School media specialists must be teachers, leaders, and advocates for reading, inquiry, and learning. Partnering with classroom teachers, they must design and implement curriculum and instruction that prepare young citizens for a life that requires thinking, inquiry, problem-solving and ethical behavior. These experiences provide the foundation…

School library media specialists wear many hats within their school libraries, classrooms, and districts. Whether these roles are formally acknowledged or not, library media specialists (LMSs) are functioning as co-teachers, curriculum designers, website managers, technology troubleshooters, administrators, and in-service staff development…

The American Association for School Librarians suggests an important mission for school librarians is to ensure personal growth through ongoing exposure to conferences, journal articles, webinars, presentations, and membership in professional organizations. As professional educators, School Librarians should exemplify the vision for being…

The most successful school library media specialists are those who collaborate with teachers as full partners in the instructional process. Without assertive action by the school library media specialist, however, school administrators and teachers are likely to be more aware of the media specialist's administrative role than the roles of teacher,…

The information age has given library media specialists an unprecedented opportunity to play a leading role in helping teachers, administrators, and especially students access and use information intelligently. As the school's premier information specialist; the library media specialist has a unique role to play in helping everyone in the school…

This is Part 1 of a three part series of articles summarizing selected articles from the journals of the American Association of School Librarians (AASL) over a period of thirty-five years from 1972 to 2007. Part 1 traces the evolution of the library media specialist to emphasize a greater student-centered approach to teaching and learning.…

Some essential components of "keeping current" with trends and new developments in the school library field for library media specialists includes attending conferences and reading professional literature. Beginning in May 2007, one article on "keeping up" each year has been devoted to summarizing the major themes in conferences and professional…

Teacher education needs greater involvement in every phase of media utilization. (Author)

Gives suggestions to media professionals for effectively providing for bilingual students, including a bilingual listening station, interest center, bulletin board display, and human resource file. Sources for the acquisition of foreign language materials are listed. (CMV)

Defines the concept of the teacher center, traces its development in three countries (Great Britain, Japan, and the United States), and draws implications for the school media supervisor. (Author)

This column lists and defines several sets of selected terms that may better help any educator communicate with the digital-savvy student clientele. Terms were gathered from the sources listed in "Further Reading" and confirmed among three online professors at Indiana University/Purdue University at Indianapolis. The sample terms are clustered by…

Makes predictions, based on a recent Delphi study, of the future of school media programs. (PF)

A challenge is presented to school media specialists to become informed about networks and data bases in order to expand access to resources to meet user needs. (Author)

Presents a step-by-step approach to school media program involvement in shared resources and services. (Author)

Describes empirical research in the fields of neurology and cognitive science that is being conducted to determine how and why the brain learns. Explains ways that video is compatible with how the brain learns and suggests it should be used more extensively by teachers and library media specialists. (LRW)