Topic 1 Organisational Theory thoughts

This is a very extensive topic and covers all of the subtopics including innovation and change, strategic planning, communication, decision -making, management, teamwork and collaboration.
The subject objectives all include these aspects but I have trouble isolating each aspect and allocating it to an objective – all overlap and inter-relate. And leadership is the overarching theme which connects them all.

Colleen Foley states that increased Internet use and access hasn’t necessarily resulted in increased information literacy skills” in our students (Hay &Foley, 2009). Why? Colleen went on to explain the need for students to be given scaffolding, explicit teaching at point of need and in context to enable them to gain skills in independent learning.

My response travels in a different direction, without disagreeing with all of those arguments – could it be that online access to millions of resources has become a source of time-wasting! In my experience, in secondary school where students and teachers have been given little or no direction or training in how to find quality resources on the Internet, the habit of “Googling” is rife and the chance of students (and teachers) using a quality authoritative resource suited to the task, their needs and learning abilities is very hit and miss, and I propose more miss than hit. It is very easy for students to appear busily engaged while they make several trips around the world on Google! It’s worth taking note of next time you see students researching on the net. If we re-invent our approach, there is opportunity to create a powerful learning community.

In my school there is opportunity, nay imperative need for me, as the TL and provider of resources, to take a leadership role in creating a school or library website or wiki so that online resources can be selected (using policy criteria), acquired, organised and shared with all students and teachers, with the aim of improving teaching and learning in our school. For the time, we have the chance to share common resources without breaching copyright, so ongoing costs for supply of resources is reduced. As well, resources are updated regularly, again at no extra cost except for time. TLs can make use of peer networks (OzTLNET, SLAV) for support with resource availability

Resources alone will not achieve this outcome, there will need to a strategic plan to change the “google culture” and to involve all teaching staff, and even parents in collective action. If teachers can see the need for change, they too can be motivated knowing it will improve their curriculum delivery as well as increase student learning skills. Professional development would be most beneficial if it is involving shared and collaborative learning, rather than bringing in outside consultants who don’t also “own” the problem.

I agree with Donham (Reading 1) that enthusiasm invigorates and inspires others. A vision would portray the intent of the Library and its resources in the context of the overall school learning programs, and hence be connected to the overall school vision. Mission statements following the vision would provide a focus for developing the goals and objectives. These vision and mission statements could be made clearly visible on the web page or wiki.

In reading Fullan’s chapter on Making coherence, I agree that even though leaders provide vision, policy, mechanisms for interaction and implementation, and monitoring it is only the teachers who can build capacity and commitment in a collective endeavour to fulfil the goals, Once the teachers realise they own the problem, they will realise they can create and own the answer. Surveying online usage of resources in our school as well as in others is a good way to highlight the need for change.

Fullan’s Chapter on Moral Purpose provides strategies that I see as useful in pursuing change in a school. He describes the need to remove barriers to implementation, regular monitoring and evaluation, re-evaluation, plan action, responsibilities and deadlines (if they apply) and expectations. There will be a need for professional development, support and training of staff as well as students.

Reference:
Hay, L. & Foley, C. (2009) School libraries building capacity for student learning in 21C. SCAN 28(2), pp. 17-26.