Affective Aspects of Instruction Librarians’ Decisions to Adopt New Teaching Practices: Laying the Groundwork for Incremental Change

Abstract

This article addresses the question: How do emotions and emotional labor relate to instruction librarians' motivations to adopt new teaching practices? Twelve information literacy instruction librarians were interviewed about their motivations to adopt new teaching practices. An initial round of coding was completed using grounded theory, to surface themes of motivations to adopt new teaching practices. In a second round, the themes were retained while further coding was used to identify language reflective of emotion and affective labor, along with five conditions for human motivation identified by Charles J. Walker and Cynthia Symons: competence, autonomy, worthwhile goal-setting, feedback, and affirmation. Using the results of the analysis, suggestions are made for library managers and administrators to lay the groundwork for developing supportive and collegial environments that encourage incremental change and emotional self-reflection.

Epistemology of Teaching Librarians: Examining the Translation of Beliefs to Practice

“…Incorporating more time for reflection in teacher librarians' work and allowing the time and space-whether in meetings or through a community of practice-creates "the conditions for adopting new instruction practices." 39 We recognize that not all teacher librarians work in an environment with multiple instruction librarians and that local communities of practice may not be available. In cases where a local network is unavailable or unsupportive, teacher librarians could turn to the scholarship of teaching and learning literature as a place to apply their individual reflective moments to the learner-centered practices of other instructors and teacher librarians.…”

Transforming Practice for Educational Impact

“…However, very little of it has discussed how to prepare librarian's pedagogical knowledge and teaching skills to become active contributors to curricular design (Moleson and Wang 2014;Osborn, 2017;Namaganda, 2020). Research undertaken by Galoozis (2019) identifies that one-shot instructional sessions do not promote the right environment to motivate librarians to move from instructional teaching practices. In such sessions, librarians generally teach on their own, consequently, opportunities for constructive feedback from peers to facilitate enhanced teaching practices are reduced.…”