Anne Johnston’s Library Blog

Friday afternoon at Knox Academy, I had my mentor hat on. I met three colleagues who are currently working towards their Charter - two School Librarians and the Young People’s Services Librarian. They are all graduates with either a degree in librarianship/information science or a degree in another subject and a PG qualification in librarianship. After a year mentored by a Chartered Librarian, following a personal professional development plan agreed with our professional body CILIPS, they must submit a portfolio for consideration to CILIPs. If this meets the appropriate criteria they will then become Chartered Librarians.

This was our second portfolio meeting. We will get together every few weeks to provide a focus for their work, otherwise it is all too easy to push professional development to the back of the queue of priorities. The purpose of chartering is to demonstrate that we are continuing to develop our managerial skills, keeping our professional skills updated and engaging in effective forward planning. We must demonstrate that we are assessing and evaluating not only our own work but the progress of our service. On reflection this is the way of working and the skills set we are hoping our school students will begin to develop as they engage in Extreme Learning.

At the Extreme Learning meeting on Thursday evening there was one of those moments where everything suddenly seems to mesh. My fellow school librarians and I have been trying to come up with ways to help students located all over East Lothian to improve their research skills. Don used examples of extreme learning projects from Macmerry Primary. Also at the meeting a teacher from Ormiston Primary who has several Extreme Learners in school, a teacher and the school librarian from Ross High. By the end of the meeting these four had plans in hand to pilot some of the ideas for progressing EL and the offer of a venue from East Lothian Library Service for the group to meet. Students from each of the schools will be given the opportunity to work together to design the next stage for Extreme Learning - variously described as simple, flexible and no teacher required, using a technique called agile software development.

 The high spot for me yesterday - definitely the short time I spent after work practising part of a tai chi form. The small gym hall in school is a great place to practice. My house just isn’t big enough for some of the forms.

Learning tai chi chuan has given me all the health benefits I had hoped for but a lot more besides. In school we tell students to keep trying even though they are finding something difficult. As adults though we are prone to forget how you feel in that situation. I often find myself having to keep working at something in a tai chi class when other people are clearly finding it easier to turn or keep balanced and am still surprised when suddenly one day something changes and a movement feels right instead of awkward. To be regularly in a learning situation where I am unsure of what I am doing helps me to empathise with students who are struggling with a task.
As you will have gathered today’s practice was one of these breakthroughs - a welcome lift for what had not been one of my most enjoyable days at work.

Have also had a good giggle, though I understand and sympathise with Alan, whilst writing this post. I was having a look at Alan Cody’s musical blog and checked out his post for 3rd May, Come back Quasimodo, all is forgiven.

I was driving to work this morning enjoying the view from Whitekirk across Binning Woods to the Lammermuirs and musing about yesterday’s 4ureaders local editorial group meeting. Our group has an abundance of ideas for content for the site and BIll Plain at Knox Academy has a student editorial group which contributes regularly. There is a mix of staff from both the public library service and school libraries and we share the work amongst the group, with Bill as the keystone. He attends the national editorial group meetings and co-ordinates our ideas and contributions. It came as a surprise to realise that not all other authorities work in this way but that sometimes one person has to collect ideas from a group of staff and try to do all the work on his/her own. This collaborative approach is typical of our Library Service. As a result our students and staff now have access to a whole range of resources, in print and electronic/digital format, over and above those held in our individual schools. Our students gradually learn to appreciate that all of the libraries in East Lothian are linked and that they can borrow items from and return them to any library. We can also teach them how to search large databases of information effectively, simply by showing them how to use the online catalogue to check their borrowing record and reserve books. This is always a popular part of my course introducing the library to first year students. The catalogue is sometimes known as Elvis. Have a look and see why.