In an effort to provide support and guidance for its members and to maintain its role as a leading organization in the field of school librarianship, the AASL Website also provides links to toolkits, standards websites, and resource guides as well as links to action research efforts that document the efficacy of school library media centers. The AASL also produces useful journals such as School Library Media Research and Knowledge Quest (some content is members only) and Hotlinks, a monthly newsletter members only. In a connected vein, the Association of Library Service to Children (ALSC) an ALA division with the broader focus of library services to children in all types of libraries, maintains a not to be missed link on the left to take you to recommended Great Websites for Kids.
Information Literacy Resource Guides
As mentioned, the AASL resource guides are well-organized and researched documents that help teacher-librarians develop their school library media programs by working with administrators, classroom teachers, and families to insure that students learn and practice information skills.
David V. Loertscher
David V. Loertscher’s website is a practical resource for school library media specialists. While some of the site’s sections contain information that has not been updated recently, the Research & School Libraries section is current and invaluable in its provision of online PowerPoint presentations championing school libraries’ connection to student achievement and related to Loertscher and Lance’s book Powering Achievement. These highly useful PowerPoint presentation are also available on a Loertscher’s commercial website LMC Source, the distributors of the products of Hi Willow and Research Publishing under the valuable section Reviews and Freebies.
International Association of School Libraries (IASL)
The International Association of School Libraries (IASL) recognizes that the Web is too extensive to provide links to all the information literacy and librarian-related websites, and, thus, via its own website aims “to take teacher librarians to the best ‘starting points’ for Internet exploration”. In this regard, the IASL has selected sites for school librarians relating to all aspects of librarians’ work (e.g., documents for school librarians, resources on the web). The section entitled Research in School Librarianship is valuable but not the most current. The site contains some valuable for librarians seeking empirical support of the efficacy of libraries in schools for raising student achievement. Furthermore, IASL is an organization worth considering joining, because its members become part of the international community of teacher-librarians and are able to stay current and fresh with ideas circulating among all of the members from many countries.
K12 Library Initiative
Although it has not been updated recently, the K12 Library Initiative website: A Project of the Washington State Library still has worthwhile resources and toolkit sections that provide ideas about the information that is available on the Web. The Toolkit section lists suggestions for advocacy, listservs, and organizations in which teacher-librarians may participate.
Library Instruction
Library Instruction, maintained by Michael Lorenzen, sports the title “The Librarian’s Weapon of Mass Instruction” and, in that capacity, provides library lesson plans galore, articles about library instruction, and links to other information literacy-related resources. The site also contains links to resources and to a timely library blog aptly entitled The Information Literacy Land of Confusion (covering among other issues information literacy, search engines, and library instruction). While it is not specifically devoted to school librarianship, Lorenzen’s website contains many relevant resources and is witty, timely, and worthy of perusing.
Pathfinder for Constructing Pathfinders
The Pathfinder for Constructing Pathfinders site provides school library media specialists with support in creating pathfinders. Pathfinders may be utilized to buttress information literacy development by guide students to quality resources. This site provides a useful introduction to those who would like to get started with creating pathfinders for their own schools. This site is designed to guide you to resources for constructing online pathfinders of your own.
School-Libraries.Org
School-Libraries.Org has been developed in dedication to the needs of school librarians and provides links supportive of many aspects of a school librarian’s work. Regarding information literacy, the site’s online collection of teacher-librarian resources offers many valuable links to collections of resources such as general teacher-librarian resources, the curriculum and technology planning, learning and teaching with the web, information literacy and library skills, and web gateways to information. Within each one of these sections, teacher-librarians are led to many more valuable resources. This is a companion site to School-Libraries.Net. The site is advantageous for aiding teacher- librarians in making effective use of the web.
School-Libraries.Net
School-Libraries.Net is a collection of pages for teacher-librarians maintained by Peter Milbury as a bonified global network providing access to status of school libraries in countries around the world. Here one can access school library websites of schools from countries around the world—from Australia to Iceland and beyond. This is the place for gaining ideas and tips about how to create a school website—both by having access to the websites of other schools and by its primers and tips in how to create your own. This is a companion site to School-Libraries.Org. Blanche Woolls and David Loertscher are co-coordinators of this project. Teacher-librarians may peruse this website and focus on learning how to create an accessible and practical website for their own schools.
Resources for School Librarians
Resources for School Librarians is broken up into three main sections: learning and teaching, information access, and program administration. Linda Bertland, a retired librarian, checks her links with dedication and maintains the links with dedication as a service for her users. The information literacy related links are valuable and diverse—including guides to standards, models, assessment, program integration, and lesson plans. The links are checked frequently so as to provide access to valuable resources and to avoid frustrating users with dead links.
Teacher Librarian: The Journal for School Library Professionals
Teacher Librarian is primarily a journal for school library professionals, but also the website provides a TL Toolkit. The TL Toolkit attempts to provide teacher-librarians with the best resources on the web including a section dedicated to information technology.
Collection Development and Analysis Tools (not free)
Baker and Taylor
Baker and Taylor offers online ordering tools such as Title Source 3 and B&T Link Online through which users can browse topical selection lists.
OCLC WorldCat Collection Analysis
OCLC WorldCat Collection Analysis enables users to evaluate a library collection by comparison. A library can compare its collection on a one-to-one peer comparison basis (with permission), against selected library collections, or against the thousands of other libraries that have their collection in the WorldCat database. On the WorldCat Collection Analysis sitse, you can even take a pre-recorded tour of how the analysis process works.
Title Wave
TitleWise Title Wave a part of Follett’s Library Resources aims to help teacher-librarians analyze the extant collection and identify weak spots.
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