Professional Goal

My professional goal is to become a library media specialist. I strongly believe knowledge and skills grown out of personal curiosity have the deepest roots and the greatest impacts on our own future learning. The media center of any school should be an integral component of that growth.

Classroom instruction is becoming increasingly more student-centered with students working on differentiated learning goals and project-based demonstrations of knowledge. In Pure Genius by Don Wettrick, he states that we need to empower students to go beyond wanting to do what a teacher wants them to do and “propel them to creative, active engagement.” These shifts require students to access and incorporate multiple sources of information in order to be able to answer complex questions and apply their synthesized understandings to real-world problems and projects.

Students need access to quality, up-to-date resources that not only provide information but also serve as models. As Kimmel states on page 9 of Developing Collections To Empower Learners, library users are becoming “both consumers and creators of content.” Effective users of ideas and information should be receiving their foundations in library settings where passion projects motivate the students to access knowledge digitally and concretely. At the elementary level, students need to learn where to begin and how to determine the best, most relevant resources for their purposes.

Students are no longer coming to the library to research dolphins and create a Powerpoint Presentation. They are coming to learn about the issues facing dolphin populations and then developing possible solutions using the engineering design process. Their answers shouldn't just be shared via a slideshow, they should be presenting their solutions via a Skype call with a scientist in Florida or by producing a video using green screen technology that can be shared with people working in the related fields.

I see the role of librarian as a facilitator - the students ask questions and in return the librarian asks more questions until the students have refined their unanswered question to the point that they have also found the needed resources. I see the library as the setting for the production of those videos and Skype calls. I see the library as where many students’ passions are ignited through the books they pick up and the ideas they explore digitally.

And, I still see the librarian and library in the traditional role of helping every student find THEIR reading passion through the selection of the perfect novel or picture book. I still see the librarian as the heart of the library sharing their excitement for reading and the next great book.

As a gifted and talented education teacher, my instructional goal is to help students build their creative and critical thinking skills. The learning experiences I plan and facilitate:

engage students in reading experiences that allow them to think deeply while going beyond the text
invite them to ask questions of and to explore content to construct their own answers based on research and investigations
generate original ideas based on real-world problems and questions through the application of new knowledge gained from reading and hands-on experiences

I feel strongly that all students can benefit from the kinds of learning experiences I am currently only able to provide to a limited population within my school community. I would like to become a library media specialist so that I can facilitate these experiences for and develop creative and critical thinking skills in more students.

Over the last 4 years I have worked closely with my staff and their students to deepen students' interactions with texts and the process of problem solving by:

providing professional development for my entire staff.
working with grade level teams to develop student learning objectives rooted in students’ motivations to read and interact with texts.
modeling and team teaching lessons in many classrooms to increase engagement with self-selected texts and readers’ notebooks.
conducting reading conferences in order to provide written and verbal feedback to students throughout the building for the purpose of growing our readers.

The role of library media specialist feels like a natural extension of the work I’m already doing as a GATE teacher to help students and staff find their reading and learning passions in order to grow the deepest roots.

Kimmel, Sue C. Developing Collections To Empower Learners. Chicago, Illinois: American Association of School Librarians, 2014.

Wettrick, Don. Pure Genius: Building a Cluture of Innovation and Taking 20% Time to the Next Level. San Diego, California: Dave Burgess Consulting Inc, 2014.