School Libraries and Evidence-Based
Practice: Dynamics, Strategies
and Outcomes
Dr Ross Todd
Department of Library and
Information science
Rutgers University
rtodd@scils.rutgers.edu
Scils.rutgers.edu/~rtodd
WA SCHOOL LIBRARY
CONFERENCE, 2003
Reluctance to change
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Too much else to do
We don’t have the time
Staff will never accept it
We like change if it does
not involve alterations
Why change, it’s working
ok
You’re right, BUT …
Let’s get back to reality
Let’s sleep on it
• You cannot teach an old
dog new tricks
• I’m retiring next year
• It will not work here
• We did all right without it
• We’re all too busy to do it
• Think of the disruption!
• Not THAT again
• We’ve always done it this
way
Your School Library?
How can your school library show that it:
– Is a knowledge space?
– Is a center for learning activism?
– Actively contributes to the school as a
thinking community?
– Shows that it makes a difference to
student learning?
Evidence-Based
Practice (EBP)
Evidence-Based Practice
Two Key aspects
1. Conscientious, explicit and judicious use of
current best research findings in making
decisions about the performance of your role
and learning needs of your students
2. Ensuring that your daily efforts put some
focus on learning outcomes evaluation that
gathers meaningful and systematic evidence
on dimensions of teaching and learning that
matter to the school and its support
community
School Libraries Empowering
Learning: The Evidence
• Making concrete the links between library
and learning
• Making concrete the links between
information access and provision and
growth of knowledge
• Practices that demonstrate tangible power
of our contribution to school’s learning
goals
• Local, immediate evidence: local
successes, local improvements
Evidence-Based Practice
Gathering evidence in YOUR local school
You are able to provide convincing evidence that
answers these questions:
“What differences do my school library
and its learning initiatives make to
student learning outcomes?
“What are the differences, the tangible
learning outcomes and learning benefits
of my school library”?
Evidence-Based Practice is …
• Examining and identifying specific student
learning goals and needs (IL Standards)
• Selecting appropriate learning outcomes
• Identifying indicators of these outcomes
• Establishing systematic approaches to
locating and gathering evidence of
achieving learning outcomes
• Analyzing and synthesizing the evidence
• Presenting and celebrating the learning
outcomes
LOCAL EVIDENCE
• Not a cook book approach
• Will vary from school to school
• Acknowledges and integrates local processes,
ways of doing
• Formative and summative evidence
• Not just assessment; it is analyses and
syntheses of assessment to create learning
outcomes profiles, and articulate differences
and impacts
• Building strategies into collaborative initiatives
that enable you to show the impact / outcomes
EBP Strategies
• simple checklist strategies: where students check
their perceived levels of skills, knowledge and
attitude before and after learning intervention;
• rubric strategies: where students are scaled
according to a set of criteria that clearly defines
requirements of performances and products
• conferencing strategies: group / individual review
activities, students reflect on their work, on their
constructive process and skills, and on benefits;
• journaling strategies: writing entries in journal to
focus on the research process as well as on the
outcomes of their research;
Checklist & Mapping Strategies
• Identify new skills mastered; skills needed to
work on
• New knowledge gained: concept maps of
knowledge of topic before and after research
project
• Short questionnaires, check lists, skills
checkers Focus on learning, not library use
• Minute Papers: what I learned, what I was
lousy at, what help do I need, what I could
help someone else with
RUBRIC
STRATEGIES
Rubric for research management
PERSONAL
ENGAGEMENT
MANAGING
TIME
RERSEARCH
PROPOSAL
NOTES AND DATA
SOURCES
Excellent
Liked project
Motivated to learn
Took responsibility for
learning
Sought advice
Formed opinions and
judgments
Excellent
Proposal submitted
on time
Adequate notes
presented
Draft on time
Paper on time
Excellent
Shows engaging
question
Shows focus
Shows clear
presentation
structure
Excellent
Notes from at least 4 sources are
thorough
Notes used to develop topic and
address focus question
Quotations cited
Excellent
Range of sources
Authoritative
Highly relevant to topic and question
Range of points of view
Up to date
Competent
(most of the time)
Competent
Competent
Competent
Competent
Making some progress
Learned about topic
because it was
requirement
Somewhat interested
Did not seek much
advice etc
Making some
progress
Making some
progress
Making some progress
Making some progress
Not yet competent
Disliked topic
No motivation
Uninterested
Did not take
responsibility for
learning
Formed no opinions etc
Not yet competent
Many deadlines
missed
Not yet
competent
Proposal missed
the research
question
Not yet competent
Notes sketch and not relevant
Plagiarism
Not yet competent
Bibliography missing
Sources not authoritative
Sources not relevant
Sources not up to date
RUBRIC FOR SELF-EVALUATION
Research Process
PLANNING
What message did I want my
project to give? Did I succeed?
What did I expect to learn?
Did I accomplish my goals?
MEETING DEADLINES
How well did I manage my
time?
ORGANIZATION
How well did I gather
information?
How well did I demonstrate the
new ideas I have learned?
WORKING WITH THE
TEACHER-LIBRARIAN
Did I ask questions and seek
help when I needed it?
Did I take initiative to set up
meetings?
PROBLEM SOLVING
What problems did I face and
how did I solve them?
What decisions did I make that
shaped the project?
Personal Narrative
My Rating
Teacher-librarian’s Rating
Conferencing Strategies
• Focused discussion: things I have learned,
skills I have learned, changes in skills and
knowledge
• Partner conferencing: PQP: Praise – what
are strengths of project? Questions - What
problems do you see with the project? Polish
– What suggestions do you have to have to
solve problems or improve the project.
Record on advice sheet
Journaling Strategies
• Date each entry
• Include written narrative, photos,
sketches, timelines, notes, checklists of
things to do and any other evidence of
organization and progress
EBP Strategies
• portfolio strategies: where students construct a
cumulative process of samples of their work
collected over a period of time, matched to
curriculum goals and information literacy
requirements, as well as work progress reports,
products, and self-assessments.
• Indicators of learning: as shown in final products,
performances, presentations, projects
• Library surveys (not of library use, but of library
learning) of how students have helped them learn
• Analysis of standardized test score data to see if
there are matches between scores and high-use
library groups
A great resource
• Information Literacy in Action
• Carol Gordon
• Published by John Catt Educational
EBP – Issues and Concerns
• Accountability: Threat to professional authority and
autonomy; immunity from accountability calls;
“proving our worth”
• I have to be a researcher: intellectual skills required to
undertake evidence-based practice are not research
methodologies and complex statistical analyses, but
information literacy competencies
• Our goal is lifelong learning, so how can we identify
outcomes? Providing learners with explicit feedback
on how they are learning in their formative years is
fundamental to effective teaching and learning
EBP – Issues and Concerns
• EBP detracts from the job! What
then is your job?
• Time: I do not have time to do this.
• Professional Development: we need
examples, models, templates
Benefits of EBP
• Provides evidence at local school level that library
program makes a difference to learning outcomes
• Models information process to teaching colleagues
• Basis for targeting time, energies and scarce resources
• Helps you not to do things that do not work or that do
not matter
• Reflective, iterative process of informing instructional
process: it informs, not misleads or detracts from dayto-day practice
• Job satisfaction and confidence in the central role that
library plays in the school
• Moves beyond anecdotal, guess work,
hunches,advocacy, touting research findings not
connected to local actions
What is the finger print
of your library on
learning?
Identify one evidencebased practice strategy
that you could easily
implement