SJSU Portfolio

Selection/Secondary

CTC Standard 18: Instructional Leader

“Each candidate demonstrates skill in selecting, preparing, evaluating and using instructional strategies, activities and resources that are appropriate to the diverse needs, interests and learning styles of all students and that may relate to differences such as ethnicity, culture, gender, physical or mental capabilities, language and socio-economic background.”

Although as a high school teacher I have a much higher comfort level with selection of strategies, activities and resources for the secondary level, my field work and observations in high school libraries have been enlightening. For example, as an English teacher who does incorporate the library into my lesson planning, I thought I was aware of the services the library was offering students. I now realize I was thinking of the library primarily as an academic resource for students, and secondarily as a source of occasional recreational fiction. Until I weeded the shelves I didn’t realize how much material on personal health issues our library offers, and how heavily it is used. In some secondary libraries I have seen carefully chosen curricular support materials, such as Playaways (Follet’s preloaded audio books on MP3‘) for required novels available to students, and strong selections of both translated curricular literature and independent reading in the home languages of bilingual students. In our high school we are increasing as funds allow our collection of mangae and graphic novels, enjoyed by many students who are visual learners, appealing also to some students who hold themselves at a distance from the mainstream school experience. Material for personal information, academic support material, and alternative fiction are all elements of a thoughtfully developed secondary library collection which attract and serve a wider variety of students into the library.

Direct instruction of today’s students requires carefully chosen strategies to engage and motivate students who have a great variety of ability and background knowledge—this is doubly true for secondary library instruction. Outside their familiar classroom, surrounded by technological distractions and interacting with a less familiar adult, many secondary students struggle for focus and self–control. During my internship at a CSU last year, I watched the instructor teach research strategies from the front of the room, with students facing her at computers. From my position I could see the number of students on facebook and shopping sites. Later I observed some different strategies to maintain student focus on new information until time for guided practice. I realized the importance of even these small strategic choices in increasing student achievement.

Evidence

    This file is a copy of the letter I wrote to accompany a funding request to the local Rotary (results still pending). Knowing that the request should be in the region of $2,000, I chose these resources from a long library list as being most generally valuable.

  • 1.Rotary Letter
  • Below is the link to the YA Blog I first created for my Libr 265 class and then later expanded. I used it as a source for readers’ advisories during my field experience, and am currently using it as an example in early meetings of our book club.

  • 2. Link to YA Blog
  • The last link leads to a project I did which also began as an assignment in SLIS. In the near future I plan to complete a grant proposal to the local Arts Council for the rejuvination of the school ppoetry collection, which contains virtually no modern poetry; my supervising librarian has recommended that I use this collection but offer a simple summary of our rationale plus a list.

  • 3.Modern Poetry Selection
  • Below are photos of a small part of the selection of books I weeded from the high school fiction collection (plus a few strays someone added later), using criteria I formulated which were approved by my supervising librarian. Altogether I removed almost 1,000 damaged, unread, and duplicate books.

    Weeded Books Weeded Books