Inquiry #3 ICT in the School Environment

 Perspectives on how to provide ICT in the school environment

This week I have been spending my “free time” listening to different episodes on one particular podcast called Leading from the Library. Which I found on https://all4ed.org/future-ready-librarians-hub/. The Host, Shannon, invites guests to share how they are becoming future ready in schools. There are two episodes I would like to highlight, one is from the perspective of a teacher librarian and one is from the perspective of a classroom teacher. These podcasts got me really excited to finish up my teacher librarian diploma and I will keep listening to it in the future.

As a classroom teacher I really enjoy collaborating. I find it exciting to have other people come into the classroom and learn with my students. I also find that students respond to different topics when experts are brought in. One line from the When Teachers and Librarians Collaborate Anything Is Possible episode was “ I am an expert at the standards and you are the expert in so many different things that you can bring to the class.” (2 min.) This connects to a project that I am doing in my class collaborating with the Indigenous Advocate. I know exactly what I want my students to learn and take away from the project and she has been amazing at helping find age appropriate information for students to do some individual research about the syilx culture, an Okanagan Indigenous Nation. My students are so excited when Ms. Maddy comes into the class and she brings in a great wealth of knowledge and calmness when learning about these important subjects. Collaboration makes big ideas come to life. The project we are doing would not be as amazing if Ms. Maddy did not help with my big idea. 

The second podcast, Innovate, Collaborate, and Explore, has sparked an excitement into future plans as a teacher librarian. Jen Mary Mckenzie was the guest and she has so many amazing ideas on how to engage students in a Library Learning Commons. She has a twitter account @jenmarymckenzie and a school library website. Her episode had such wonderful ideas of what she was doing in her school by collaborating with the community. For example she connected a local radio station and has set up a podcast station in her Library for students to get hands on experience broadcasting. As a teacher I could teach the skills of podcasting but who wouldn’t want to learn from an expert broadcaster. The last idea that I wanted to mention because I feel like I would like to do this more with my students is Maker Space. This episode aired during the pandemic so Jen said that she made Maker Crate that could be to sent to students when they were doing online learning. I can only imagine my own children getting mail, but imagine it was filled with fun Maker Space material. She had so many other great ideas. 

Retrieved from https://www.mysubscriptionaddiction.com/2021/03/kiwico-doodle-crate-woven-landscapes-review-march-2021.html

The main take home from both episodes was that the Teacher Librarian needs to create a relationship with their school community. This relationship allows the Teacher Librarian to be the perfect person for teachers to collaborate with. The Teacher Librarian needs to develop these relationships to know what each teacher is looking to get out of collaborating and what they comfortable with. 

Works Cited:

Miller, S.M. (Host). (2021, October 19). Innovate, Collaborate, and Explore [Audio podcast]. 

     Retrieved from Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/3Dbl8eGvVu5EDf43v5YKXA.

Miller, S.M. (Host). (2021, October 19). When Teachers and Librarians Collaborate Anything Is  

    Possible [Audio podcast].Retrieved from Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/3Dbl8eGvVu5EDf43v5YKXA.