School Librarian Check Out

I haven't written a list of the things I've been checking out so here it is:

Reading:
Ally Condie Matched. There was an article on this book and on Ally Condie in SLJ and I had to pick it up. I loved Hunger Games so I thought I have some high expectations. On the back of the jacket it also mentions Twilight (cringe) so hopefully it's better written.

Graham Bowley No Way Down: Life and Death on K2 - I love these kinds of books. Also, this came highly recommended from students and Ambookgeek.

Clay Shirky Cognitive Surplus

Survey of EBook Penetration and Use in the US School (K-12) Libraries - you can download it for your appropriate library. If our school is any indicator, ebooks are where it's at (FINALLY)

Listening:
Jeff Lindsey Dexter By Design. This is making me want to watch the show.

Highly Recommend:
You check out the Midwinter 2011 Tech Trends wrap-up presentation archived at ALA Techsource - so worth watching. Lots of interesting things - the Library in the Cloud is one of the things I'm interested in. Plus, @griffey 's gadget report. That alone makes it worth watching. I love gadgets even though I can't afford them! But at least I can drool over them :)

Also, read about this Librarian game on the Speak Quietly blog. What a great way to teach kids about how to shelve books. Actually, and parent volunteers. I want to use it next year for our call numbers lesson. I played it on Library Goddess' iphone. It was so fun! Except you need a bigger screen because some of the call numbers are hard to see. I say we get iPads for our library lessons. Wouldn't it be great to also have them using Noodle tools or some similar tool as well especially since after we started using LibGuides our database and ebook use is up pretty much 2 fold!

Book Drops: Nonfiction Mondays "Emily Post's Table Manners for Kids" (rated 4 stars)

Emily Post's Table Manners for Kids

by Cindy Post Senning

It's Nonfiction Mondays! For the round up, please visit SimplyScience Blog, who is hosting this week. Also, I cannot put my nonfiction mondays label because I'm dog sitting and I don't think it's appropriate to download stuff on other people's computers. But I'll use the computer...

Anyway, this week I'm featuring, Emily Post's Table Manners for Kids. I never was formally trained proper table manners as a kid, there are some things that just seem common sense but as a kid, I grew up using a spoon and fork to eat or learning to eat with my hands. For the longest time, I thought that was normal, well, it was normal in the Philippines and other Filipino households I hung out in. So, it was interesting reading this book on table manners.

It was a very informative and entertaining read that is geared towards 5th grade to middle schoolers and contains equally amusing illustrations. One of tips is how to properly pierce a cherry tomato and the illustration shows someone who’s bit into a tomato and accidentally squirts the person seated next to him. As an adult, I still learned some things, like how to properly eat soup in public. I honestly had no idea that you scoop away from yourself. Also, who can keep straight the proper location of all those utensils, cups, salad plates, etc. Well, now I can because the Posts’ lay it out very nicely and easily. Definitely a great book for children and adults!

See more about Emily Post's Table Manners for Kids

Safety in the Children's Library

On Saturday, a man was arrested for trying to lure kids out of the library by telling them that he had a puppy and he wanted to show it to them. The older you get, the more distance you have from those old PSAs and educational movies we watched in Elementary school. However, working with children, it is still such a real danger. This is just a reminder to be aware. Get to know the kids who go to your library so that they are comfortable enough to tell you when someone is acting strange or making them feel uncomfortable. A coworker thwarted this attempted kidnapping by being aware and approachable.

However, I am not saying that we, as librarians, are the only ones who need to be responsible for the well-being of our youngest patrons. Parents need to be there. They need to not assume that librarians are there to babysit their children. They need to educate their kids on some harsh realities and give kids strategies on what to do if this happens to them. Yes, sometimes they laugh at those PSAs "stranger danger! stranger danger!" But this is twice that I have heard of and seen on the news that that call has helped a kid stay out of harm's way.

Here are some links:
Safefromharmvideo.com - they have a good video to watch with your kids and it's free!
The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children
The National Alert Registry - you can keep aware of child predators in your neighborhood
The LAPD or your local police department
McGruff - the National Crime Prevention Council (as a kid, I loved McGruff)
Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention - great resources for parents, kids and educators, etc.

Living like a Hermit

The last couple of weeks I feel like I have pretty much just holed up in my studio and have not gone out much. Granted, I have been sick and I put my self on a pretty tight budget (I've gotta save money for China) - so I ended up reading a whole lotta books. I try to write little book talks here and I was going to try to be ambitious and do mini movies but I think that may be a little too much for me at the moment.

I also have been in a locked in my headspace kind of place so I tend to not want to be around people...

But here is a list of what I have finished reading. I always wondered how those librarians who give those book talk workshops do it and now I know. (1) they don't sleep
(2) they don't go out
(3) they don't have tv (or they do and they don't really like to watch it)
or
(4) they have tv but only receive 1 channel so really what is the point? (that's me!)

Here are books I have finished:

• Ancient Philosophers by Don Nardo. This 110 page book is a brief introduction to ancient philosophy and covers both the east and the west. Nardo focuses on Democritus, Plato, Aristotle, Buddha and Confucius but he also mentions Socrates, Thales and Theophrastus. It contains maps of where these different philosophers lived in relation to one another as well as illustrations and depictions of these men. He pulls out the main questions that each philosopher focused on, writes on their childhood and lives as well as each man's contributions. In the end, there are passages attributed to each philosopher that asserts their contributions or views on things Nardo mentions in the earlier chapters. For example, Nardo writes about how Aristotle believed that slavery was natural and excerpts a passage from Politics to support this point. For Buddha, Nardo emphasized that Buddha focused on suffering and the passage is about how evildoers will not go unpunished. It is short but filled with a lot of good information and a great list for those interested in reading more. As always, Nardo is very accessible for those of us who are not philosophy majors or experts.
• The Boy Who Dared by Susan Campbell Bartoletti. This is based the true story of a German boy named Helmuth Hubener, who at age 16 was tried and executed by the Nazis for spreading "propaganda" on the truth about the war. Bartoletti interviewed Hubener's friends, 2 of who helped him spread his fliers and also were tried with him. It is told with Hubener in prison counting down the days to his execution looking back at his life. His family was very patriotic towards Germany. It is another perspective, one that I do not think we really acknowledge. The Germans who were against Hitler but also loved their country. Life and decisions are much more complicated than they seem. Bartoletti also included photographs of Hubener, his family and his friends.
  
• When You Are Engulfed In Flames by David Sedaris. This was much better than Dress Your Family In Corduroy and Denim. Sedaris again takes us on a hilarious ride as we catch glimpses of his life with Hugh and his family and living in France and then in Japan. The last tale focuses on Sedaris' quitting smoking. I can say that I know exactly how he was feeling except I did not spend $20,000 to do it. I really enjoyed his stories of following Hugh, who sounds like he's a speed walker, and his quest to quit smoking and his impressions of people. One of my favorite stories is about a plane ride where he doesn't want to give up his seat. His lozenge ends up somewhere awkward. You read it to find out where and what happens.
  

Also in my hermitude, I watched a couple of movies, which at the moment, I cannot remember any of the titles of..One of them was "27 dresses" - meh. Also watched "There Will Be Blood" - I don't get the big deal. Why all the hype? Daniel Day Lewis' character, Daniel, is an a--hole but I guess, it was a masterful performance of an a--hole. Then I watched some old favorites, like "Kinky Boots."

Character Building - Do you have book suggestions?

I mentioned earlier that this school year's theme was about "character." Today, I was reading Read Write Web's post on books that can build character. It is a short list but pretty diverse with books by Murakami (my personal favorite) and Lance Armstrong, not only books on technology or business.

What books would you include on a list related to building character?

I have been thinking about what I have read this past year and I think I would include:

• Paul Newman & A.E. Hotchner - Shameless Exploitation
• Greg Mortenson & David Oliver Relin - Three Cups of Tea
• Randy Pausch - The Last Lecture
• Bethany Hamilton - Soul Surfer

I will look through my list but if you have any suggestions please comment and I will create a display in the library related to the theme.

Book Challenge: Read a Banned Book

It is Banned Books week - Sept 29 to Oct. 6.
Learn about why it came to be here.
I also thought that with the whole Palin banning book controversy, the issue is back in the limelight.

Here is the challenge. Pick a banned book. Read it and then post a comment here if you want about the book you read and why you think it was added to the list. I am curious to see what people about some of the books. You can agree, disagree - just don't be rude or obnoxious.

Here is a link to ALA's Banned Books page. They have a number of different lists to check out.

Last year, Chris Crutcher, author of Whale Talk and Deadline, visited our school during Banned Books week. He is one of the most challenged authors because his books actually deal with issues and are not all light and vapid.

Here is a list of the top 10 challenged authors:
1) Robert Cormier
2) Peter Parnell and Justin Richardson
3) Mark Twain
4) Toni Morrison
5) Philip Pullman
6) Kevin Henkes
7) Lois Lowry
8) Chris Crutcher
9) Lauren Myracle
10) Joann Sfar

That should help you get started.

I think I am going to read Walter Dean Myers' newest book, Sunrise over Fallujah. I think that might make the list this year.

Pop-Up: Blocked Blocked Blocked - the joys of filtering

Filtering as defined in Wikipedia is "the process of filtering for information or patterns using techniques involving collaboration among multiple agents, viewpoints, data sources, etc."
Recently, I was informed that they would no longer be filtering at my lovely place of employment. However, what has been happening when I try to look at my Clipmarks page? Blocked! Blocked! Blocked! I am getting so frustrated by it because these are valid sites that I am bookmarking and clipping for school. This is not the only site that's still being blocked too. There are other things that I cannot access that I am a shocked to see it not accessible.

Will Richardson recently blogged about filtering at a school he spoke at and he made a great point - in order for us to learn how to use the web, we need to be able to use the web!
We have a new Integration Specialist who is advocating moves that put the responsibility on the students and the teachers. I hope it works out. I am a little fed up with how generations are losing their ability to take responsibility for their own actions. Yes, you need to monitor and you need to take those opportunities to teach what is proper and improper use of school resources but filtering is not the answer.

Blue Skunk Blog also mentioned earlier about how filtering is another form of censorship, which I also agree with. So much information, like political blogs or news videos, are being filtered in addition to sites that are supposedly "bad."

I am hoping that the filtering is over so I can do my job and access those articles and news stories that are relevant to this job.

"Middle School Library Geeks" Podcast On Its Way!!!

I am so excited. A couple of my students, who have dubbed themselves the "library geeks," are interested in creating a podcast. We were supposed to meet this week but I have the flu and missed our first meeting. Of course, the sponsor of the project ends up having the flu. Hopefully, next week we will be able to meet and create something to share here or some where else. I still need to figure it out because it is a middle school.

This year, at IL 2007, I attended the "Podcasting and Videocasting Bootcamp" hosted by David Free and David Lee King. It was a very informative workshop where they showed the attendees how to create podcasts and videocasts as well as discussed the types of equipment needed and where to host these projects. I was really excited about creating a podcast but then I lost a bit of momentum because of the class load I have at the beginning of the year. It is a time-consuming and also getting students onboard has proved to be a bit difficult because even if they are interested, they are just as busy as we are. Hopefully, this works out. We will meet once a week to record and then probably take a bit of time to edit. I am hoping we have a segment a week. Am I being too ambitious?

Podcast Wiki by David Free:
http://davidfree.pbwiki.com/il2007

Feeling a little overwhelmed

I have not been able to post at all. I wanted to post more often and also write a bit about the IL conference but I just keep running out of time. I think I need a secret hour, like in Westerfeld's Midnighters series, so I can just catch up on reading and writing.

Some cool things I am checking out:

• Flock - social web browser
  
• My Pop Studio - for digital literacy and critical thinking skills amongst middle school girls
• reading SLJ about Twitter & Libraries

That's about it for now. One day I will catch-up. Hopefully.

Google Sketch-Up and the Classroom : How would you use it?

I was reading Boing Boing today and Mark Frauenfelder linked to a review of Google Sketch For Dummies by Aidan Chopra and I thought I should write about the Google Sketch-Up club.

The image on the left is one of the first buildings on our students created using Sketch-Up. He is a lot more skilled at using it than I am and the things he creates get more and more incredible over time. So, this is just to give you some idea of what the students are doing with it.

Currently, it is only a club but a couple of weeks ago one of our teachers approached me about using Google Sketch-Up in conjunction with Google Earth for a class project. I thought it was a great idea, I just was not sure how to implement it. However, I was impressed last club meeting when one student decided to try to re-create the Step Pyramid of Djoser.

However, currently, some of the students simply use Google Sketch-Up as a fun "game." They build things like snowmen, draw it in or just create really fantastic buildings. However, some students take it all very seriously and are have created some amazing cities. They have utilized the "warehouse" and download people, buildings, cars and whatever else is available. It is extremely time-consuming for more elaborate projects but I think for say a project on Ancient Civilizations, students could include a sketch-up model in a slide show or other type of presentation.

Another point of interest is that a lot of girls are using Google sketch-up. Normally, boys are the only ones interested in trying these things out but it has been great seeing more girls creating buildings or other things in the lab.

It would be interesting to see if we could get some visitors in to talk to students about architecture and 3D rendering.

I am not sure how else we could use Google Sketch-Up but if anyone out there has any thoughts or have used it already, I would be interested in hearing what has or will be done.

RSS Aggregators & the Classroom

I just looked at the Shifted Librarian's post "New York Times Figures Out Aggregators" and it made me start thinking about a recent RSS aggregator lesson Ambookgeek created for the journalism class. I was lucky enough to be included in teaching this lesson but the credit all goes to Ambookgeek.

It was interesting that S.L. points out that people will not know that it is "RSS" but how they described "My Times" is the part of the definition of what RSS aggregators are. Check out this RSS in Plain English youTube video for a cool explanation.The NYT states:

What is My Times?
My Times is a free service that lets you create a personalized page with what you like best in The New York Times and your favorite sites and blogs from all over the Web. This personalized service makes it easy to read all that you like, from one central place.

I decided to to check out the New York Times' "My Times" feature and wondered if it would be more appropriate for a classroom setting. Looking at it, I do not see how it is any different from My Yahoo or iGoogle except that you can get NYT journalists suggestions.

I am wondering about possibly using something like MyTimes or iGoogle, because of the filters that have been installed on the school computers. Our journalism teachers were interested in using Bloglines, but the word "blog" seems to be one of the words that is filtered. Ambookgeek suggested introducing aggregators because the students need to read a number of different types of news stories and thought it would be a great way to (1) show them aggregators and (2) set them up with a one stop shop for news stories that they could "star" or "keep as new." Would the NYT's aggregator be a way to bypass the filtering software? It is obvious, that these personalized pages are becoming more and more mainstream but how can we utilize it for the classroom?