![]() Don't make the choice to become a librarian because you only want to work bell-to-bell. Prior to joining SAGE in 2022, she designed compelling lessons and library trainings integrating critical. But as is the life of any educator, that doesn't always happen. Kaneisha Gaston is a teaching librarian at heart. Do I sometimes wish that an idea that changes Monday's lesson completely comes to me before Sunday afternoon? Of course I do. I lose sleep over budgets as we work to keep a large library collection relevant and diverse and current. I am often kept up late at night trying to figure out ways to convince library non-believer colleagues that we can support them and their students. It's invigorating to attend an edcamp on a Saturday morning. I like to participate in evening Twitter chats with educational colleagues. I am incredibly lucky that I don't feel like the work I do at home is torture (I also know that I come from workaholic stock and I can't help it). Every good teacher that I know spends many evening and weekend hours working way beyond contract, grading and planning, attending professional development sessions, learning and growing, with their students always at the top of mind. ![]() Teaching is a job that takes an incredible amount time. In short, don't make the choice to become a librarian because you think teaching is too difficult or exhausting, because if you do the librarian job right - you'll be just as busy in a library as you are in the classroom. And I spend those days handling the administrative tasks required of a large library program: ordering, reporting, planning, drumming up business (outreach), managing the physical space, tech trouble-shooting and more. And sometimes I wish for the kinds of relationships that classroom teachers have with the students they see day in and day out. We collaborate across the curriculum and I find that I often have to change my teaching style to align with the teacher with whom I am working. Our kind of teaching is very different from that of a traditional classroom teacher - I have different kids every day, different subject areas, every day. I run a busy, instructionally-focused middle school library and we often have two or three classes in the library at a time. Sometimes I teach seven out of seven periods in a day, without a planning period or lunch. We may not do as much grading (although I know that 9 out of 10 of us offer to do grading for the instructional components we support) but we DO spend a whole lot of time teaching. ![]() These include, according to Queen University library, help students with information-related activities, assist students in developing information literacy skills that allows them to navigate and search the web effectively, collaborate with teachers in. Sure, we don't have to manage huge amounts of parent communication (some librarians at other schools ARE on the master schedule, teaching technology classes, reading classes, yearbook classes, research classes). They are entrusted with various educational tasks. If you are are tired of classroom instruction, school librarian is not the job for you.
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