Preparing to Teach

What?

At the end of last year I completed a 12 week City & Guilds course at a local college in Preparing to Teach in the Lifelong Learning Sector. This was recommended by my Chartership mentor because one of my main areas for development on my PPDP is to get more teaching experience. My current job doesn’t involve any teaching but this is something hope to move into in the future. I currently work in an academic library, staffing the library enquiry desk for a large chunk of my time, and I’d like to progress in this area of library work in the future. The course is perhaps more appropriate to those wanting to go into a teaching role, rather than a role that involves a teaching element like many teaching librarian jobs, but I still found many aspects of it very useful.

This course can be the first stage of 3 leading to a diploma in teaching in lifelong learning. Doing this first part provided a good introduction to teaching which was sufficient for my needs, offering a good grounding in how to plan a teaching session and to build a short programme of sessions within the context of my particular subject area. Over the 12 weeks we considered all aspects of teaching including assessment, equality and diversity, and differentiation of teaching activities. I also got an opportunity to have a go at actually delivering a teaching session in a 30 minute ‘microteach’. Although purely theoretical at this stage we all linked the work to our own specific subject area – which meant the microteach sessions were interesting as I learnt some new skills (mainly how to paint my nails properly!).

So What?

As I’d had no prior experience of developing and delivering teaching sessions this course was really useful for giving me an overview of the key elements needed when developing a teaching session and for enabling me to consider my own approaches to teaching information literacy and library skills. It’s easy to continue to re-use the same materials without looking for new ways of doing the same session so I tried to come up with my own ideas rather than looking at how this is already done in my place of work.

The main learning points from the course for me were:

• Creating a teaching session is a holistic process where all of the elements are interconnected following a cycle from planning → delivery → assessment → feedback, and so on as the feedback given should inform the planning of the next session.
• Use of differentiation is essential in order to vary learning activities and cater for a range of learning styles and needs, accounting for equality and diversity
• It is important to engage learners through the use of varied, student-led activities
• Bloom’s taxonomy should be used to write targeted learning outcomes which build learners’ knowledge from lower to higher order thinking skills. This also allows for differing levels of ability among learners.

Although some of this seems quite prescriptive it is good way to give structure to a teaching session and ensure learning outcomes are realistic and guide what students will be doing in the session.

I’d be interested to know of innovative ways others have used to engage students in information literacy teaching…

One of the key things I learned about myself whilst doing this course was that I would need to build my confidence in delivering teaching sessions (apparently I’m very good on paper…) as I didn’t come across as confident in the microteach. This sounds like a huge barrier but it’s one that I’m still hoping to be able to overcome. I think the main reason I came across like this was more to do with me being very aware of the false nature of the microteach situation and that I was delivering a session to a mixed group of people who had no use for the information I was giving them. I hope that in a real life situation I would do much better.

I also learned that I am very target-driven and work better when I have set tasks to complete. I much prefer this way of working – perhaps the reason I am making Chartership much harder for myself than it really needs to be!

Now What?

I have been getting some experience of supporting a range of teaching sessions at work so the next step for me would be to have a go at actually planning and delivering a session myself. This might not be possible in my current role but at least now I’ve gained some valuable skills and knowledge (in theory anyway!) that would put me in a better position when going for new jobs. One thing to work on is my confidence and voice projection. Hopefully these things will come with time and experience.

CPD23 – Thing 23: Reflection…what next?

Finally, I’ve come to the end of CPD23. It took a lot longer than I intended but I got there. I don’t like to leave a task unfinished so I persevered with it. I do wonder what I’ll have got out of it having taken so long over it.

There were two types of ‘thing’ in the programme: the theoretical, ‘thinky’ things and the more practical, trying out new tools and applications things. I enjoyed both but found that the more theoretical things suited me better at this time; helping me to evaluate my career at the moment which is really useful practice for the reflective thinking I need to be doing for Chartership.  Although I am interested in trying out new tools I found it difficult to fit in the time to try out some of the things, especially without a real purpose for using them – I find it difficult to use practical things in a hypothetical situation. However, doing CPD23 has highlighted some new tools for me to go back and try out more at some time in the future when a genuine need arises.

I already have a personal development plan in the form of my PPDP for Chartership and wrote a SWOT analysis for this. Now I’m halfway through Chartership I should perhaps redo this as a way of re-evaluating my skills at this point. I’m not sure I’d be ready to share these publicly however! I found the process of writing the PPDP for Chartership quite difficult, more as I was unsure of how I would be able to get the opportunities to develop the skills I need due to limited funding for CPD. Doing CPD23 has made me realise how important it is to take the initiative and find inventive ways of developing professionally for free (Katy’s recent blog post on this subject has some really great ideas for this). Using a SWOT analysis to identify skills gaps was certainly a good way to identify key development needs for my PPDP.

And so, my CPD23 experience in 6 words….?

 “Finally finished. Better late than never!”

Looking back and moving forward: resolutions for 2012

I’m not usually one for resolutions but as I’m about a third of the way through Chartership I thought some work-related goals for 2012 might be in order. Also I should take the opportunity to reflect on 2011 if only to get more into the habit of reflective writing…

This year I’ve achieved a few things career-wise, both in work and in my own time:

• Registered, and started collecting evidence, for CILIP Chartership
• Been involved in various projects at work which have given me the opportunity to gain more professional-level experience
• Completed the City & Guilds qualification in Preparing to Teach in the Lifelong Learning Sector – I did this mainly as one of my Chartership goals. However, it was really useful for getting an introduction to teaching generally so I would recommend something like this to those who have no experience in this area.

Next year I hope to achieve:

• Complete CPD23 – this should have been included in achievements for 2011 but I got so behind that I’ve still got a few things left!
• Manage my time and commitments better – see CPD23 above!
• Get a professional post – easier said than done but I’m hoping that this will be the year that something turns up!
• Submit Chartership application – hopefully by the end of the summer
• Attend more LIS events –applying for sponsored places where possible

 

Hopefully 2012 will be a good year.

Bleak House or Great Expectations? NE CILIP Mini Umbrella – November 23rd 2011

I often complain about living in the North East. Being a fair distance and an expensive train ride away from most of the interesting LIS events it’s easy to feel disconnected and as though you’re somehow missing out on all the important stuff that’s happening in the profession. Mini Umbrella (organised by NE CILIP and the Department of Information Studies at Northumbria University) is a great event – partly because it’s local and free!! – but mainly because it is an opportunity for local library and information services to showcase their initiatives and innovative approaches to service delivery. And actually this event highlighted that really important stuff is happening right here in the North East region too. Who knew?!

There were speakers from across the sector – NHS, public, HE, and FE – who are doing really innovative work to improve and develop their library services, adapting to new ways of working when faced with the challenges of the current economic situation. Two of the key messages that stood out were the need for library services to develop strong working partnerships and to manage expectations.

Partnerships

Rachel Steele from Tees, Esk and Wear Valleys NHS Foundation Trust spoke about a pilot project to develop to role of the clinical librarian. A clinical librarian develops strong links with medical practitioners to inform evidence based practice. They assist in keeping practitioners’ knowledge up to date by conducting literature searches and critical appraisal of health research. This role involves accompanying practitioners when they see patients so the librarian can source relevant research to inform the treatment of those patients.

Mark Freeman and Kathryn Armstrong talked about the Tyne2Seine2 project that they have been involved with for South Tyneside Libraries. This was an international reading project to introduce children to modern European languages. It involved forging strong partnerships between South Tyneside council staff, libraries, and schools and developing links with their counterparts in the twin town of Epinay-sur-Seine in France. They also worked with authors from both countries and even with colleagues from North Tyneside! This project has been very successful in developing the language skills of both English and French schoolchildren and of the adults involved. Most importantly it has demonstrated the value of libraries in reading and in education.

Sharon Reeve from Newcastle City Libraries spoke about services for visually impaired users. Development of this service has relied upon strong partnerships with a range of groups, including service users and external bodies. Newcastle City Libraries were part of the NEALIS (North East Accessible Library and Information Services) project, which was nominated for the 2011 Libraries Change Lives award. This project brought together 12 public library authorities from the North East of England to develop library and information services for people with visual impairments, working in partnership with the RNIB (Royal National Institute of Blind People). Sharon also described the Reading Buddies scheme for providing one-to-one assistance for visually impaired library users from Duke of Edinburgh Award participants, which is another strong partnership for the library service.

Managing Expectations

Speakers from the education sector – FE and HE – highlighted the importance for academic libraries of measuring student satisfaction with and expectations of library services in order to develop and make improvements to services. Dilys Young and Christine Willoughby from Northumbria University described how the University Library uses National Student Survey (NSS) data and other feedback for targeted service development, for example improving resource provision in subject areas where NSS scores are lower, thus responding to student needs and rising expectations. Middlesbrough College learning resources service also use feedback and survey data to determine student expectations. Claire Donlan, Tracey Totty, and James Wells described how this information has highlighted that their students’ expectations of a technology enabled library service. In the current economic climate it is not always possible to spend on all the latest technology and where they have done so they have invested wisely. They also emphasised the importance of “doing more with less” (a phrase familiar to most of us these days) by making the most of existing resources and investigating the plethora of free online resources available. I will certainly be investigating some of the free online tools they mentioned. Just as soon as I finish CPD23…

In his summing up of the day, Colin Raistrick (Chair of NE CILIP) said that the day had proved that the situation is far from bleak. It’s inspiring hear about a range of innovative developments in library services especially when they’re happening in your area of the country.

CPD23: Things 10 & 11: Masters, Charterers and Mentors

I’ve blogged about my, somewhat roundabout, route into librarianship before. I’ve recently started on the next step of my career, again doing things in possibly the ‘wrong’ order; I’m working towards CILIP Chartership whilst still in a para-professional role. However, I’ve come to realise that there is no right or wrong way to go about it. I’ve worked with and met librarians who have entered the profession through a variety of routes. I can’t say what’s ‘best’, only what I’ve gained from my experience so far.

I’ve always said that I wished I’d had some experience of library work before diving in and starting the Masters and I stand by this to a certain extent. However, I don’t think that I got less value from doing the course because of this lack of experience. I was pretty much single-mindedly focused on working in academic libraries and through looking at the person specifications for more senior roles, where a postgraduate library qualification seemed to almost always be an essential requirement, I realised that, for me, the Masters was the way to go. The course was a great introduction to the profession I was about to enter. It gave me a broad understanding of the profession as well as some useful practical skills such as cataloguing and classification.

So, why Chartership? And why now? My current job has given me the opportunity to get quite a varied experience and get involved in plenty of projects, so although not a professional post it has prepared me to progress in my career. I always wanted to Charter at some point and hesitated for quite a while over whether to do it while still in a para-professional role. Although not a requirement for many posts, Chartership often appears among the desirable criteria for a lot of positions I see advertised in academic libraries so I knew it was something I would have to do at some point. And, let’s face it, as jobs become scarcer and competition for posts becomes greater, there’s no harm in having something to give you an edge. That said I’m not just doing it because it’s a hoop to jump through, or to help me to get a job. That would probably be just a little bit too cynical. The main reason I’m doing Chartership is to give me a focus for my CPD activity. For a while after finishing my Masters I lost my way professionally as it took me some time to get a permanent, full time post. I didn’t have much opportunity for professional development through work, and admittedly lost some of my motivation to seek this out for myself. I’m now back on track with my professional development and believe that Chartership will enable me to get the best out of this through the necessary formal reflection. As a professional it is important to me to continually develop my knowledge and it is this commitment to professional development that makes us more employable; Chartership is just one of the ways of demonstrating it.

My experience of Chartership so far is that, well, it’s hard! I found writing the PPDP particularly difficult as I struggled to focus the areas where I wanted to develop into achievable actions. I really recommend looking at the example portfolios to help with this. Speaking with my mentor about this was also a huge help, which brings me neatly onto the subject of mentors. Chartership has been the first experience I’ve had of formal mentoring. We’ve only had two meetings so far so I’m hardly writing from vast experience but I think for Chartership it will be important to have a mentor to seek guidance from through the process. It did feel quite formal at first, especially as I’m fairly shy and hadn’t met my mentor before, but I’m sure this will get easier as it goes along. I’m finding it’s also valuable to have senior colleagues to seek out for advice along the way; sort of like having a few informal mentors.

CPD23 – Thing 7: Face-to-face networks and professional organisations

I know it’s just semantics but the term ‘networking’ doesn’t really sit that well with me. Thinking of it in this way – networking, building a network… – instils it with a sense of formality which fills me with trepidation when it comes to meeting other professionals face to face. I’m naturally quite shy so there’s no real surprise there, though when I manage to control the nerves I can get by – though it tends to be less ‘networking’ and more just finding a few people to chat to at a conference or event. There’s definitely some cross over between my online and face-to-face networks as I tend to see people I follow on Twitter at events I attend. Although I’ve heard many people say that knowing someone online first makes it easier to break the ice when you meet in person, I find this makes it more awkward for me and I’m still not comfortable with acknowledging that I follow someone on Twitter when I meet them in person. It’s the same self-consciousness that holds me backs online and means I often don’t engage as much as others. Perhaps once I stop over-thinking things my networks – both online and face-to-face – will build more easily!

And this, in a way, brings me to consider professional organisations, specifically CILIP. Most events I’ve attended have been organised by CILIP and I’ve recently joined the committee of my local Career Development Group division so most of my face-to-face networking is because of being involved with CILIP. Of the professional organisations Bethan mentions in the CPD23 blog post for this ‘thing’, the only one I really have any knowledge of is CILIP. As I work in a traditional academic library, it seemed to be the best one for me. However, I have only rejoined fairly recently, and there are a number of reasons for this. I took advantage of the student rate whilst studying for my MA but let my membership lapse after this, partly as I couldn’t really see any benefit of remaining a member, but mainly because I simply couldn’t justify paying the membership fee. It’s been said before I’m sure but it is a bit steep, especially as even on a relatively low salary members are paying the highest rate. So why did I rejoin? Chartership, mainly. For academic library jobs this seems to be valued and is often a requirement so it is an important step for my career. Since rejoining I’ve seen other benefits of being a CILIP member and realise that investing a bit of time by joining a committee (admittedly I’m yet to get properly involved in this) is a great way to be more professionally active and engaged.

CPD23 – Thing 6: Online networks

So for Thing 6 of CPD23 we’re looking at online networks. I’m already registered on most of the networks mentioned in the blog but engage with them to varying degrees and use them in different ways. I tend to be quite passive; lurking in the background reading what’s being said without getting involved myself. However, looking at these networks as part of CPD23 has made me think again about the way I use social media. I realise that I will definitely get more out if I put more in!

Facebook

Hmm, Facebook…I’m not much of a fan of Facebook. I’m on there, but only use it occasionally now. I use it mainly as a way of keeping in touch with friends and I have been known to reject many friend requests from people I’ve not seen for years. Well, if we really were friends I’m sure we’d have stayed in touch. Call me old-fashioned but I still prefer a text to a wall post! For the moment I prefer to keep my use of Facebook more social than professional.

Twitter

I really like Twitter. Although I use it mainly as a professional current awareness tool, it’s also a really useful platform for building a professional online network. Twitter benefits from its simplicity and the lack of formality so it is a professional, yet social, space. For me, Twitter is useful as a tool for sharing knowledge with your network through short snippets of information or links, and to tap into the knowledge and expertise of your peers.

LinkedIn

I’ve had a LinkedIn account for a while now but my profile was fairly sparse and rather neglected. I had been considering closing my LinkedIn account as I didn’t seem to be gaining anything from it. However, I’ve decided to give it one more go and have finally got round to adding more information to my profile (it’s now 80% complete! – just wish LinkedIn wouldn’t remind me of this every time I log in!). After speaking to my Chartership mentor this week about how I could use LinkedIn as a tool for professional engagement for Chartership, I’ve joined more groups and had a look into some of the discussions. This is one area that I think LinkedIn could be really useful to me.

I joined LISNPN (LIS New Professionals Network) after the New Professionals Conference last year and have to say that I don’t use it all that much, especially as a network. I use the resources area but only ever dip into the forums occasionally and don’t comment much at all. As the platform is the same I think I will probably end up using LAT Network (Librarians as Teachers Network) in a similar way. I don’t do any teaching in my current role, and although this is an area that interests me professionally, I have been putting off joining this network. I’ve taken the plunge and registered now – I just hope I remember to log in occasionally! I follow the Twitter account for both networks so I think I would still catch anything of interest that way. I think I’ll probably skip CILIP Communities. As a CILIP member I have access to this but I rarely check it. There seems to be less activity on the forums here than on the LinkedIn discussion boards, I subscribe to quite a few of the blogs in the CILIP blog landscape and see some of the others from the Weekly Information World bulletin. Again, and this is one of the reasons I like it so much, Twitter often points me in the direction of many blogs and discussions that I’d see on here.

I struggle to keep up with the various online networks that I use now, and though I’m keen to try out new things, I’m wary of signing up to too many. What I really need is an online network that encompasses many areas, combining the professional elements of LinkedIn and the personal, social side of Facebook…and, from SimonXIX’s recent blog post, it seems that Google Plus might be just the thing. I’m really keen to explore this – anyone got a spare invite?! – though of course the main thing about online networks is to be where the conversation is. At the moment for me this is Twitter, it could be Google Plus next. The main thing I’ve learnt from revisiting my online networks is that I need be less passive and get more involved. I’ll aim to be less consumer, more contributor in future.

CPD23 – Thing 5: Reflective Practice

As I’ve recently started working towards Chartership, reflective practice has been on my mind a lot lately. In this blog for this thing, there was a link to my blog post about a reflective writing workshop. This was a really useful workshop so I’m pleased I’ve been able to write about it in a way that is of use to others.

Although I’m starting to find it a little easier, I still struggle with reflective writing. I think I was looking for a model to fit all types of activity rather than finding a different framework that would suit each experience. The main problem I have with reflective writing is finding the time to do it. I’ve struggled to keep up with the CPD23 schedule – partly due to going away on holiday, but mainly because it takes me so long to write up the blog post for each thing!* For Chartership I know I’m going to have to work on my time management to make sure I actually fit in time to formally reflect on my professional development.

Even though I’m finding it hard to keep up, I’m enjoying doing CPD23 so far. It has encouraged me think more about my online presence and to try to develop a stronger professional ‘brand’. Although I’ve not yet taken the opportunity to explore any new online tools, I’m thinking more about how I can get the best out of those tools I currently use. I’m also really enjoying reading blogs of the other participants, as it’s interesting to read a range of different views on the same things. It is also a great way to learn about new tools - I’m particularly interested in trying out Diigo after reading Laura’s blog about Thing 4.

So, in the spirit of reflective practice, I’ve identified some actions I can take:

• Organise my time better – I need to do this anyway but for now will just be happy to try to catch up with the things over the next couple of weeks
• Try out Diigo
• Look at ways I can organise and share information better in Google Reader

I think that’s enough for now or I’ll never find time to get it all done!

 * This is mainly due to procrastination. I’m easily distracted by a good book, a Doctor Who repeat, a Jensen Button Grand Prix win…

Reflective Writing Workshop

Last Thursday I attended a workshop on Reflective Writing, organised by CDG NE, led by Dr Ali Pickard, Head of Information and Communication Management at Northumbria University. I’m (finally!) about to begin my Chartership attempt (registration fee paid, meeting arranged with potential mentor…this really is happening!) so one of the main reasons I was there was to develop my skills further for writing the portfolio. However, as I’ve mentioned before, I’m keen to incorporate reflective practice into my working life where possible. As information professionals we instinctively look back on and evaluate successes (and failures), continually learning from our experiences. This workshop was about bringing all of that to the surface, looking at the reflective process, and formalising how we articulate this into reflective writing. For Chartership I know that I’ll need to develop more structure into my reflective process and writing style so this workshop has given me the foundations for that.

The main points I took from the workshop were:

• Start analysing, evaluating and recording what you’re doing anyway BUT be realistic – can’t analyse everything to the same degree!
• Reflective practice is a cyclical process so it is most important to identify action taken as a result of reflection
• Chartership is about evidencing that you are a reflective practitioner and therefore a professional (we do this stuff anyway, Chartership is the badge that tells everyone else!)
• Reflection is a method of thinking about and challenging your practice, adding to your knowledge so you continue to develop and learn
• Need to learn to be good at recognising what went well as it is as important to identify and analyse successes as to reflect on what went wrong and how things could be improved
• Important to reflect quickly after the event so as not to lose the ‘gut reaction’
• Reflective practice gives us the ability to develop creative solutions rather than just identify problems

Ali identified the main elements for a template for reflective writing as:

1. New knowledge & learning
2. Personal reaction
3. Any problems / difficulties / challenges
4. Action taken

[Image taken from slide used in workshop]

By answering questions in each of these areas we can create an open narrative (perhaps as a journal entry) which can be structured afterwards into a piece of reflective writing to include in the Chartership portfolio. From this we developed a framework for reflective writing which will be useful to help me structure my thoughts into a more formalised analysis and, hopefully, to more effectively articulate my learning experiences.

1. Description – this is the briefest section, outlining the event/activity to be reflected upon
2. Interpretation – this is the main section of the reflective review. Look back at the open narrative and make it meaningful. And personal – what did it mean for you?
3. Outcome – another brief section to explain action taken as a result of the reflective process

The emphasis was definitely that the most important part of the reflective process is to take action afterwards. If it was a success, evaluate why so that this success can be repeated. If things went wrong, what could be done better next time? The only way to fail is to do nothing!

Inspiration for reflection

I recently attended a training session on ‘Giving your best at interview’. Interviews are one of my real weaknesses. I know I can do the job but somehow can’t seem to get that across in the interview (even though I know I must be capable, having managed to get jobs in the past!). I usually view these sorts of things with a certain amount of cynicism – surely it’s all just common sense – but I went in with an open mind, and the knowledge that I need all the help I can get!

Aside from learning to control my nerves, I need to look at how I can be better prepared. Preparation for interviews is something I struggle with as I often find that this makes me even more nervous! One of the things we focused on in the session was developing ‘stories’ of our achievements to have examples to refer to in the interview. Now this may be something that seems really obvious to most, but it really resounded with me as something I’m not doing so well. I can speak hypothetically about the skills I have and which aspects of the job these are relevant to, but when it comes to demonstrating these skills by describing real experiences I sometimes struggle to give enough detail or, shamefully, to recall anything at all.

When I was speaking with one of the other attendees the penny suddenly dropped! She mentioned that this part of the interview preparation was quite easy for her as reflective practice was embedded into her working life as a nurse (I should have perhaps realised the benefits of this sooner considering I work with student nurses!). Rather than trying to recall pertinent experiences only when preparing for interview (a bit like trying to remember everything you’ve done in the last year the week before your appraisal!) I’m going to have to ensure to record and reflect on achievements and experiences as an ongoing process. I always try to do this when I attend events and conferences but know I could do more if I’m to have enough evidence of my skills and experiences to refer to in interviews. And it’s a win-win really as this would also be good practice to get into for appraisals, Chartership, or for my CPD in general.

Reflective writing is of course not without its problems (partly the reason for my procrastination over commencing Chartership), being quite a difficult skill to master in itself. This blog post from Rachel Smith describes an interesting, creative method of reflection and, while I’m not all that creative, it has definitely inspired me to find a way to make the reflective process a bit easier for myself too.  Simply setting aside enough time for reflection would definitely be an improvement at the moment, especially as, after a fairly quiet start to the year, I’ve suddenly found myself with quite a few events and CPD opportunities to fit into a short space of time.

I’d be really interested to hear other ideas people have for effective reflection, or any interview tips.