I've had the good fortune these past two school years to have worked in an elementary school library as a librarian teacher while  completing my coursework for a Graduate Youth/Children Library Services Certificate at the University of Southern Mississippi. As the previous twenty years of my  career have been in high school language arts classrooms, my certification course work has been critical to my ability to facilitate positive library experiences for the children I serve.

     Our school serves ages pre-school through sixth grade and I program for the full spectrum of ages in blocks ranging from 20-75  minutes. My USM classwork has versed me in a wide variety of curriculum, activities, and approaches to learning theory that I otherwise might have struggled to access. These critical resources have given me the tools to get down to the practical business of providing educational and entertaining library experiences for my students. Facilitating storytimes and library sessions that introduce students to new titles, perspectives, and activities has shown me the importance of libraries in our schools. The opportunities my library provides for students to explore, self-select, and experience new media they otherwise might not have encountered I feel is a critical counter point to the otherwise prescriptive curriculum that comprises most school days. Likewise, my assignment of providing media literacy and critical thinking activities to our middle grade students has shown me the role libraries can play in helping students grow into more thoughtful and discriminating digital citizens. These opportunities to enrich children's lives whether it be through showing a preschool circle the part of a book and how to safely turn pages or sixth graders ways to determine which news sources are most reliable make working in a library a rewarding experience for me.

     It's my hope that my USM studies and work in school libraries allow me to instill in my students a life-long love of reading and exploring media while at the same time providing them with the skills they need to be responsible consumers of media throughout the shifting media landscape that dominates our lives. My work in school libraries will forever be shaped by my studies at USM and I'd like this portfolio to serve as my thanks to the University of Southern Mississippi for giving me the tools to make a positive contribution to the education of the children in the schools I work in.

Tom Grenier

Librarian, Abbott Loop Elementary School

Anchorage, Alaska.

Working with Youth in Libraries