I spoke with the teacher librarian at my school today and she gave me great insight into how hard it is for a teacher librarian in todays society.
She spoke about how she must use modern technology, ie the internet, to get students engaged in using and reading books. She is in the process of creating a web page for students to access. She was worried about how many students do not know how to utilise the information in books in their research process. The school has invested money into a journal data base that none of the students (or the staff) use. It is a great resources but no one is using it.
She is finding it hard to tell teacher about what her job description is and many teachers do not use her knowledge base of what books/resources are available in the library, limited as they are.
She was telling me about how little funding that she has and the funding that she has is going towards replacing old textbooks that students have not returned over the years and trying to update the fiction and non fiction sections of the library.
Many students on the campus have reading difficulties and she is appalled that she has to be buying books that are at a grade 5/6 level for year 8/9 to read. Along with this she is investing a lot of money into buying graphic novels so that students will utilise the library.
I have walked pass the library many times and i have seen that it is usually empty, no classes using books for research, no students reading at lunchtime. She is trying to increase reading rates in the school by using these measures and i hope that she is successful.
It looks like being a teacher librarian is going to an ongoing battle of working with technology, not making the research process redundant and battling with staff and students to utilise the library to its full potential and not just a place to hide when it is raining.
Something to consider.
