There are issues that teaching personnel are currently having in school libraries. These issues focus on the fact that up until the late 1990s most school librarians were actually teachers with little to no librarian education just a teaching degree and that these teaching personnel are no longer sure of their roles in the school library environment now that libraries are staffed with trained library professionals (Doiron, 2003).
What was a teaching personnel role in a school library?
In the past, a teaching personnel’s role in a school library was a large role to fill, as the personnel had to fulfill both the role of the teacher and the role of the librarian in the school library. The role of a teacher required personnel to do a number of steps in perpetration to bringing a class to the school library a few of them would be:
• creating a lesson plan for the class before coming to the library
• providing supervision to a class coming to the library
• manage student questions on class assignments
• schedule a time slot for the library usage
• inform the class that they would be going to the library
• provide information to students about class assignments in the library
• schedule a class to inform students on how to work in a library
The role of a librarian required personnel to do a number of duties once the class was in the library, a few of those would be:
• supervise students in library
• assist students with locating books and other resources
• inform student how to locate their own books and resources
• inform students how they check books in and out of library
• check books in and out of library for students
• setup a work area for students to do class work in
• provide a tour to students when it’s their first time in library
The role of the teaching personnel was generally to consider the school library as an extended part of their classroom when bringing their class to the library providing assistance to students at the library as if it was just another part of their curriculum in their classroom (Niederlander, 2002).
How has a teaching personnel role changed and/or been made more difficult with new technology in school libraries?
Teaching personnel understand their role in a school library has changed with the addition of computers that now manage the school library cataloging. With the addition of a computer managed library catalog and the movement from the card catalog as the only way to locate a book has led to more libraries now having trained librarians that can better work with these new systems, eliminating the librarian roles that teaching personnel previous had to do, when full time trained librarians were not the norm in a school library (Doiron, 2003). Now that most school libraries have properly trained staff teaching personnel are not as certain what they should do in the library once they bring their students to the library. Where previously teaching personnel would handle everything when they were in the library, now they have full time librarians to handle many of these duties. Though the role of teaching personnel is now more vague as the role differs between school libraries depending on how much the school librarians will do with classes, with some librarians doing all the work letting the teaching personnel leave once they have outlined what they want students to do in the library and other librarians opting to do next to nothing with the class, only checking books in and out for the students and allowing teaching personnel full reign over the library (Niederlander, 2002). It is because of these inconsistencies in their role between different school libraries that teaching personnel have problems planning what they should be doing with their classes leading to the student having a poorer education experience with their school libraries (CLA, 2007).
What can be done to ease or assist teaching personnel with understanding their roles in a school library?
The simplest and most effective way to assist teaching personnel with understanding their role in a school library is to create a definition and outline of their role in a school library, which should be used by all schools. Once the teaching personnel’s role has been defined, it should then be explained to both the teaching personnel and school librarians through a one-day workshop that should answer any questions about their roles, as well as, provide tips on how to go about their roles in school libraries. With their role clearly defined and explained to teaching personnel and school librarians, this should resolve any uncertainties that teaching personnel have with their role in a school library.
Canadian Library Association (CLA). (2007). Students' Information Literacy Needs in the 21st Century: Competencies for Teacher-Librarians (1997). Retrieved June 1, 2010 from http://www.cla.ca/casl/literacyneeds.html.
Doiron, R. (2003). School Libraries in Nova Scotia. Retrieved June 1, 2010, from Ray Doiron: http://www.upei.ca/~raydoiro/html/sch__libraries_in_ns.html
Niederlander , M. (2002, June). School library resources. Retrieved June 1, 2010, from http://www.librarysupportstaff.com/4schools.html#teacher
Researched and written by Mitchell McNally.
