Librarians Learning to Teach: Community, Play, and Best Practices

How do we learn to teach? Few librarians have access to formal coursework in library school that can aid in developing a theoretical framework for teaching, and particularly for teaching in the contexts we do. Rather, most of us rely on formal and informal networks or communities, stories about our experiences, and experimentation and reflection. Fortunately, librarians tend to be very generous and willing to share, but librarians are also very busy individuals, and sometimes find it hard to carve out the time, or to find colleagues who can carve out the time, to play, share and help each other along our path to becoming experienced teachers. The presenters for this session have each spent time reflecting on what it means to be both a librarian and a teacher and on how we learn to teach, and they will share several ideas and strategies for developing as a teacher, creating community within the workplace, and seeking out ideas and best practices beyond the workplace