School Libraries: Where Learning Starts

Learning Starts With You: Productive Pedagogy Through The School Library

Dr Ross J Todd

Center for International Scholarship in School LibrariesSchool of Communication, Information and Library Studies

Rutgers, The State University of New Jerseycissl.scils.rutgers.edu rtodd@scils.rutgers.edu

50 Years of Research50 Years of Evidence50 Years of Learning

“With the school library literally the heart of the educational program, the students of the school have their best chance to become capable and enthusiastic readers, informed about the world around them, and alive to the limitless possibilities of tomorrow.” Mary Gaver, 1958

Gaver, M. Every child needs a school library. Chicago, ALA, 1958 Gaver, M. Effectiveness of Centralized Library Service in Elementary Schools. Rutgers University, 1963

Schools & Libraries Studied

Since 2000, 16 state-wide studies undertaken AK, CO, DE, FL, IA, IL, MA, MI, MN, MO, NC, NM, OH, OR, PA,

TX

Over 8,800 schools

Elementary, middle and high school libraries serving an estimated 2.6 million students

Diverse funding authorities: Sate Libraries, Education Dep’ts, Federal (IMLS), professional school library associations

Three Types of Studies

1. Studies that examine the presence of school library infrastructure, personnel and library services / processes and their correlation to achievement as measured by standardized test scores (with other school and community conditions controlled for eg. Adult educational attainment; Minority enrollment; Per pupil spending; Teacher-pupil ratio) (Lance) What school libraries look like; what they need to have

2. State-wide studies that examine the nature and strength of helps provided through school libraries linked to learning outcomes (CISSL) How good school libraries work: Ohio, Delaware

3. Learning through school libraries (CISSL)Instructional dynamics of school libraries (IMLS study NJ)

Student Achievement

Learning outcomes are achieved through deliberate actions and instructional interventions of school administrators

and school librarians

INFORMATIONAL – TRANSFORMATONAL – FORMATIONAL

3 Studies: Student Learning Through School Libraries

Ohio: 13,123 valid student responses and 879 teacher responses (39 schools) (2003-4)

Australia: 6,718 valid student responses and 525 teacher responses (46 schools) (Lyn Hay, 2004-5)

Delaware: 5,733 valid student responses and 408 teacher responses (13 schools) (2005-6)

25,574 students tell us!1,812 teachers tell us!

Learning to Read

Transformational Role of School Libraries

Reading to Learn

READINGKNOWLEDGE

Reading

Not merely acquiring sound-print and writing techniques

“Complex system of deriving meaning from text”.

The transformation, communication and dissemination of text and the development of meaning and understanding.

“An attitude of creation and re-creation, a self-transformation producing a stance of intervention in one's context” (Paulo Freire,1973)

The school library as a transformational agent in the reading-literacy-knowledge life cycle begins with reading

Reading

When reading is at risk, it is not just school libraries that are at risk; more

critically, it is knowledge that is at risk.

Are our school libraries as transformational as we think and believe when it comes to reading?

Reading Patterns Ohio & Delaware

In terms of perceptions of how school libraries help students, reading statements overall ranked low, compared to other helps

Reading helps strongest in elementary school, and decline throughout schooling

Reading helps significantly higher for African American students

Reading helps significantly higher for girls rather than boys

The scores of schools in small cities are significantly higher than other type of schools

Reading-Literacy-Knowledge Life Cycle:

Delaware

Survey of 154 public school libraries in Delaware (2004-2005) (100% of public school libraries)

Measured: - School Library employees- Frequency of co-operations, co-ordinations, collaborations- Participation in professional development activities- Provision of professional development activities- Information literacy interventions- Reading / writing initiatives- Significant learning outcomes enabled by school

library- Information resources, information technology, budgets

Reading - Delaware

Typical activities to promote reading and motivate readers: literature displays, book talks, promoting information resources, reading incentive programs, and to a much lesser extent story telling, book clubs and author visits.

Primarily passive activities.

Reading activities that foster active student engagement, discussion and creative outputs far less frequently reported.

High school students “don’t have time to read”.

AN ACTIVE READING CULTURE

Focus on reading activities that foster active student engagement, discussion and creative outputs:

web blogs; book raps; interactive book reviews; online literature circles, reading pals online; create your own e-books; student-run school reading web pages

CONSTRUCTIVIST LEARNING

"Education is not an affair of telling and being told but

an active constructive process.”

At the heart of knowing is constructing meaning, and at the heart of meaning is

reading

Are our school libraries as transformational as

we might think?John Dewey

Think of the most recent time you worked with a class in your school library.

What did your students really learn?

What deep knowledge and deep understanding of their curriculum topic did they come way with through their school library experience?

What skills and attitudes did they continue to develop? How do you know this?

How did they transform information into knowledge?

And how would you explain it to your school community?

The dimensions of Productive Pedagogy

Intellectual QualityDeep knowledge

Deep understanding Problematic knowledgeHigher order thinking

Meta-languageSubstantive communication

Quality Learning Environment

Explicit quality criteriaEngagement

High ExpectationsSocial Support

Students’ self-regulationStudent direction

Significance Background knowledge Cultural knowledge Knowledge integration Inclusivity Connectedness Narrative

Gore, J., Griffiths, T., & Ladwig, J. (2002). Productive Pedagogy as a Framework for Teacher Education: Towards Better Teaching. Newcastle: Faculty of Education, University of Newcastle. Available at: http://www.aare.edu.au/01pap/gor01501.htm

Libraries as Transformational?Delaware Study

Number of instructional collaborations with teachers is low.

Information literacy instruction initiatives typically center on knowing about school library, different sources and formats, learning how to use resources, and evaluating information.

Are we really playing a role in helping students transform information into new knowledge?

Learning Outcomes: Delaware

39% indicated school library had helped students develop skills in locating, selecting, organizing and evaluating information

37% indicated school library helps improve reading skills; interest & motivation in reading

22% indicated improvement in technology skills

16% indicated development of positive attitude to libraries

4.5% indicated outcomes linked to curriculum standards and goals

New Jersey IMLS Funded Research

What learning outcomes does the school library enable as students make use of diverse digital and print information sources?

How might these learning outcomes be identified, measured, and embedded into professional practice?

Develop a learning impacts measure for use by school-based teams. (SLIM Toolkit: School Library Impact Measure)

Schools Context & Sample

10 New Jersey public schools

Experienced and expert school librarians

Diverse public schools

10 school librarians working on curriculum projects with 17 classroom teachers

574 students in Grades 6 – 12; range of disciplines

Inquiry Training Institute Feb 24, 2004: overview and critique of units, use of data collection instruments, procedures and ethical guidelines

Central Research Questions

As students proceed through the stages of a collaborative inquiry project:

What changes, if any, are evident in their knowledge of a curriculum topic

What changes, if any, are shown in their feelings?

How does their study approach influence knowledge construction of a curriculum topic?

What interactions exist between knowledge construction, feelings, and study approach?

How did school librarians and teachers help students with their learning

Data Collection Instruments

Five data collection instruments were used to collect the data from the students:

1. Writing Task 1 (at initiation of inquiry unit)2. Writing Task 2 (at midpoint of inquiry unit) 2. Writing Task 3 (at conclusion of inquiry unit)4. Search Journal Log5. Study Style

The instruments consisted of a combination of qualitative and quantitative questions to identify changes in knowledge, feelings, study approaches, helps

Measuring Changes in Knowledge

Substance of knowledge

Amount of knowledge

Structure of knowledge

Personal estimate of knowledge

Labeling of knowledge

Substance of Knowledge

Statement type Definition Example

Property statements describing characteristics

The color of Valentine’s day is red

Manner statements describing processes, styles, actions

People drive aggressively in USA

Reason statements of explanations of how and why

The wall was constructed to block invaders

Outcome statements providing end result (People eat too much) As a result, people got very sick

Causality statements showing some event causally leads to another

Too much alcohol can lead to liver failure

Set Membership statements about class inclusion Michelangelo created works such as statue of David, Cistine Chapel and the famous Pieta

Implication statements showing predictive relations, inference, implied meaning

He was suspected of poisoning him

Value Judgment statements presenting personal position or viewpoint

That’s not right

Changes in Knowledge

Two distinctive approaches to knowledge construction:

-- Additive

-- Integrative

ADDITIVE APPROACH

Knowledge development characterized by progressive addition of property facts

As the students built knowledge, they continued to add property and manner statements, and to a lesser extent, set membership statements

Stockpile of facts, even though facts were sorted, organized and grouped to some extent into thematic units by conclusion.

Remained on a descriptive level throughout

INTEGRATIVE APPROACH

Initial: superficial sets of properties

Moved beyond gathering facts:- building explanations- address discrepancies- organizing facts in more coherent ways

Interpret found information to establish personal conclusions and reflect on these.

Some students subsumed sets of facts into fewer but more abstract statements at the end

Changes in knowledge (knowledge growth) did not occur evenly in the schools

No significant variations across the age, grade, and gender groups; the disciplinary field does not seem to be an explanatory factor

Nature of task: imposed task or negotiated task

Engagement and ownership in the topics

Nature of Interventions: Development of skills to construct knowledge rather than finding information

Factors Contributing to Differences Across

Schools

Rethinking Information Literacy?

Information literacy instruction typically focuses on “finding” information: transport rather than transformation

Are we unwittingly contributing to plagiarism?

Typically treat information literacy as a separate discipline (teacher teaches content and school librarian teaches information skills)

Scope and sequence models of Information Literacy are problematic (akin to “fixed schedules”)

Students do not go beyond the basic knowledge level of Bloom’s Taxonomy: recalling and recognizing information

Guided Inquiry

Need to think more strategically about our instructional interventions

Specific interventions are determined by the stage of the search process, the affective, cognitive and behavioral needs of the learners, and the curriculum standards and goals to be achieved

Instructional interventions enable students to produce and demonstrate deep understanding, and facilitate intellectual and personal agency

Starting point for the school library is not information literacy, but a critical Zone of Intervention in the learning standards, and the nature of disciplinary knowledge and how a discipline / field of study develops knowledge

An Approach to Auditing Standards

Identify ZONES OF INTERVENTION where information-to-knowledge processes and knowledge outcomes are embedded and lend themselves to inquiry in the school library = opportunities for developing authentic research

Understanding how disciplinary knowledge is constructed

Frame information-to-knowledge processes (Information Literacy) in the language of the particular discipline and based on how knowledge is constructed in the discipline

Establish learning outcomes as established by the Standards, using language of standards

Construct instructional interventions, building in approaches to Evidence-Based Practice

An Approach to Auditing Standards

Dimension aspect

Zone of Intervention

Disciplinary Knowledge Construction

Instructional Intervention

Outcomes Measures (EBP)

Outcomes

Standard: ……………….

Dimension, or part of a dimension, at any level thatlends itself to inquiry and authentic research throughthe school library, and where the pedagogical expertiseof the school librarian can contribute to reaching Standards

Mathematics:Knowledge Construction

Aim to develop students sense of mathematical inquiry: problem posing, problem solving, modeling and investigation

Mathematical Inquiry framework (= IL Framework)CONJECTURE, FORMULATION, SOLUTION, COMMUNICATION

Find ideas, examples, counter examplesExplore patternsDevelop conjecturesTest simple conjecturesExplain propositionsAnalyze reasonableness of points of viewDevelop generalizations by abstracting featuresTest truth statements and generalizationsDevelop models

Implementing Guided Inquiry: Design

Strategies

Initiated though compelling situations and questions

Instruction puts emphasis on meaningful, authentic activities; focus on identifying and solving intellectual and/or real-world problems

learning activities resemble ways that students will use knowledge and skills in the real world

Students are more motivated to engage in their inquiry when they are able to exercise some choice over questions and how to present their new understandings.

Implementing Guided Inquiry: Design

Strategies

Attempt is made to connect with students’ background knowledge

Instructional activities involve transforming prior knowledge, skills, attitudes and values - higher order thinking and critical analysis occurs throughout.

Instructional activities enable students to develop deep knowledge, deep understanding

Opportunities for sustained dialogue and feedback, opportunities for students to provide their understanding of concepts or ideas during the search process

Implementing Guided Inquiry: Key Strategies

Choice of products to show their new understandings

Students have opportunity to communicate and share their new understandings

Inquiry engages students in conflicting information

Students are given opportunity to practice their new skills

inquiry learning is responsive to students’ personal, social and cultural worlds, valuing differences and cultivating an inclusive community

Great Minds at

work?

Inclusiveness InnovationCreativity

Clarity of focus

CRITICAL THINKING

Read

View

Listen

Connect

I didn’t know that! Questions I have???

I agree / disagree I wonder ….

Dealing With Conflicting Information to Develop

Knowledge

Central Questions

Source 1 eg encycl

Source 2 eg Poor quality web site

Source 3 egHigh quality web site

Source 4 egNewspaper

Source 5High quality print source

What I can say? Evidence for my statement?

who

what

when

where

why

how

result

Transformation of Text: Help Organizations

The Information BaseAMNESTY INTERNATIONAL

Creating the Text Transforming the text

History of Organization

Vision and Goals of Organization

Significant Achievements

Barriers

Transformation of Text: Help Organizations

The Information BaseAMNESTY INTERNATIONAL

Creating the Text: Transforming the text

History of Organization

Vision and Goals of Organization“research and action focused on preventing and ending grave abuses of the rights to physical and mental integrity, freedom of conscience and expression, and freedom from discrimination, within the context of its work to promote all human rights”http://web.amnesty.org/pages/aboutai-index-eng

Synthesizing sets of ideas into your own words

Creating a bullet point summary

Significant Achievements

Barriers

School LibrariansLeading Learning

School librarians must be dedicated to best practice

Continuously enage in thinking about and reflecting on effective school library practices

Translate this thinking into action to lead learning through school libraries

Move beyond just thinking about improvement, and taking action – implementing local strategies and processes that contribute to a cycle of ongoing improvement

Thinking and believing without action is pointless

Taking action means you are living the solution.

Not taking action means that you will be living someone else’s dreams and someone else’s solutions.

And someone else’s solutions may not be in the best interest of student learning outcomes through the school library.

The Reading - Information - Knowledge Challenge