library-wanderings

Juggling -- The Reality of Being a Classroom Teacher

Sun, 12 Feb 2012 14:56:43 +0100

Well, now I know one thing that the new school year brought – busy teacher syndrome! While I am greatly enjoying my (newish) teaching duties this year as a homeroom and language arts teacher for our fifth-graders, I am often overcome by a sense that I will never feel completely ready, never be truly organized, never be totally prepared.

What is interesting is that I’m finally okay with that. I am at heart an extremely logical, prepared, focused person. I went into this school year with the whole year mapped out, week by week for the entire year. Guess what happened? (Experienced elementary teachers are already snickering…) I had to remake my plans. And then I had to remake them again. One of the books I chose to have my class read was really difficult for them. Sure, I had fabulous lessons all worked out, that they would be integrating computer learning with reading the text. But instead, I had to let some of the bells and whistles slide by while I explained what was going on in the novel. I had planned to have my students taking photos and writing on a class blog on a weekly basis. Guess what? Once we got into serious reading, we suddenly had very little time to work on the blog. My students preferred using their “quiet time” for drawing comics rather than blogging. I may work to go back and integrate the two, but for right now the blog is on hiatus.

I am still generally following my grand scheme for the year, but I have re-learned one of the most important teaching skills -- to teach the students you actually have as opposed to the ones you were expecting. While this school year has been keeping me juggling many issues, I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Image from: http://www.aasd.k12.wi.us/staff/boldtkatherine/images/animated-teacher.gif

What will the new school year bring?

Mon, 08 Aug 2011 22:05:30 +0100

I am anticipating this fall in much the same way as many students are—I will be facing new challenges, learning new material, trying new things. I have many hopes and dreams for the school year, as do they. And like them, I am partially responsible for preparing them for an uncertain and unknowable future.

This year, in addition to being the librarian at my school, I am tackling the challenge of being the 5^th grade language arts teacher. This challenge is both new and old for me. I spent twenty years teaching beginning college students how to write and how to read literature. Since then, I have been an elementary school librarian. Both (I hope!) have helped me be ready to teach the wonderful 5^th graders I will be working with this fall.

I hope that I can teach them to love reading as much as I do. I have chosen some new material and some old favorites – we will be reading some newer novels (Because of Mr. Terupt, reviewed elsewhere on this site, and The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate), we will be working with the Junior Great Books Program, and we will be doing some classics (The Watsons Go to Birmingham, Love that Dog, and Tuck Everlasting). We will read poetry, journalism, and science writing. And I also want them to read for pleasure, books that they choose because they look fun and interesting.

I hope that I can help them love to write, or at least not be intimidated by writing. I want them to become fluid, confident writers, who know how to use the writing process to their advantage, who are willing to experiment, who understand what audiences need. I want them to play with words and sentence structures, while still understanding that grammar and spelling are important. I want them to love language.

Yet I am trying to prepare them for a future that is ambiguous and unclear. As Virginia Heffernan observed today in her essay “Education Needs a Digital-Age Upgrade”, students who are in school today are likely to be doing jobs we can’t even imagine in the future. She cites a study by Cathy N. Davidson as advocating that “Even academically reticent students publish work prolifically, subject it to critique and improve it on the Internet.” She goes further and asserts that: “A classroom suited to today’s students should deemphasize solitary piecework. It should facilitate the kind of collaboration that helps individuals compensate for their blindnesses, instead of cultivating them. That classroom needs new ways of measuring progress, tailored to digital times — rather than to the industrial age or to some artsy utopia where everyone gets an Awesome for effort.”

To that end, I am planning to have my students go that further step – I have created a class blog for them to “publish” their polished pieces of writing. I am still trying to work out how much autonomy my students will have in commenting and posting in the blog. For now, I will do all the posting, and we will work out if that approach will need to be modified or not.

So now I am also reaching out to my PLN community. If you are a teacher of students in the 4^th through 6^th grade range, and would like to collaborate by having our students read and comment on each other’s writing, I would love to have you email me. I think the best way I am going to be able to have them learn how to collaborate and how to write for an audience is to work with a wider range of peers. They need to learn what I already have—the world is our community, and we need to help each other learn.

I can be reached at lydia dot schultz at bookfrontiers dot com, or at my work email at lydia dot schultz at ttsp dot org. I hope to hear from you.

Jewish Book Carnival: July Edition

Fri, 15 Jul 2011 12:59:55 +0100

It's that time again! Bloggers who write about Jewish-themed books collect their posts once a month to share and reflect on what is going on in the Jewish book world. This month's collection, which you can find at Ann D. Koffsky's blog, includes a wide range of topics, ranging from Life Is Like a Library with its take on Being Mirka from the book Hereville by Barry Deutch (which I reviewed elsewhere in this blog), to Linda K. Wertheimer's Ode to Spirituality, to much more.

The Jewish Book Carnival is a great way for people who blog on these topics to find each other and read each other's writing. But it is also a great way for you to find some new blogs to follow, that cover topics that are important to all of us. Stop by Ann's blog for a complete list of participants this month.

Camp for Librarians--The Pleasures of Spending Time Reading

Thu, 14 Jul 2011 18:48:24 +0100

I am a lucky camper -- literally. I am participating in a program sponsored MELSA public libraries and MetroNet for people who teach literature and/or who are children's librarians called Camp Read-A-Lot. And this has been the summer camp experience I have always wanted!

The wonderful people behind this program have put together a fun bunch of new books for all of us campers to read. We get to read books, write reviews of them, and then participate in discussions, either virtually on the Ning's forum or in person at the Day Camp date in August. Just to give you a sense of how popular this program is, I registered on the day it first was open, but because I didn't get to it until after lunch, I was TOO LATE to be an in-person day camper. (I'm still hopeful a spot will open up!)

As a result, I feel as if I have direction in the reading that I am doing this summer, with some accountability to go along with it. I have been posting reviews in both places, so this site is also benefiting from my increased diligence. I am participating with the books geared toward 4th and 5th graders, but I plan to look for the other age group books as well, given how much I have liked most of the books on the list I am currently reading.

If nothing else, this program has reminded me just how much I enjoy taking the opportunity to participate in professional development and in interacting with my peers. This is yet another example of how technology can work to bring us all closer together. You may want to visit the link (click on the logo above) just to see what a great job these organizers have done.

Jewish Book Carnival

Tue, 15 Mar 2011 23:26:04 +0100

Today is the 15th of the month, so it must be time for the Jewish Book Carnival! Each month bloggers who write about and who review books share their entries so that we are easy to find. This month's carnival is being hosted by Linda K. Wertheimer, who blogs about issues of faith and family. You can learn more about the Jewish Book Carnival by visiting their site -- it is sponsored by the Association of Jewish Libraries to encourage people to read and comment on more blogs written about Jewish books and topics. This month my review of Dori Weinstein's book, Sliding into the New Year, is one of many featured blogs.

So stop by a give a look at some of these other sites. You might find a new favorite!

What Computer Programs Do We Really Need? -- Free Alternatives for Small Schools

Thu, 24 Feb 2011 22:54:05 +0100

photo © 2006 Louise Docker | more info (via: Wylio)
In this time of budget crunches in the world of education, I have learned to be creative in how I choose what to pay for and what to find for free when it comes to computer programs. Here are some free alternatives that serve as good substitutions for their more costly peers.

1. Tux Paint => Kid Pix     For years my school has struggled to keep using a very outdated version of Kid Pix because we just couldn’t afford a site license for a newer version. Yet every time QuickTime updated, our version wouldn’t work any more. Finally, it just became too much of a hassle to support. This year I found Tux Paint and discovered it had many similar bells and whistles as Kid Pix. No, it isn’t identical, but it does the job of providing an easy-to-use, easy-to-learn drawing program for younger students. Plus, the creators openly encourage you to install it on as many machines as you want. So this year I took the plunge and introduced Tux Paints instead of Kid Pix. Not surprisingly, the kids were thrilled and they loved that they could download it to use at home as well.

2. BBC Dance Mat Typing => Type to Learn   What leads to success in learning keyboarding skills? Frequent repetition and practice are the usual answers. Well, the easiest way to get students to practice a skill is to make it easy to access and fun to do. Enter BBC Dance Mat Typing! Our 3^rd and 4^th grade students love the British accents of the animals, and the humor and colorful graphics keep them coming back. With a simple link on our Media page, students can easily find the program and pick up at home where they left off at school.

3. Starfall => Raz Kids    Reading programs for beginners are a great way to encourage the more reluctant students to practice (they love to play with technology!), and they provide a painless way to let children do as much repetition as they need to build their skills. Up until this year, we only used Starfall, which provides stories that specifically emphasize sounds that children are working on—for example, short “e” sounds. Children can listen to the stories, read the stories, and practice to their heart’s content. This year my school also paid for a Raz Kids account, which gives a teacher more direct control over what students are doing and gives them data to analyze. It also provides testing for comprehension. While Starfall does not provide such controls, it does enable beginning readers to practice and play games related to their reading.

4. Electronic Library of Minnesota => Library Databases     Okay, this one only works for schools in Minnesota, but I have seen other places that have similar access for their residents. The Electronic Library of Minnesota (ELM) provides all residents of Minnesota access to a variety of databases for free. Some access requires a user to put in a valid public library card number, but many geared toward children do not. Again, since my school has an extremely limited budget, we cannot afford to pay for databases. Rather than having students resort to their first inclination (“I’ll just google it!”), I can link them to the ELM databases so that they can get grade-appropriate material. Some of the articles are even available in a format that “reads” the article aloud.

All in all, technology is helping small schools like mine to provide wonderful programs for students without the subsequent costs. If you are creative in how you think about what resources are available, you too can provide your students with great access to the learning opportunities around them. And, you can encourage your teacher peers to think before they spend, so that the limited resources we all have go toward things we can't already get for free.

Be My Tweetie—Using Twitter to Build a Personal Learning Network

Fri, 04 Feb 2011 21:06:24 +0100

photo © 2009 Rosaura Ochoa | more info (via: Wylio)I first was introduced to using Twitter during the 23 Things on a Stick and More Things on a Stick programs sponsored by the Minnesota’s Multitypes Libraries. Much like the Teacher Challenge, these programs encouraged people to try out the growing technologies and explore how they related to our work as librarians. By participating, I grew to “know” some of the other participants, at least virtually, and I began to develop my own Personal Learning Network, also known as PLN.

As Wikipedia (that font of all shared knowledge) defines it, Personal Learning Networks “consist of the people a learner interacts with and derives knowledge from in a Personal Learning Environment.” In them, “learners create connections and develop a network that contributes to their professional development and knowledge.” Twitter is an excellent platform for cultivating and growing one’s PLN.

Twitter is regularly ridiculed in the mainstream media, in part because it has become a fad among celebrities and celebrity-wanna-bes. It is true; one can subscribe to some relatively silly, purely fun feeds. I personally receive one from a local ice cream parlor that tweets when they put out one of their rarer flavors. (More interesting in summer than right now, I grant you.) But Twitter’s potential for PLN help is amazing. How, you ask?

Twitter as a back channel—When I was doing PBWorks Camp, we were often participating in live webinars. Participants would also have open Twitter to comment on the webinar and to discuss it afterwards.
Twitter as community building—Participants in programs such as the ones I listed above and in the Teacher Challenge can interact more quickly and directly as a result of following each other in Twitter. And for those of us who have few or no colleagues in the same field in the building we work in, Twitter’s impact can be huge. Suddenly we can bounce ideas off of people all over the world!
Twitter as a resource—I have seen teachers and presenters use Twitter to show the power of PLNs. One of my favorites occurred when a teacher in one part of the world asked her PLN to tweet back with their time, weather, and location, to help pique her students’ interest in geography. The ability to get some instant help is amazing.
Twitter as self-promotion—Okay, I know I made fun of how celebrities do it, but Twitter enables us to broadcast to the world that we have written a new post on our blogs. And if our followers retweet our posts, we build our readership and increase the scope of the conversation.
Twitter as sharing—I love to find and share newly discovered resources on Twitter. It works just like walking down the hall at school to share with a friend that neat thing I just learned. Only here the hall is virtual, and my friend can be anywhere in the world.

I have built lists of librarians, of fellow teachers, of friends. I have learned to use hash tags for children’s literature (#kidlit), for libraries (#library), for the Teacher Challenge (#ksyb). If you go to a conference or take part in any sort of seminar, a hash tag is sure to follow. It’s a great way to communicate with your colleagues.

Overall, Twitter is a fabulous resource. While its characters may be numbered, the potential value to our practice is incalculable. Please join me as part of my PLN. I am LibraryLady90, and I would love to explore the practice of education with you.

Color Coordination and Pizzazz—Pulling Together the Side Bar Outfit

Tue, 01 Feb 2011 23:54:59 +0100

This challenge was both fun and difficult. I needed to take a fresh look at how my site appeared to other people. So here’s what I did and why I did it.

Additions

“Show Yourself” – This widget (which I found at “The Groovy Librarian”) allows you to group all your contact information on the Internet in one handy, dandy tool. I like that all the lines are hot links to the appropriate pages. It eliminated the need for a separate Twitter tool. I added this widget to each page of my site, since it simplified my contact information.
Badges – I added to my “Library Wanderings” page my Badges from the Guide to Online Schools and PBWorks. I wanted to share the educational aspect of my work.
Categories – I hadn’t used categories up until now. Now that my site has this page, I have a greater need to have one. I decided (for now, at least) not to add categories to the review pages because the separate pages do some of that work for me.
Flag Counter – I replaced Cluster Maps with Flag Counter when I began the Teacher Challenge because I think it is more interesting to see the various countries that people are from. I like Cluster Maps too, but I think the flags are more visually interesting.

Subtractions

Twitter tools – I had included a visual image for people to click on to follow me in Twitter. With the Show Yourself widget, I don’t need the separate tool.
Voki – While I liked playing with the Voki, I don’t feel an overwhelming need to have it live in my sidebar. It also makes the page load VERY slowly, which can be an issue for some users.
Poll Daddy – I decided that I will be removing the Poll Daddy poll in my sidebar soon, so as to declutter.

Aesthetics and Organization

Color Coordination – This aspect was what took me the longest, but I like the results. I went into the html of several of my widgets to make the colors and patterns follow the general color scheme of my site overall. I was able to tweak the colors in my Twitter feed, the Flag Counter, and the Show Yourself widgets.
Organization – I tried to group my widgets in an order that made sense to me. With any luck it will make sense to other people too. I began with all the contact information, then the material in the blog, then Twitter, tags, and everything else.

So what do you think? Do these changes work and make sense? Is there anything else I should drop or add?

Movin' and Groovin': Teaching with Video and Slides

Mon, 31 Jan 2011 20:12:59 +0100

I haven't played much with video. It is one area that I need to work on, technologically speaking. I have tried a few tools that I find exceptionally easy to use, and that have relevance to my work as a librarian and media teacher. I want to say a "Thank You" to the people who are running the Teacher Challenge. Without the "kick" to do this entry, I wouldn't have figured out how to embed these videos into the blog. I also ventured into tweaking html to change sizes of things to make them fit better. Thanks for giving me some incentive!

Here are my experiences.

1. Animoto

I have had great fun with Animoto. I have used it for a variety of things, but below is my favorite--a short video of books that were most challenged or banned in US schools. The combination of motion and music make the seriousness of the topic clear. It is also amazingly easy to use. All one has to do is upload photos and choose the music--the site will do the rest.

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

2. Video

I have used a variety of videos in teaching, embedding them in classroom wikis or linking to them on interactive white board presentations. It is nice to embed them, because then you can have just the video, without any of YouTube's adds or suggested videos getting in the way. (There are tools to make them cleaner--See Free Technology for Teachers.) Here is one I like to use to explain how to search using Google.

I also highly recommend the Common Craft show videos for teaching basic tech concepts to lower grade students. Their video explanations of blogs, wikis, searches, and so on are extremely useful. (I also particularly enjoyed their video on how to protect my brain from Zombies...)

3. Slide Shows

I have mostly used Slideshare to create presentations to share with students and staff. I might now consider using the GoogleDoc Presentation feature, just to make sharing the material easier. Here is an example of an introduction I did for our more tech newbie staff members.

A (Very) Brief Introduction to Tech Tools

View more presentations from librarylady90.

So what should I play with next?

My School Library, and "I Can See Winter..."

Mon, 31 Jan 2011 20:13:49 +0100

I've posted a slide show from Picture Trail above. I use picture trail in my Library wiki to share with parents the books that I am reading in a given month to the media classes. It is an easy way to make the front page of the wiki have a consistent item, but one that I can vary from month to month. If you would like to see how it works on my Library Wiki, click here.

As you can see, my school library is a lovely spot. January in Minnesota, on the other hand, is something one learns to live with. Right now Saint Paul (my city) is gearing up for a Winter Carnival. If you like, you can learn the depth of our delusions by seeing the official site for the celebrations.