SLJ's Leadership Summit: Tweet and Shout By SLJ Staff - 10/02/2009
More than 200 media specialists and leaders in the profession descended on Washington, DC, this weekend to talk about librarians as leaders of the 21st Century.
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Web Site in a Rush: H1N1 threatening, EdReady goes up fast By Steve Hargadon - 10/01/2009
If a pandemic or other significant event made it difficult or impossible for your students, staff, or teachers to physically attend school, how would you make sure that communication and education still take place? This is the question looming for educational institutions nationwide, given the potential of the H1N1 virus to disrupt or even close schools this year.
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Digital Resources for Kids Suffer in Tough Times By Lauren Barack - 09/29/2009
While public libraries continue to make tech-based educational resources a priority for K-12 students, digital services dipped last year as budgets were trimmed across the country, says a new study by the American Library Association (ALA).
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STEM to Grow in Libraries: Research project to get science content into media centers Lauren Barack - 09/01/2009
School librarians searching for a better way to broaden their science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) resources for K–12 students may soon have some innovative help. Marcia Mardis, an assistant professor at Florida State University, is embarking on a three-year project to build an RSS-like feed that she says will search Web sites and online libraries, pluck specific images and o...
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Site of the Month: First Day of School Icebreakers By Kathy Ishizuka - 09/01/2009
www.teachersfirst.com/firstday.cfm Ah, the first day of school. For students, educators, and parents alike, it’s a remarkable occasion, loaded with excitement, anticipation, and, yes, sometimes even a tear or two. To help get things off to a good start, the Web site TeachersFirst has created “First Day of School Icebreakers.
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Excuse Me. Do You Speak Digital?: Harvard's John Palfrey Explores What It's Like to Be a Digital Native By Christopher Harris - 09/01/2009
John Palfrey is one busy guy, with an impressive gig. In 2008, he was named the Henry N. Ess III Professor of Law and Vice Dean for Library and Information Resources at Harvard Law School. And when he’s not teaching courses on intellectual property and Internet law, there’s a good chance he’s overseeing the L school’s research library.
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Pen Ultimate: For kids who take part in National Novel Writing Month—the acid test for would-be authors—it's no guts, no glory By Lauren Barack - 09/01/2009
Kathleen Kohl was penning 2,000-word short stories at 12 years old and by 13 set her sights on writing a novel. In a move gutsy enough for any would-be writer, much less a teenaged one, Kohl last year signed on for National Novel Writing Month, an online contest, of sorts, that challenges all comers each November to complete a 50,000-word piece of fiction over 30 days.
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As Goes California: A Flawed Initiative Could Become a Fabulous Opportunity Brian Kenney, Editor-in-Chief - 09/01/2009
Digital textbooks, once the playthings of a few Arizona high schools, are suddenly looking like they might become commonplace. And that could end up being a great thing for school librarians and, more importantly, students. Back in May, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger announced the Free Digital Textbook Initiative, which would make open-source textbooks—for now just in science a...
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Web Archiving From a Kid’s Point of View By Lauren Barack - 08/31/2009
Could 22nd-century researchers think of the Captain Underpants Web site as source material? They might if kids taking part in the K-12 Web Archiving Program decide they want to preserve it for future generations.
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San José Public Launches Text a Librarian By Lauren Barack - 08/28/2009
Students in San José, CA, can now text local librarians reference questions on everything from the Gettysburg Address to the definition of an isosceles triangle, thanks to a newly launched pilot program.
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A 2.0 Toolkit: A hand-picked set of free Web programs to take to school this fall By Shonda Brisco - 08/01/2009
Regardless of the subscription databases that are available in your library, there's always a sense of professional satisfaction when you're able to access and utilize free software programs to create an entirely new way to engage your users or fulfill a need. For some librarians, 2.0 tools have become a major component of their instructional day, virtually a "must-have" within their profession...
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Face-to-Face Goes Web 2.0: Enhance in-person events with these social tools By Steve Hargadon - 08/01/2009
Every year, right before NECC, I hold a free, one-day event for educators interested in using 2.0 tools called EduBloggerCon. This unique conference is organized by the attendees (the 2009 class pictured), who, using a wiki, sign up to lead a discussion of their choice. Sound like chaos? It’s not.
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Sticky Standards: AASL requires permission to use 21st-C standards sparking backlash Lauren Barack - 08/01/2009
The American Association of School Librarians’ (AASL) decision to require permission—and potentially a fee—to commercially use its Standards for the 21st-Century Learner (bit.ly/lWd9B) has generated ire among its members. “At first I was annoyed, but now getting mad,” posted librarian Beth Frise on Twitter.
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Get Ready for Google Wave By Christopher Harris - 08/01/2009
Over the past few years, Google has changed the way we search. Later this year, the search giant is going to reinvent how we communicate and share online with its new Google Wave application. To get a good feeling for what Google Wave’s about, imagine that your email program got a bit hungry and ate your instant-messaging client.
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My First NECC: The big tech show still resonates for two first-timers Kathy Ishizuka - 08/01/2009
NECC, the big National Educational Computing Conference, has come and gone, but attendees, both in person and virtual, are still basking in the glow of all that sharing (bit.ly/dbGY5). School librarians Keisa Williams of Monarch Academy, a K–5 charter school in Oakland, CA, and Melissa Techman of Broadus Wood Elementary School in Albemarle Co.
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More Media, But Less TV for Teens By Lauren Barack - 07/20/2009
A new study says that while teens are turning to TV and radio programming far less often, they’re consuming more media, the digital kind, that is. So says a new report from Morgan Stanley, which turned to its 15-year-old summer intern Matthew Robson to write the study, “How Teenagers Consume Media,” assuming that since he is a teen, he would know.
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Maine Expands Its School Laptop Program By Lauren Barack - 07/16/2009
The Maine Learning Technology Initiative, which aims to supply a computer for all middle and high school students, is one step closer with an additional 66,000 MacBooks ordered for the 2009-2010 school year—and educators say the program has helped spotlight the importance of media centers.
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Library Media Specialists Represent at NECC Kathy Ishizuka - 07/10/2009
NECC, the National Educational Computing Conference, drew more than 13,500 attendees despite a depressed economy, including many library media specialists, who continue to have a presence at the largest ed-tech event in the country.
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