Trying to absorb the American Association of School Librarians (AASL) and the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) standards can be quite overwhelming. Essentially, the 2018 AASL Standards framework structure was created to show the comprehensive relationship between the National School Library Standards for Learners, School Librarians, and School Libraries supported by a shared foundation totaling six elements: inquire, include, collaborate, curate, explore, engage. Within each of these elements, four domains (think, create, share, grow) are specifically targeted. The 2016 ISTE Standards are comprised of five groups (students, teachers, administrators, tech coaches, and computer science educators). The AASL standards appear to be more about teaching library skills while the ISTE standards seem more fitted for teaching technology skills.
However, that doesn’t mean that they don’t have similarities or that they wouldn’t marry well. On the contrary, they blend together quite well. Where one set of standards are weak, the other set steps. This is nicely depicted in the National School Library Standards crosswalk with ISTE Standards for students and Educators. Through an examination of the crosswalk document, the ISTE Standards have a strong presence in the AASL Standards shared foundation elements of inquire, collaborate, explore, and engage.
I have to agree with blogger, Connie Hanes, when she stated the verbiage of the ISTE Standards create more energy and excitement. For example, “Students build knowledge by actively exploring real-world issues and problems, developing ideas and theories and pursing answers and solutions” (ISTE) versus the comparative AASL standard, “learners develop and satisfy personal curiosity by reading widely and deeply in multiple formats and write and create for a variety of purposes”.
