LM_NET Top Ten is coming up next. I know you're sitting on the edge of your seats, but I wanted to devote a little more than a bullet point to one thread: Book Rooms and Literacy Coaches
This thread started as a vent of sorts about Literacy Coaches, book rooms and the difference in collaboration between them and teacher librarians. What seems like a doubling of resources - books in a room available for check out and teachers hired to connect students to improved reading development - is eliciting mixed feelings.
On one side are librarians that have felt left out of literacy efforts as classroom teachers use the multiple copies available for literature circles and book club group discussions. Less than accurate cataloguing was another frustration. But what seems to be the biggest concern is the separate funding for the creation and maintainence of book rooms while libraries typically remain underfunded. Just because someone comes back from a conference excited with a new, gimmicky (some might say) idea we should neglect the library?
The other side is not so much the book-rooms-are-great side, but rather book rooms are misused. It seemes perfectly summed up by a few Netters who posted asking for clarification of what is a book room and who is a literacy coach. The lack of information power is what's truly going to frustrate matters more. A book room, as it is meant to function, is a teacher resource to aid in reading development. Rooms are stocked with leveled readers with highly controlled vocabulary and sentence structure (
The Wright Group is a popular example) to be checked out and used specifically for guided reading groups or for reading assessments (
DRA,
Fountas & Pinnell, etc.). Also stocked may be multiple copies of chapter books and trade novels to be checked out and used for literature circles, book club group discussions or
Reading and Writing Workshops for upper grades. This is where the Literacy Coach (and some of the librarians' frustrations) come in.
When I began my M.Ed. coursework 30 semester hours ago, I was in the Reading Education program to become a Reading Specialist. I vividly remember a
table in a textbook showing a continuum of variations of terms and job descriptions of a Reading Specialist, including Literacy Coach - much like school librarian, information specialist, teacher librarian ... you get the picture. Literacy Coaches/Reading Specialists are specially trained in assessing and diagnosing literacy development skills and then designing and implementing reading improvement programs. A good distinction here, and why it's not really a doubling of resources, is pleasure reading and research versus short vowel sounds and word families. Librarians are not asked to take running records and generate miscue analyses. Another way to think of it might be Literacy Coaches/Reading Specialists help students learn to read so that Teacher Librarians can help students read to learn. The two roles are invaluable to one another.
I am not a Reading Specialist and actually switched my degree to Curriculum and Instructional Leadership (did I mention I graduated Friday?!). Regardless, the most important concept I have learned in the last year is "
balanced literacy." And it's come to mean so much more than a happy medium between whole language and phonics. It's symbolic for working toward the best fit. Many Netters wrote about how they strive to be very involved and hands-on with the book rooms and Literacy Coaches because, really, isn't it all part of the bigger literacy picture?
"I believe that change is inherently difficult for many people, but that one's
attitude and choices about the change is what gets one through it and often
preserves one's sanity!" -Lucretia Miller, School Librarian, Jacksonville, FL
What we do have a responsibility toward is doublechecking. Is everyone clear about how Literacy Coaches and Teacher Librarians can collaborate? Is everyone clear how to work together in maintaining the book room and for what purposes? Is a Book Room a best fit for your school? If we all sat down and talked together, what resources might we learn are already available in the library and classrooms?
"Until administrators and teachers have a better understanding of WHAT a library
is and WHAT a librarian can do, these types of situations which undermind the
library program and its budget will continue." -Shonda Brisco, MLIS Library
Media Specialist / Technologist / Columnist Fort Worth, Texas
As much as there was confusion about the existence of Literacy Coaches and Book Rooms, we need to make sure the seemingly universal role of Librarian is also not misunderstood, or rather, underestimated.
I feel like holding hands and singing.
