Time for Some Professional Reading ...

Did you read Charlie Naylor's 21st Century Learning: Widening the frame of focus and debate: A BCTF research discussion paper yet?   We are thrilled to have the BCTLA Points of Inquiry document both cited and quoted.  And if you are really attentive to details in reading Charlie’s paper, you will recognize the work that Sylvia has been involved in at Livingstone and the citation that includes her name.

In particular, Charlie heralds the ways in which education K-12 is being transformed by technology but cautions us to attend to the ways in which the messages about 21st Century Learning are being shaped.  They are steeped in some old understandings, such as de-schooling, and do not attend to such 21st C educational priorities such as social justice and sustainability or give credit to the many places that change is already under way in our schools. 

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Here are two documents that are must-reads -- certainly the latter is a must-scan -- as your school plans for technology and 21st Century learning:  

• From Ed Leadership this month, an issue entitled "Teaching Screenagers": A technology plan that works.  Guess what, you have to start with the teaching and learning ... then you select the the toys and tools that work best to achieve best practice.  Any plan that is founded on a brand name or a product is doomed to fail.

• The EL article above alludes to the North Carolina IMPACT media and technology integration approach which is fantastic.  It's a huge read at 347 pages but my quick review was that it would be worth spending some time on its important ideas.  In his Introduction to the document, Chairman of the NC State Board of Education Howard N. Lee writes:

We know that school library media and instructional technology programs are the foundation of a 21st Century education. The access to information that these programs afford makes the difference between the textbook-bound classroom of the past and the far-reaching, resource-based curriculum of today and tomorrow. Research tells us that instructional technology, used appropriately, results in higher test scores.  It is remarkably effective in sparking student interest, increasing motivation, and raising self-esteem, thus positively impacting student achievement. Research also tells us that a school library media center that provides up-to-date, accurate, and attractive resources managed by a professional school library media coordinator who collaborates with teachers to augment and enhance classroom instruction also results in increased test scores, especially in reading. IMPACT reflects both the reality of this research and the commitment to assuring that every teacher and student has the academic and personal advantage of access to these high quality programs.

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Feeling a need for some research on reading, literacy, and second language learning?  Thanks, Drs Annette Lamb and Larry Johnson, for the wonderfully deep Eduscapes site and these links on The School Library Media Specialist site to the significant work of Stephen Krashen.

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The 2011 Horizon Report produced annually by the New Media Consortium (That's Larry Johnson again) and Educause has just been released.  Here is one of many discussions of what are the 6 Top Trends in Technology identified in the Report.  



... Some Technology Research ...

Useful tools and resources to review and share:

• I am liking this Comox Valley English teacher Tara Colborne's blog for her Grade 11s.  Share this with colleagues.  And I couldn't agree more about the usefulness of blogging as a tool for reading and writing.  Here's an article from Ed Week:  Tech Tools Boost Literacy.
   
• WebList (create a list of URLs, images, documents, videos at a single web address to share with friends, students, colleagues) which I think has tons of instructional value.  Register to keep your discrete lists available.  Here's a great example:  Copyright-friendly Images

• The E-Book Directory for fine literature from around the world:  see the right-hand sidebar for links to YA and Children's Lit.  

• Online Maps - a definitive list of map sources available online, from the Library at Carleton University, including this one that is the subject of much tweeting this weekend:  Show/MappingWorlds.  You select a subject from the top menu and watch the countries on the map change their size. Instead of land mass, the size of each country will represent the data for that subject --both its share of the total and absolute value.

... and Some Professional Development 

Here's hoping we will see you at:

• District Technology Day Supporting Learning Through Technology on Friday, February 18.  It's at JO (8:30 to 1:30, $15) and will feature several workshops with and for TLs, including Denise doing Prezi, Aaron doing Social Media, Frances doing Blogging with Jacob (secondary science and literacy mentor) and Pawan (primary teacher and former literacy mentor), and Michele and I on Points of Inquiry as the impetus for building the school-wide plan for technology integration with teaching and learning.  Yep, that's right:  Michele is BACK!  Looking forward to seeing you there.
  
  REGISTER NOW: Supporting Learning Through Technology

• Winter Tonic:  All Wrapped Up ... February 22 at Van Tech.  Keynote Dr Eric Myers from SLAIS at UBC will discuss Social Networking.  Cheriee is presenting Book Trailers; Pat, Human Libraries; as usual, expect Adult Reads, and more.  There will be a Q & A panel for new TLs.  If you can`t find the registration form, contact Mark at Cunningham.  Send $40 to Jan at False Creek (includes VTLA membership) - $20 for out-of-district registrants.

• YSL6:  School Library Advocacy: Evidence and Image / March 4 to 18 / Check for information here.  The list of speakers includes BIG names, like Gary Hartzell, Keith Curry Lance, Stephen Krashen, and Buffy Hamilton. 

What's New This Week?

Twenty-two newly trained TOCs, possibly the best-trained you've ever seen, qualified for call-out to school libraries. With a full agenda over two after-school sessions -- four hours -- this week, these keen educators new to Vancouver schools learned about Horizon, shelving, databases, planning collaboratively, using library cards, finding borrowers, and more. A few of the trainees are still at UBC (student teachers who are getting ready to jump in as TOCS to school libraries in September) -- now that's keen! A huge thanks to Denise, Gwen, and David for an amazing job of piling on the learning and, well, everyone seemed to like the snacks as well. Over 40 TOCs have been trained this year, and we are still getting calls asking about the next session!

Refreshments -- I have learned these are an important part of TL get-togethers. There are TLs who decide whether or not they are coming only after phoning me to find out what is being served. This week's feature items were the red pepper hummus and toasted pita chips as well as the ginger cookies with grapes from Costco. One of those calls about the menu has resulted in the change in the Starbucks coffee order to de-caf, as noted above! Cheriee got up early on Thursday morning to make a fantastic chocolate mousse.


We finished a second Spring Weeding workshop with lots of joyful chatter and more great refreshments. What a great group and fun experience. David showed half the group how to create the Discard IGE and one that tells the age of your collection while the other half of us weeded.






Where Cheriee had been loathe to consider pulling 1800, she is now talking 5 000 with some conviction. Here are some of us considering the art of pulling:

Julia has proven to be an excellent student of TL'ship!

She has just the right amount of obeisance, I'm sure you'll agree, Chris.

That may -- I repeat, may -- be Cheriee putting something back!

The first week for me and for my new friend, teacher Yvette, was much easier than the second. Yvette and I had no problem weeding old sports books. But sports are followed by poetry and, as we moved along this week into the poetry section, we knew we were going to face challenges. In fact, five of us debated what makes an old poetry book worth keeping: we discussed names of editors, writers, and illustrators, quality and colour in the illustrations, the lack of illustrations, what was sticking to the pages, the age, sanitary characteristics, and reader appeal of the grimy fingerprints, and of course, the copyright date and recent use of the book; we set a few old ones aside for repair, so charming were the poems or the illustrations; many didn't make it past our group scrutiny and were sent summarily to the deepening discard pile.

Everyone agreed it was a good experience. Meanwhile, back at the mothership, Irina reports a growing interest in weeding ... TLs are calling for reports on their collections in record numbers and venturing into sections in need of thinning with a sense of discovery and adventure.

One attendee at Thursday evening's session pointed out that Doug Johnson, in the article I had given out for reading last week, states that an unweeded collection signifies nothing more than ... well, read for yourself .... "Weed!" by Doug Johnson (Head for the Edge, Library Media Collection, Sept/Oct 2003).