Inquire

          On March 25^th, 2019, I met with Traci Morrison, the librarian at Herbert A. Wood Elementary School, to discuss the AASL National School Library Standards for Learners, School Librarians, and School Libraries Shared Foundations. Mrs. Morrison chose to discuss the Shared Foundation I., Inquire.  I asked Mrs. Morrison questions that were outlined in our instructions from SLIS 794. The Competencies addressed by Mrs. Morrison were based on the following statements:

A.   Think - School librarians teach learners to display curiosity and initiative when seeking information.

B.   Create - School librarians promote new knowledge generation.

C.   Share - School librarians guide learners to maintain focus throughout the inquiry process.

D.  Grow - School librarians implement and model an inquiry-based process.

         When I asked Mrs. Morrison what some examples were of how she implemented the Shared Foundation Engage, she gave me an extended example of a research unit that she teaches with one of the teachers at her school.  In this unit, students are supposed to select an animal that they are personally interested in and the do research about that animal.  Mrs. Morrison said that she models the selection process by first talking to the students about an experience she had where she and her husband got to do a nighttime sea turtle watch and how she was able to help make sure that newly hatched turtles made it to the water.  She said that she talks to the students about how she is intensely interested in sea turtles and therefore would choose to do research on them because of this interest and her experience.  With this example, she teaches students to inquire and display curiosity about topics that interest them personally.

         As far as the resources that Mrs. Morrison said she uses to engage her students, she said she pretty much uses Discus.  She said, “It’s safe and free.”  She also said that Epic eBooks is another source she uses.  Currency was one of her main concerns because she said her print collection was a bit dated. 

         As far as collaboration goes, Mrs. Morrison said that she always asks teachers a week ahead of their visit what they will be studying during the next week.  (She has a fixed schedule and sees all of her students weekly.) She said that she tries to fit her lessons into what the classroom teachers are teaching, but they mostly rely on her to pull books that she thinks the students may find interesting and that go along with some classroom topic.

         When asked what some of the challenges are that she faces when trying to address engagement with knowledge and creating a culture of inquiry she said with emphasis, “Time!”  She said it was not just her.  Teachers, too, have little time to plan with each other or with her to create collaborative lessons.  Mrs. Morrison said that there used to be a planning period where related arts teachers and she could get together and discover what lessons teachers were teaching so that they could support the curriculum.  However, that planning had been taken away. 

         Of all the librarians that I observed and interviewed during my internship, Mrs. Morrison was the one that spoke most clearly about the AASL standards in general.  She actually had her own copy of the book and referred to it when we met.  The other librarians knew that the standards exist and had a general idea about the domains and competencies but were not that well versed in discussing them.  Mrs. Morrison is part of a group of Lexington Two librarians that meets to do professional development about maintaining library standards.  (My group of librarians, in my district, mostly meets about technology and maintaining equipment.)  It was a pleasure to be allowed to interview and visit Mrs. Morrison as she provided a different, more academic, perspective to librarianship, maybe more by-the-book, than the others.  Not better, just different.