ASSL Standards Interview- Amber Glade

On today, November 19, 2020, I was able to interview the lovely Mrs. Amber Glade through a zoom videochat. Ms. Glade is a seven year Pk-12 school librarian at Morristown Central School located in Morristown, NY. Instantly we connected! It's just something about meeting librarians that makes me so bubbly inside. I love hearing about their experiences. Well before I get off topic, let's continue on with the purpose of the interview. Amber's focus for the AASL standards, domains are competencies are listed below: AASL Standards Shared Foundation II: Include Domain- Grow Competencies: School Librarians explicitly lead learners to demonstrate empathy and equity in knowledge building within the global learning community by: Creating an atmosphere in which learners feel empowered and interactions are learner-initiated. Initiating opportunities that allow learners to demonstrate interest in other perspectives. When asked what are some of examples of ways that Amber was utilizing the chosen comptencies in her library program, she provided great examples such as, collaborate with 4th grade teachers through social students projects and with 7th grade science teachers for a special project on the solar system. She explained that the projects consisted of have students develop their own questions, and search through different databases to find the information on the topics. She also encourages students to use eboooks and interactive books. She also expressed that although the younger students aren't able to begin research yet, however, she creates smaller projects that consist of researching. One project in particular, consisted of students choosing topics from a recycled can of vegatables. Students would then use that stick to find books on that particular topic. As for this year, she plan to turn the activity into a virtual assignment, which would more likely be something she put together on the computer. Some resources that Amber are using in her libray program due to COVID-19 includes using the zoom app to reach out to remote students, that way she is able to interact with everyone. She is also using google classroom to interact with students in their daily cycling for library time. Another great app that I plan to use, is the "Remind Me" App. This is used specifically for connecting with parents and open communication for students in 9th through 12 grade. As a result, these apps are creating growth and empowerment to for students to be able to work together for projects. She also promotes many different databases, all while giving students the freewill to choose any databases they would like to complete research. As for her younger babies, Ms. Glade normally introduces students to the online databases and guide them as through the databases as they are learning. Often times, she uses screen castify- a video recording program through google where she is able to create instructional videos to send out to students. Lastly, and most importantly she uses one of the best platforms, SORA which her district purchased. This program is indeed helpful when it comes to pushing ebooks, audio books for students mainly because they are able to access the books remotely. This is great for a time like this. Collaborating with teachers is nothing new to this wonderful librarian. Specifically she works with 4th grade ELA/Social Studies teachers and 7th Grade Science Teachers. She did explain that other teachers aren't willing to give her as much of their time as these particular grade levels. Once example of collaborating with teachers included creating an Black history month project. Students are randomly assigned a famous African American to complete a research project on. They are broken down into groups, required to create a biography of their person, and each student in the groups writes 1-2 pages on the chosen person. All groups are then required to share their reports with the Ms.Glade and their teachers. She also collaborates with the science teacher for several projects throughout the year. One that she has co-taught for the past seven years is the "Solar System" Project. Students are given the free choice to create their own project based on an assignment planet. They create their own research questions, using adode spark to present, and google sites. The ultimate goals is to convince Ms. Glade and their teachers to visit their planets, they have to interview them both to learn about their likes and dislikes, then they must find ways to entice them both to visit their planets. I know my students would enjoy doing something similar to this and I made Ms. Glade aware that I would be trying this activity out as well. :) Some challenges that Ms. Glade has faced when implementing this specific AASL standard is the complexity of the shared foundation: include. Ms Glade expressed that she was the first librarian to enter the building after the school not having one for over three years. Therefore collaborating with teachers were not hard at all. The teachers instantly took onto her, and was excited about the fact that there was a new librarian on the block. The biggest challenge this year is including students in zoom sessions, and the different virtual projects that she has in place. As with any other schools, it is very hard making sure that students are always signed in, focused and completing their work. Another challenge is having to social distance. She is so used to students working together in groups, and herself working closely with students. However,since the dynamics of that has changed, it is way more challenging to reach out to students. When asked if she had any further comments on the AASL standards, Ms. Glade simply summarized that she was excited that teachers wanted to collaborate and include her within their instruction time. This has made her job so much easier. I just hope and pray that I have that same experience. This was by far, one of the best interviews that I've ever had with a librarian. I was able to learn so much in so little time.