I’ve had the good fortune to attend a series of state school library conferences this year, and I’ve been struck by the language we librarians use to talk about collaboration. Clearly, the value of teamwork has been heard by the great majority of us in the profession, but the language we use to talk about it? “Get teachers to collaborate with us.” “Why won’t they work with us?” “The principal needs to tell them to work with us.” Less than inspirational.

And, to be honest, a sign that the nirvana of collaboration is still very elusive for many practitioners. Let’s be real about that. The number of buildings that have healthy, productive working relationships among most colleagues is … well, not a majority, I’d wager.

I did some staff development last year with a group of librarians who actually made far bigger leaps in their fixed schedule teaching when they freed themselves from aligning their work with the classroom teachers (in one grade only). Sometimes, when we want to reform our librarian practice, we need a chance to try it out first before we can know how to approach teachers with those ideas. The librarians were energized at the new ideas and strategies, and that energy spread back to their teacher colleagues. And yet it was completely antithetical to what we’ve all been taught.

If collaboration means we’re actually lowering our best practice standards, how does that help kids? It doesn’t. It just helps us “look collaborative” (and, taken to the extreme outlined by Zmuda & Harada, makes us “accomplices to bad learning.”) And that means we’re prioritizing ourselves over our students. Ouch. And yet completely unintended!

It’s also useful to look more globally at your entire school culture on the topic of collaboration and realize that WE ARE NOT THE ONLY ONES. Many people in a school building — from special education teachers to counselors to art teachers to literacy coaches — want to collaborate with classroom teachers. If those “special” teachers are collaborating with your teachers, and you can’t — there’s a lesson in there. If no one is collaborating outside of grade levels — there’s a lesson there. If everybody is still teaching everything on their own — there’s a lesson there. Look systemically.

That’s why I like the Choice Literacy newsletter, because I get to read about collaborative efforts between a literacy coach and a teacher, not a librarian and a teacher. I get to glean insights from another point of view. (I mean, who doesn’t want their students to be literate?)

Check out the link below … and share your thoughts about collaboration. Is it attainable? Is it even the top goal we should be pursuing? Or are there other things we should be striving for?

My Colleague Refuses to Collaborate with Us (LITERACY COACH CONFIDENTIAL) via kwout

For those of us teaching in Michigan, Tuesday is a big day, because it’s the first day of school. State law requires that school start after Labor Day in hopes of getting in one more tourism weekend to boost everyone’s coffers.

All summer long, I’ve been thinking about collaboration and about the great collaborative teaching and writing opportunities I’ve had. They have brought me so much joy and soul-searching and growth. But, as with all collaborations, they start somewhre.

The Choice Literacy newsletter (go here and scroll down to the bottom of the page) was recommended to me by Beth Friese about a year ago, and I enjoy at least one takeaway nearly every week. This week? How literacy coaches can build relationships with teachers (click below to access it).

It’s always useful to remind ourselves that we’re not the only folks trying to build relationships with classroom teachers. This is both great (we can strategize with others and see how they gain traction) and, of course, a bit of competition (just how many people can a classroom teacher collaborate with before he/she slumps in exhaustion?).

Take some time to look at the entry below. Which of these literacy coaching strategies might work for you? Do any feel more powerful than others? Are there any you wouldn’t try? Why?

Eight Tips for Building Relationships: A Tale of Two Literacy Coaches via kwout

I was excited to have one of my grad students visit today. Yay! It’s fun to catch up and hear what people are up to, even if they ARE already done with Mockingjay and you haven’t even started it yet.

Here is one of the many things we talked about today that is resonating with me hours later.

So … we’re making these libraries that are more stimulating, more social, more cooperative, and more interactive.

What are we doing, as a movement, as a profession, as an association, to protect quiet spaces for the kids who can’t function with additional stimulus? Those who would benefit from being squirreled away, perhaps working alone, in a quiet study carrel? Those students — students with Asperger’s or autism, for example — who need hushed comfort to help them focus?

Our classroom colleagues talk all the time about meeting the individual needs students with various special learning or developmental needs.

All. The. Time. In hallways, in professional journals, in books, on podcasts, at conference.

But let’s turn the mirror the other way and reflect on our own practices. As a movement, as a profession, as an association, what are we doing to make sure that our learning commonses (is that a word?) are truly embracing all kinds of learners BEYOND diversity in reading materials?

So, thinking I had just offered up a thoughtful nugget for you to chew on, I was about to click “Publish” when I glanced at the back-to-school issue of School Library Monthly. Well, look what’s on page 52 — “Meeting the Needs of Students with Disabilities,” by Kendra L. Allen and Sandra Hughes-Hassell.

Beaten to the punch by folks far more expert than I!

(Though I hope I get some credit for learning-by-osmosis. My mother was a resource room teacher, my father was a special education director, and my stepmother still works with pre-primary impaired students. Y’all be careful coming to our house for dinner if you don’t enjoy table talk about special education.)

Here are three statistics from Allen and Hughes-Hassell’s article:

- Did you know that almost 14% of K-12 students have disabilities?

- That 90% of surveyed North Carolina school librarians scored themselves a C, D, or F when it came to their knowledge of best practices in special education?

- That only 1 of the 67 survey participants read all of the IEPs for her school? Which, umm, by the way, is kinda like against the law for school librarians to be doing if they consider themselves teachers of those students.

Those are some pretty scary numbers that tell us that this is a huge area for our professional growth!
Whether you’re a Southerner about to enter Month Two of the school year or a Midwesterner just about to start, let’s take a moment and think … if we had taken Allen’s survey about our special education practices, what grade would we give ourselves?

And here’s one final thought. Did y’all know there are books out there about collaboration and the SPECIAL ED TEAM, just like there are reams of published information about collaboration with school librarians? Do we see our special ed colleagues the way THEY want to be seen? As instructional collaborators, co-teachers, and partners? If not, what does THAT tell us?