Week 5

The Reference Interview

At the start of this lesson I was leaning towards the teacher being responsible for starting the reference interview. This way they can help the TL by telling them their needs for the class and the TL can assist them by finding the information. I fully agreed with Cristal's answer to the posting for question #5 where she also stated that the classroom teacher starts it.

I put out a suggestion about the TL approaching the teacher and creating a unit together based in the TL starting the reference interview....perhaps asking the teacher what units they have coming up and then starting a co-teaching unit from there. However, nobody seemed to bite on this.

After going back and reading the chapter again, I think it is equal on who starts the reference interview. It can happen with the TL, teacher, or the student. The textbook talks about how the students approach the TL asking for help and yes it is usually much smaller of a demand then a teacher asking for unit supplies, it happens far more often on a daily basis in elementary schools. The students are always asking where a certain book is, either fiction or non-fiction.

So, I'm changing my opinion to be more open and that the reference interview can start from any of the 3 parties involved, they just have different degrees in depth for the needs to be met.