Article you should read!!

This is article about a privacy case in a Public Library, but felt it was something we should all hear and know about.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2008/07/19/national/a104017D48.DTL&feed=rss.business

Free lunch

I won the free lunch at Gerrold's!

Adding to your blog

I am curious, which of the various programs like Scrapblog, Slide, etc. have you found to be the most useful to upload to your blogs? I found One True Media to be impossible to upload, burying you in html code that I didn't understand. Any tips?

We are up on the NEW Blog!!!

http://cwulibrarycamp.blogspot.com/

Come on over- there is a cool post on where to put Praxis stuff already!
~Amy

Another ALAN

This one has some great articles: Gary Paulsen, Will Hobbs, Jack London...
Another ALAN

Another issue

Here's another issue for you to look at. When you join you get three a year and they are really cool.
This one has a super article about teens and the web and libraries.

ALAN AGAIN

ALAN Review

Fabulous resource. Here is a link to an issue for you to look at. It's fantastic for YA Lit.
ALAN
Cathie

5 Stages of Media/Tech Dev. (pdf)

I think that I totally fall into these 5 stages... and in happened in the same order! That doesn't happen very often. I remember having another teacher teach my class in basic technology skills before I felt comfortable doing it alone. Now I am in stages 4 and 5 - using it as a relevant tool to facilitate learning, and finding new technology uses (which I am doing through this class). Still learning so much and have a super long way to go...
Lori Scott

Fuzzy on "widgets"

It could have something to do with the fact that I missed class the day this was covered, but I don't understand what widgets are...can anyone share some light and what they could be used for in education (or in regular life)?

Proquest Help

I am a first time Proquest user. I was successful in my search and located an article I wanted to read. I was able to get to the abstract, but couldn't see how to read the full text. Anyone know how to do this? Is my aura black today? I'm feeling like the last salmon trying to swim upstream! ----Karen

Praxis

I just took my first practice Praxis (yeah, me) and scored 72 out of 90. Not too bad. I missed 2 questions on MARC records - gee I wonder why. Lots of questions are exactly what we've been talking about so it's fresh. I'm more relaxed about it than ever. You are welcome to look at the practice test. (maybe I'll bring my computer to class Friday, and Jerry can burn the cds. I'm not so good at that.However, I did get a message that I was being charged for turning the page. What's up with that?

my portfolio (lame) is in. everything is complete except the final. I don't say that to add stress, but I can't believe i'm finished! Claire

More on AR

In response to Heidi's post, I think that AR could be used as just a small part of the reading curriculum. Sure, it's good incentive for some kids, but my youngest son had a horrible reading experience in 5th grade because of the way it was used. It was the ENITRE reading curriculum, and he couldn't keep up with earning the points many of his classmates earned, so I couldn't even get him to read because it had to be an AR book! The points were posted on a wall in the classroom; how is that for self-esteem?!

One more thing...

Oh, and I want to practice working on the simple blog I created to "fancy" it up a bit. Gotta know how to teach the kids, right?

What I Will Use

Well, Amy, thank you for asking that question! I am definitely going to use digital storytelling (and am still going to go to sites others have recommended for new ideas), student email and blogs, and Jerry's online notetaking form! :)
Lori Scott

Pyzam.com for Blogger Templates

Wow, I'm watching the finale of Celebrity Circus and it is SO intense, I just needed to take a break from the action and come here to share with all of you Blogger-lovin' people about Pyzam.com . Laurel asked me where I got my templates for my blogs and this is the place. Be sure you get what you want template wise before you add awesome widgets though, as these get wiped out when you get a new template, unless you are good enough with html code to prevent that from happening. :)

Anyhoo... you can get them for MySpace pages (Claire, did you hear that?) and other things too. There are LOTS of template options. :)

~Amy

*** No bears were harmed in the making of Celebrity Circus. ***

***Several humans were harmed, but they signed a release.***

What will you use?

So, realistically, what do you think you will take home and use that we have experienced in this class? There has been so much that has been new, but what has really jumped out as "Oh yeah baby, I'm totally gonna use that!"

Here are Amy's top 3:
1. Blogs (kind of a gimme, huh?)
2. VoiceThread
3. Survey websites

Reminder about Tomorrow night at Jerrol's

Don't forget: 6:30-9:00 @ Jerrol's Thursday. Free root beer floats (great for kidney stones) and great discounts on ALL items, not just school supplies. It's a fun time!

AR...I like it but...How do you handle teachers who pick up their classes and inspect their book choices to make sure that they are AR. We have a AR obsession...My compromise is that they can check out two-one needs to be AR. An easy thing for me to handle ar reading ranges is to a classroom set of index cards with students name, reading level and teacher. I spread them out before checkout and students turn them in to circulation desk after checking out. We keep them in classroom sets banded so they aren't lost. that seems to help manage the AR level quest esp. for the younger ones.

Do all of your libraries to check out to Kindergarten students? We don't- but check out boxes of books to their teachers.

I really do not want to have to evaluate students in the library through assessments etc. I do give a number 4321-dependent on behavior and participation.

How many of you are taking the Praxis next Saturday? And, How many of you have turned in your portfolios?

OK-I'm a bit overloaded now but just a question to you elementary librarians. How many of you have online databases for student researching? We currently do not have anything in place-I'm wondering if it is common and if we need to get it started. Thanks, Heidi

iGoogle

So, last week I blogged about iGoogle, which many of you have since discovered for our assignment. It is very cool, because you can totally personalize. Claire discovered books on it. The only thing I haven't been able to do yet is add links from outside of the multitude of Google offerings and gadgets. The gmail and Google Talk features are also really cool. I am slowly moving from my Comcast email to gmail because the gmail is so cool.

I....can't......breathe....panic....setting....in.

What is the simplest way to create a podcast? Has anyone had good luck with a particular site? Please send any hints asap. Otherwise, I will have to turn in a really sad assignment to Jerry. I will keep trying, but must move on to other work.

Bliki

Let's create the bliki! maybe it will be a money maker! Claire

The delicious site!

I figured out how to use this one this morning! Very cool! I only added two of my "favorites" to it so far, but thanks to Emily, will be adding great educational sites as soon as she emails them to me! I will also add many that Jean covered today. I can see how handy this site can be! Almost as "delicious" as chocolate with almonds!

outside comfort zone

Every time Jerry gives us a new assignment, I think I'll never be able to do it. But the amazing thing is, once I get into it and pass the frustration stage, I CAN do it! It must be like that "runner's high" (which I've never experienced! Could be because I never run.) where you get past the hard part and get to the smooth sailing part.

I LOVE This Stuff! but,

Does commenting to a post merit a credit the same as posting a post. It just that my computer is really slow, and I want a reason to take the time to read and comment on post, but I don't, today have time to do that, because I'm kind of busy. So do comments count?

Voice Thread

How many of you tried Voice Thread today? I began a project that I am using for my assignment and think it could be a useful lesson. So far I have only gotten a written comment with my picture uploaded and gotten a book cover posted, but I want to tool around on it with my MAC to elaborate on it. I also have to figure out how to get it so Jerry can look at it, but I haven't even looked at that yet! If you have, feel free to let a sister know! :)

Blogs!

How cool was that today, learing how to set up a new blog?! I especially liked how EASY it was to set it up, using a pre-template of course. I also liked that I could edit the template I chose and changed the color schemes. I can't wait to learn how to add pictures and clip art to make it more fancy!
Lori Scott

Congratulations!

Amy,
I'm so happy for you.
Best of luck to you all. Claire

Thanks Janet!!!

I for the life of me couldn't figure out how to start a new post...Janet guided me through the process and now I'm doing new posts!!! Happy Friday!!!

They are legally ours!!!

We got "the call" this morning and I am SOOOOO happy to announce that Elizabeth, Yaw, and Ellen are now legally Ferrells!  I am officially a mother to 5 beautiful children!  I will be traveling the day after classes finish (August 2) to meet my kids and file their immigration paperwork in Ghana!

OneNote

I just finished reading about electronic note taking in Chapter 12 of Beyond Technology. The author talked about using databases as a convenient way to label and sort research findings. I have a glimmer of a recollection that a Microsoft program called OneNote might be used for the same thing (and much more). Has anyone had experience using it?

Second thoughts

Oh, wait! Maybe with the "comments" area at the bottom of each post you can keep the thread of an idea together? I'll go back and see if I can figure this out....

Blog vs. Wiki

I've looked at the blog postings, and I like the fact that they show up and can't be changed. Too bad, though, that comments on the same topic (e.g. Boolean logic) don't stick together. So, it's nice to have the Wiki where postings on different topics go together. But, I don't really like the fact that anyone can change any part of it. Is there a hybrid out there - a Bliki, maybe?

Serious Stuff this Internet

My husband, back when he was practicing law, tracked down a little girl's true character by getting himself invited to her myspace. (he used an alias) His client an accused child sex offender got a pretty good plea bargain, because that girl had some crazy pictures on the internet. She looked like Hannah Montana in court.

Well it was good news for the Sughrua family. That guy got out of jail and paid his legal fees.

Seriously, the word is colleges are looking at these things.

boolean logic

I have a need for better understanding of Boolean logic. I know enough to kind of understand it but not be a very good teacher of it. I watched a librarian use kids ages and sexes to demonstrate. I would like to know of anyone has any good lessons. I could 'google' it and use logic to narrow my search, but as usual, I'm low on time! Let me know if you have any ideas. I know we're mostly frantically trying to get our blogs in for points, but I'd like some good info.

Rate your teacher blog

Elizabeth, I have heard that kids do say things on their myspace pages (which I realize is different from a blog) about teachers and have ratings and things. It's pretty scary. Also, kids don't think about how far and wide their postings can go. They post things that employers look at before hiring and things like that. I suppose this is more of a conversation about social networking rather than blogging, but it all kind of runs together to me.

LMnet

Has anyone subscribed to LMnet? I think there's probably a lot of good stuff on there, but I've heard nothing but scary stories about email overload!

Big 6

I remember when our district required all teachers to attend the Big6/Super 3 training and I totally dragged my feet. I felt like we were already doing these strategies in our classroom and somebody just came along and refined, compiled and named these steps - And is now getting paid millions! How many other things do we actually do in the classrom that we could get pattent for and also make more than a teacher salary!

curriculum mapping

If your buildings are able to have a literacy/reading coach and a math coach and a science coordinator-they will probably have this info in their files. i.e. reading themes for each grade levels-they can be a tremendous help and take some of the teacher work away. You could enter in given info-ask for additional info for other subject areas and check for accuracy.

inference in non-fiction

Inferences have been pounded into my school's kids in the fiction-I've never thought about how that skill in non-fiction is ignored. Next year is going to be very busy-so much I'm not doing.

Trash or Treasure:
What a cool idea-Has anyone taught that skill in your library classes? I will have to try that!

Misuse

I wonder about the misuse of blogs in the classroom. It seems to me that once you teach kids how to do this they will then start creating their own non school related blogs. It would make it easy to start a "cyberbully" blog or a rate my teacher blog. How do schools deal with that?

Re:Boolean?

They are words such as and, but and or. They are used when you search for something on the web using google or yahoo. overall they help you to limit the information or expand your search.

dewey explained to elementary kids

One way that I have had success with explaining the dewey system and arrangement of the non-fiction i s by reading The Shelf Elf-there is a great poem that we practice and I keep a copy of the poem by the non-fiction area to help them. It works great with your younger ones!

Boolean?

We've had the word Boolean in some of our readings. What is it?

OK, so now I'm wondering why my picture just shows up on one post?

Hmm, just answered my own question! Each post has a certain number in really light blue where you go to read the other posts! Glad you like my picture Jennifer, it was taken in the Bahamas in January on a snow day:)

Like Amy, I've also been wondering how all of this can be relevant in school. I can see using a blog for book talks, new books, etc., like she suggested. The problem I see, is how do you control the content? Also, I can't get to any kind of blog from a school computer!

I'm so new at this I'm also wondering, what happened to the posts from this morning where Jennifer called me a dork? :)
She told me you're supposed to make fun of each other on blogs.

How to use blogs for the library

What do you all think about different ways blogs can be used to enhance the library's ability to mass communicate?

I can picture lost of things to post like, weekly book reviews, what is new in the library, photos of student work, announcements of community events (at your library and around town), procedural changes,etc. Sure, much of this could be done on your website, but it is so much easier (from my experience) to pop into a blog than it is to get into the website to make changes. I am thinking I might have a prominent link to my blog for the "latest and greatest" from the library website. :)

~Amy Ferrell

I'm in Like Sin!

Never done this before; figured it out even when I had to go change my password!

Welcome To Our Blog!

Welcome students of EDCS 516: Media Utilization-Advanced Theories. This is our own personal Blog. We may use it to talk, share, discuss, muse, wonder, imagine etc. Anything to do with anything - as it relates to using media and living in the world of the CWU Library Endorsement Program. Please make use of this forum for fun, entertainment, education and edification.

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