Going on a summer holiday

For those who can afford it Novel Holidays looks very appealing. Not only do they do literature trips but they also propose the kind of holidays that people can then go and write a novel about.

Great fun.

As for me - it will be a summer at home, then at my folks bach at Rangitata - reading books of course while my guys fish for salmon.

Getting Kids to read...

Working on WEb 2.0 for school libraries

It has been my week for inspiration from colleagues. At a School Library Network meeting I met Jill McGregor from Glenfield College. She has just begun a library wiki for her school library. She wants it kept quiet for a while but it looks great. Then when I get to school on Wednesday i find a colleague in Australia wants to work on web 2.0 for school libraries - some training, skills, examples type things.

It is great to look at each other's work, to assist each other learn new technologies and apply them successfully to our libraries.

So what have we got that can be used in school libraires? Let's begin some lists
Wikis are great for collaborative learning
Delicious for classes bookmarking useful sites for research
Blogs for sharing views and information
Flickr for sharing photos
You tube and teacher tube for video

That's just to start off the top of my head. I wonder about trying twitter to track research progress or for staff to log what they are doing over a week to see if you need to increase library staffing.

By the way there are a few changes I want to make to this blog page but I need to spend longer than two minutes to figure out how to do that and at this time of the year.... so when I do I will add the Hub and artichoke

Sound of one hand typing

Welcome back to term four. So far for me it has been quite a challenge personally. I have injured my right hand so no writing or blogging for a couple of weeks.

We have changed library software and now use AccessIt. This is a great programme but of course with any data transfer there are a few technical hitches.

We have had two very large rocks through library windows at the start of this week AND as if that wasn't enough smashing I had a small car accident (no injuries just me feeling really stupid).

Hope to blog more next week. Happy long weekend - read a good book...

Book bites for the holidays

Week 7: Creating a community of readers. The workshop I mentioned last week also included staff. Here at TGS we try to develop a community of staff readers by inviting everyone to have morning tea in the library in the last week of term and choose some holiday reading. we pull out all the adult fiction and non fiction (one of the joys of working in a high school library is we can buy adult fiction) and place it on the tables. Staff cruise the tables and displays and shelves, drinking coffee, eating our home baking and sharing thoughts about the books they have read. Some thing we started four years ago has now become a tradition.

I am off for two weeks for a happy holiday.

So we would rather read....

Week 6: There were several workshops on Book Clubs - I went to one led by a librarian, Hsieh Shu-His from Taiwan. She organised her whole school to run class book clubs and a staff book club. That got me thinking about running a class book club next year with my English class. Actually Hsieh's achievement was huge as her high school was one that focussed on vocational training only - so the idea of book clubs was very ambitious.

We do have a book club here at TGS. We have four year 9 students who have been wonderful and recently a German exchange student has joined us as well. We linked up with the Book Lady and have read three titles through her service. The students really like to all read the same book at the same time. The Book Lady provides copies of the book and some great discussion questions. She also e-mails the students with discussion questions. The students found the e-mails a but limiting because they couldn't see what each other were saying to the Book Lady so we set up a wiki space. The Book Lady is a member but I am sure if you asked her she would note as I have that the space has gone very quiet recently.

I have to confess that with being away at conference and being ill the last two weeks I have neglected my wonderful book club. They have become very good at leading their meetings on their own. This is something the book Lady encourages. I asked them add to the discussions on the wiki but last Wednesday after school they preferred to sit in the fiction area and read their books. Looks like for some students the novelty of web 2.0 is already waning and they would rather sit together and read good books.

I will ask them if I can add a photo of them... watch this space.

The monkeys are on our side

Week 5 - Evidenced based practice is the way to go and a lot of the best changes we have made in our school library have come from data gathered in our annual library survey of students and staff.
While at conference I attended a number of workshops based on research papers. Some of the data had been gathered by using electronic surveys.

Our school has bought a license for Survey Monkey - though there are parts of this website that you can use for free. I am looking forward to using NO paper and having the monkeys analyze my survey. This week I have been given the password and have a library folder. Survey Monkey here I come...

If a tree falls....

in the forest and no one is there to hear it does it make a sound? If some one posts an article to a blog and no one comments on it ......

No not my blog.

Week 4: Read and make a comment on an article in 'School Libraries Worldwide' ezine. One of the sessions I attended at conference was "Sparking a worldwide conversation on School Libraries 2.0" by Marlene Asselin and Ray Doiron of Canada. Marlene and Ray are co editors of School Libraries Worldwide special topic issue on New Learners, New Literacies and New Libraries. Already this magazine has been the subject of a post on the New Zealand Librarians listserv. The post encouraged people to read the articles.

I read Ross Todd's article

Article 2: Youth and their Virtual Networked Worlds: Research Findings and Implications for School Libraries

which was challenging to me in several ways. I won't discuss all of that here because I did post a comment. I guess my issue is this - it is the first comment. Does that mean no one is reading the articles - I'd like to think not. Does it mean no one is willing to post a comment - probably. Are discussions harder on an online environment like a blog? Are some online environments more conducive to discussions? The article did raise some things for me to work through in my school - thanks Ross.

I saw this line on a teeshirt when I was in Phoenix, Arizona recently "If a man speaks in a desert, and no women are around to hear him, is he still wrong?" Perhaps we could come up with something pithy for what happens if a blogger posts a blog and no one comments.....

Citation Centre - thanks to Berkeley High

Week 3. We went to visit Berkeley High library and there I found the citation centre. It is a clever way to encourage students to write up accurate bibliographies. My version of it is here. On the left are cards. One for books, one for periodicals, one for the Internet and one for encyclopedias. Students fill in a card for each item they use in their research. They may well end up with 8 - 15 cards, depending on how many resources they consult. Then they use the bibliography guide on the right to put the cards into the correct order. Once that is done they can write up a very accurate bibliography for their research. Senior students are using this already.

Libraries can end all literacy crises forever

Week 2 I shared with our EHSAS group about ICDL and about Stephen Krashen's key note address - How libraries can end all literacies crises forever.

Stephen Krashen has been researching how children learn to read and improve their reading comprehension. He advocates "Free Voluntary Reading". Stephen's website is a treasure trove of research papers, great ideas and he believes in making as much of his work available to people through the Internet.

Stephen says that the best thing we can do to assist learners improve their reading comprehension is to encourage them to read - anything they want - no strings attached. No book reports, end of book tests, no activities - just read, things you like to read, and read some more.

Also he encouraged us to drink more coffee, learn a foreign language and READ - to keep our minds alive. His best way to do this - go to coffee shop and read a great book in another language. Quite a challenge.

International Children's Digital Library

Week One was to make time to share with one of the ESOL teachers about the ICDL.

Ann Weeks gave a key Note address about this amazing resource. She was told it could never happen but she made it happen anyway - an International Children's book digital library which has books from a wide range of countries and languages. What a great educator she is - don't you just love people who go ahead and do the impossible?

I cannot take a lot of time to describe it - best you go and have a look. Sign in - join up and use it. It is brilliant. It is free - it is FULL of possibilities.

Do one IASL thing each week

- that does scare me, apologies to Eleanor Roosevelt who apparently said "Do one thing everyday that scares you."

I was privileged to attend the IASL conference in Berkeley, this month. Upon my return home to NZ I have decided to try to do one thing each week that relates to the things I learned, discussed and thought about while at conference. There is so much it can feel overwhelming to try to implement it all in one go. One thing a week is the goal and so far so good - I have had three weeks back at school and I have managed to do three things that relate to conference - one a week.

Subject Association Conferences - little gems for the holidays

I have just spent the last two and half days at the NZATE conference hosted here at TGS. My mind is buzzing with new ideas, strategies and inspiration for the work I do.

Thank you to the organisers, the key note speakers and the workshop presenters. I am in awe of your generosity with your time, skills and resources.

Now I feel I can go on holiday - virtuous in the knowledge that I have worked well and hard on my teaching craft already these holidays.

Here is a little gem to help navigate the textual sea for the rest of the year. Published in Teacher Magazine, an article on the short and happy lives of teachers.

In the article the writer challenges teachers to summarise their lives in six words. The one I really relate to after this conference is "Exercised the muscle of the mind"

23 things on a stick

There is a great blog on web2.0 for librarians with training links called 23 things on stick. Go have a look. It starts with how to create a blog and goes on to collaborative creation and other wonderful things web 2.0 offers users. It has a great library focus.

Like a yo yo I guess

and I'm back again

Apparently good bloggers never draw attention to any lapse in their regular blogging - not that you could accuse me of being a regular blogger YET.

Where did I get this good advice? From North X East a website which offers weekly advice for bloggers and how to blog. You can subscribe and get the weekly post sent direct to your inbox.

Go Mums in Washington State - now for New Zealand...

After a long pause, a great summer holiday and a crazy, busy start to the school year I have decided to continue with this blog.

The latest source of inspiration came this morning through the listserv I belong to LM-NET. Some Mums in Washington State have successfully lobbied their state politicians to fund school libraries. They have a website which shows what they are up to. Other states are forming their own fund our future lobby groups.