I did run into a few challenges when creating these pages.  The teacher page was pretty straight forward, the only struggle was the endless hours of selecting the right resources. More frustrating was the layout of the student pages. I was really hoping to do a padlet to make the explanation more visual for the students but I just couldn’t figure out how to embed it. In the end, it is somewhat visual but there are definitely things I want to change about it.  There are so many library websites in my district that are much more sophisticated than the one I have created.  I aspire to develop my website into something that I will be proud of among the other Delta library websites.  I intend to add “how to” videos, more visuals and more forums where all my patrons can begin to share their thoughts and begin to connect with each other and others. There will be challenges that come along with is though.  First off, I need to learn how to make the website look more sophisticated. I need to learn how to create and embed videos that will help patrons and encourage them to want to get involved in creating there own online presence.  Then once the improvements are made to the website, how do I get all my patrons to visit the site? This is something I think everyone in our class can identify with.  Creating interest is always difficult but I will do whatever I can think of to promote the site come September. I will use staff meetings, newsletters, announcements etc. to get the word out there but managing the website and blog and gaining continual engagement is something that will always be a struggle.  I will stay persistent as possible and hope for the best.

Where I was…

When starting my project this week my mind was everywhere. I knew that the topic I wanted to focus on was “Inquiry of Inquiry” but I had no idea what I information I would share with others, who the information was for and how I planned to put it out there for my audience to see.  As the week went on went on and as I collaborated with my group members, slowly are started answering these question one by one.  The discussions with Doni and Lisa really helped me clear my head and pointed me in one direction.

So my participants were going to be predominantly the staff and students at my school. My goal was to advocate for more inquiry-based learning at my school. And I was going to do this by adding “Inquiry” pages to the weebly website that already existed for my library.  Keep in mind when viewing this website that I have not introduced it to my staff and students yet even though I created it back in the fall. And no, that is not me in the picture…it is a Bollywood actress 🙂

Delview Library

Where I am now…

So I ended up adding 5 new pages to start accomplishing my goal. There is one “Inquiry-Based learning” page and 4 sub-pages, 1 for teachers, 2 for students and a blog that is open for anyone to comment, on connecting globally.  I did run into a few challenges when creating these pages.  The teacher page was pretty straight forward, the only struggle was the endless hours of selecting the right resources. More frustrating was the layout of the student pages. I was really hoping to do a padlet to make the explanation more visual for the students but I just couldn’t figure out how to embed it. In the end, it is somewhat visual but there are definitely things I want to change about it.  Finally, the blog that I added, is a place where anyone, teachers, students, parents, anyone, can comment and give suggestions on how our school can become more connected and socially aware of the world around us.

Where I want to go…

At this very moment, I want to go to Hawaii!  But when it comes to the website and ICT use in general, there is sooo much I still want to do.  First off, I would like to make all pages on the website more visually appealing by adding padlets and popplets and pearltrees, etc.  Right now it is just too information based. I would like to think about all the things we learned in this course more deeply and figure out how to get myself, my colleagues, and my students more out there in the social context. I want to advocate for sharing our views and opinions with the world and make a difference!

The article we read at the beginning of class really left me with some uneasy feelings.  The automatic response from most of us was anger but Jenny made an important point.  That the answer is not to fight; we need to continue investigating, build connections and come up with positive solutions.  Some of the questions that arose for me were, who is writing this? Where are they getting their information? And, although teachers know to investigate further, how would parents react to an article like this? If people say these types of things constantly, how do we know if parents won’t just go along with it? Many parents are naive to what goes on in schools. They don’t know how important the face-to-face interaction is to building well-rounded members of society.  They might think since technology use is inevitable, maybe ipads instead of teachers is the way to go.  So it is our job as teachers to ruffle the feathers and get our word out there too.  This is a perfect example why we all need to stay or become connected and voice our opinions as well.

Some of the others questions we were trying to answer today include: What am I using for our future vision projects? Why have  I chosen this medium? And what do I hope to get out of the use of it.  First, I am using my library weebly website to share my project online.  The reason I chose this is because I feel that the best way for me to advertise the library as a learning commons area, is by providing as much information and resources on the library website as possible. I want the library to become the hub of information and inquiry, both physically and digitally.  I chose to use weebly because I find it to be very easy to use and navigate through.  What I hope to get from creating these new inquiry pages is to get more teachers and students engaged in inquiry and to make it clear that I am becoming the information and inquiry specialist at my school.

Our focus during class on Tuesday was who are our participants and what are their needs. Thinking about the information I’d like to share on inquiry, I’m struggling with my Intended audience. My reason for this is because initially I had decided that my project would be geared towards teachers, students and parents. Now, after starting to collect my information, it seems that most of what I will be sharing is focused on teachers. There will be a small section for students about formulating the “the big questions” for inquiry. Also, although parents can look at any part of the website, the only place they can really participate is in the “global connections” blog I will create on the website. Here teachers, students and parents can suggest ways in which our school can get involved and connect with places around the world. So, for now, the inquiry pages on the website will mostly be for teachers, but that is ok since the initial push for more inquiry-based learning will come from teachers.

During our group discussion on how to reel in our participants, we came up with the following:

Teenagers: love to connect-Facebook, twitter, Instagram, (wont be as difficult to pull them In But they need to be taught proper social responsibility is most important first.

Teachers: some reluctant of change so as we work with them on inquiry projects that end successfully, word of mouth will get others on board.

Parents: many parents are not involved at all so maybe those parents will never connect but others that do, send out newsletters or hold a general meeting at the beginning of the year. How can TL’s get involved in PTI’s???:

Today when we broke into our project groups, Doni, Lisa and I had a great conversation around just how we each planned on sharing our information in a url.  I feel confident adding pages to my weebly library website but Lisa and Doni still struggled with figuring out there best options. Doni liked my idea of adding to a website that already existed and we all agreed that as librarians we all wanted that website to be the library website, although Lisa mentioned that on her school website there is an “Inquiry” button that also might be a good place to post her Inquiry on Inquiry.  We discussed what might be some good headings for different sections and decided what type of information would come under each.

Through this discussion and the one we had at the beginning of class as a whole group, I’ve decided to make my “Global Connections” section a blog that will be part of the website. Here students, teachers, administration and parents can discuss connections they think we as a school can make with the rest of the world.  I am a bit hesitant about this being open to everyone to express their views but I think it is worth a try and I will be sure to police and monitor the blog on a regular basis.

I also came to the realization that for now, all my new webpages will, for the most part, be informational.  My goal in the future will to have more interaction on the site.  For now I will allow the blog to act as the interactive piece and as time goes on I will try to add more activity-based items. Although I didn’t get to creating any pages today, I look forward to getting at least one page done tomorrow.

After being introduced to new ICT resources through the 10 minutes of fame presentations and hearing peoples’ thought processes around ICT through their summative presentations, I am becoming more and more encouraged to improve ICT in my library and at my school.  At the same time, I am also becoming more confused about where to start. That said, I will start small and try and keep organized by keeping track of all my ideas and creating a tentative schedule of when might be the best time to implement different ICT resources and ideas.

My “starting small” will be my future vision project, focused on inquiry. I am anxious and excited about starting the new “inquiry” pages for my library website.  Although I am still doing my research on inquiry and what scholars have to say about it, at this point, I plan on naming my new pages: “What is Inquiry and why its important,” how to form those big questions, “Digital literacy/social media etiquette” and “Global Connections” These pages will definitely be a work in progress and I haven’t decided exactly what is going to go in each section.  By the end of the week, I’m hoping to have a substantial foundation.

Today the main topic in class was “worldwide libraries.”  When I did my initial individual search of this term, I was lead to a number of online library catalogs. But what I was in search of was academic articles on the topic.  One such such I found was International Association of School Librarianship (IASL). “School Libraries Worldwide” is the offical professional and research journal of this site and publishes current research and scholarship on any aspect of school librarianship. I did not have a chance to look at many articles, but this is definitely one of the sites I will bookmark on Diigo (once I figure out how it works!).

In discussion with others who teach secondary, we talked a bit about what we thought worldwide libraries meant and their implications.  We agreed that the ideal would be: resources accessible to anyone/anywhere with an internet connection, since online material is growing in popularity compared to textbooks and other information books.  But the reality is that we are limited by things like copyright, publishers and internet accessibility. One of the group members talked about the idea of producing things for the sake of sharing with other people rather than for the sake of financial gain; she called it “creative commons.” I feel as educators, this should be at the forefront of our beliefs. Unfortunately, I am not confident that governments and financial institutions would buy into this ideal so easily.

When discussing worldwide libraries with my inquiry group, we agreed that inquiry already demands outside connections.  Some examples of connections we came up with were web quests, pen pals in other countries and skyping with experts in a particular field of work or subject.  We also agreed that up to date, current information is not always found in the books we have in our libraries, so it is important to make connections to other libraries throughout the world.

Finally, Jenny put up 3 words at the end of class: Why, how and what. I immediately related these three questions to my future vision project.

Why?: I am conducting my “inquiry of inquiry” to become the “inquiry expert” for my students and for the staff at my school.  I want to be able to teach my students about info and digital literacy, social media etiquette and how to create and answer those overarching big inquiry questions they wonder about.

How?: The way I plan to start this by continuing my research on inquiry-based learning and eventually adding “inquiry” pages for teachers and students to my library website, addressing the items listed above and by connecting with students and teachers to facilitate inquiry projects.

What?: What I hope to get out of this is the satisfaction of knowing that I played a pivotal role in the incredible changes that will take place in my students, in my staff and in my school through inquiry.  I want to be driving force for change.

Jenny introduced us to three new terms today to help us deal with the best way of introducing changes in ICT at our schools.  After thinking about these terms a little bit, I started relating them to my future vision project.  One thing that stood out for me, to do with Autopoesis is that for so long we have been taught that we are all individuals who can me independent, but Jenny pointed out that “this is wrong!” That we are not superior to nature and we are not separable from any other living systems.  We are ecological beings and we are connected as long as we are alive.  So, I need to unlearn the notion that maybe I can independently introduce more ICT and inquiry into the library and then slowly try to get other teachers on board.

This brings us to the second term, Structural Coupling.  Structural Coupling is the drive for connectedness and is continuously occurring biologically, cognitively, culturally and technologically.  Furthermore, our existence depends on our relationships between the cognitive, cultural and technological, which are constantly forming and going away.  So, since we link to ourselves and to others through language (linguistic cognitive domain), I realized that it is very important that I approach the introduction of Inquiry and ICT to the teacher and administration very carefully, using a positive confident demeanor and a language that everyone understands as is drawn to.  I will need to name things in a way that people want to get involved and contribute.

I am still struggling with how I intend to do this but by introducing it through the library website and by explaining how easy it was for me to add in the new pages on inquiry, to the teachers benefit I might add, I am hoping I will be inspired to get involved. Although changing people’s beliefs is not easy, considering that inquiry has become an important and well-known term at my school in the last year, I am confident that my push for the use of the library as the technological/inquiry hub of the school will get teachers and administration excited to see what I have to offer and start to collaborate with me more and more.

Today we learned about the structure of inquire which includes: process, participants and purpose.  There is a relationship between all 3 parts, which is why we must address all 3 when setting out to do inquiry and look at each relationship thoroughly.  We looked at participants as being meaning-makers and that purpose will be slightly different for everyone since each person will take away something different than others depending on how they interpret their inquiry. We also learned 3 important terms that pose as inevitable challenges we face in schools.

First, Institutional Isomorphism is the idea that all institutions are living organisms, self-shaping, and sustain their own existence.  They sustain their own life through policies, philosophies, beliefs and practices.  These things that sustain an institution evolve all the time, which keeps it living and changing. But one challenge is that many institutions resist change, including schools.  They resist through normative practice or the mentality of “we don’t do that here,” coercive practice where you are forced to comply by administration or because of financial issues etc., and mimetic practices when people just copy each other and don’t “step on any toes.”

Next, the term Conservative Dynamicism, coined by Larry Cuban, refers to when learning activities stay the same but teachers say they use ICT just by using a digital projector for instance.  Lecturing from a power point presentation is the same as lecturing from the chalk board.  This is a synical, passive response to ICT use.  Thus, we need to come up with more innovative uses for ICT.

Finally, Socio-Cultural Homeostasis, termed by Antonio Domaeio, says that historically, feelings were suppose to be suppressed.  He believes feelings proceed thinking and that the way we use words will invoke a response  from others.  If you have a positive impression, then you may form a connected relationship.  On the other hand, If the impression is negative or aggressive, the relationship may become more distant. There is a socio-cultural aspect to these feelings and relationships.  The socio-cultural environments control what we can feel.  These environments inhibit change.

These are very important terms to me as a teacher and a TL especially with my willingness to bring change through ICT.  I know these are challenges that I will continue to face but I am going to stay optimistic and confident and do whatever necessary to bring more inquiry and technology into the library for students and teachers.

For my future vision project I have chosen the topic of Inquiry.  I’ve chosen this topic because my school is starting a new grade 8 Inquiry cohort in September and I would like to contribute to the digital literacy aspect of inquiry as the teacher-librarian.  I had a wonderful conversation with 5 other classmates who also chose inquiry as their topic today.

We discussed the meaning of inquiry and our roles as teachers of inquiry.  The biggest focus of discussion was “how can TL’s help teachers use inquiry?”  We came up with many questions we’d like to address for our individual projects.  Some of these questions included: how do we come up with the guiding questions?, How do we create scaffolding sheets/rubrics?, How do we use technology for inquiry?, and how do we present our knowledge to teachers?

We also discussed some resources we could use to find out the answers to these questions.  One major resource I already knew about was the Calgary Science school.  The inquiry director in my district, Neil Stephenson, introduced me to the Calgary Science school last year. He was a former teacher at this school that is completely Inquiry-based.

It really helped to discuss our concerns as a group, in order to help decide what our individual focuses will be.  My main goal with inquiry is to be the teacher and facilitator of information and digital literacy in the library when students come in with a project idea. Being in a high school and teaching senior students, I would like to help teach students to come up with there own guiding questions from a given topic.  Most of the elementary teachers agreed that it was best to provide the guiding questions to younger questions but I feel senior students need to start making their own connections to inquiry.  I would also like to educate all students on how to analyze and synthesis information they find on the web and to be socially responsible.

The question now is, how do I intend to do this using technology?  Once I spend some more time researching what others have to say about inquiry and what they do to promote inquiry, I will make a final decision. But at this time, I am thinking about adding inquiry pages to my school library website.  I am excited to see where the next week takes me!