Library Land

I am going to focus on the print materials of my Reference Section.The present condition of my traditional reference section is a total of thirty-five books. Our collection includes six dictionaries, a thesaurus, three atlases and the remaining books are special topic encyclopedia books. My collection reveals, that according to Reidling's General Guidelines for replacing reference materials (p.24), my entire collection is out of date. Unfortunately, my library budget for this school year is zero dollars from the school. This constraint makes it exceptionally hard for me to tackle the issue of replacing materials. According to my school district's Teacher Librarian Job Description and Responsibilities , #4 states, "Ensure that the school library collections are organized, maintained, and made available to staff and students, with the assistance of the library Clerks, according to acceptable standards." The acceptable standards according to AIL standards for ...

SOMETIMES IT TAKES A GOOD FAIL TO KNOW WHERE YOU STAND I was very excited about this opportunity because I had the chance to work with a colleague that I had not taught or collaborated with yet. He is known as an old-school teacher who is slowly, but surely, coming around to digital technology. Most of his lessons make use of the whiteboard, worksheets, textbooks and overhead projector. I admire his ethics, demeanor and presence in the classroom. I have much to learn from him and was excited to potentially teach him something new. I was nervous to approach and suggest this collaboration, as I was worried I might be turned down. I was fortunate that he was gracious and willing to work with me for this assignment. I wanted to ensure that I was not creating more work for him, but helping to facilitate a new approach. During our first collaborative meeting we agreed to a three week plan, with three, one hour lessons. The subject matter was something I wanted him to choose, a...

The one thing guaranteed to all of us is change. Our world is constantly in flux, shifting and moving. Nowhere is this more apparent than in our language where words morph their meaning and sprout like new buds. We see it in our borders and boundaries and our physical world as rivers rise and glaciers recede. As Teacher-Librarians we are the guides through an ongoing change in information and must do our best to keep our collections current and relevant. What strikes me as interesting is the formal and informal growth of language. Even dictionaries vary in their viewpoint. "Most of the Merriam-Webster dictionaries take the stance that 'almost anything goes' as long as it is popular." (p.62, Reidling) According to merriam-webster.com, the 2017 dictionary added over 1,000 new words, including fast fashion and woo woo... Definition of fast fashion : an approach to the design, creation, and marketing of clothing fashions that emphasizes making fashion tr...

Evaluation of a Reference Work I'm so pleased to have the opportunity to look into the reference section of my Library-Learning Commons. It is abysmally evident that our reference section is minimal and outdated. Our print resources include a handful of dictionaries, thesauruses, atlases and topic-specific books. I chose one of our specific reference books to evaluate, "World Book looks at the Sea and Its Marvels ". The  content and information in this book is organized haphazardly.  There is no obvious way search the information, other than consulting the index for the animal you are searching. It has vague groupings of information into chapters. Some examples of chapters include, "Strange Sea Shapes", "Ocean Wanderers", and "Exploring the Reef". Although the title claims to explore the sea, there is no mention of tides or the way the moon affects the ocean. There are no mention of pollution, climate change, fishing or overfishing, oil s...

Library Land is a blog for all things bookish and literary! I love reading and discussing literature.  Here are some of the best books I have read, they have left lasting impressions, years after I put them down. It's hard to narrow the list, but here's the quick fiction version; War of the Worlds by H.G Wells All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr The Prince and the Pauper by Charles Dickens Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne Memoirs of a Geish by Arthur Golden What are some of your favourite books?