#22 Week 9 Ebooks and audiobooks

What a great resource this was. I have used ebooks, but had no idea of the number of collections that were available. It certainly opened my eyes to another way of linking up students, staff and others with books that might not be readily available. These are definitely sites I will share. This is an area that is underutilized in my school, so I will now need to take the time to develop an action plan to reach this audience.
I often refer people to the regional library collection, and they have had great success there. So this is another resource for people to explore. I am always amazed at what one can find on the Internet.
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#21 Week 8 Podcasts

There is an amazing number of podcasts available. The site EPN Educational Podcast Network had all kinds of amazing entries. It is impressive, and makes me want to try this in the future at our school.
I happened to be reading the book The Educator's Podcast Guide by Bard Williams so I decided to try some of their sites.
One site now charges a fee. I thought that was interesting. I found two school sites that were very interesting.
www.tclauset.org/wpa/
This is the Hanes Middle School in North Carolina. Truly impressive what they have done.
I also located Mabry Online.org Podcast Central
p://mabryonline.org/podcasts/
This is a school that really understands and embraces podcasts as a learning experience for students. Another impressive site.
I wanted to look up Grammar Girl but ran out of time. Another interesting idea that will need some more exploration.
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#20 Week 8 YouTube

I was unable to access YouTube from my home computer, and was blocked at school. However, this is one area I have had some experience with, and have seen the potential. Students love video, and if done correctly making a video and posting it on YouTube could be a worthwhile experience. But it would need to be structured well, and have assessments and rubrics along the way as a class.
There is an issue that I am reading and hearing about a lot lately, and I think it's time that schools address the issue. I am also a member of our school's Tech Vertical Team, and I do think this issue will be brought up. Cell phones are everywhere, and what happens when students take a picture or create a video from things that happen in a class, and then post it on YouTube. Do schools have policies in place? What if someone posts a class video that might put others at risk? What are the guidelines, and how do we make sure that both students and staff members understand them.
There is a great new book called "Digital Citizenry" by Mike Ribble that deals with all of these issues. Whose responsibility is it to teach these ideas? I am planning to develop a curriculum this summer for students in Grades 6 and 7 in my school as I feel the issue is important. Students love video, and at the age of my students many believe everything they see. I have students in Grades 3-7. It's an important issue, and one I feel we all probably need to pay attention to.
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#19 Week 8 Library Thing

What a terrific tool! This is really cool. I can see lots of uses for this. I will begin by keeping a list of my favorite books that I read. It will also be great for my course work as I can keep a running list of all the books I need to remember for future projects. This is a site that will have great appeal for many library users.
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#18 Week 8 ZoHo

What a terrific concept! Too bad that they don't let users under age 13, (I understand why), but consider how useful this would be for students at middle school level. I created a test document and emailed our tech and curriculum director. This would be a useful tool for working on our Vertical Teams. All the other options have great potential too. I think this could be particularly useful for teachers and high school students who did not have access to the same word format as the school might use, or who were away on vacation and needed to post a lesson or create an assignment. I can see that this will be a useful site to explore and use. When I go to work tomorrow I am going to share this site with some teachers who would find it useful.
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#16 Week 7 Wikis

I needed this refresher on Wikis. I had participated in using a group wiki before when we were writing information literacy rubrics. I found them very useful at the time. However, after that I forgot all about using them, and how useful they can be. This is an area that needs to be reexplored. We are in the midst of several curriculum revisions and creating benchmarks, and this tool would be very helpful. I am going to have to reacquaint myself with them so I can teach others on our curriculum teams to use them.
Some of the sample wikis provided were outstanding. I really liked the idea of the book reviews. I found several new titles I needed to put on my reading lists. I also liked the wiki created around job training. What a useful way to keep updated and current about all the needed training and expertise needed for a particular job.
A possible on-the-job use would be to create a wiki especially for your clerical staff between schools. This would be a great tool to keep up-to-date so you don't have to retrain your new personnal each time, and wonder what you forgot. I think I might suggest this to each school librarian and the one support person.
Students working in groups could really benefit from having a common wiki to share ideas and revisions with on projects they are involved in. It would help students to have one central location to keep their work. One problem here might be students that don't have computer access. Not having computer access will be a problem that needs to be addressed once schools start using more of these Web 2.0 options.
This was a great refresher for me. I have already begun to think of ways to use them with students, staff and within the actual library department.
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#15 Week 6 Thoughts about Library 2.0

Taking this course has certainly stimulated my thinking about the important role the library plays in the school culture, and that the role is changing right before our eyes. Libraries in reality are only a place. This idea was just brought home to me by our sixth grade science teacher. She and I are collaborating this year for the very first time, and have had some stimulating conversations. She feels we should change the name from library to a more comprehensive term so that students and parents will begin to understand the importance that using information, technology, literacy skills, reading and curriculum intergration are the focus. She feels a library is so much more than just a place. I am beginning to see her point more and more. As our digital natives move more and more into this Web 2.0 world, what they need from the library is a dedicated reliable source of help and information that will respond to their needs. Students need to be taught concepts concerning searching, reliable sources, ethical and respectful behaviors, and the librarian can do that. The library itself will need to be a welcoming place where technologies, books and areas for social networking are available. I guess the future library will no longer look and be a place just to house books, as much as it will be a place to work, socialize, network and use many different forms of technology to enhance and support student learning. In taking this course, I have many different ideas and thoughts coming together in my mind. I am not sure exactly where they are leading just yet, but I see many needed connections to the curriculum and student learning finally coming together. If there was ever a time when the library can make an impact it will certainly be now. Libraries need to be open to learning from students and their needs, and then helping the teachers and administration meet those needs. It will require a new vision, but one that will mesh nicely with a guaranteed and viable curriculum for all. It means being open to new possiblities, and how they can link to both the curriculum and student learning. It can be mind boggling, but it will also be a new adventure. If we can reach students now, they will come to see the value of what libraries can offer them.
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Week 6 #14 Technorati

I had absolutely no idea the blogging world was so widespread. I hear about blogging all the time, and there are a few that I blogs that I look at on a semi-regular basis, but I am astounded by what is out there. I know that blogging has been extremely big in the campaigns lately. It is also on the news stations, and they encourage you to go to their blogs. So I knew all this, but I guess I wasn't really paying attention as to how big it was. I was surprised at the photos and videos that were available from Technorati also.
Here are just a few tags that are popular today: apple, barak obama, china, economy, britney spears, gadgets, politics, iraq, microsoft.
What better way when your high school students are doing research on current events than to have them read some blogs. Think of the discussion you could have relating to bias, opinions, valid or invalid sources. Exposing students to some good blogs to read and discuss could help them to understand that they need to make sure they are using valid sources, and that anyone can post anything they wish on their blogs, but it doesn't necessarily make it true! Students today want their classes to relate and be revelant to where they are today. What a great tool to help them learn. Of course, there is always the APU and class curriculum guidelines to consider, but if your lessons were well planned out, and shared before hand, I think they could work. What a great opportunity for the school librarian to pair up with ELA, history, science, or any other course and help make it revelant to our students. I'm a little more leary about using blogs with grade 4-6, but if the right blog was available and the lesson was structured appropriately I might consider it. I sometimes worry that all the IMing and text messaging is the only way students are writing, but just looking at some of the blog postings made me see that almost everyone that is blogging is good at writing. This leads me to believe that students would write well because it was going to be meaningful and others were going to read it. This would be relevant to them. A great learning tool when used well.
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Week 6 # 13 del.icio.us

This site has such great potential. It can be extremely useful for bookmarking and linking your own professional sites, but it is with students that I see great potential. Students who are our "digital natives" instinctively see the "social networking" potential as a way of life. If they can link up with their friends and others in the global community through their interests by tagging them, think of the potential. I have been reading about tagging and have even been seeing some tags recently when doing research with students. While it may not be as categorized as librarians are used to, I can see how useful this can be. I am taking a curriculum course right now, and I can see how tagging would be useful in our group projects. I am also on several Vertical Teams in our district, and developing our own tagging and links for information we are sharing could be beneficial. This would be a great benefit for our 12 graders who are working on their Senior Projects. We are also doing an Independent Research project with a small group of 5th graders, and I know they would love this concept. A couple of them would really take off with this idea, and because they are the leaders, we would soon have several other fifth graders and sixth graders tagging. The whole concept is exciting! It has tremendous potential in the educational field.
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#12 Week 5 Rollyo

I have just finished exploring Rollyo. What a terrific idea! Now I need some time to think about how I want to use it. Tonight's not the night to begin this project, but I can already see the possibilities. This would be a great way to link curriculum topics for your staff. It would also be a useful tool for creating curriculum links for students to use on their projects. It would be especially useful if linked to the school website. Lots of possiblities I will need to explore.

Even though I realize I am behind in this coursework I am using ideas I have found. We have all 6th and 7th grade students blogging on ePals, which is a safe secure site that our school is part of. I thought since I was blogging I could definitely try it with my students. ePals has worked out really well as you need to register your students, and any staff you want to have privilidges. No one else has access to the site. The blogs about books are coming along nicely. As we also have non-readers, we have encouraged students to blog about anything they have read. A newspaper, magazine etc. So far so good. We set up the parameters ahead of time, and had parents sign a permission slip. We have had one student removed for inappropriate comments and language. Other than that so far all is going well. I would recommend it to others to try. I have had a couple of parent concerns, and by sharing what we are doing, and that site is open only to students in our school, they seem to be okay with this. Students are enjoying it from the conversations I am overhearing.

I used the Trading Card idea from Flickr with fourth graders doing National Monument research. What a hit! They each have a monument in Washington, D.C. to research. Two students are enlarging a map of the city, and students in groups of 2 are creating a trading card of their monument. We will print enough for all students so they can actually trade them, and then one will be printed to attach to the map. I have used heavier card stock, and tried printing 2 per page. On one I didn't cut off the end, but instead folded the paper back, and it actually stands! Two fifth grade teachers came by as we were trying this out, and they would also like to try the idea. The students are excited. I will have to take a photo and post it when we are done.

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#11 Week 5 Web 2.0 Awards

I have just finished looking at and exploring some of the Web 2.0 Awards. I had actually heard of several of the sites, but was astounded and overwhelmed with the variety of sites available. Web 2.0 has really taken off, and people from all over are finding creative ways to use technology. This creativity is one of the skills that Daniel Pink talks about in his book, A Whole New Mind: Why right-brainers will rule the future. This kind of creative mode wouldn't never have happened before the web became a powerful part of everyone's lives.

Some of the sites are becoming quite mainstream: craig's list, google doc, bookmarking sites. I liked del.icio.us, rollyo as I felt they would be useful tools for our job, as well as sites that students could be taught to use as they research. The social networking sites are amazing. This trend of networking across age levels, the globe and the work forcehas amazing implication for the future of education. The college community is big into the social networking scene, and eventually this trend will trickle down into the high school and middle school levels. As the education field is very slow to acknowledge new trends and slower still to change their culture, we as librarians have a tremendous opportunity. It is absolutely essential that we stay on top of this entire trend, and begin to think of ways to tie these sites into the curriculum. The swivel site which is a data collection site has tremendous potential for use in high school math classes. Especially classes that are trying to reach those advanced learners.
I like the esty site. I love unique things, and with just a brief overview I found beautiful jewelry, pottery and lots of needlework ideas. This is a site I will return to often.
This was an extremely thought-provoking, and interesting exercise. I found myself overhwelmed, but came away with lots of new knowledge that I can now share with others.
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#10 Week 5

The possibilites of using these on-line image generators for use in the curriculum are amazing. Our sixth graders will be starting a Be a Country Expert unit in the beginning of March. I would love to have them use the Banner Generator to create flag banners for their country. If the teacher and I worked together to create some guidelines it would be a great visual to add to the project.
I loved the comic strip generator. It has so many possibilities. I am using Movie Maker with seventh grade students. They are creating movies on Global Warming. So many of the students don't know how to start as I want them to either draw or illustrate, rather than just use clip art and graphics. Comic strips could be a real draw for the students.
The fourth graders are doing a States Project. They could create a name badge with facts about their states. Great ideas to share with both students and staff.
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#8 and # 9 Week 4 RSS & Newsreaders

RSS feeds make sense, but the quantity of information that is out there is overwhelming. I am amazed at all the different blogs out there. It seems like anyone who has an interest can start a blog. The concept of social networking is amazing, and will continue to attract new participants. I found that I needed to narrow the field to what I thought was managable. I created my newsreader account and looked at sites concerning school librarians, technology issues related to education and would like to do some more searching for curriculum issues. I think you could be innundated with sites and find yourself overwhelmed if you aren't careful. RRS feeds have the potential to be very useful and helpful for staying on top of the issues, but it seems that you would need to keep your focus small as you start.

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Week #3 Technology Related Post

This course is a great place to talk about technology issues with others facing the same issues. On Monday the technology teacher and I both received our current issue of Technology & Learning. We both were discussing one of the articles "Top 10 Tech Trends" We are both on our Technology Team in our district and the pace of technology seems to increasing every day and we feel we can't always keep up.
Here were the top 10 tech trends:
1. Data mining
2. Cyber-bullying
3. 21st Century skills
4. Digital content on the rise
5. Learning at leisure--on-line learning
6. Personal responders--Do you know what these even are?
7. Mobile tools--driving the path of ed reform
8. Bandwith is suddenly an issue--This is a huge issue in our school district this year!
9. The penguin is snowballing--open source Linux
10. The participatory web--Web 2.0--This certainly ties in.

These are all issues we all will be grappling with. There was another article in the same journal that people should read "Tossing out Texbooks" How a Tucson high school customized its curriclum around its laptop program.

If you haven't read Daniel Pink's "A Whole New Mind": why right brainers will rule the future" I highly recommend it. Pink is really on to something that will change the way we view education and should make us think about how we educate students now. Thought provoking!

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Week # 3 Flickr Post

Flickr has been such an interesting site. We are having trouble uploading photos from school so I will try it from home tonight. Exploring Flickr has given me several great curriculum ideas that I need to explore more. We do a intergrated Grade 5 Art, library, technology Shadow Theatre project. The theme this year is Explorers using a survival theme. I think the Art teacher will love this idea. There are lots of other activities I will also have to explore.
My photo that I uploaded is from the YSLead Conference at Endicott College that I was part, along with Elaine Loehmann from my school district. This is the building where we had a group dinner one night as part of the program.

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Week 1-2: 7 and 1/2 Learning Habits

This has been an interesting experience. This is my third try at creating this blog. I thought I had created my first one, only to find that I hadn't checked the availablity of the address, and someone else's blog came up. So then I tried several different names and they were all taken. At that point I gave up and decided to try another day. So now I went through and started again only to find I hadn't save it right. So here I am finally starting.

I found as I started this project that I kept putting it off. I like to read about it first or have someone else demonstrate before I start. When we finally got together as I group at my school I felt so much better. What does that say about learning? It is a highly social experience.

I loved that the course started with looking at the 71/2 habits of learners. I agree with all of them. I tried to practice many of them. Learning is definitely about cultivating an attitude and accepting responsibility for your own learning. Being confident is so important. Developing your own toolbox of options that work for you is something I try to get kids to do. Seeing problems as a challenge is so important. I just read this is a book which I love. If you continue to make old mistakes you haven't learned. Making no mistakes means you aren't learning anything new, you are just coasting on what you already know. The challenge is to make new mistakes because that is how you learn. It really is true. I can see that from just this blog. Now I really know how to set one up. It has been a challenge though. I always try to teach and mentor others to give them confidence. Probably the areas I am weakest in are: using technology to my advantage, and playing with technology. I don't really experiment. I would rather someone show me something new, and then I almost immediately see what I can do with it. I am not a real hands on learner so this course will be a new challenge and hopefully extend my learning in technology.

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