virginia State Library to all schools. I began with trials of Gale Resources and after a successful fall, subscribed to their Student Resource Center for the remainder of the year.

We also linked to online services available through our Chesterfield County Public Library. With their public library card number, students have remote access, from our school library web page, to the collection database and most licensed resources subscribed to by the public library.

Our virtual library branches to pages listing additional reference sources, other virtual libraries, recommended staff sites and, most important, the Class Lists. These are web pages designed collaboratively with teachers to guide students through specific classroom research objectives. The early pages were designed simply to help students locate pre-selected, curriculum-specific Internet sites. These allowed students to find election information on candidates, supplementary information on F. Scott Fitzgerald or job opportunities for Americans with disabilities, without losing valuable class lab time mistyping URLs or surfing through inappropriate and misleading information. For instance, a Spanish teacher designed her page with general Spanish links for class lab sessions. Following each session in school, students could enjoy the sites again as reinforcement from home.

The superior quality of information found in licensed databases quickly became apparent when biology and ecology students compared findings from Gale and SIRS to Internet search engines. One student commented, “I find more information on the [free] Internet but the licensed databases are more on the topic.” Every student using the licensed databases found solid material on his or her topic and completed the assignment in one lab session. After searching for information on Homer’s Odyssey, Grade 9 English students were asked to compare results from licensed databases to their previous results from the Internet. Following are some of their comments:

• “ I like using the licensed databases better than the regular Internet because the information is deeper and more concise.”
• “ I always found what I needed in the licensed databases.”
• “I like not having the screen flooded with advertisements, banners and adult-oriented sites.”
• “The databases have more complete information so I don’t have to search a lot of web sites.”
• “Licensed databases stick to the topic and you know you are getting factual information.”

Clearly students recognize the value of edited, authoritative material. Teachers remarked that students were more focused using the class web pages. One science teacher observed that students with attention problems who have trouble in other class activities stayed on task when directed from the class web page. Everyone is equally engaged at the same time. One student summed up an overwhelming benefit of directed Internet access by commenting that “more students can be looking at the same thing and not have to wait around on a book.”

As we came closer to opening day for the new library, the focus of the class web pages began to shift from providing guided Web searching to providing guided research strategies, including using print resources. These research strategy guides were first developed for our Grade 9 classes, held at a former middle school 2.5 miles away, during the main campus renovation. We maintain a small but fully functioning library collection there staffed by a clerk. The two librarians take turns scheduling hours on the West Campus to meet instructional needs. Using research assignments in the Grade 9 curriculum as our model, Nancy and I developed a template patterned after our research locator sheet which guides students through the first phases of information access and retrieval: task definition, keyword analysis and resource selection.

Looking at the class web page displayed on the wall with the LCD projector, students fill out research locator sheets as we introduce resources and strategies they will use to complete their assignment. Beginning with task definition, students determine keyword combinations, Dewey decimal numbers on their topic, electronic resources, print resources and other potential sources to use in their research. Explanations of Internet search engines, Boolean operators and evaluation strategies are incorporated into the web site and can be opened to instruct students as needed. Examples of works cited in the MLA format are also available on the web site to model correct form and reinforce ethical use of materials. In short, the virtual library has grown into a teaching tool that instructs and guides research as well as being a resource for students available seven days a week, 24 hours a day. We are creating a library without walls in a program, which guides students to use these resources efficiently and effectively. As one student wrote, “Even when you can’t get into the library, the web site is there.”

Articles Published

To be sure students and staff know about the resources available and take advantage of our program, we have submitted articles to every publication available to us. The Knightly News is our student newspaper and student reporters have run articles regularly about the library’s progress and the Virtual Library. Knightline is the newsletter for parents and we publish an article in every issue. Our local Chester Village News has been extremely supportive and published an article detailing our cooperation with the local public library and last spring describing our grand opening. I wrote an article for our state librarians’ journal, the Mediagram, describing my determination to be the “visible librarian with an invisible library.” My principal was so pleased she copied it and put it in every teacher’s box. We have done our best to reach every student and staff member and offer our services and expertise to help them succeed. Keeping the school community informed is critical to securing philosophical and monetary support for library resource programs.

Gala Event

To celebrate our grand opening in the spring of 2001, we planned an arts day for students in our beautiful new resource center. Coinciding with Read Across America Day, March 2, we invited the theater arts and creative writing teachers to showcase the talents of their students with original and dramatic readings. Between readings we had performances by vocalists and musicians from the music department. The art teachers filled the walls, windows and countertops with original student work. Six unique 30-minute programs were scheduled and classroom teachers signed up to bring their students to see the new resource center and enjoy the performances. Refreshments were served to staff, invited guests and performers. We invited administrators and friends from the public library and community who had supported us through the renovation process. It was a grand day and the local newspaper gave us front-page coverage.

Community Support

The overall success of our 10 months without a library is due to the amazing support of our school community. Teachers welcomed us into their classrooms and were willing to collaborate with us to try a new online approach to research. We grew continually adding modules and pages to the Virtual Library to meet new instructional needs, demonstrate research models and streamline the research process. Even today with our library open, new links are being added to the Virtual Library as we discover new appropriate sites. Teachers constantly stop us in the halls with suggestions or send students to the library with lists of web sites to add to their class page.

The April 2001 Parents, Teachers, Students Association (PTSA) meeting was held in the new library media center and we presented a program for parents to showcase the print and online resources available to them as parents of students. One mother remarked how helpful it will be to see her son’s research assignments online! Connected to the library is a new computer lab with 27 top-of-the-line workstations. Students without Internet resources at home can come before and after school to use the lab for research or word processing for their assignments. We offer extended library hours on Wednesdays, until 5 p.m., to meet the needs of both students and the community.

We truly have the best of both worlds: a well-rounded print collection with more than 20,000 items and a growing web site with unlimited resources. We are knocking down the “walls” of the library and working to prepare our students to be information literate in the 21st century.