This idea came to me when I was working on part of the collaborative project for ETL504 and was pondering the question from Montiel-Overall — what form of collaboration should TLs be involved in given limited resources (Montiel-Overall, 2005, p.41). I started thinking that bringing about collaboration is a very complex undertaking. Are TLs being encouraged to try to be ’super-human’ by the academics? Like the assignment in talking about Standards of Excellence, is it all expecting more than is possible? Which got me thinking about Coveys Circle of Influence and Concern and the proactivity thing.

Proactive people focus their efforts in the Circle of Influence. They work on the things they can do something about. The nature of their energy is positive, enlarging and magnifying, causing their circle of Influence to increase.

Reactive people, on the other hand, focus their efforts in the Circle of Concern. They focus on the weakness of other people, the problems in the environment and circumstances over which they have no control. …[which] causes their Circle of Influence to shrink.” (Covey, 1990, p.83).

I started thinking about the things we TLs had the most influence over and those we had less influence over. Is this a strategy? To work from the inner circle out? This probably isnt complete but gave me an original perspective on things that might be useful in addressing THE question — “How can TL’s influence teachers to collaborate with them?”

Covey, S. (1990). Habit 1: Be proactive. In The 7 habits of highly effective people: Powerful lessons in personal change (pp. 65-94). New York: Fireside.

Montiel-Overall, P. (2005). A theoretical understanding of teacher and librarian collaboration. School Libraries Worldwide, 11(2), 24-48. Retrieved August 5, 2008, from Emerald Insight database.