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A Worldly Diverse & Healthy Media Center

It is essential in today’s economy for Media Specialists to make themselves visible and entwine their job into the lives and jobs of those they serve at school [P10]. If the administration of a school or district cannot fully see the necessity of the Media Specialist, they will feel that they can save on the budget and ask the Media Assistant to complete the necessary tasks in the Media Center. Media Specialists are a resource not only for the students, but for the teacher as well. It is their job to promote an environment that is conducive to collaboration and learning.

If the Media Specialist is involved with the curriculum that the teachers are implementing, they will be appreciative for the help and the students will be able to see how working together can be beneficial for everyone. They will benefit from having more teachers working with them. Having two or three teachers in the room when dealing with research or technology is a huge benefit to everyone involved. If a Media Specialist runs her Media Program correctly, teachers will be coming to him/her as well as he/she going to them by knowing what is going on in the classrooms by attending grade level meetings to seek collaboration to involve not only the Media Center but Special Area teachers as well [P1, 3].

An example of a Media Center that has integrated the curriculum into its program and collaborates with its staff can be found in a local urban public elementary school. At School 79, the students are from different countries all over the world and are receiving refugee students on a weekly basis. The cultural differences are a great learning experience for the students as well as the staff. This also proposes a challenge for the Media Specialist. The staff is looking for resources to use to teach the new students English and about our culture [P7]. They want videos, books, audio books, websites [L1-4] and anything else that they can use with the students. When the ESL students come to the computer lab for class, they are placed on the laptops and websites that show them pictures that go with words that are spoken aloud. They work to learn their alphabet and love the math websites since math is a universal language [P9]. The Media Specialist is currently working on a grant [K6] that would provide more ESL resources to the Media Center to help the students adapt quickly and smoothly. The Media Specialist is hoping to also receive materials in multiple languages to also help the students feel more at home and comfortable being in the Media Center with things that are also familiar.

The Media Specialist utilizes the computer lab which is connected to the Media Center for technology instruction. This way it is still a part of the Media Center, but there is a door so the noise from the games and activities do not disrupt the other students in the Media Center [L5]. The computer lab can be signed for teacher use as well as for the Media Specialist to use with students. Many times the Media Specialist and classroom teacher are working together on a project together that utilizes both the Media Center and the computers so one adult is in the lab while the other is in the Media Center helping with print resources [P4].

In late December, the gym teacher at 79 approached the Media Specialist, 6th grade Language Arts teacher, and the 6th grade Math teacher about possibly doing a cross curriculum collaborative project with the 6th graders [K3, 8]. During different times of the school year, the gym teacher has to give the FitnessGram test to the kids. This test involves a variety of exercises that they have to perform and their results are tracked. The idea is to improve each time. Well instead of just doing the test, the gym teacher wanted the kids to understand what being healthy really means. She wanted them to understand that this concept needs to carry through to their daily lives and continue on into adulthood. Her proposal was for her to administer the physical test, for the Media Specialist to use print and virtual resources to teach about nutrition and daily exercise along with the gym teacher, for the Language Arts teacher to have them write to a writing prompt about what they have learned and use the laptops with the Media Specialist to type this paper, and have the Math teacher use statistics and graphs to show their progress throughout the year with the Media Specialist helping with the use of Excel on the laptops. Overall this would involve a total of 4 staff members and cover math, language arts, writing, gym, and technology covering many of the required state standards in these areas as well as the information literacy standards [P2, 5: K1, 10].

The gym teacher would be giving each student a journal [L6] for them to track their scores on each exercise. They are also to use the journals to write about how they felt at the conclusion of their tests. This way as they go through the year they can see not only the progress in their numbers, but in how they felt when each one was completed. This journal will go with them to the Media Center when they start working with the Media Specialist on finding information about what it means to be healthy. They will take notes [K2] from the websites and print resources that they use. Students may choose to work in pairs or individually on their research of nutrition and wellness [P8]. The Media Specialist will show the students which databases [L10] would be useful to them for finding facts and information on exercise and nutrition. Those notes will then be used for their writing prompt with the Language Arts teacher and Media Specialist. The journal will also be used to create their statistics and graphs [L7] with the math teacher using Excel. Their journal contains all of their data. The graphs that they produce will be displayed in the hall along with their writing prompts for the school to view [L8]. This display will be done by the Media Specialist and include some of the information that was found, resources used, and the process that had then ended with the paper and graph.

Each teacher will have a form of authentic assessment [K4] to go along with the project so that the students receive multiple grades since they are putting in so much work for this cross-curricular project. The gym teacher’s grade may be based on behavior and participation. The Language Arts teacher could use a rubric [K9] to grade the writing prompt and the math teacher could use a checklist to grade their Excel spreadsheet to make sure certain things have been included.

Alternatives for this project to expand it for following years could include activities where students interview [K7] health professionals around the city about their opinions and beliefs on what makes a person healthy. The students could also get into contact with personal trainers and discuss with them practical exercise programs for people to get moving on a daily basis. Students could be pen pals with a school similar to theirs in another state and compare the activities that they do in gym class and sports that are played that have them moving. That may give the students more ideas about how to stay active.

When the Media Center isn’t being used for formal instruction or collaboration, the Media Specialist is actively working with students to encourage them to read. Students come into the Media Center throughout the day to return and check out books. The Media Specialist has a reading program started with the students that rewards them for reading books on their reading level. The Media Specialist works with students to help them find books that interest them but are also on their level so that they are challenged but do not become frustrated. He/she has different activities then that the student does to show comprehension of the book once they have completed it and receives stars for each book. Cumulating stars is the goal since they can be turned in for prizes. The Media Specialist also has times during the week where students can sign up to come in for a read aloud session. There is an area of the library that is set up for just reading [L9]. There is a carpet, pillows, stuffed animals, and chairs for the students to get comfortable and read a good book. This also applies to being read to. Since the school is very diverse, the Media Specialist tries to find books that expose students to a wide variety of cultures so the students can gain understanding of their classmates’ backgrounds. She could then encourage them to search online for more information about the countries that are represented in the school. This is on their own with no guidelines and no grade attached. This is simply for the student’s own personal knowledge. [P6, K5]

Overall, the Media Specialist at School 79 has found implemented a healthy environment that includes all students who walk through the door. The Media Specialist works well with the staff and has built a trusting relationship with the students. The Media Center is a fun place to be and learning is happening in every corner. The students at School 79 bring their diverse experiences to the table and in turn become teachers themselves.