Category Archives: Digital Learning

Leading Learning: Advice from the AASL School Leader Collaborative

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Last Friday, American Association of School Librarians (AASL) past-president Kathryn Roots Lewis posted “Celebrate Your Influence!” on the Knowledge Quest blog.

This is a must-read, seriously consider, reflect upon, and take action guide for all practicing school librarians, librarian candidates, and school librarian educators.Word Cloud in the letters W and ELeaders and Instructional Partners
The responses from five of the seven School Leader Collaborative (Collaborative) members reinforce the critical actions school librarians have taken during the pandemic. The school librarian’s role as a leader and the Collaborate Shared Foundation (and action taken during the role of instructional partner) are dominant threads throughout the Collaborative members’ comments. These principals and superintendents know the school library can and should be at the center of the academic program and that school librarians can and should lead from the heart of the school.

Although many school librarians have been serving as leaders and instructional partners for decades, the necessity of leadership and classroom-library collaboration came into acute focus during school closures, hybrid and remote learning. These practices must continue into the future if we are to demonstrate our value and reach our capacity to influence teaching and learning in our school communities.

Maximizing School Librarian Leadership
I believe that the testimonials of the Collaborative suggest that educators thrive in a positive school climate characterized by a can-do spirit. In their comments, they ask school librarians to be adaptable and flexible, intentional and effective communicators who practice grace and patience, and serve as outcomes-oriented coteachers who can be assertive team players.

School librarians must be coleaders in building and maintaining a collaborative culture of learning. “Leaders must communicate optimism to their followers. Optimistic leaders support people in taking the first and then the next steps in a change process. School librarians can be coleaders who positively affect school climate and culture through successful classroom-library instructional partnerships” (Moreillon 2018, 130).

Advocacy
From the perspectives of these administrators, the positive results of (more) school librarians serving as leaders and instructional partners has been a “good thing” for students, educators, and administrators.

This MUST become the new normal for our profession!

Publicizing the work of the Collaborative creates an opportunity for advocacy for all of us. But first, it is incumbent upon all school librarians to take action to work toward the highly influential role of instructional coleader in our schools.

After we have taken on that responsibility, sharing the understandings, experiences, and suggestions of these school leaders can help school librarians influence the actions of administrators in their schools and districts. Combining exemplary practice with administrator support will help us achieve our rightful place at the center of teaching and learning.

Coming Soon at the AASL Conference
Pam Harland, Anita Cellucci, and I have just completed a research study of content created by the Collaborative. We will be presenting “The Influence of Standards on School Administrators’ Priorities for School Librarians” during a “Research Into Practice” session at the AASL National Conference in Salt Lake City in October, 2021.

Work Cited

Moreillon, Judi, 2018. Maximizing School Librarian Leadership: Building Connections for Learning and Advocacy. Chicago: ALA.

Image Credit

johnhain. “We Unity Cooperation Together.” Pixabay.com. https://pixabay.com/illustrations/we-unity-cooperation-together-566327/

Virtual Libraries for preK-12 Students, Educators, and Families

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School Library Month, Part 2

During the pandemic when many students were and still are learning through hybrid and remote instruction, many school librarians and library organizations across the country stepped up to share resources and co-create resource portals.

All of them were intended to help students and educators identify online resources and tools without having to completely re-create the wheel for each lesson, unit, or project plan. Instead, they could tap into these portals, adapt them for their teaching and learning purposes, and share them with others.

Sharing resources is a cornerstone of school librarianship.

One of these state-level portals has been around for years; others were developed more recently in response to school closures in 2020. All provide resources specific information and resources that may require log-ins for their in-state users as well as resources generally applicable to users in other states.

None of these sites was intended to replace state-certified school librarians and collaborating classroom teachers who design and guide students in their learning process. In fact, the plethora of resources linked to these portals points to the critical need for educators who help students hone their purpose for and proficiency in searching, analyzing and using information, and creating new knowledge.

INFOhio
INFOhio began in 1989 when a group of school librarians developed a plan to “computerize” Ohio’s school libraries. Their vision:

“Each Ohio PreK-12 student has equal access to high quality digital resources for a successful education and future”

and mission:

“INFOhio transforms student learning by providing equitable access to quality resources and cost-effective instructional and technical support for each student, educator, and parent in Ohio” (https://www.infohio.org/about).

sum up the aims of all of these resource portals: equity of access to digital resources.

The site is organized around pre-K (ages 3-5), K-5, 6-8, 9-12, Parent Tools, and Educator Tools sections. The latter is organized by grade level, subject, item type, training and promotion, instructional trends, and Dimensions of Inquiry. Educators, including school librarians, can also receive various types of training and certifications using these resources.

Massachusetts Virtual School Librarian
Early on in the pandemic the Massachusetts Association of School Librarians (MSLA) collaborated with other state-level stakeholders to create their Virtual School Librarian. Organized in instructional levels, elementary, middle, and high school, the site also includes an educator support section. There are currently 133 Massachusetts Library System LibGuides on the site.

One especially exciting and high-impact service was MSLA’s commitment to answering questions posted to the site within 24 hours. Nineteen members volunteered and were organized to respond within three grade bands—elementary, middle, and high school.

To learn more, read about it in Georgina Trebbe and Deeth Ellis’s 6/1/20 Knowledge Quest blog post: “The Massachusetts School Library Association Launches Virtual School Librarian Website to Help Educators during School Closures.”

New Jersey: SchoolLibraryNJ
This project is newly completed. Led by Rutgers University School of Communication and Information, MI Program, the New Jersey Association of School Librarians, and supported by the State Library of New Jersey with the generous cooperation of Springshare, this site is as deep as it is wide.

Sections of the site include grade bands, resources for parents, educators, administrators, and librarians. I will be sharing the Elementary and the Middle School sections in an Arizona Library Association Teacher Librarian Division Professional Development meeting on Wednesday, April 14th. (Patty Jimenez will be sharing Sora-facilitated high school resources.)

I attended the 3/24/21 webinar in which Joyce Valenza, Grace McCusker, and Michelle Luhtala shared many features of the site. Of particular note, the Administrators section offers AASL and other resources to support you as you educate your administrators about your vital role in education. During the session, Joyce invited librarians to contribute to a Padlet to provide possible additions.

You can read more about the site in Steve Tetreault’s 2/5/21 Knowledge Quest blog post: “School Library NJ: Support for an Entire State – and Beyond!” Steve was responsible for the middle school resources on the site.

Or you can view the EdWeb video recording: The Ultimate Research Guide for All Learners (Including YOU!)

New York City School Libraries System: Connect, Create, Lead
Led by Melissa Jacobs, the NYC School Library System has been at the forefront of providing librarians with resources to support hybrid and remote learning. Their Translation of Practice document guides school librarians in making connections from in-person learning and teaching to remote practice, organized in these categories: Learning and Teaching, Information Access and Delivery, and Program Administration.

Washington (State) School Libraries Tools and Guides
The WA Digital TeachKit is designed to help K12 educators select, understand, and use commonly-adopted digital learning tools in Washington State. It was created by Washington teacher librarians and members of the Washington Library Association School Library Division and led by Shana Ferguson, Christie Kaaland, Hillary Marshall, and Mark Ray. The site is divided into two sections: Tools and Guides.

The Tools section includes frequently used digital tools with information organized by first steps, next steps, instructional design, management, differentiation and adaptation, and hybrid strategies. Some links include Wakelets and other collections of information and tips.

The Guides section is “designed to help educators understand different kinds of digital tools and services and how they can fit into your instruction. If you’re not sure which tool fits which need, these guides are designed to help you make the right choice.”

So, as to be redundant: None of these sites was intended to replace state-certified school librarians and collaborating classroom teachers who design and guide students in their learning process. In fact, the plethora of resources linked to these portals points to the critical need for educators who help students hone their purpose for and proficiency in searching, using and analyzing information, and creating with new knowledge.

Image Created with
kalhh. “Learn Media Internet.” Pixabay.com, https://pixabay.com/illustrations/learn-media-internet-medium-977543/

Inquiry Connections: Competence, Autonomy, and Relevance

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Image of 3 interlock puzzle pieces and the words competence, autonomy, and relevance (plus modeling)In the past two weeks, I have been engaged in an email exchange with Connie Williams, who retired from her high school librarian position in Petaluma City (CA) Schools and walked into her second dream job as a part-time History Room Librarian at the Petaluma Regional Library. In her current role, she often has the opportunity to work with individual students as they conduct research.

Connie and I began our conversation after my 11/16/20 blog post that referenced Joyce Valenza’s “Enough with the CRAAP; We’re Just Not Doing It Right.” We have been sharing ideas about using Mike Caulfield’s The Four Moves and SIFT process when teaching students to closely examine the reliability of sources.

Last week, I also had the opportunity to engage in a virtual interview with Barbara Stripling, which will be posted to School Library Connection.com (SLC) in the near future. Barb posed questions about how to motivate students to engage in inquiry and how inquiry motivates students to become lifelong learners. (Note: Barb also discusses relevance, autonomy, competence (confidence) in her recent SLC article.)

Central to these conversations has been how to engage students in the hard work of determining the reliability of sources—to dig deep enough to determine the perspective, bias, and authority of texts, free-range web browser-searched texts in particular. This work is essential for student-led inquiry learning.

These conversations prompted me to revisit the work of psychologists Edward Deci and Richard Ryan, which I first learned about in Paul Tough’s book Helping Students Succeed: What Works and Why (2016). Research conducted by Deci and Ryan points to the fact the people (students) are motivated by intrinsic needs for competence, autonomy, and relatedness (personal connection or what we in education call relevance). According to Deci and Ryan, motivation can be sustained when those needs are met.

I believe these three needs are the key to unlocking in our students the motivation to doing the hard work. (This is the order in which Deci and Ryan address these needs.)

Competence
Making sense of any text, also known as comprehension, is work. It requires that readers who want to know the answers to their questions apply a range of strategies. These strategies include self-assessing their background knowledge or building it, posing meaningful questions and questioning the texts they encounter, determining main ideas, perspectives, and bias, drawing inferences, and synthesizing information from multiple sources. It also requires that adults and more proficient peers model what is going on inside their heads when they use these strategies to analyze a text.

K-12 students who have learned and have been guided in practicing reading comprehension strategies have learned to “stop” and chose from a selection of strategies to gain or regain comprehension. The process involved in making sense of text is an essential practice in reading and therefore in inquiry, which often challenges students to learn from texts that are above their proficient reading level. Students who are accustomed to doing this work will have a leg up when they are engaged in inquiry learning.

When students have confidence built from success with difficult texts, they will realize they are empowered with the skills and strategies needed to investigate any question they want to pursue. They will experience competence in making sense of texts. This competence can be a foundation on which they will persist in doing the hard work of analyzing and effectively using unfamiliar texts for their own purposes.

Experiencing competence creates confident learners
who are prepared to take the risks necessary for inquiry learning.

Autonomy
Autonomy is a centerpiece of inquiry learning. From my perspective and in my experience, there are two big buckets of inquiry practices in K-12 schools: guided inquiry based in curriculum standards and open-ended completely student-led inquiry learning. I believe both practices can create the conditions that further motivate students as lifelong learners.

I have the most experience facilitating guided inquiry based in content-area curriculum standards. When educators create opportunities for students to exercise choice within a content-area topic to achieve a standards-based outcome, they have created what Bhabha (1994) called a “third space,” a negotiated space between the curriculum required in school and the student’s outside of school interests and experience. In this context, students have the authority to ask personally meaningful questions within the required curriculum framework (Kuhlthau, Maniotes, and Caspari 2012).

Junior or senior capstone (and some university-level) projects are inquiry examples in which students may assume complete choice over the topic as well as the questions of their inquiry. These projects can pave the way for supporting a lifelong commitment to the process of asking questions and seeking answers, solutions, and uncovering more questions.

Empowered students engaged in inquiry exercise choice and voice.

Relevance
Deci and Ryan use the term “relatedness” which we, in education, call relevance or personal connections. Again, inquiry supports relevance and relevance supports inquiry.

Inquiry learning creates opportunities for student agency. Agency involves students in taking an active role in and ownership over learning. “They may set goals that are relevant and meaningful to their lives, practice autonomy by having voice and choice, and be empowered to share, reflect on, and grow through their learning” (Moreillon 2021, in press).

Exercising agency and experiencing empowerment is motivating.

Plus One: Modeling
To these three, I would add one condition that creates the kind of learning environment that motivates youth to enthusiastically engage in learning and persevere when the going gets tough. I believe that modeling is the most important example educators can offer students. When school librarians and classroom teachers show students that we, as adults, continue to pursue personally meaningful questions in our own lives, students can understand the usefulness of a lifelong inquiry stance toward learning.

Educators who model lifelong learning show students and colleagues that doing the work is worth it. This is not easy at a time when the most common question is what’s the quickest and easiest path to success.

Educator modeling invites students into a supportive inquiry learning environment, a club of inquirers.

Works Cited

Bhabha, Homi K. 1994. The Location of Culture. New York: Routledge.

Deci, Edward L., and Richard M. Ryan. 2018. Self-Determination Theory: Basic Psychological Needs of Motivation, Development, and Wellness. New York: The Guilford Press.

Kuhlthau, Carol C., Leslie K. Maniotes, and Ann K. Caspari. 2012. Guided Inquiry Design: A Framework for Inquiry in Your School. Santa Barbara, CA: Libraries Unlimited.

Moreillon, Judi. Ed. 2021. Core Values in School Librarianship: Responding with Commitment and Courage. Santa Barbara, CA: Libraries Unlimited.

Tough, Paul. 2016. Helping Children Succeed: What Works and Why. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

See also: My 6/5/17 review of Tough’s book How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity, and the Hidden Power of Character.

 

Digital Learning: SIFT Meets Reading Comprehension Strategies

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Image of Laptop with Books on the Screen and this text: Physical/digital access without intellectual access does not support traditional or any other literacy.Since computers entered libraries (and classrooms), students have been reading on screens. The difference today during the pandemic is that many students are reading exclusively online. This means that during this academic school year, more K-12 students than ever before will be engaging with digital texts.

An 11/11/20 Knowledge Quest blog post by Elizabeth Pelayo, librarian at St. Charles East High School in St. Charles, Illinois, brought this situation into sharp relief for me: “Print Nonfiction vs Databases.”

Elizabeth’s post reminded me of the challenges of allocating funds for library collections during tight budget times (and a pandemic). Her post also brought back a comment a high school junior made to me in 2010 when attempting to use a database during an inquiry project related to Harlem Renaissance literature and the arts: “Dr. M., can’t I just use a book?”

I agree with Elizabeth’s conclusion that students need both paper print and digital information sources. Her conclusion also aligns with Kathy Lester’s perspective in her 10/26/20 KQ post “Access to Print Books? Yes!”

Comprehension Using Digital Texts
I think it is critical that all school librarians and educators, including administrators, read the research referenced in Jill Barshay’s The Hechinger Report article “Evidence Increases for Reading on Paper Instead of Screens” (2019). This is essential information if we are not only focused on providing access to paper print and digital resources but also committed to ensuring readers comprehend what they read.

This research finding should give us direction: “The excessive confidence of screen readers (with regard to their comprehension) is important, (researcher Virginia) Clinton said, because people who overestimate their abilities are likely to put in less effort. The less effort a person puts into a reading passage, the less they are likely to comprehend. That’s because reading comprehension, like all learning, isn’t easy and requires work” (Barshay 2019). (Emphasis added.)

As noted in Barshay’s article, the genre of the text figures into the mix. When Clinton’s research separated out studies in which students had read narrative fiction, there was no benefit to paper over screens, “but for nonfiction information texts, the advantage for paper stands out” (Barshay 2019).

Physical/digital access without intellectual access does not support traditional or any other literacy.

Connections to Inquiry Learning
Today, when students are engaged in remote and hybrid inquiry learning, they will be even more inclined to use digital texts accessed exclusively from the web in their information search process. Sorting fact from fiction, misinformation, disinformation, propaganda, and outright lies during free-range web searches requires the “work” that Clinton’s research supports.

SIFT + Comprehension Strategies = Critical Thinking
In a recent School Library Journal blog post “Enough with the CRAAP: We’re Just Not Doing It Right,” Joyce Valenza makes a research-based case for reassessing and changing the way we teach validating online information. I have never used the CRAAP test in my teaching. I have not found this apparently linear list useful to students. (Not to mention that I find the acronym off-putting.) On the other hand, I have used graphic organizers that I hope have led students to dig deeper when they are analyzing a source of information.

In her post, Joyce cites “Educating for Misunderstanding: How Approaches to Teaching Digital Literacy Make Students Susceptible to Scammers, Rogues, Bad Actors, and Hate Mongers,” research from the Stanford History Education Group. Joyce’s post and SHEG’s research finding should be a wake-up call for school librarians. It’s time to rethink how we teach digital literacy. (I encourage you read both Joyce’s post and the SHEG study.)

Joyce also cites Mike Caulfield’s “SIFT (The Four Moves).” For me, the SIFT process is aligned with and reinforces reading comprehension strategies that (upper grade) students should know and be able to apply. Parenthetical are mine.

Stop
Ask yourself if you know this website and the reputations of its authors. (“Stop” is precisely what readers are advised to do in order to self-assess their comprehension. Questioning and monitoring comprehension are reading comprehension strategies.)

Review Your Purpose
How will you use this information? (Reconnecting with the purpose for reading is a “fix-up option” reading comprehension strategy.)

Here Caulfield makes a distinction between next steps for a shallow or deeper investigation. Since this discussion focuses on students who are engaged in inquiry learning, school librarians and coteachers would guide them on to:

Investigating the source (building background knowledge)

Finding trusted coverage (determining main ideas and questioning the text until trusted information is found)

Tracing claims, quotes, and media back to the original context (verifying background knowledge) (Caulfield 2019).

And for me, at this point, educators stress the importance of deeply examining the author’s purpose, bias, and perspective, which is when students will make inferences combining their background knowledge with the evidence in the text (yet another reading comprehension strategy).

Digital Reading Comprehension
At this time as new practices are developing in instruction, it is essential that we have focused conversations with education decision-makers about how student read for meaning (reading comprehension), engage in inquiry, and determine the reliability of digital information.

AASL’s own “The School Librarian’s Role in Reading Position Statement” is also a rich resource for engaging in this conversation with decision-makers.

Collaborate!
The skills we have traditionally considered “information literacy” must not be separated from reading comprehension strategies, inquiry, and critical thinking. All of these tools—working in various combinations—help students analyze and make sense of texts. This is essential work for today’s students. Educators must teach these skills and motivate students to practice them—consistently—most especially in the free-range web learning environment.

In an SLJ article, Irene C. Fountas, professor in the School of Education at Lesley University in Cambridge and Gay Su Pinnell, professor in the School of Teaching and Learning at Ohio State University, were quoted: “Having a library is a treasure, and having a librarian is a gift. And when reading teachers, classroom teachers, specialists, and school librarians come together as a team, their collective knowledge about texts can help every child love to read independently, love to read in their classroom, and love to read at home” (Parrott 2017). (Emphasis added.)

Working together as a team, educators can also ensure that students deeply analyze and comprehend the “informational texts” they read in paper print and on their screens. School librarians can be leaders who make (digital) literacy teaching teams effective for the benefit of students.

Works Cited

Barshay, Jill. 2019. “Evidence Increases for Reading on Paper Instead of Screens.” The Hechinger Report, https://hechingerreport.org/evidence-increases-for-reading-on-paper-instead-of-screens/

Caulfield, Mike. 2019. “SIFT (The Four Moves).” https://hapgood.us/2019/06/19/sift-the-four-moves/

Parrott, Kiera. 2017. “Fountas and Pinnell Say Librarians Should Guide Readers by Interest, Not Level,” School Library Journal, https://www.slj.com/?detailStory=fountas-pinnell-say-librarians-guide-readers-interest-not-level

Valenza, Joyce, 2020. “Enough with the CRAAP; We’re Just Not Doing It Right.” School Library Journal, http://blogs.slj.com/neverendingsearch/2020/11/01/enough-with-the-craap-were-just-not-doing-it-right/

Image Credit
kalhh. “Learn Media Internet.” Pixabay.com, https://pixabay.com/illustrations/learn-media-internet-medium-977543/

SLJ Summit Recap

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Image of Laptop with Bookshelves on the ScreenI appreciate School Library Journal for organizing a purely virtual 2020 Summit. The line-up of content was outstanding with many familiar as well as new (to me) and diverse voices represented. The interface was easy to use. My only regret is that my schedule did not allow me to attend all of the live sessions in real time, which were not recorded for later access.

CORRECTION: The live session recordings are now available! Please don’t miss the recording of “In Conversation with Patrisse Cullors” moderated by Erika Long!

Reimagining School
After a Zoom social and welcome remarks, the opening session “Reimagining School” was a perfect way to launch the day-long conversation about challenges faced and solved for successful remote learning, equitable access to resources, and serving underserved students and families.

The presenters were Susan Gauthier, Director, Library Services, East Baton Rouge Parish School District, Dr. Jacqueline Perez, Assistant Superintendent, Equity, Access & Community Engagement, Riverside (CA) Unified School District, Brian Schilpp, STEM Supervisor, Garrett County (MD) Schools, Marlon Styles, Jr., Superintendent, Middletown City (OH) Schools; the session was capably moderated by Kara Yorio, SLJ News Editor.

Each of these presenters shared their unique teaching and learning environments and highlighted that a one-size-fits-all response to remote, hybrid, or in-person learning during a pandemic is not recommended or even possible.

Susan Gauthier expertly presented the pandemic worldview from the school librarianship perspective in East Baton Rouge Parish, Louisiana. With over 41,000 students, Susan and her librarians’ biggest challenge was scaling their digital collections to meet the needs of all students, educators, and families. She wisely started planning for the closure this fall with a stakeholder survey; the results showed that no one wanted physical book checkouts and all resources would be delivered electronically. Here are the highlights of what Susan shared:

  • Promoting and using e-resources exclusively meant the district had to rethink their reading culture, including orientations to the virtual library, reader’s advisory, and reading challenges.
  • Expanding adoption of e-resources from broad acceptance at middle school to the entire K-12 community was essential and a leadership opportunity to school librarians.
  • The district had benefited from FEMA hurricane funds and built on their “weather resistant” collections, including expanding into nonfiction and titles in Spanish.
  • District librarians made a concerted effort to collaborate with the public library to ensure all students had e-cards that provided access to the public library’s digital collection.

Susan thanked the vendors who provided their district with free e-resources, including MackinVia, TeachingBooks, ABDO, and Follett’s Lightbox.

Here’s one takeaway from each of the other presenters:

Jacqueline Perez stressed the critical importance of taking an asset-based view of each individual student in terms of addressing their needs and engaging them in learning. (Another asset-based view in Riverside district involves the community and volunteers in organizing and staffing learning hubs particularly for homeless or other students who lack adult support.)

Brian Schilpp noted that “aggressive” professional development for educators must be individualized—meeting educators “where they are” is essential. (The district’s drive-in movie theater set-up for sharing information with families is brilliant.)

While all of the presenters talked about the importance of building on the relationships they had formed with students, families, and community, Marlon Styles, Jr. reinforced this truth in all of his comments. His best quote: “Creativity is free!” (Co-creating individual reading plans with students and families is an outstanding way to gain support for youth from the adults in their homes.)

After the session there was a post-panel discussion in Zoom where participants crowdsourced ideas and resources.

I have watched two previously recorded sessions so far.

Nick Glass, founder of TeachingBooks, spotlighted the amazing digital resources offered on the site—232,000+ and rising! In addition to the TeachingBooks search tools, the site offers a Diverse Books Toolkit, Reader’s Advisory, and Library Programming. As an added benefit, particularly during remote learning, sharing tools allow librarians and other educators to connect TeachingBooks resources to their learning management systems.

Watching this resource evolve over the past twenty years has been amazing. If you don’t know and use TeachingBooks, be sure to sign-up for the free trial offered to SLJ Summit attendees.

I also viewed “Vote Woke: Empower Students to Vote with Books and Community Support” by Cicely Lewis, 2020 School Librarian of the Year and founder of Read Woke. (To learn more about Read Woke, connect with Cicely’s blog). In this session, Cicely shared how she engaged high school students in registering themselves and their friends to vote. She stressed how students took the lead in all of the voting initiatives launched at her school. Cicely recommended The Voting Booth by Brandy Colbert (2020) as a must-read title for engaging youth in discussions around voting. She earned a $5,000 MTV Virtual Program Grant and her students had the distinct pleasure of a private Zoom call with former First Lady Michelle Obama and Jenna Bush Hagar.

Cicely was joined by Ron Gauthier, Branch Manager of the Grayson Public Library in Gwinnett County, Georgia. He shared how he and his team have partnered with public schools and the community to provide supplemental materials and programs tailored to their needs. This public library – school library collaboration is admirable and should be replicated across the county.

Sadly, for me, I was unable to attend the final live session of the Summit: “In Conversation with Patrisse Cullors.” Patrisse is an artist, activist, and educator; she co-founded Black Lives Matter in 2013. The movement, now an international organization with dozens of chapters around the world, campaigns against anti-black racism. Patrisse’s memoir When They Call You a Terrorist was a New York Times bestseller. Tennessee school librarian Erika Long moderated the conversation. Erika was part of the ALA Presidential Initiative: Fight for School Libraries, AASL Presidential Initiative Task Force on Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion, and is a co-contributor to the “Equity” chapter in the forthcoming book Core Values in School Librarianship: Responding with Commitment and Courage (Libraries Unlimited 2021).

I turned to Twitter colleagues to get their takeaways from their session (with thanks to them):

Lindsey Kimery @LindsKAnderson Loved the conversation btw @erikaslong & @OsopePatrisse -Young people need to know they have the capability to be leaders right now. Educators need to be on the front lines of supporting the voice and vision of young people- Patrisse Cullors. #blm #sljsummit #mnpslibhack #tasltn

Jennifer Sharp @JenniferSharpTN – “Young people need to know that they have the ability to be leaders right now.” “There is a vibrancy to this moment that is very different than 2016 and everybody feels it.” Loving these thoughts about the activism of young people, @OsopePatrisse and @erikaslong Raising hands Clapping hands sign #sljsummit

Sara Kelly Johns @skjohns Just watched a powerful session at the @SLJ Summit with @erikaslong facilitating a conversation with Patrice Cullors, author of When They Call You a Terrorist. Whew! I am going back for another listen. #sljsummit #BlackLivesMatter

Kathy Ishizuka @kishizuka – An inspired and hopeful note to end on. @erikaslong @OsopePatrisse Peace, and remember to #vote #sljsummit #thankyou

Thank you again, SLJ, for this fine learning opportunity. I intend to make time this week for taking greater advantage of what you have generously offered.

Image Credit
kalhh. “Learn Media Internet.” Pixabay.com, https://pixabay.com/illustrations/learn-media-internet-medium-977543/

Online Literature Teaching and Learning

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In recent weeks, several national and state-level organizations have suggested various roles and activities for school librarians and other educators in face-to-face, hybrid, and remote learning contexts.

Image: Laptop with book shelves on the screenIn my opinion, there are roles and activities around children’s and young adult literature teaching and learning that have not been prominent or fully promoted in these documents. These are some possibilities:

  • Facilitating online book clubs for students and other educators;
  • Coplanning, coteaching, and coassessing online literature circle discussions in collaboration with classroom teachers;
  • Curating and guiding technology creation/productivity tools use and integration for students and other educators during literature studies;
  • Supporting individual readers through remote reader’s advisory for both personal and academic books and other resources.

Both as a practicing school librarian and a university-level preservice classroom teacher and librarian educator, I have been integrating technology tools into children’s and YA literature teaching for twenty years. The experiences I’m sharing in this post were hybrid, including both face-to-face and electronic communication (not necessarily in equal parts), or totally online.

What Does Technology Have to Do with It?
In spring 2000, I was a doctoral student teaching a face-to-face undergraduate children’s lit course for preservice classroom teachers at the University of Arizona (UofA). In the article cited below (which is no longer readily available online), I shared the students’ Southwest Literature website book review publications and our long-distance book discussion with preservice educators attending Northwestern Michigan College (NMC) in Traverse City, Michigan.

Then:
Each student wrote their review of a Southwest-themed children’s book and submitted them to me as Word documents; I offered the students feedback. Using my personal computer, students met with me to transfer/design their work and publish their pages and images, including book jackets and students’ artwork, on the website.

Reading and discussing in small groups, the UofA class, 60 miles from the U.S.-Mexico border, and NMC students, a couple hundred miles from the U.S.-Canada border, shared our responses to and questions about Esperanza Rising (Ryan). We communicated via email. We also exchanged paper print artifacts. The geographically distant perspectives of Arizona and Michigan undergraduate students enriched our conversations around the book and issues related to immigration and migrant labor.

Now:
I believe it is important for preservice classroom teachers and school librarians to read book reviews and compose and possibly publish book reviews. The combination of reading and writing helps educators become more critical of what is included and what is left out of some book reviews. Doing professional work, such as writing/publishing book reviews, during their preservice education, can help develop the skills necessary and a commitment to share professional knowledge and experience with colleagues.

Rather than exchanging paper print artifacts–our personal photographs and photos and information about our local communities–we would exchange Google Slides or create a collaborative website or blog for sharing.

If I were teaching college-level or 4th-12th grade students today, I would still reach out for long-distance literature discussions. I believe bringing together learners from different locations (even within the same city) can bring new perspectives into the online classroom. I have not much success with this in higher education since the AZ-MI collaboration with Barb Tatarchuk, but I made several good faith 7th/8th-grade students-and-preservice classroom teacher attempts in a hybrid model while teaching at Texas Woman’s University.

Additionally, knowing that all learners had high-speed Internet access, I would support the whole class or student small groups in holding online meetings within the learning management system (LMS) or outside of it, if appropriate. I would rotate among small groups as a solo educator or as a coteacher and serve as a listener or questioner in breakout group meetings.

**Whether school is taught face-to-face, in a hybrid model, or totally online, offering both asynchronous and synchronous options is critical. Knowing the resources available to students and any other life situation-learning constraints is critical.

Learning and Teaching in WANDA Wiki Wonderland (focused on 8th-graders)
In the 2008-2009 academic year, I served as the school librarian in a combined middle and high school library facility for Emily Gray Junior High (EGJH) and Tanque Verde High School. That year, I had the pleasure of co-planning, co-implementing, and co-assessing a year-long hybrid literature circle unit of study with 8th-grade English language arts teacher Jenni Hunt.

The unit involved students in one literature circle activity each quarter. In the fall of 2008, I was also teaching Children’s and Young Adult Literature in a Multicultural Society in the School of Information and Library Science at the University of Arizona (UofA). (The article I wrote related to our collaboration is available through databases.) Unfortunately, most of the EGJH students’ responses to the books are no longer available (since Wikispaces left the Web). I have summarized two of the four circles.

Then:
First Quarter: The EGJH students who co-read and discussed books with UofA grade students selected one of ten books with Southwest settings: Hole in the Sky (Hautman), Ghost Fever/Mal de fantasma (Hayes), Downriver (Hobbs), Walker of Time (Vick), Canyons (Paulsen), Weedflower (Kodahata), The Big Wonder (Hobbs), Crossing the Wire (Hobbs), Becoming Naomi León (Ryan), and Esperanza Rising (Ryan).

The 8th-graders and grad student used the discussion feature on Wikispaces to share their responses and questions regarding the books. The UofA graduate students preserved some of the EGJH students’ responses on the Southwest Children’s and Young Adult Literature Web Site. (See the “students’ voices section of each of the EGJH titles reviewed.)

Now:
Fortunately, there are many other “Southwest” novels from which to choose today. For remote teaching, it is essential to ensure that that all students will have access to downloadable ebooks from their school or local public libraries. (In my opinion, some of the online platforms that are currently offering free ebooks lack diverse and #ownvoices titles as well as sufficient user privacy.) I would still create small groups around a particular theme or learning objective to offer choice within a framework.

Then:
Fourth Quarter: The EGJH students read one of six titles by Jacqueline Woodson. Still using the Wikispaces discussion feature, they discussed the books with members of their small groups. They also invited the twelve high school library aides to join in their discussions. 8th-graders created final projects related to their Woodson author study. Their projects were linked to their wikipages and includes tools such as: VoiceThread.com, Wordle.net, Newspaper Clipping Generator (available from Fodey.com), and other Apple and Microsoft software that was available at the time.

Now:
This year-long classroom-library collaboration literature circles unit could have been co-taught totally online. Using the discussion feature of any LMS, including Google Classroom, 8th-grade students, high school library aides, and children’s and YA lit undergrad or grad students can conduct literature circles totally in the only environment.

**I, personally, would require all students who had cameras to turn them on (the bandwidth willing). I think it is important for students to see one another in the online environment. Audio and posting in the chat or elsewhere are an option, but in my opinion, maintaining some traditions of the classroom is essential if we are to create virtual learning communities.

I believe author studies are central to literature teaching. Authors with five or more ebook titles are good candidates for online literature discussion choices. There are a number of platforms and authors who stepped up and reached out to share during the school closures of 2020. These are just a few highlights:

Companies, Organizations, and Publishers

Book Trust (United Kingdom)

Candlewick Press

Lee & Low Books

Teaching Books, especially Read-Along Audiobook Performances Collection

Authors:

Kwame Alexander (illustrations by Kadir Nelson): The Undefeated

Monica Brown: Marisol MacDonald Doesn’t Match

Grace Lin, a generous selection of her work on her YouTube channel

Jason Reynolds: from Ghosts

**I would use all of the tools students used in 2008-2009, especially VoiceThread.com which was especially effective for students’ presentations. To these, I would add any number of creativity/productivity tools spotlighted for iSchool graduate students (spring 2020), especially infographic generators, Mentimeter.com polling/word cloud generator, and brainstorming/mindmapping tools, such as Padlet.com.

I would also use Flipgrid.com for introductions, community building, and selected lit response/booktalk activities. I would use the entire Google Classroom suite or other LMS features with which students and classroom teachers are familiar.

Inquiry into Nonfiction and Informational Global Literature Focused on Prejudice and Discrimination against Children and Teens
In summer 2019 and spring 2020, I taught a fully online graduate course focused on children’s and YA nonfiction and informational books and resources. The iSchool graduate students were preservice school or public librarians.

Then and Now:
Graduate students used Flipgrid for course introductions and book or resource talks. They engaged in an author study with narrative nonfiction author and photographer Susan Kuklin. Kuklin’s body of work offered both picturebook and YA nonfiction allowing for student choice and relevance to their practice. They participated in a Zoom meeting with Ms. Kuklin and engaged in a Twitter chat focused on their reading and response to her work before and after our class meeting with her.

Library science students studied and practiced the Guided Inquiry Design framework (Kuhlthau, Maniotes, and Caspari 2012). After engaging in a whole class example, students formed small interest groups around an inquiry question. They collaborated, curated books and digital resources, and published their work on Google docs. They presented their work to the class using combinations of the spotlighted tools on the IS445 course wiki as well as their own favorite and effective tools. (I would keep adding to these tools as students bring them to my attention.)

Students also engaged in three additional Twitter chats focused on their reading. After the author study, their reading was focused predominantly on their small group inquiry questions and their final course project choice.

As one possible final project, students had the option of composing and submitting critical book reviews with the potential of publication in WOW Review. (I’m disappointed that a few of the summer 2019 students did not submit or were not published in the nonfiction and autobiographies issue.)

**With planning and preparation, author-illustrator studies and inquiry learning can be effective in the virtual environment can be successful. Identifying authors for author study takes a good amount of preparation time searching, selecting, and communication—and is so worth it.

Identifying ebooks and resources is time-consuming; collaborate with your librarian! (Side note: Finding author-created or publisher-promoted recordings of fiction genres seem to me easier to locate than nonfiction and informational book recordings, particularly international titles or those created by diverse, #ownvoices authors.)

School Librarians
With students and educators, I would also stress Applying Fair Use AND Honoring Copyright During a Crisis (or at any other time for that matter).

As national-, state-, and district-level advocacy tools are proliferating in the school librarianship world, it is clear that school librarians know their work will be tested and evaluated, especially in the upcoming school year. During this time, it is more important than ever to create access points and procedures for responding to individual students’ and classroom educators’ reader’s advisory requests. Making ourselves available via email, social media, and other messaging services is essential.

Whether we are teaching face to face in the physical library, using a hybrid model, or teaching totally online, we must show our value added and document the outcomes of our work in terms of student learning, educators’ teaching, and support for families (not addressed directly in this post). Let’s not forget that teaching literature with the support of digital tools has been and is central to our work then and now.

References

Kuhlthau, Carol C., Leslie C. Maniotes, and Ann Caspari. 2012. Guided Inquiry Design: A Framework for Inquiry in Your School. Santa Barbara, CA: Libraries Unlimited.

Moreillon, Judi. 2001. “What Does Technology Have to Do with It? Integrating Technology Tools into a Children’s Literature Course.” Reading Online 5 (2). (No longer available online)

_____. 2009. “Learning and Teaching in WANDA Wiki Wonderland: Literature Circles in the Digital Commons. Teacher Librarian 37 (2): 23-28.

_____. 2019. “Inquiry into Nonfiction and Informational Global Literature Focused on Prejudice and Discrimination against Children and Teens,” 4-part Series. WOW Currents. Available from https://wowlit.org/blog/tag/judi-moreillon/

Image Credit
kalhh. “Learn Media Internet.” Pixabay.com, https://pixabay.com/illustrations/learn-media-internet-medium-977543/

Books and Resources about the Current and Past Pandemics

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Image: Global NetworkOn distribution lists, blog posts, and social media, librarians and other educators in the U.S. and around the globe have been sharing free ebook and online resources that explain the coronavirus and the current and past pandemics. Nonfiction and informational books as well as fiction can reach readers’ hearts and minds and change our emotional responses and behaviors, too.

Using literature to provide information at this time is critical. Knowing the facts about the current situation and historical parallels can help reduce the fears and concerns that many young people are experiencing. Bibliotherapy originally applied in psychotherapy to treat depression or other mood disorders, may be what many children and teens need at this point in time.

In this post, I am highlighting a few of COVID-19 resources with special thanks to Patricia Sarles, Library Operations and Instructional Coordinator, Brooklyn and Staten Island, New York City Department of Education, for her LibGuide of free ebook sources and the Worlds of Worlds (WOW) Executive Board for their collection of “Resources Around Epidemics and Pandemics,” which includes both fiction and informational books.

From Patricia Sarles’ LibGuide
Patricia’s curation is illustrated with e-book jackets. This helps parents and educators get an idea of the target age level for the information in each title. The books show animal as well as human characters, and all help adults assure children that the grown-ups in their lives are doing all they can to keep people safe and healthy. A number of the ebooks ask for donations that will be used to support others in particular need during this crisis.

“The House We Sheltered In” is a well-written and beautifully illustrated poem by Freeman Ng. The poem is a free download available from his website with either color and black and white illustrations. I found hearing the poem read aloud and seeing the multicultural illustrations via the YouTube video very moving.

Since COVID-19 is a pandemic affecting people around the globe, I especially appreciate the work of Christine Borst, Ph.D., who is a therapist (LMFT) and university professor living in Colorado. She wrote and illustrated her nonfiction book What Is Coronavirus? with her own two-, four-, and six-year-old children in mind. Her mother voice shines through in the text. Additionally, she provides .pdf files of her book in Farsi, French, Spanish, and Turkish as well as English. You can access a recording of her book in English and in Farsi from her website. Donations via PayPal are earmarked for families and small businesses in need.

From Worlds of Words
The annotated bibliography “Resources Around Epidemics and Pandemics” on the WOW website includes intermediate and YA historical fiction and science fiction titles as well as informational books. I have not read most of these titles, but I can highly recommend Susan Bartoletti Campbell’s book Terrible Typhoid Mary: A True Story of the Deadliest Cook in America (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt 2015). This informational book reads like narrative nonfiction or as the annotator notes, “a crime novel.” This book will appeal to many readers who will connect with the historical, social, and political aspects of Mary Mallon’s life and times.

From this page, WOW also linked “Catching a Bug: Reading about Pandemics, Epidemics, and Outbreaks” posted in 2013 on the WOW Currents blog by T. Gail Pritchard, PhD, College of Medicine, University of Arizona. One of the videos she offers is a TED-ed video called “How pandemics spread.” I believe these three blog posts and the resources Gail highlights could be of particular use now and in the future to those currently teaching upper grade students.

Global Perspectives: Empathy
It is logical and critical that librarians and other educators take a global view of the current COVID-19 pandemic. It is arguable that at this current time in our human history we should be aware of our global interconnectedness more than ever before. Our shared realization and understanding of the impact of this virus and the measures needed to contain its spread should be heightened and spotlighted from a global perspective in the resources we share. This is especially important in the U.S. where our information sources have historically taken a U.S.-centric perspective.

If there is a brighter spot in this crisis, it could be the opportunity to develop compassionate empathy for the way daily lives have changed for people all around the globe. Compassionate empathy is an understanding of another’s pain plus the desire to act and somehow mitigate that pain (Skills You Need). Today, we are experiencing the many ways global citizens are acknowledging and responding to the needs of others: sheltering in place, wearing masks and making masks to share, donating and delivering food to those in need, and caring for the emotional and physical needs of our families, friends, students, colleagues, and neighbors–near and far.

Stay safe and well.

Side Note (but no less important): Thank you to the Arizona Daily Star Opinion editor Sarah Garrecht Gassen for your 4/25/20 op-ed: “How we decide which COVID-19 letters to publish, and which we won’t.” As Ms. Gassen wrote: “Our obligation is to the truth, to the facts, and to our shared safety.”

The same could be said to be true for librarians and other educators, children’s and YA book authors and illustrators—at this time and always.

Work Cited

“Interpersonal Skills: Empathy Types.” SkillsYouNeed.com, https://www.skillsyouneed.com/ips/empathy-types.html

Image Credit

Altmann, Gerd. “Web Networking Earth Continents.” Pixabay.com. https://pixabay.com/illustrations/web-networking-earth-continents-3079789

Equity for All Learners

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Last week, I spotlighted one of the top five critical topics from the International Literacy Association’s (ILA) “What’s Hot in Literacy” survey: access to high-quality diverse books and content. In my post “Librarians Curate During the Pandemic,” I provided some examples of how school and public librarians are selecting and annotating online resources to support student learning and teachers’ teaching during school closures.

Image: Equality or sameness compared with equity or fairnessAnother of the top five critical topics was “increasing equity and opportunity for all learners. This topic has most certainly been highlighted both in the U.S. and around the globe during the pandemic. According to U.S. Congress Joint Economic Committee, nearly 12 million K-12 students nationwide lack broadband access in their homes in 2017 (cited in Common Sense Media 2019).

When librarians and classroom teachers are considering the necessity of providing online resources during this crisis, we must not forget that so many young people will lack the means to access those resources. See my March 16, 2020 post “Inequitable Access During School Closures.”

Equity in Classroom Book Collections
It is no surprise to librarians that equity is a top concern of teachers, higher education faculty, researchers, literacy consultants, and administrators. (As it was in 2018 “What’s Hot in Literacy” survey, equity is the top of five critical issues and respondents identify as deserving more attention and focus. When looking more closely at the issue of equity, the Literacy Today article quotes a respondent from Illinois: “educational inequalities are huge in all areas, such as teacher preparation, teacher opportunities for professional learning and development with their peers, adequate resources in terms of classroom libraries, and small class sizes. All of this greatly impacts literacy learning for students” (Bothum 2020, 24)

As a former school librarian and current librarian educator, I was saddened to read this particular comment. While I agree with this person’s assessment of the impact of these resources and activities on student learning, I am frustrated that school libraries and librarians are not mentioned. Classroom “libraries,” which are really “collections” not “libraries,” will never be able to achieve the robust diversity of resources afforded by a well-funded school library that serves the diverse academic and personal reading needs of readers at all instructional levels within a school.

Of course, classroom teachers must provide books and other reading materials in their classrooms. But investing in school library resources results in schoolwide equity. Classrooms will never be able to offer the range of reading resources that a school library can. A well-stocked library and library program facilitated by a state-certified school librarian also reflects a commitment by the school district and community to serving all students, educators, and families.

Access to School Libraries and Librarians
In the area of equity, forty-nine percent of the respondents say they want more support in addressing inequity in education and instruction. While all of the factors cited in the survey are important, I would humbly suggest that supporting fully-funded school library led by an effective state-certified school librarian should be a top priority in every school and district across the U.S. (and around the world). An open school library where students can check out, return, and check out more books and materials to read based on their needs and choices makes a difference in the quantity and quality of students reading.

Ninety-two percent of respondents agree that “educational equity for all students cannot be achieved without instructional equity” (Bothum 2020, 24). An effective professional school librarian who collaborates with classroom teachers to integrate vast array of library resources and coteaches the classroom curriculum can elevate literacy learning for every student in every classroom in a school.

Collaboration to Increase Equity
ILA Board of Directors member Rachael Gabriel notes that “structures aimed at collaborative problem-solving can be used as practice grounds for more equitable conversations because of their emphasis on protocol, participation, and the use of evidence.” When classroom teachers and school librarians share ideas, they further develop their understanding of how to best need the needs of all students. When they coplan, co-implement, and co-assess student learning outcomes, they gather evidence of the effectiveness of their teaching and can make modifications for improvement in their instruction.

Since sixty-one percent of ILA respondents identify collaboration as an area of concern, school administrators around the globe must step up to help provide educators with collaborative planning time with school librarians as well as with classroom teacher peers and specialists.

School Librarian Roles During the School Closures
The American Association of School Librarians (AASL) conducted a survey from Monday, March 30, 2020 to Monday, April 6, 2020. There were 843 respondents representing all fifty U.S. states. (AASL will conduct and report on similar surveys in the coming weeks.) The librarians who responded cited unequal access to technology tools suitable for online learning as a problem during school closures. Librarians reported that students:

  • have full access to technology and Internet for personal use in their home (laptop or desktop computer): 49%
  • have shared access to technology and Internet for use in their home (shared computer): 25%
  • have access through mobile device (tablet, phone): 22%
  • do not have reliable access: 12%
  • do not have any access: 10% (AASL 2020).

The survey captured the many ways school librarians are adapting to changes in instruction and are offering the same services and activities provided during regular school days, including:

  • Offering resource curation and technology tools for “classroom” instruction: 84.89%
  • Expanding online resources: 80.37%
  • Virtual assistance: 82.06%
  • Virtual meetings/collaborative events: 74.29% (AASL 2020).

Please read the entire AASL survey report.

Schools Without Librarians
What the AASL survey could not capture is the lack of equitable access to online learning in schools without state-certified school librarians. We can speculate about what is happening for students, educators, and families in schools where a state-certified school librarian is not on the faculty. To be sure, educators in some of those schools have technology coaches who are helping them transition to fully online learning, but are they collaborating with educators to provide the specific learning and teaching resources needed to student and educator success? In some districts, there may be a “library” or “technology” person at the district-level who is providing some of these services.

However, without a building-level school librarian these services will be hit and miss in terms of the actual needs of students, educators, and families at any given school site. Some of the educators in all of these schools are the very ones who, on the ILA “What’s Hot in Literacy” survey, noted they were looking for instructional equity for all K-12 students.

For example, when schools closed in Arizona, the state superintendent of instruction stated that 100,000 of the 1.1. million students in the state did not have the tools they needed to be successful in online learning. The Tucson Unified School District identified 18,000 families that lacked such tools. (There are around 40,000 students in the district; the number of families is unknown to me but there are only 13 state-certified school librarians serving 86 schools.)

The pandemic has spotlighted inequity in K-12 education. How can we achieve social justice in education if access to broadband, technology tools, library-based elearning resources, and the expertise of school librarians are not universally available to all of our students?

The short answer is we can’t – but what can we learn from this situation, and how can it motivate us to take action going forward?

Note: In this blog post when I refer to learners, they are educators and administrators as well as students. All members of a school community must be learners.

Works Cited

American Association of School Librarians. 2020. “Snapshot of School Librarian Roles during School Closures,” KnowledgeQuest.aasl.org, https://knowledgequest.aasl.org/snapshot-of-school-librarian-roles-during-school-closures/

Bothum, Kelly. 2020. “What’s Hot in 2020—And Beyond: ILA’s Biennial Report Highlights the Topics Most Critical to Shaping the Future of Literacy.” Literacy Today (January/February).

Common Sense Media. 2019. The Homework Gap: Teacher Perspectives on Closing the Digital Divide, https://www.commonsensemedia.org/sites/default/files/uploads/kids_action/homework-gap-report-2019.pdf

Image Credit:

OccupyAwareness. “equality equity2.0.” Creative Commons.org, https://ccsearch.creativecommons.org/photos/9ebc181e-48a4-42c6-ab27-c86854d1ee0a

Librarians Curate During the Pandemic

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Image: Handshake word cloud - cooperate, serve, communicate, unite, and moreSince school closures began, school and public librarians have been collaborating to share online resources to support at-home teaching and learning. They have been sharing widely to help other educators, families, and librarian colleagues to help youth continue learning outside the four walls of the school or library building. Librarians are sharing their curation efforts on distribution lists, in blog posts, and on Twitter and Facebook.

The response of the library profession to the pandemic makes a strong case for how librarians can help educators around the world address one of the critical hot topics identified by 1,443 respondents from 65 countries and territories who responded to the International Literacy Association’s (ILA) “What’s Hot in Literacy” survey (formerly annual, now biennial). The goal of the survey is to rank topics in terms of what’s hot (talked about) and what (should be) important at both the community and country levels.

Respondents to the survey identified “providing access to high-quality, diverse books and content” as one of the top five critical topics (Bothum 2020, 24). You can access an online infographic summary of survey and the full report.

Librarians are consciously or not addressing global educators’ critical need for “high-quality, diverse books and content” during the pandemic. That fact contributes to the body of evidence related to the essential role(s) of librarians in education. To my knowledge all of these resources that follow are shared ethically following copyright laws or with permission of the authors, illustrators, or publishers whose work is shared.

Jennifer Brown, Youth and Family Services Manager, Suffolk Public Library, Suffolk, Virginia, has curated spreadsheets focused on author read-alouds, craft, music, and other resources for storytimes, tips for hosting online storytimes, and more.

Sabrina Carnesi, Newport News, Virginia, middle school librarian/school librarian educator, curated the links school librarians shared during the March 24, 2020 American Association of School Librarians Town Hall meeting. Close to 200 (!) resources were curated by Sabrina and shared by colleagues across the country to support virtual instruction while schools are closed:

Haley Cooper, Abbigail McWilliams, Amelia Owdom, and G Trupp, IS445: Information Books and Resources for Youth graduate students at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign iSchool curated a standards-aligned pathfinder of resources for 4th-6th grade students and educators to explore a timely topic during the pandemic: food insecurity and food culture.

Zakir Hossain, teacher-librarian at the ICS Inter-Community School Zurich, Switzerland. curated a libguide with open access ebooks, databases, copyright-free images, and sounds.

Kathy Lester, Plymouth, Michigan, middle school librarian has curated three lists, which she is using with East Middle School Library patrons and has shared these resources on several distribution lists.

eBooks

Storytimes

Other Online Resources

The National Emergency Library (NEL) has made 4M digitized books available to users without a waitlist. These resources can help educators provide students with access to books while their schools, school libraries, and public libraries are closed.

Thank you to these school and public librarians and the NEL for curating/making these resources available to us.

School librarians know that coplanning standards-aligned lessons and units of instruction with our educator colleagues is the ideal way to gather paper print or online resources for students’ learning. We can still collaborate with classroom teachers online during school closures, and we can use our librarian colleagues’ curation efforts as resources for that collaborative work.

Thank you for all you are doing to remain safe and healthy and to provide for your library users. I hope all librarians will continue to curate and share their work with others. We are stronger together, and together, we demonstrate our value to our library patrons even more so during this time of need.

P.S. And if you are looking specifically for online read-alouds for the students, families, and educators you serve, I have embedded additional resources from the 3/23/20 comment section into the blog post.

Work Cited

Bothum, Kelly. 2020. “What’s Hot in 2020—And Beyond: ILA’s Biennial Report Highlights the Topics Most Critical to Shaping the Future of Literacy.” Literacy Today (January/February).

Image credit
Johnhain. “Handshake Regard Cooperatie.” Pixabay.com. https://pixabay.com/illustrations/handshake-regard-cooperate-connect-2009183/