Building Bridges

As I am writing this, I am wrapping up my first half of student librarian teaching at Hickman Elementary under the supervision of Diane Chen. Yes, I know. She is amazing. Many of you probably know her from being a former President of TASL. I still can’t believe how lucky I was to have this opportunity. She is the ultimate example of a school librarian. Anyone who knows her knows that I am speaking the truth. This being said, I would like to share with you some of the lessons I learned from my time at the library media center at Hickman Elementary.

When I was asked what I was studying in graduate school, I was often given strange looks along with ‘You have to go to graduate school to be a school librarian?’ usually followed with a raised eyebrow. Reactions have not changed much when I tell others that I am a student library teacher. As I approach my graduation date this May, I have a different perspective about how I view these people. I used to think who cares what they think. Their opinion does not matter to me. Now I have learned it is important to be concerned with these types of views. As a school librarian, it is our responsibility to get the message out about the key role we play as educators. If we do not, there will be a continuing break down of librarians in the schools.

School Librarians wear many hats. This I learned watching Diane balance all the hats she wears on a daily basis. I never figured out how she kept them on her head without one falling off. But if you ever figure out her secret, please let me know. It is imperative to be part of school committees as well as library committees. Who else better to be part of a team to improve the school than the very person who is in the hub of the school?

Another hat that could be worn by us is getting involved in writing articles for librarian journals and book reviews to help our fellow colleagues or attending professional workshops. We need to work together not only to improve each other, but to ultimately improve our profession. Also, going to the legislature to give a voice to all librarians is a hat we need to all own. We need to remind the people who make the significant decisions on education of the role we play in our students’ future. With this matter of the “65% Solution”, it will take everyone getting involved spreading the word of how our role is essential, too. While there are many other hats school librarians can wear, the best hat of all is the hat of building bridges with students and staff and the community. We provide a vital link in education and hopefully, wearing these numerous hats, we will be able to show others this very fact.

My next lesson is true for many. There is never enough time in the day. You start the day with so many things on your “to do” list. There are lessons to prepare for and lessons to teach. There are students to assist in finding books for their reports and books they are yearning to take an adventure with. The amount of technology questions that surface from the school in one day can be overwhelming at times. The numerous requests for assistance with other teachers’ lessons can flood in while with one hand you are checking in and out books and with the other hand juggling the phone as it rings constantly. I love it though. The excitement of handling the challenges that come your way keeps life from ever getting boring. But your daily tasks can sometimes get to you, so you must prioritize and make sure every moment of day is productive.

Another important lesson I learned is the value of a library aide. If you are fortunate enough to have one, then you know they are worth their weight in gold. Having an aide allows you to focus on your main priority: the students. The aide frees you up to concentrate in teaching while he or she takes care of task such as shelving books and checking in and out books. Hickman Elementary has a wonderful aide, named Dorothy Read. She keeps everything in tip top shape. I can only hope to work with someone like her again.

While I could go on for days about all the lessons I learned in my student teaching experience, none of them, including the ones I mentioned before, even compare to the lesson of why we do all that we do. I learned there is no more rewarding experience than making that connection with a student. Seeing the excitement in students’ eyes when you were able to help them find a book about something they were curious about or witnessing a student who was absolutely positive he would not like poetry and realizing that he does.

We inform all those who are ignorant of our role in education, we juggle the huge collection of hats, write the many articles about the tools of our trade, and conduct our daily tasks so students can have many of these many moments of discovery and wonderment. I am so proud that I am soon going to join the ranks among all of you.

During my time at Hickman Elementary, I had the wonderful opportunity to observe different styles of teaching and various grade levels. I was always very rewarded by what I witnessed. Whether it was something I wanted to incorporate into my style of teaching or something I wanted to stay clear from, I felt greatly benefited by this chance to view these various teachers at work.

The first teacher that I observed was a kindergarten teacher. I had such great respect for style of teaching and was in awe of her performance. I found myself wanting to be a student in her classroom. When she said “Good morning, boys and girls,” they in return would say, “Good morning, Ms _____.” She had the student’s total attention the whole time. If they seem that they are going off track, she has the ability to gain their focus back instantly. She did this while always maintaining a loving and nurturing environment.

During carpet time, they sat in front of her to review the date, cite words, and many other daily routines. I notice that she had slightly tailored behavior control of one student. She gave an extra warning when he would lose his focus on the lesson. He was fidgety and he seemed to have difficulty paying attention. When he failed to adhere to the second warning, she asked him to stand rather making him pull a card. She then, without missing a beat when right back to teaching. This all took place in a matter of seconds. Three minutes later, she gave him permission to sit with a statement, “Try again.”

Later that day, I asked her about the incident. I wondered why she gave him more warnings and chose to have him stand rather than go to the next step of her discipline plan. Her response was thought provoking. She stated that this child in particular had more difficulty focusing than the other students. He needs more guidance and should not be punished after every warning, or she would spend most of her time correcting him rather than teaching. He could not help his lack of focus for the most part due to a condition unknown to me and needed to stand to help him with become focus. Her procedure seemed to work. He did not have any trouble after that moment during the time I was there. I loved the fact that she does not have a “one size fits all” mentality in handling behavior challenges.

The second teacher that I visited was a second grade teacher. I really loved her lesson and the way she presented it. It was a classic style of lesson right from Dr. Harry Wong, author of The First Days of School. She had an attention grabber in the beginning that was impressive. Her science lesson was on vibration. Before she mentioned what they would be learning, she laid out six film canisters in front of the class. She took one by one, shaking them and asking the class what they heard. Students gave many hypotheses to what they thought the canisters contained. After recording the statements on the board, she instructed the class to open their textbook and they read as a class what made those noise.

The whole time she was teaching, it was obvious to me and not the students that she was always setting up for the next step in the lesson. This created amazing flow to the lesson. No time was wasted.
The only aspect that I had trouble incorporating to my style of teaching is her interaction with the students. She tended to be sarcastic and spoke down to her students which created an atmosphere where certain students would no longer stay focused on the lesson and retreat within. I noticed that the students tended to be sarcastic with one another and even from time to time with her as well. I feel she would keep the entire class’s attention and command respect with such ease if she did not use sarcasm and use more praise. I felt she was unaware of her sarcasm and that it was obvious that she loved teaching and her students. While I was memorized by her remarkable lesson, and was flawed by her classroom management.

Last, I observed a third grade teacher where I left with great excitement of what was occurring in her classroom. She always gave clear instructions of what was expected academically and behavior wise. Most incredibly, was what she did not say. It was quite obvious she had instilled in her students from day one what was expected from on every aspect of her classroom. I witnessed an entire lesson with not behavior problems, full of excitement and the student encouraging each other in learning.

She started a lesson called around the world. This was used as a multiplication review. The class of 23 students quickly sat in a circle. The teacher started the game off by asking a multiplication problem. The student instantly answered. That student stood behind the next student beside him. Student after student kept getting the answer right. The class was cheering him on while encouraging the student who failed to give the answer before him. After ten students, the successful student was beat out by a fellow student. Rather than be a sore loser, which is what I expect to happen. He shook his opponent’s hand and said good job. I felt that he genuinely meant it. The whole class was this way. The student, who was successful and just lost, got up and took the teacher’s position of giving multiplication problems. She set back and observed the process. I though this was a great way of cooperative learning.

When I remarked to her how I was impressed on how the students were so encouraging to one another, she modestly stated that she was lucky to get such a good group this year. I felt that it was not luck. No one could be this lucky to have a class of student to automatically get along at the level they did and achieve this level of learning.

So, I investigated more into this matter. I asked my supervising librarian teacher how this teacher had such a great class. She said that she was that great of a teacher. She established her expectations early on and she herself was very encouraging. The students were modeling her behavior. This made total since to me. All the classes that I observed seem to model their teachers’ behavior. Teachers set the tone of their classroom environment by their own actions. I felt this was a valuable lesson and it is going to make me a more effective teacher.