LIS-S 671 School Library Management
3 credits
- Prerequisite(s): LIS-S 500, LIS-S 507, and LIS-S 574 (Note: Those with a valid teaching license may bypass the LIS-S 574 prerequisites. School Library Certificate students may bypass all prerequisites.)
- Delivery: Online
- Semesters offered: Fall (Check the schedule to confirm.)
Description
School librarians must see themselves as teachers—crucial instructional leaders in the overall structure of the school. The information, technology, digital and media literacy skills that are the basis of our information science “curriculum” are taught most effectively when they are imbedded within classroom standards-based curriculum rather than taught as isolated lessons. The activities for this course are meant to both help you become familiar with the content, but also to give you various opportunities to participate in brain-compatible instruction techniques. The course is taught from a predominantly constructivist perspective meaning you are expected to “construct” learning with your instructor and classmates rather than be an idle participant. In addition to the instructor role, school librarians must be fiscal agents, publicists, free speech and ethical use advocates, collection developers, professional development coaches, student and teacher empowerment agents, and visionaries. Group discussions will be designed to stimulate your thinking, not provide all the answers. Most importantly, this course emphasizes the teacher librarian as a professional responsible for curricular leadership with the school community. It is no longer acceptable for a school librarian to “fly under the radar.” Rather, this role requires cutting-edge thinking, vision for what is possible but unknown or untried, and the tenacity to take educated risks.
Program Learning Goals Supported
Instructors map their courses to specific LIS Program Goals. Mapped program goals drive the design of each course and what students can expect to generally learn.
- Connect Core Values and Professional Ethics to Practice
- Facilitate Engagement in the Information Ecosystem
- Lead and Manage Libraries, Archives and Other Information Organizations
- Conduct Systemic Research to Inform Decisions
- Innovate Professional Practice with Information Services and Technology
Learning Outcomes
Instructors develop learning outcomes for their courses. Students can expect to be able to achieve the learning outcomes for a given course after successfully completing the course.
- Generate a profile of their school library program including all crucial components learned during the semester
- Analyze and internalize the philosophy and content of the 2018 AASL National Guidelines for Learners, School Librarians, and School Libraries.
- Apply a process for establishing priorities and gaining resources to meet goals, objectives, and actions to improve school library programming.
- Identify the typical public school budget accounts and describe a budgeting process for school library programs.
- Plan and evaluate program decisions based on analysis of data gathered locally and compared to data provided from state and national sources.
- Address key issues in school librarianship and the needs for evidence-based decision making.
- Articulate their role as school librarians within the school library program they design
- Identify the various roles of those associated with an innovative school library program.
- Lead collaborative planning conversations with colleagues in order to design instruction that integrates standards encompassing content area concepts, information literacy, technology literacy, digital literacy, and/or media literacy standards.
- Use state grade-level curriculum standards and/or Common Core standards to plan, teach and evaluate instruction that imbeds information, media, and/or technology literacy within the classroom content.
- Implement teaching methods, collaborative planning techniques, learning styles, and evaluation processes that are associated with the effective instruction.
- Experiment with state and national professional education associations relevant to school library services.
- Identify the major names, state and national, current and historic, in the development of school library programs, as well as within education literature in general.
Course Overview
Instruction is in Canvas. Lessons are organized into Modules whose length may vary.
Modules 1-2: New Vision of School Libraries / AASL School Library National Standards and AASL Position Statements
Modules 3-4: School Library Program Mission and Vision
Modules 5-7: School Librarian as Collaborative Teaching Partner / AASL Learner Standards
Modules 8-9: Fiscal Agent / Budgets and Funding as Related to Collection Development
Module 10: Reading Advocacy and Advisory / Roles Related to Traditional Literacy
Module 11-12: Leadership Role as Technology Integration Specialist
Modules 13-14: Leadership and Advocacy for Your Library Program
Module 15: Leadership and School Library Program Evaluation
Policies and Procedures
Please be aware of the following linked policies and procedures. Note that in individual courses instructors will have stipulations specific to their course.