Interview with a Middle School Librarian on Collaborate

 

    I had the privilege of asking Alana Lewis about her experience with the AASL standards of Collaborate. Ms. Lewis is in her fifth year working at her current middle school. The middle school has students in grades 6th-8th. There are around 800 students. The elementary schools that flow into middle school are considered lower income, but it is not considered as Title 1. She has received the South Carolina School Librarian Award. Prior to becoming a school librarian, Ms. Lewis worked in the university field of library science. She loves working with middle schoolers and meets them where they are. Ms. Lewis states that she tries to collaborate with every teacher in the building. During our interview, we discussed how she strives to work with other teachers, maintains a welcoming atmosphere, and what keeps students coming back to the library each day. 

    The questions that I came up with for our interview are as follows: How do you encourage teachers to collaborate with you? You see a wide range of students each day. How do you get students to work together during their free time using makerspace resources? How do you get middle schoolers to work together and learn from each other? How do you keep a positive atmosphere that makes the students want to keep coming back to the library? These questions that I created are based on expectations of a school librarian and students when it comes to collaboration and its domains. 

    One of the first things I noticed walking into Ms. Lewis' middle school at the start of the school day was the wide range of students who hung out in the library. You had students playing games, working on their Chromebooks, or hanging with their friends. When Ms. Lewis and I were able to sit down, I stated what I noticed and asked how she encourages all students to come into her library. She stated that she encourages them to share with one another. She welcomes each student when they enter the library. She could not pinpoint the exact reason that kids from different personalities and social groups all come into the library. Ms. Lewis discussed that she encourages students and builds on their strengths. She has witnessed students who do not like talking to anybody lead a group during their D&D club time. We moved on to discuss how she collaborated with other teachers. She stated that she seeks them out. She will approach the teachers and tells them that they should collaborate. She recollected that she has collaborated with geography teachers, math teachers, and English language arts teachers. When she collaborates with the teachers she makes sure that the students are also collaborating with each other. She uses groups and partners when completing collaborative assignments or tasks. She creates activities that she knows will keep them engaged. She uses breakout boxes where students must complete a task. Once the task has been correctly solved, they receive a key to unlock a lock attached to the box. This has been used for math activities and science activities. Ms. Lewis encourages students to share with others about something exciting or a book they found interesting. She said that she has students help her decide and create themes for their book display (There is a large wooden display in the center of the library when you walk in, featuring different books on display depending on the theme). 

Reflection

    Not only did I get to interview Alana Lewis, but I also got to observe her over several days. While she and I were walking in the halls on one of those days, I witnessed her tell a teacher she hadn’t yet worked with this year that they were going to collaborate on an activity. I watched as she made an effort to talk to teachers in the hall, not just polite talk, but conversation that showed she had a personal relationship with them. I observed how she treated all the students with respect. You could tell that all of the students love her.

    I am in my first year as a school librarian. I hope to create a welcoming atmosphere in my library and maintain that each year. Ms. Lewis reminded me that sometimes you have to get out of the library. Sometimes you have to go where the people are because they may not come to you first.