Understanding introverts

I am way, way late on writing up anything from ALA Midwinter, but I told a few people I'd write up my reflections from Susan Cain's talk about introversion--and I'd also like to write them up in a more formal way for my own reflection purposes. Given the amount of time that's passed however, this is going to be more of a "what she said/what I thought" list rather than something cohesive.

Cain started by asking everyone in the audience to think about a moment in their childhood that illustrated their introversion or extroversion, then gather in groups of six to share those stories. Everyone shifted uncomfortably for a moment before she said she was kidding. You could feel the entire room relax.

I think it would be fair to assume that the majority of people in that room were self-identified introverts--and I think we've all been in situations where a speaker actually wanted us to actually do something like that. And then all tried to figure out how to escape. It was nice to have a speaker instead acknowledge how terrifying such requests can be.

The idealized extrovert:

What Susan Cain had to say:

• In this extroverted world of ours, we all act more extroverted than we really are
• We internalize the biases against introverts from a young age
• We view introversion as something between a flaw and a pathology

My thoughts:
I know I, as an introvert, internalized biases against introverts. I figured there was something wrong with me because I didn't like being around people all the time--and often find social situations overwhelming. Some of that was shyness, but a lot of it isn't. No one who knows me well who would describe me as shy, but I am definitely still introverted.

I think part of this is that extroverts are more likely to be public figures--and introverts who are in the public eye put on an extroverted face. Which always makes me think: we're being told extroversion is the ideal--but who are the ones telling us that? Extroverts. So maybe their viewpoint is a wee bit biased. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with being extroverted--just as there's nothing wrong with being introverted. I think these two personality types can exist without value judgments.

Different kinds of attention:
What Susan Cain had to say:

• Introverted children absorb information by observing rather than by participating, but they’re still involved.
• When given a math problem to solve, introverts performed better when there were low levels of background noise, extroverts performed better when background noise went up.

This made me think of the constant debate around multitasking, and students' constant insistence that "I work better with music!" I'm also curious about what this looks like for people who have ADD/ADHD or other executive functioning issues. Does more noise still help? Or hinder? I don't know if there's been any research on that, but I hope there will be.



I also know that I, as an introvert, tend to absorb more by observing than by participating; I think "l'esprit de l'escalier" is the curse of the introvert. In meetings or other groups I am often so busy trying to absorb and process what's happening that it's not until we've moved on (or the meeting is over) that I'm ready to respond. Given the option, I prefer asynchronous communication on group projects--or at least the ability to follow up in writing afterwards (writing helps me figure out my thinking on a topic). Unfortunately, following up with an e-mail about something you "should" have shared in a meeting is often viewed as weak or passive-aggressive (and this is not me projecting insecurities--I've had people tell me this). I've tried to get better in these situations about at least speaking up to say, "I need to think more about this; I'll follow up with my thoughts in an e-mail later."



Lessons for teachers and schools:
What Susan Cain had to say:

• Classrooms used to mostly involve individual work; focus has tilted almost too much to group work. We need to have room for both.
• We do a good job facilitating the needs of extroverts; we need to be better at facilitating the needs of introverts
• Small groups (managed well) can be good for both introverts and extroverts.
• People learn well in groups, but that’s not the full picture; in real life, these groups are different than the “ideal model” being studied. And really, we learn best 1-to-1
• Introverted students love to work independently and autonomously, and it drains their energy in order to have to work as an extrovert. 
• In our push away from “one size fits all” education, are we just trying to cram students into a different mold when the old size actually fit them well?
• We need balance. And we need room for both.
• Solitude is an important catalyst to creativity, and introverts are comfortable with solitude. 

My thoughts:

The more we value collaboration in school, what is the impact on our introverted students? I think it's vital that we create ways for both extroverts and introverts to play to their strengths--and to stretch a bit beyond their comfort zone. Collaboration is, I believe, important to learning, but there are different ways to collaborate. Asynchronous collaboration is possible; it doesn't all have to be active group work.

I also think this needs to impact the way we teach and manage our classrooms. Having "active" classrooms is great for extroverts, but overwhelming for introverts. It's important to create room for quiet, too. Just as introverts can benefit from developing the ability to be more active in groups, extroverts can benefit from developing the ability to sit and be still.

Cain also said something else that made me think about how I, personally, work in a school setting. She said that introverts prefer to devote social energies to people they know well. I think this is, likely, why I like working in a small school--working with fewer people, it's possible to develop meaningful working relationships with a higher percentage of the people you work with. And given that librarianship, at least in my mind, is about relationships (more on that in an upcoming post), being able to build those relationships is important. I'm sure I could build those relationships in a bigger school, but building them with a greater percentage of my colleagues feels more possible for me in a small school.

General takeaways:

• We are losing out on the skills and talents of introverts by compelling them to pretend to be extroverted.
  Introverts are social beings, too. We just express it differently. 
  Extroverts seize the day, introverts make sure there is another day to seize.
• Everyone shines, given the right lighting. For some it’s a Broadway spotlight, for others it is a lamplit desk.
• Collaboration between introverts and extroverts can be powerful. Each brings different strengths. 
• I’m not saying John Donne was wrong and man is an island after all. We need each other.
• We need a world where it is culturally permissible to go off and be quiet. At work and at school.
• We need to let our children know that it is okay to be introverted

That last one is the big takeaway for me. We need to stop teaching--directly and indirectly--that extroversion is the ideal, and introverts better learn to measure up to it. Or we're all going to miss out.

One School, Many Books

My students have all headed off for Spring Break--a welcome break for all involved! I'm relieved to be on break (goal for break: get my sleep back in functioning condition), but also excited about what will be happening when students come back from break.

We started a program I'm calling "One School, Many Books" this year. I'd long been interested in doing a One School One Book program, but had no idea what book I would choose for such a program. As a result of working in a very small school with students with very diverse reading interests, all of my top ten checkouts have checkout totals in the single digits. What book could I possibly choose? Especially since much of my population is comprised of VERY reluctant readers. If the book doesn't appeal to them, there's no way they're going to even give it a shot.

But then I started thinking about what could motivate students to read a book over Spring Break. And I realized, as with so many other things, it's about making connections between people. A student who might not be interested in reading a book (or only have a passing interest in reading a book) might be more interested if reading that book was tied to a book club being hosted by one of their favorite teachers.

We have an amazing faculty here, and several of them stepped up right away to host book clubs. Each of them have different interests, and connect with different kids, and so picked out very different books. Which I love. We've got groups reading The Hunger Games, The Art of Racing in the Rain, Lola and the Boy Next Door, Gentlemen and Trapped.

Once I announced the book clubs, students would come in looking for "the book that Ms. _______ is reading." Didn't matter the book, they wanted to spend time with the teacher. They knew the teacher, liked the teacher, assumed

We're building on relationships that already exist in order to foster a love of reading. And it's really cool to watch it happening.

As part of this, we're hosting a visit from Michael Northrop (author of Gentlemen and Trapped) in April. Handing out those books to kids has been particularly cool. "This is mine to keep? Do you think he'll sign it for me? Awesome!"

In honor of that visit--and in the interest of generating more interest in those books, I made a couple book trailers.





I love making book trailers, as it pushes me to think in ways I don't usually think. "Thinking in pictures" is generally a weakness for me, but many of my students connect really well with images, so it's a skill I work on a lot--and making book trailers is a really fun way to develop that skill set. I use flickrCCBlueMountains for images, and have recently added PhotoPin to my "go to" sites for CC images. I use Jamendo for music, and I don't know what I'd do without it.

Overall we have about 30 (out of 180) kids involved in the book clubs in some way. I'm looking forward to the book club discussions that will be happening after break!

I'm not "just" anything

I have been kind of completely and totally overwhelmed at the response to my most recent post; it's amazing to me that something I wrote could resonate with so many people. What's been even more gratifying is the conversations I've been able to have with people about the role and perceptions of school librarians. 

In that post I hinted at--but did not make entirely clear--one of the two words that bothers me most when we talk about images of libraries and librarians.

That word: make.

The point I didn't make clearly enough in that post is that I have no problem at all with the doing what we can to help educators, administrators, and legislators understand what we do and why it's important. I think we should demonstrate, I think we should teach, I think we should share, I think we should tell. I think we should be very deliberate and purposeful about taking our lights out from under the bushel. But those are not the words I most often hear--the word I hear more often than not is "make"--and as a reader and recovering English teacher, I know that verbs matter.

I know, of course, that other parts of speech matter, too. Which brings me to the other word I hear again and again in these discussions, and that bothers me even more.

Just.

As in "more than just a librarian." Or "more than just books." That we need to "make" people see that we're more than "just" librarians.

I am often described by colleagues as being "more than just a librarian" and while I know they're trying to be complimentary, it always makes me cringe. Is there something wrong with being "just" a librarian?

It just seems so. . . dismissive. As if being a librarian isn't much to be impressed by.

It seems that people are looking for a term that encompasses more than traditional, stereotypical definitions of what a librarian is. In school libraries in particular, they seem to want a word that encompasses both teacher and librarian--and the term they most often go for seems to be "media specialist." For the record, I hate the term media specialist. I think it makes me sound like a PR consultant. Not that there's anything wrong with being a PR consultant--it's just not what I am. 
 
We seem to be in a bit of a "redefinition phase" and I think we need to be really thoughtful about the roles we're playing as people make up their minds about the terms they use to describe us, and the definitions attached to those terms. The dictionary definitions of librarian are vague enough that it's really up to us. And beyond the dictionary, it really is up to us as librarians to define who we are and what we do; we won't be able to "make" anyone have a particular definition of librarianship, but our actions will determine the limits of that defintion.

I really hope that the end result of these growing pains is not a new name for what I do, but a new definition of the term librarian. I don't want the idea of librarianship to be limited by "just"; I want to expand the limits of traditional definitions.

I worry, too, about the use of the word "just" when we talk about being about "more than just books." Even though what I do extends far beyond paper books, I don't think that the work I do with connecting readers and books (no matter their format) is anything to be dismissed; it's important work, and it's work I love.
  
I've heard other school librarians use the term "more than just a librarian" too (usually in the context of "how do we make them see we're more that just librarians). I always find this a little dispiriting--if we won't own the title, how can expect anyone else to?


I don't want a new name for what I do. I love being a school librarian, and I think that title fits perfectly for what I do and who I am.  Rather than looking for a term that means more than "just" a librarian and encompasses all that we do, I would love to see us broaden the definition of librarian to include all that we know librarians do.

I am not "just" anything. I am a school librarian. No more, no less.

"You're not really a librarian"

The other day I got into an "argument" with a student about whether or not I was really a librarian. His position was that I wasn't a librarian--I was actually a teacher who happened to have an office in the library.

It was a weird discussion to be having. As the conversation continued, it became clear that he was, in no small part, trying to annoy me. But I don't think the original statement was meant just to taunt me. We ended up trying to pull in other students to make our respective cases--his that I wasn't a librarian, mine that I really was. The general consensus seemed to be that I was definitely a librarian. And probably also a teacher.

I was thinking about the discussion I had with him, and with other students, in light of one of the phrases I so often hear when it comes to changing the perception/image of school librarians:

"how do we make them see that librarians [fill in the blank]"


This was not a student I know particularly well, nor have I worked with him a lot. He's new to the school this year. There's nothing I've done to try and "make" him see anything. I've just been doing my job the same way I've been doing it for years, and he came to his own conclusions.

We will never "make" anyone understand anything about school librarianship. We will do our jobs, and people will come to conclusions. It is frustrating that our colleagues, our administrators, and our legislators don't always understand our jobs. But there is no position statement or pamphlet that will truly change that. They are carrying with them perceptions of school librarians formed when they were in school.

If we concentrate on our students, our future colleagues, administrators and legislators won't need to be "made" to see anything. They will carry with them the perceptions of school librarians they are forming right now. Which is why we need to hold ourselves--and each other--to a high standard. Unfortunately, there are school librarians out there who are not doing us any favors when it comes to the perceptions of school librarians students will carry into the future.

I have met librarians who say, "this tech stuff is interesting, but it has nothing to do with my job." Or, "collaborating with teachers just takes too much time." Or librarians who express, in dozens of little ways, their general disinterest in students who don't come naturally motivated when it comes to reading and research.

We don't know which students in our library today are going to be future teachers, administrators, or legislators--but I guarantee their rosters are going to include today's unmotivated or struggling students who don't feel welcome in their school library. And by the time they're adults, there's nothing we will be able to do to "make" them change their perception. The only time we have for that is right now, with the students in our schools.


I don't know what to do about school librarians who are unconcerned with the perceptions their students are forming about libraries. It's a bigger issue than I feel equipped to address. So in the meantime I go to my library, and I do my job. And if my students graduate thinking of a school librarian as "a teacher who has an office in the library," I like to think I've done a pretty good job.

14 Things to Tame

While at AASL in Minneapolis, I went to a session about 17 Things to Chew On, a 23 Things-style learning program for teachers created by two school librarians (Alicia Duell and Allison Cabaj) in Illinois. I'd been thinking about doing something similar for a while, but couldn't wrap my head around the logistics; the plan that Alicia and Allison shared filled in some of the blanks for me.

Inspired, I returned to my school and started to think about how to make my own "Things" program a reality. I'm lucky to have a very supportive administration, and even though I'm not sure they understood exactly what I was planning, they gave me the go ahead.

The next step was to create a video to promote the program. I wrote a script, and then gathered my performers. I also went around asking faculty if I could take a picture of them looking frustrated in front of a computer; none of them asked me why I was taking these pictures, displaying a level of trust in me that I both truly appreciate and plan to exploit again in the future.



I introduced the program, 14 Things to Tame, during our professional development day last week, and the response so far has been amazing (and I only had to strong-arm a few of them). There are incentives involved along the way; I've also been putting candy in the teacher's mailbox after each task they complete, in an effort to create a Pavlovian response (learn something new! get a piece of candy!). Dear colleagues: please do not think of yourselves as subjects in a science experiment.

There are teachers from all different departments participating; there are also at least a few teachers who are following along, even if they're not participating. And that's part of what I love about a program like this--you can participate in the conversation in whatever way you're most comfortable, but--one way or another--everyone becomes part of the conversation. The people who are participating are talking about it to the people who are participating--and they're all talking about the role that these technologies can play in their professional development and in their classrooms.

I'm excited. I already have more teachers participating than I expected, and I'm sure I can guilt even more into participating. I know it's going to be a lot of work, but I think the payoff will be worth it. If you're thinking of doing something similar in your own school, please feel free to ask questions or borrow anything from my own program!

Reference Question of the Day

"I need some sources on the history of Christianity before Jesus."

Mid-year New Year

Having spent most of my professional life as a teacher (and most of my life before that as a student), the January New Year has never felt quite right to me. The real New Year for me was always in September (or August). The January New Year seems like a bonus New Year, a mid-year pause to reflect on the first half of the year, and re-focus for the second half of the year.

For the record, I am not much a resolution maker (or keeper). I have only successfully kept two resolutions: 1) to moisturize and 2) to make changes in my life when I felt like I needed to, and not when dictated by a date on the calendar.*

The second half of the year is, generally speaking, much busier than the first half of the year, at least in my library (though how my year can get any busier is beyond me; maybe I should go buy some more coffee). The fall is a warm-up in a lot of ways. Students and teachers are getting into the groove, getting to know each other, and just starting to dive into content. I, too, am getting to know new teachers, new courses, and testing out new ideas. Come spring, however, we're all warmed up and far more people are ready to dive in to more and more ambitious research projects.

I like this pattern a lot. I always have teachers who do research in the fall, and it gives me (and them) a chance to test out new ideas for instruction and resources. I'm then able to fine-tune, re-work, or completely abandon those ideas come spring, when the research projects and requests for instruction and resources start coming fast and furious (and usually with short turn-around time).

But, as I mentioned, this fall has been busier than most. This is a result of many things--having more on my plate (first as the de facto ed tech facilitator, and then as the actual ed tech facilitator), more teachers who want collaborate more often and earlier in the year (file that under "good problems") and, as I start to feel really "at home" in this profession, and more professionally active (both formally and informally) I am increasingly aware of what's out there, what other people are doing, what I want to do, and what I think I should be doing. And all of that adds up to a lot.

As a result, I feel both more and less ready for the second half of the year than I usually do--more ready because I have more ideas, but less ready because this fall has been so busy I've had less time to really reflect on what's working and what's not working.

This has been one of the downsides of being so busy this fall; as I have more and more I want to take the time to reflect on, the less time I feel like I have to reflect--both on the day-to-day of my practice, but also on the larger picture of how I work. How do I pace myself, without feeling like I'm leaving something out? How do I focus, while continuing to grow? What is the balance? Is there one?

One of the most amazing parts of this past year has been the many people I've been able to meet and learn from.** While more and more librarians are going solo, this experience is far less isolating than it used to be; even though I have no librarian colleagues in my school, I feel like I have colleagues all over the country. And because of all I've learned from these people, I feel the need to give back, but I want to give back something that is as good as what I've taken from people. It's a pressure that's coming from no one but myself, but it's a pressure I feel nonetheless.

I have ambitious plans for the rest of this school year, and for the calendar year as well. I know that I will fall short on some of them--I know because I've fallen short on my plans even when they're less ambitious. And I think I've decided that's okay. I would much rather over-extend and fall short, than just work within my comfort zone.

It's not exactly a resolution, but it'll do.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
* I did, however, tweet the following last night: ""When someone asks you if you're a god, you say yes." #favoritelinefromGhostbusters/NewYearsResolution". This resolution was inspired by the fact that a) I had a couple nights earlier gotten into an "argument" with a friend of mine about whether or not I was well-liked (I was arguing to the contrary) and b) I'd been watching Ghostbusters.

**And holy crap, as I think back on the past year, I have met a lot of people and had a lot of amazing opportunities. I'm half-inclined to do a year-end inventory of everything I've done in the past 12 months, but just thinking about it is kind of overwhelming, and right now I'm trying to focus on being overwhelmed by the upcoming year.