ISTE 2011- A takeaway from a Vendor? Sweet... no... SweetSearch!

When I was at ISTE11 in Philly I did not spend much time in the vendor hall. I never feel comfortable talking to vendors since I have so little clout when it comes to what my district purchases. When I did go into the hall I was specifically looking for World Book to see what their new science module was all about. I was so focused on that mission that I almost missed the biggest library takeaway of them all. Mark Moran of SweetSearch lured me in to his booth with bookmarks, yes that was all it took, paper bookmarks (since I give out more than 400 book marks to students each week of the school year this was quite a prize). Anyway, the bookmarks give students tips for Internet Research. Mark who is the founder and CEO of Dulcinea Media, the parent company of SweetSearch, told me about this free search engine for students. It searches only credible web sites. The search engine part is free but there is so much more and it will have a pay component. I love how well researched this product is and I love that some of it is free in case the other librarians do not agree that this is as great as I think! I also just started following Mark Moran on Twitter. And a SweetSearch search came up with a webinar link that explains more about SweetSearch. The video below is what Mark was offering at ISTE11.



A YouTube search of SweetSearch came up with this tutorial from Anna Laura Brown the SocialNetworkingLibrarian.



What do I think of SweetSearch? I am ready to put the widget on my library home page!

Protecting Reputations Online

In light of the newest situation where a Bangor, Pennsylvania teacher's aide had a nude photo of herself passed around her school, it is becoming more and more important to protect your reputation online. Young people do not have any problems posting pictures of themselves and their friends online in less than flattering situations and sometimes compromising positions. While it may seem harmless now what are those pictures going to do to future reputations? I once heard New York Times columnist David Pogue say never to post anything that you would not want your grandmother to see and that things posted online never stay where you put them (people "borrow" stuff and re-post to other sites). There is a new Commoncraft Show Video called "Protecting Reputations Online in Plain English" It is aimed at young people to try to get them to be more careful about what they post. The video is for evaluation only but as usual, Lee Lefever gets it right.

21st Century Learning

I think maybe these guys got it right. We need to start thinking outside the box in education.

Love the idea of teaching with Primary Sources but Primary Sources are not just Library of Congress archives. A bus ticket or subway token can be a primary source. Show and tell is an example of teaching with a primary source, and helps students use 21St Century Skills when planning their presentations. As educators we must get on the rocket that is 21st Century Learning or we will get left behind. And if we are left behind so are our students and that can't happen!

Wordle Fun

I love Wordle. So, this morning I decided to check out what my Plurk posts look like in Wordle. The results are here to the right. Plurk is so much fun and so is Wordle. There are so many applications in the classroom. Some teachers use it for vocabulary words. I had a great idea for using it when I have to teach the Dewey Decimal System. I am going to have the students browse and list the names of books and types of catagories in each section and then create their own wordle of that Dewey Class. I may even pass out a kids guide to Dewey for those that need more help. It is all about differentiated instruction!

By the way, there was a new post on the Wordle Blog on how to make Wordle safer for students. Check out what Jonathan Feinberg who made Wordle has to say about blocking only specific parts of the Wordle site. Personally I feel the threat is not as great when I just make the Wordle create page a favorite and have the students go directly there, by-passing the front page gallery all together.

Presenting with text

I have been teaching 4th grade students how to use PowerPoint correctly during the last few years. I was wondering how I could show them that text and layout were important to the esthetics of their presentations and then I came across this presentation by Tudor Girba from the University of Bern in Switzerland. Check out his SlideShare Presentation:

Presenting with text

View more documents from Tudor Girba.

Librarians Are Vital to Education

I have been following this link to Kelly's Curriculum Corner and I am getting angry at administrators who think they can get away with an aide in the library 3 days a week and sharing librarians among several schools. Kelly's Curriculum Corner: Libraries as the Hub of School Improvement.
Librarians are vital to education. I agree that librarians share unique perspectives about the curriculum. Why won't anyone listen? It is getting frustrating too that some librarians refuse to change. Refuse to acknowledge that our jobs are changing. If librarians are not into technology then they may loose their jobs. But, our students need us to help them wade through the jungle that is the Internet. If librarians are willing to use technology tools they are vital to the development of the 21st Century learners they teach. Information and Media literacy are important things for students to learn and if they are not learning them in the library where are they learning them?

A Youtube lament

I am again lamenting the fact that Youtube is blocked in my school. OK so I am whining. I know there are ways around it but if we want teachers to use technology in their classrooms why are we making it harder for them to do so? I found this wonderful video that I want to use with my 2nd grade students who are having a hard time figuring out what a pulley does. I found this video on another website but the link goes to Youtube so if I tried to open it I would get a nice blank spot on the monitor. I know it will get their attention because it is from NASA but now I am going to have to spend an hour of my Sunday downloading it another way to use it in the library tomorrow. Before Youtube was blocked I could have embedded it here or on my library wiki and used it in the lesson, easy as pie. But now I have to jump through hoops to be able to use it. I have been told that I may use such Youtube videos in my lessons and that I can get the content any way I know how, did anyone offer to show me how? No, so it is a good thing I am a PowerLibrarian. But then I start thinking, Youtube is providing content that is made to stream over their network, am I violating copyright by downloading or ripping their content? I know it is fair use because I am going to show it in the classroom but there is a deeper issue here. Blocking Youtube is a form of censorship that feel violates my First Amendment Rights to Free Speech. And don't tell me to use TeacherTube. Been there and this video is not there! There should be understanding technology people in school districts that unblock content on teacher computers, or on a case by case basis, but I feel like I am chasing the wind. Anyway, if you are in a place where you can view this video, enjoy. If you are not, join me in my lament as I spend my Sunday morning downloading this 3 plus minute video.

Kathy Schrock is a Digital Pioneer

Yes, I agree with Kathy Schrock's video that I came across today.  She and many of us digital immigrants are not really immigrants but digital pioneers.  Not that I am counting myself among the elite digital librarian pioneers of our day.  I am a follower of those pioneers and love to sit at their feet, or attend their conferences and learn. Watch Kathy's Digital Pioneer Avatar.

Digital Pioneer: The Movie from Kathy Schrock on Vimeo.

More Free Open Source Sites...

Wow... just heard about this wonderful new site for finding and uploading music. Jamendo is open source. Their tagline says: "On Jamendo artists allow anyone to download and share their music. It's free, legal and unlimited." It's nice to have a leagal source for music when creating videos with children. Some of the pictures from the album art on the site are not for elementary school students, so make sure if you are having them use these materials that you download the music for them to use.

Another site that touches a librarian's heart is webcitation. Have you ever had a student cite a website only to have that website not come up or give you an error message when you tried to check the source? Well, webcitation can solve all that. I have just signed up but have not used the site yet. Bacically it works by adding a bookmarklet to your citation page instead of just a URL. The bookmarklet will lead you back to the actual page, as it looked, on the date the student accessed the page. Now there will be no more padding of citations, students will actually have had to use the site... or will at least have to visit the site to have the proper bookmarklet.

Do you use technology in your classroom?

Sorry, I admit it, it is a loaded question.  The reason I am asking is that the instructor in my multi-media class showed us this video from teachertube last night and it really has me thinking about what technology looks like in my library.  Sometimes it looks like frustration.  I seem like I am frustrating my students.  I want them to use technology as a tool. I don't want to be like the teachers touted in this video:


I want to be the solution. I want to make learning fun. I want students to create their own learning. I am in the process of rethinking my methods yet again. Let me know if you have any suggestions for me.

Information Literacy = Big6?

More preaching to the choir... librarians love research models... assessment is another issue... should there be a grade for library class?

In chapter 7 of Steven Mills’s Using the Internet for Active Teaching and Learning, the author indicates that problem solving needs a process. I agree, students work more efficiently when they are given a set of steps to follow in the research process. The chapter is titled “Using the Internet for Information Problem Solving” and Mills first defines problem-based learning as active learning with realistic problems for students to solve based on curriculum content. “Problem based learning always begins with the curriculum; the real-world problem must be related to a curriculum topic” (133). Mills goes on to describe briefly three Information Problem Solving Models: InfoSavvy, The Research Cycle, and The Big6. What he leaves out is almost as significant as what he puts in… what about ISearch, Pathways to Knowledge, the Stripling and Pitts REACTS ten step model, and FLIP It by New Jersey’s Alice Yucht? Mills goes on to describe Big6 in greater detail proclaiming it the best model for research on the web. I don’t necessarily disagree but even if it were not the best, it is the best marketed and provides the best teacher support via their Big6 Website. So, with those credentials alone Big6 is the best known research model. Don’t get me wrong, I love Big6, I use Big6. Mike Eisenberg is an Orangman! Ok, so in the picture at the top on the right he is a penguin. What I am saying is that if Mike Eisenberg would dress up like a penguin, as he did at the AASL convention in Reno in early November, to promote the newest Big6 book is it any wonder the processing model is so popular with librarians? I do not think the other processing models are as well know because of marketing and what Mills calls the Matthew effect back in Chapter 5. The Matthew effect was touted by sociologist Robert Merton in the late 60’s, it is the “phenomenon of allocating more credit or recognition for scientific work to well-known scientists” (105). I am not saying Eisenberg and Berkowitz are not the greatest but I am saying some of the other research process models deserve at least a look. The biggest reason I like ISearch is its research journaling component (it is also much better for special education students in my opinion). The main reason I like REACTS is because it is an acronym and I can remember it better. The reason I like FLIP It is because it is simple. So, what is keeping me from using these other models? Not as much support and hardly any web-presence, and yes, it is all about the marketing. Eisenberg and Berkowitz are great at marketing their product. Besides, the Big6 is flexible enough that I can add an ISearch like journaling aspect to it without much problem. So, in my library we use Big6 but we have a research journal tucked behind our Big6 checklist and every day during the research process my students journal these 3 questions: What went right today? What went wrong today? Where do I go from here? Back to my fellow Orangemen penguin… Mike Eisenberg was dressed as a penguin at AASL to promote the latest Big6 book, for elementary research. The Big6 breaks down into the Super3 for the youngest elementary students. The new book is called: The Super3 : information skills for young learners. If Eisenberg is willing to make a penguin of himself, there must be something to this Super3! Again, it is all about marketing!

In chapter 7 Mills also describes what he calls a toolkit builder: Noodle Tools. I think Noodle Tools is a great way to keep students organized during the research process. I also agree that Noodle Tools is an excellent resource for students in school districts that can afford it. And, by afford I mean those that want to take another bite out of an already overstretched library budget. What I do instead is use the parts of the Noodle website that are free. Noodle Tools is out to make money, so very little is free but NoodleBib Express is excellent for students just entering the research process and just learning how to do Works Cited pages. The librarians in my district have decided to use the terms Works Cited rather than Bibliography because Bibliography indicates print sources, books, while our students are so clearly using less books, and more online resources, so Works Cited fits much better.
Finally, Mills gets to my least favorite subject, assessment. He makes a good argument for authentic assessments with rubrics. I just have a hard time giving students grades in the library. While I am all for self-evaluation, I would rather the product and the student’s reflections on their process and outcomes be allowed to stand on their own without having to add my assessment. My assessment is when students work hard on a project and complete it to the best of their ability that is reward enough, everyone gets an A. However, we don’t live in perfect library land, so I am glad that Mills includes a mini tutorial on how to use RubiStar to create assessment rubrics at the end of the chapter.

Mills, S. C. (2006). Using the Internet for active teaching and learning. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson.