"The Coach in the Library"

This month's (October 2011) Educational Leadership's magazine's featured topic is Coaching: the New Leadership Skill. The online extension of the print magazine contains an article by Carl. A Harvey, opening keynote speaker at MAME 38, president of AASL, and School Librarian at North Elementary School in Noblesville, IN.

Harvey compares the support and guidance that School Librarians give to teachers to the support that a coach give team members.  He says, "Like coaches, an effective librarian (also called a media specialist these days) gives teachers ideas and resources for instruction, models lessons, and provides information when educators have questions."  He also says, "In these hard economic times, schools must use each staff member to the fullest. School librarians have great knowledge about 21st century skills, technology, literacy, and much more. Schools should take advantage of the opportunities this knowledge store can create and run with them-for the benefit of our students."

 

Read the article "The Coach in the Library" here. 

 

Editor's Note:  I'm really looking forward to meeting Carl A. Harvey and hearing him speak at MAME 38.  Hope to see you there!  

 

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At the Ludington Lighthouse Triathlon in August, Tom Stream won his age group in the swim leg of the race. (He finished 11th of 250 overall swimmers!) Also, he was the fastest of the slow guys in his age group as well - sort of an Emperor of the Penguins!

Congratulations to Tom!!
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Pamela Cameron is now teaching 5 periods of an Inquiry and Innovation 12 week long elective class.  Although she is still officially the Media Specialist at Mattawan Middle School (with about 900 students); she now has just two periods for library and prep work.  Pamela is trying to make "lemonade" out of this by trying to use the AASL Standards for the 21st Century, 21st Century Partnership Skills, and the Common Core Standards.  Her fall cheer is "hit them high, hit them low, go MeL, go MeL, go, go, go."  Can MeL be imprinted in 12 weeks?

 

The description of Pamela's new class is below.  This may be helpful to other MAME members who may find themselves in a similar position.

 

The Inquiry and Innovation class is based on the skills needed to succeed as a 21st Century Learner. Students will access and evaluate information and use critical thinking and problem solving methods to propose new information and innovation. Students will be gatherers, evaluators, creators and communicators of information.

Exploration of topics will require examination of multiple texts and the ability to form conclusions using relevant and accurate data and evidence.

Selected units include: Inventions, Civic and Global Understandings, Natural World Interactions, Generation Interviews, Health and Nutrition, Database Searching, Webpage Annotations and Personal and Electronic Communication.

Assignments and projects will involve collaboration and communication with classmates, subjects experts and classrooms from other countries. Class activities are supported with computer access for each student.

Additional info: Family life and Speech and Communication Classes were discontinued, so Pamela is adding some of the important topics from those classes.

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Due to changes in the Library of Michigan's MeL support contract, MeL Databases Librarian Kelly Bayee is leaving MCLS, and her last day was Friday, September 30.  Kelly has been an excellent source of information and support for MAME members.  We will certainly miss her work at MCLS and wish her all the best in her future endeavors.  

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Volunteers are still needed for the conference!   Let me know if you can donate a couple of your conference hours to help the event run smoothly by completing this form. No experience necessary. Thank you!   Gwenn Marchesano gwenn2ns@gmail.com

To see the list of databases that are included, a list of the expanded Gale Virtual Reference Library titles included, and a list of databases no longer included, go to this

MCLS site.

NCTE President, Yvonne Siu-Runyan wrote an article in September's NCTE Council Chronicle supporting school and public libraries.
Yvonne sites many statistics and research in her article, such as:
In a Scholastic & Gates Foundation study, "83% of all students said they got their books from school libraries". The aspects of the school library that relate to reading achievement include "the size of the collection, the presence of a credentialed librarian, and overall staffing."
Yvonne concluded her article with the statement "Library funding should be expanded, not cut."
Thanks to the NCTE President for supporting and speaking out for libraries and librarians!

You can read the article

What great things are going on in your media center?   Has a journal article or book recently inspired you?   Found a shortcut, great website, new and improved techie tool?   ...Or just have a funny story to share?   We love to hear from our readers!

Send your newsletter contributions to Kathy Lester   mediamatters.mame@gmail.com