The idea behind the site is to introduce students to a variety of books and form classroom book groups. How does Extreme Speed Booking work? A whole lot like speed dating. Students spend a little time with each book and then rate them accordingly with "I want to read more", "Interesting", "Not for me", or "I've already read". Students can also make a note of how interested they are in reading the book (maybe a 1-10 scale)? This process introduces students to a variety of books, genres and authors. Students may come across titles and authors they wouldn't otherwise find. It also helps teachers form classroom book groups that are of high-interest and investment to students because they had input. iLearn Technology
A series of studies that have had a great deal of influence on the research and decision-making discussions concerning school library media programs have grown from the work of a team in Colorado—Keith Curry Lance, Marcia J. Rodney, and Christine Hamilton-Pennell (2000).
Recent school library impact studies have also identified, and generated some evidence about, potential "interventions" that could be studied. The questions might at first appear rather familiar: How much, and how, are achievement and learning improved when . . .
librarians collaborate more fully with other educators?
libraries are more flexibly scheduled?
administrators choose to support stronger library programs (in a specific way)?
library spending (for something specific) increases?
high priority should be given to reaching teachers, administrators, and public officials as well as school librarians and school library advocates.
Perhaps the most strategic option, albeit a long-term one, is to infiltrate schools and colleges of education. Most school administrators and teachers never had to take a course, or even part of a course, that introduced them to what constitutes a high-quality school library program.
Three factors are working against successful advocacy for school libraries: (1) the age demographic of librarians, (2) the lack of institutionalization of librarianship in K–12 schools, and (3) the lack of support from educators due to their lack of education or training about libraries and good experiences with libraries and librarians.
These vacant positions are highly vulnerable to being downgraded or eliminated in these times of tight budgets, not merely because there is less money to go around, but because superintendents, principals, teachers, and other education decision-makers do not understand the role a school librarian can and should play.
If we want the school library to be regarded as a central player in fostering academic success, we must do whatever we can to ensure that school library research is not marginalized by other interests.
A great overview of Lance's research into the effectiveness of libraries. He answers the question: Do school libraries or librarians make a difference? His answer (A HUGE YES!) is back by 14 years of remarkable research. The point is proved. But this information remains unknown to many principals and superintendents.
Anyone interested in 21st century teaching and learning will find this interview fascinating.
Feed readers
are probably the most important digital tool for today's learner because they
make sifting through the amazing amount of content added to the Internet
easy. Also known as aggregators, feed readers are free tools that can
automatically check nearly any website for new content dozens of times a
day---saving ridiculous amounts of time and customizing learning experiences for
anyone.
Imagine
never having to go hunting for new information from your favorite sources
again. Learning goes from a frustrating search through thousands of
marginal links written by questionable characters to quickly browsing the
thoughts of writers that you trust, respect and enjoy.
Feed readers can
quickly and easily support blogging in the classroom, allowing teachers to
provide students with ready access to age-appropriate sites of interest that are
connected to the curriculum. By collecting sites in advance and organizing
them with a feed reader, teachers can make accessing information manageable for
their students.
Here are several
examples of feed readers in action:
Used specifically as
a part of one classroom project, this feed list contains information related to
global warming that students can use as a starting point for individual
research.
While there are literally dozens of different feed reader
programs to choose from (Bloglines andGoogle Reader are two
biggies), Pageflakes is a favorite of
many educators because it has a visual layout that is easy to read and
interesting to look at. It is also free and web-based. That
means that users can check accounts from any computer with an Internet
connection. Finally, Pageflakes makes it quick and easy to add new
websites to a growing feed list—and to get rid of any websites that users are no
longer interested in.
What's even
better: Pageflakes has been developinga teacher version of their tooljust for us that includes an online grade tracker,
a task list and a built in writing tutor. As Pageflakes works to perfect
its teacher product, this might become one of the first kid-friendly feed
readers on the market. Teacher Pageflakes users can actually blog and create a
discussion forum directly in their feed reader---making an all-in-one digital
home for students.
For more
information about the teacher version of Pageflakes, check out this
review:
""By creating makerspaces in an educational context, students can have access to tools and equipment that they might not have otherwise; they can collaborate on projects that are driven by their own interests, and by doing so, develop the capacity and confidence to innovate.""
Understanding Millenials: The Next Normal by Kirsty Bloore, Director of Research (VIMN) - a real insight into what is important to high school students, how they communicate and what influences them.
Kirsty overturns some of the stereotypes we tend to believe of the Millennial Generation, and comes up with some interesting findings about how they see themselves.
reading bubble will be larger in schools with a large percentage of students who are not testing at grade leve
library media programs have intrinsic reading motivation and free volunteer reading as their core contributions to a school's reading program
providing and promoting high interest materials at a variety of reading levels that meet a variety of developmental needs, we will create kids who not only can read by want to read.
in schools where there is no separate "technology integration specialist" available to students and teachers. This is also more prevelant at the secondary level.
An increasing number of schools seem to be emphasising technology as a focus
teach the educational application of technology tools, not just the applications themselves
our programs acknowledge our roles as reading and tech teachers, but we empahsis the application of these skills in an IL model that helps solve real problems and answer genuine questions.
the larger the information literacy bubble, the more opportunity library media specialists and teacher will have to address these areas both formally and informally
The best library program is the one that best supports the needs and goals of its school. It doesn't get much simpler than that.
Not reading won’t kill you, but it will also make you a less interesting, engaged, and intellectual person
reading literature also helps to develop an individual’s emotional literacy
Reading about an event or the inner working of someone else’s mind or emotions stimulates the human brain to experience those same feelings or to essentially have the same experience in terms of memory that they would have if they actually did the activity or experienced the emotions themselves
The main activity of a college education is critical thinking and intellectual engagement: most of the background work for this endeavor is done through reading
Ubiquitous video, or some other information technology, may one day overtake the written word as the foundation of our literacy, but for the moment, reading and writing are the keys to full and fruitful participation in human society
His take on the education system, for example, is that it is a badly designed game: students compete for good grades, but lose motivation when they fail. A good game, by contrast, never makes you feel like you've failed: you just progress more slowly. Instead of giving bad students an F, why not start all pupils with zero points and have them strive for the high score?
How can this idea be applied to information skills and school libraries?
a consultant on cyber-crimefighting speaks with undisguised joy about how much information the police could glean from Facebook, in order to infiltrate communities where criminals might lurk. Asked about privacy concerns, she replies: "Yeah – we'll have to keep an eye on that."
Until recently, the debate over "digital distraction" has been one of vested interests: authors nostalgic for the days of quiet book-reading have bemoaned it, while technology zealots have dismissed it. But the fusion of the virtual world with the real one exposes both sides of this argument as insufficient, and suggests a simpler answer: the internet is distracting if it stops you from doing what you really want to be doing; if it doesn't, it isn't.
Fascinating article about the next generation of the ubiquitous web and the implications. Good definition of "gamification." This is excellent background information for strategic planning and discussing the potential implications on education.
Fascinating article about the next generation of the ubiquitous web and the implications. Good definition of "gamification." This is excellent background information for strategic planning and discussing the potential implications on education.
Librarians feel compelled to acquire eContent from only one distributor because it is too confusing – for them, for students, for teachers, for business managers - to purchase eContent from a variety of distributors, thus materials selection is driven by who they buy from, not what a
igns with the curriculum. This is a classic example of the tail wagging the dog.
It is our job to develop our collections, aligning them with our school/district’s curriculum – not to buy ready-made packages from vendors. It is our job to create, instructional materials, and to determine how to best assess our students’ learning. This requires granular knowledge of our patron base, our curricula, and our collections. You can't fake this. It takes a long time to build that knowledge base. If we relinquish these responsibilities to commercial interests, we literally sell out our own profession.
eContent requires meticulous, patron-aware (rather than traditional) cataloging. It is virtually (no pun intended) impossible to “display” eContent. There is no way to physically put it in the hands of students, if students are using their own technology. This is not happening for a few reasons:
Since vendors and library management systems have made it possible to import MARC records, librarians, as a whole, have been falling out of the cataloging practice.
Cataloging is time consuming, and tedious work.
Cataloging, as we learned it, doesn’t work for our students. We have to reinvent it. For example, at New Canaan High School, we add the project name as a subject heading to each title in the eCollection that supports it.
In BYOD programs, library programs should be undergoing significant instructional transformations that evolve as students’ facility with mobile technology increases. The ratio of print to digital content should be contingent upon students’ ability to access eContent. Developing a system to calculate this would help school librarians make sound decisions about format choices."
Lissa Davies on 31 Jan 12The idea behind the site is to introduce students to a variety of books and form classroom book groups. How does Extreme Speed Booking work? A whole lot like speed dating. Students spend a little time with each book and then rate them accordingly with "I want to read more", "Interesting", "Not for me", or "I've already read". Students can also make a note of how interested they are in reading the book (maybe a 1-10 scale)? This process introduces students to a variety of books, genres and authors. Students may come across titles and authors they wouldn't otherwise find. It also helps teachers form classroom book groups that are of high-interest and investment to students because they had input. iLearn Technology
