Reply To: Teachers and Librarians Working Collaboratively

[Jenny Toerien Keymaster]

Thanks for the update Matt – there is a great deal of exciting work here to delve into and we look forward to hearing where it goes. For those just joining this thread, there are two other historical threads that may be of interest:

• Integrating FOSIL with the MYP ATLs where Darryl and I documented our original attempt to do this at Oakham School
• Using FOSIL outside a full inquiry where Matt originally mentioned his school’s large-scale project to collaborate with teachers on the AtL skills

The five skill bands you have chosen to focus on are very important, and are clearly very much the province of the library, and I think that chosing to focus on these gives you a very clearly defined scope to your project that both makes it feel more achievable and helps you to track and measure your impact more effectively. The only caution I would give (that I am sure you are fully aware of and don’t need me to tell you!) is that these focus skills don’t exist in isolation. For example, we would always look at the Investigate skill of “Capturing information and thinking/notetaking” alongside Construct skills like “Claims/opinion and point of view” and “Interpretation and synthesis of information”. You’ll see this in the Investigative Journal and Cornell notetaking sheet. What you are doing is very sophisticated, Matt, so I’m sure you are well aware of this – the fact that you are focusing on one skill doesn’t mean you are ignoring the others. I’m really just flagging this for anyone who is reading this who is new to the process.

This is one of the key differences between information literacy and inquiry teaching. Information literacy is very focussed on individual skills, whereas inquiry acknowledges that these skills only really make sense as part of a framework of skills within a process, embedded within units with authentic learning outcomes (which might be subject based or extra-curricular but are never just skills for the sake of skills). This is exactly what you are talking about above, Matt, it’s just that your library is particularly invoved with certain skill sets.

What I am really interested in is your goal of monitoring student progress with these key skills, as up to now our particular focus has been embedding inquiry units within the curriculum all the way up our school, from Primary to Sixth Form, with particular focus on Signature Work inquiries where library staff are involved throughout the design (and sometimes teaching) so that we know that all children in key yeargroups have been exposed to a full inquiry cycle and had the chance to practise age-appropriate skills that can then be used in other subjects. This is quite a ‘top down’ planning approach. I am really interested in your ‘bottom up’ approach of tracking certain skills with individual students and determining who needs intervention, and would love to hear more about how this goes. You might find the New York State Infomation Fluency Continuum Priority Skills assessments helpful for this (although I know there are particular assessment points within the MYP which will also help). FOSIL is based on the NYSIFC, and these priority skills assessments inform our graphic organisers. Part of the difference is that the FOSIL graphic organisers focus on stages of the process, and often combine several skills in one organiser, while the NYSIFC organisers are focused on one skill per organiser, which may be more what you are looking for at the moment.

I definitely agree with your approach of being happy to work with any teacher on any unit where a skill is being addressed rather than waiting for the perfect unit. This has always been our approach, and often leads to wider collaboration further down the line. The more we can get involved with individual teachers in small ways, the more we can spread and support inquiry skills throughout the curriculum. Skills need reinforcement little and often, rather than just the odd big ‘project’ (although full inquiries are really important and we can’t abandon them entirely).

We’re really excited to see where your work goes. If you are looking for tools further down the line to help you to track skills across different units and to track student self-assessment I would recommend having a look at Mondrian Wall and didbook. (This is an entirely personal recommendation – we don’t do sponsored recommendations on this site!). We spent a lot of time working with Kevin Heppell, the director of the the parent company, Sequential Systems, when we were at Oakham and he is someone who is really passionate about education and young people and creating tools to help schools and students to develop and understand their educational identity. You can see a presentation he did to the IFLA School Libraries Section 2022 Midyear meeting here, about creating a dynamic curriculum map. This is a whole school tool, and your school may not want or need something like this yet, but what you are doing is very sophisticated and has huge potential so it is worth being aware at the outset that a tool like this exists so that you can start including it in your conversations with senior management if it might be helpful.

Please do keep us all posted about your progress. Building this sort of evidence-base to demonstrate impact is such important work.