Reflection: ETL505 Assessment 2 and Life

My second assignment for ETL505 was due and submitted on the Monday just past. I have been very busy and have not had a chance to write about it until now (and can't really afford to dwell too much now, as I need to get stuck into the next module!). I tend to immediately forget/block out assignments after I have submitted them, but I actually rather enjoyed this one so it should not be too hard to remember what I did for it. In fact, I would say it is the best time I have had completing an assignment that I can remember - even though I know that thinking that may make me a strange  person! I know a lot of people had trouble with the concepts - and I'm not saying I thought it was easy and that I am confident I got a perfect mark (I am fairly certain I didn't!), but most of the concepts just clicked, and even when they didn't, it was like a puzzle trying to figure it all out. It has made me realise once again that there are so many paths this course could take me down. I could actually picture myself working for SCIS one day, as a part of the team who come up with these subject headings. I think that I would enjoy that.


cc licensed ( BY NC ND ) flickr photo shared by B G

I have opened so many doors of late, and this course has only encouraged me to do so. In hindsight, this is rather surprising. I think if you asked me two years ago what I thought I would get out of doing a Master of Education (Teacher Librarianship), I would tell you that I would expect to become a qualified teacher librarian, that I would be better at teaching library concepts, and that I would be able to run the administration side of a library as well. The things I have gotten out of the course have been quite different to what I expected. I am now working in a library two days a week, and am having to learn a lot on the job as far as teaching (though I have lots of big ideas and understand the important concepts like information literacy and digital citizenship that I need to encourage/teach), and definitely as far as running the library goes, but I feel that I am a more well rounded person from this course. I feel that I have learned important skills that I did not expect to gain: leading from the middle, how to create an engaging PowerPoint presentation, how to create an effective weekly plan, and perhaps most useful of all: I have realised that my options really are endless. This course does not narrow my options to fit with the study I have completed, but broadens them.

I am currently working in a school libary on a temporary basis, working in a public library system on a casual basis, and teaching on a casual basis, and I would be happy doing any of these things and others along this spectrum of information and people related career paths. The only thing I know for certain that I would like to have in the near future is for it to be one job, full time. I feel that that day is coming, and I am excited to see what I end up doing, and how much I enjoy it.

ETL505 has been such a different subject to the others that it has made the variety of colours peeping through all those different doors I have started to open seem even more vibrant and exciting. I wonder which door will open fully first...