Interdisciplinary Instruction
Making connections across disciplines and content areas is vital when considering the retention level and effectiveness of instruction. When students are able to apply their knowledge in "real world" contexts, they assimilate the knowledge and are more engaged and actively participating in their education.
Library Media Specialists are a natural bridge for interdisciplinary instruction. Through the use of literature, we make connections that are relevant to students, and are able to expand upon those concepts to enhance core content. With the addition of technology and digital databases, we can expose children to resources that support the curriculum and reinforce their learning experiences.
I strive to create lessons that make those connections, engages our students, and supports the instruction and curriculum of the classroom teachers. I provided a few examples of the learning that takes place in the Ridge Road Library.
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I first developed this project while attending the Project Based Learning workshop presented by the Buck Institute for Education in August of 2015. Project Based Learning (PBL) is a teaching method in which students gain knowledge and skills by working for an extended period of time to investigate and respond to an authentic, engaging and complex question, problem, or challenge.
The entire Fourth Grade class of 2017 participated in the project, and I was able to purchase 24 student-recommended books for our library collection for them to leave as their legacy.
What is the process?
The students are first presented with the question, "What is a Legacy?" After some discussion, we came to a working definition of a product of learning from the past, living in the present, and building for the future.
Next, students brainstorm the genres and titles of books that they have really loved throughout their childhood, so far. Then, students worked in groups of 3 or 4 to research and ultimately to recommend a new title to purchase for the Ridge Road Library to leave as their legacy to the school.
The requirments for the recommendations were:
~Age and interest level appropriateness
~Had to be new title (that we didn't already have in our collection)
~Had to be listed as a title in Accelerated Reader
After researching possible new titles, using our OPAC to determine that we didn't already own the book, and confirming that Acclerated Reader supported the title as well, students submitted their recommendations to me, and with the PTO's support, I was able to purchase the books to add to our collection!
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Legacy Book Project: Year Two
Ridge Road Fourth Grade class of 2018 students are currently
in the process of choosing their Legacy Books!
These are some of the titles that
have been selected so far:
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Second Grade State Research
Students in the Second Grade complete a research project in which they each learn about a state. In Learning Lab, the students navigated to a website which provided them with many of the facts they needed. They learned about utilizing a digital resource and taking notes from a website. They then used the information to create posters about their state.
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Lori Cady, a Second Grade teacher at Ridge Road, shared her thoughts about collaboration with me:
Amanda Robbins has been very helpful with research this year in 2nd grade. We recently did a state research project, and Amanda was very helpful in providing grade appropriate materials and websites to make the project a success. Additionally, Amanda has supplemented math instruction with guided practice math computer activities and introduced keyboarding to help with typing skills on future projects. Also, Amanda has researched for the 2nd grade teachers to find grade appropriate video clips of different types of weather to supplement our science program. In the future, we will collaborate with Amanda on solar system research and dinosaur research projects. Collaborating with Amanda Robbins has helped the 2nd grade teachers use resources they otherwise would not have time to find or use.
Lori Cady
2nd grade teacher @ Ridge Road
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