Transcript

SARAH:

I think when you're doing some collaborative project work with teachers, it's really important to do your homework. I certainly found if you can invest some time in looking at the exam syllabus that they're following or maybe you look at the scheme of work and the coverage of the curriculum, then you become more knowledgeable and you can make sure that the help you're going to give them is relevant.

Always remember, these are busy people. And I remember my daughter saying to me once that stop filling up my brain with things that I don't need to pass the exam. And I think we need to bear that in mind because we need to keep our help to the point and something that people accept, so that they accept us as part of the learning team.

With that in mind, it's also important to pick teachers who are really wanting to work with you. Because if you can work together to plan the lesson and to select the resources, then you can ensure that the learning outcomes for the students will be met. If you've got confidence in what learning outcomes the students are trying to achieve, it really helps you to guide the students to the correct resources no matter what the format is.

But the other thing is that some teachers, they might have a really difficult class to deal with and they just want an alternative environment, somewhere else to take that class, so that maybe they calm down a bit or they're more ready to learn. And we have to be aware that sometimes that's how they want to use our libraries.

One thing that I really enjoyed was watching teachers teach. You can learn so much. Not just the good bits, but you can learn what to avoid as well. And it led me to a qualification, just an NVQ level three, in adult education and training for post 16 students, and that got me to understand where teachers are coming from. It got me to speak the speak and it got me to understand the terminology.