Creative Educating

In the 2010-2011 school year, my Individual Growth Plan was to prove high circulations would bolster reading scores. I was able to prove an expected, yet interesting point instead: classrooms having more frequent interaction with the media specialist had notably more growth than those who didn’t.
This year, many school libraries will do without a team of media specialists. Most will have one media specialist and no assistant for up to one thousand students. At WMS, we are fortunate to have a part-time assistant, but still need to get creative to make this work.
How will we keep our program moving forward this year?
I can sit in my office and brood about the state of school libraries in the United States, but I choose to do anything I can to step out into the classroom and create a dynamic teaching experience for our students. By using the duo powers of teacher content experience and background knowledge with my resource knowledge and matching appropriate educational technologies, our students at WMS have a chance for a learning experience they will retain to develop themselves as lifelong information seekers. Working collaboratively is the key to provide an enriching classroom experience. Promoting the information center as the core of our school environment is essential.
You’ll see me in your department meetings, at leadership meetings, begging staff members to contribute by becoming active members of our Media Technology Advisory Committee. We will work together to find the best resources possible, create dynamic lessons, teach digital citizenship and work together to implement them for a successful school year.
This means that I will be less available to look up student logins already available on the network, troubleshoot technology issues and a/v problems, and write lesson plans by myself. I’m calling on teamwork to help our students succeed this year. I know we can do it, in spite of the impossible obstacles before us. We are a teaching and learning community. Let’s keep that in perspective and bring our best game this year.