A Month on the Pro D Circuit

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The End of a 9-Day Conference?

For some of us, it has just begun. It was hard to get into the Transforming School Libraries Online Conference, to find the time to stay current on the presentations, and to learn our ways around. We will be in much better shape for the next one, I can assure you. Occasionally as I popped in an out of places, I virtually ran into people I knew. Thankfully, the conference will remain "up" for us to poke around and consider the artifacts for a month or two longer, and I found some fascinating things.

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But first, you just have to listen to and watch this beautiful international/global video version of the song Stand By Me where, performing together but in vastly separate stages, are artists from around the world. There is a youtube version of this, but the original and other songs performed on the global stage and the articulation of a vision of peace through music are found on the Playing for Change website. I found this, as I wandered through information about various conference presenters, on Edmonton TL Arlene Lipkewich's short-lived blog. She challenged her students to consider the youtube version (both blog and youtube are Web 2.0 tools) and the way in which it was created.

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As I started to say, some of us were just a little overwhelmed by arriving just-in-time at the very complicated Sosius platform and the various places and formats in which information and conversations were happening. I really enjoyed Arlene's voicethread presentation on various Technologies for Learning, old and new. In this Web 2.0 presentation, we looked at how hardware, software, and 'webware' can be used for both teacher and student learning. Now there remains no evidence I attended the session as I didn't actually log in, just observed and kept an eye on the discussions ... but you will find others we know there, like Pat from Gladstone and Karen from Victoria too.

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Arriving at a presentation a few days late didn't matter as participation was asynchronous. Notice that some of the participants in this discussion presented themselves in text and others used audio features. This was my first ever voicethread discussion; I think it offered a great learning opportunity for many of the conference attendees and you will see and hear their learning as they go along. While this is ultimately a long presentation and discussion, it is really interesting: how might this format be useful for working with teachers as well as students?

I also participated in a regional meeting of the westcoast conference attendees using a webtool new to me called Mobee. Needless to say, it cannot be accessed through our district filters as it is a chat program, or so we discovered at the TL Studio this week ... but you can enter the chat rooms at home using any chat tool. That is, you don't have to be using the same tool. I don't chat much but my gmail has chat capacity, so in I went to the "tsl" (transforming school libraries) chat room for a fun two hours of library-chatting one evening. James Henri and Sandra Lee were there too. I will have to go back as there were some fantastic "library" videos added to the discussion wall.

Not all the sessions are accessible from the outside but I am happy to be able to show you some of the tools being used for TL discussions and professional growth. Another open-access site within the conference is Coquitlam TL Judith Comfort's online consideration of the seamless and blended nature of collaboration between Ts and TLs at bestlibrary for online learning support, both for Ts and for students.

I also went to Anne Robinson's Librain blog of the online conference. Anne is in the UK. I think you will find lots here to think about from Anne's report and I see no need to repeat, only to recommend you peruse her discussions of the event at this link. Thanks, Anne, for this.

Does social networking produce cognitive side effects?

Facebook and Bebo risk ‘infantilising’ the human mind

Posted to IASL listserv by Gerald Brown, Winnipeg, from The Guardian (U.K.), Feb. 2

British physiologist Lady Susan Greenfield warns that social-network sites risk infantilizing the 21st-century mind, leaving it characterized by short attention spans, sensationalism, inability to empathize, and a shaky sense of identity. Greenfield, professor of synaptic pharmacology at Lincoln College, told the House of Lords that children's experiences on social-networking sites "are devoid of cohesive narrative and long-term significance ...."

Here is the audio link to Lady Greenfield speaking on social networking and your health.

BCTF Conference for New/er Teachers

What? These don't look "new/er" to you?

I stopped by the Radisson Hotel to see how Janet, Katharine, and Michele were doing in their presentation at the BCTF New/er Teachers' Conference about the ways they could collaborate with TLs. Put on out in Richmond on Friday, Val H was on duty for the provincial association at the BCTLA table. I scored lunch which was fantastic. So was this presentation. Thanks to all for the work that went into the session, as well as the commitment, to promoting collaboration with our teacher-colleagues to create meaningful learning experiences and enjoyable learning communities.


Did you know?

The Very Hungry Caterpillar is 40 years old!

From Twitter / School Library Journal: "Librarians and other educators are encouraged to download an activity kit,which includes a free commemorative 40th anniversary poster featuring classroom activities on the back, and a booklet with cross-curricular lesson plans, booklists, and arts and crafts projects such as a make your own Very Hungry Caterpillar mobile."

Posted from IASL: Manitoba - Brown / Stinson

And that, dear collagues, was quite a month of professional development, wasn't it! Don't worry if you couldn't keep the pace. I never quite caught up to the pace. Needless to say, we all have lots to learn. We can perhaps claim ground as leaders in modelling teachers-as-lifelong-learners!

See you next week.

A Wonderful Day with Dr Jason Ohler ...

Dr Jason Ohler, on Tech 2.0:

Teaching for Today and Tomorrow

February 20 Pro D Day at Magee, Vancouver

This week's blog is only about Technology Day, sponsored this year by Learning Services here in Vancouver. I am just so delighted to be so delighted with the whole day, and I think it took all of 15 minutes of listening to Dr Jason Ohler to know that the 230+ educators who had convened at Magee were going to be in for a very good day. The group included teachers and teacher-librarians, support workers, teacher candidates, administrators, our district systems librarian, TOCs, a couple of outside educators, district management, and a Vancouver trustee.

Jason was at once engaging, fun, practical, informative, and visionary -- what he said made so many connections to what we know to be good instruction; by simply applying new notions of "literacy" for 21st century students and presenting so many ideas about how we can do it with conviction, with sound educational grounding, and with little or no cost, Jason ensured there was little chance anyone in the room wouldn't find a place in what we heard to make connections to their own work with kids in our schools.

Ohler began by talking about all the "well-intentioned paperwork" that has accompanied initiatives such as No Child Left Behind in the US and the contrast of this kind of learning to those "teachers who opened doors" that might not have been apparent if they had been following the new scripts for student learning that are prepared for educators in the literacy field. The doors were opened because teachers knew the students and saw the potential and were not bound by prevailing wisdom about limiting the ways students can progress and be shown to have progressed.

Literacy has changed -- students need to be engaged by their work with text and image; they need to be able to "write collage" or write as they see on the web, some traditional writing, some visual imaging, some design components, all artistic and productive and creative, yet subject to sound assessment practices that ensure clarity through feedback and wisdom. It is no longer satisfactory for educators to assign A's to "anything that moves," but rather to see in the media product its inquiry, discovery, and transformational roles, the processes by which it has been created, and the learning that takes place within the story being told.

Ohler's website offers lots for those interested in re/viewing what he said today or what he showed us, all of it powerful testament to the very powerful work he advocates doing with students often described as least likely to succeed in traditional measures of literacy and learning but who are, like the students described by Torres and November and Leu (see previous blogs), so empowered by being recognized for their abilities to work in the new or multi-literacies and with technology. This website features his photo, using Photoshop, Biceps Version, he told us!

Kids, he told us, don't need more "clicks-and-tricks"; they need teachers for quality control. When we teach for digital literacy, as educators, we need to shift from text-centrism to new writing in what Ohler calls "media collage." We need to value writing more than ever; it must be deliberate, planned, but now visually differentiated in boxes, with bullets, breaks, boldface, and so on. We need to adopt ART as the 4th R but, while new ISTE standards include innovation and creativity, issues of copyright are real. This new literacy is digital / art / oral / written. It hinges on understanding that attitude is aptitude; digitally literate learners quickly transform new information into something they need. Literacy in the digital era is practiced both privately and socially; we no longer write in isolation. Educators and users will need to develop the codes of responsibility about using digital tools. And literacy is not enough; fluency can leverage action and success. While we can harness both report and story, it is story we must embrace. It is story that our students engage with and remember and can create and be transformed by.

The Day was one of those beautiful crisp sunny West Coast days of late winter, the kind of day that has every Vancouverite smugly congratulating him/herself on choosing to live here, a day that lent itself easily to walking briskly into Kerrisdale for a quick lunch before the featured afternoon Sandbox sessions for different interest groups. So uplifted by what we heard in the morning and by the weather, it is worthy of remark that there was little that distracted our keen crowd from the afternoon sessions back at Magee, even though for many Friday is the "short day." They came running back ...

Some attended sessions on Moodle

... or Ubuntu Linux

... or Rosetta Stone

... or Smartboards, while

... others went to hear more from Dr Ohler on the art of teaching for storytelling.

Twenty-plus teacher-librarians convened in the -- you guessed it -- school library with Sandra Lee, notably of the VSB Summer Institute and UBC TL'ship online program. We reviewed some Web 2.0 applications and then looked into the 9-day online international conference about Transforming School Libraries with Web 2.0 which was beginning today. Fourteen Vancouver teachers and TLs will participate over the next nine days in the actual conference, the proceedings of which will be available into April.

We are entering a new educational world of "continual beta" -- that's how Sandra Lee described today the new landscapes of school libraries called Library 2.0 -- where beta means "in the testing stage" so everything becomes something you can't count on in the version you had yesterday but you get used to that and get better at handling technological change, like students! They just figure it out. Some who work amongst us can attest to the fact that we do in fact move along the technology-learning spectrum to become more flexible -- less fearful -- in adapting to and using the new technologies.

Will we see some of you this week at TL Studio in Kerrisdale at our monthly "sandbox" for trying out tools and applications that can work with school library programs? For dates, check the online Pro D (or the yellow Pro D Connections booklet for February, which has all upcoming dates for both Kerrisdale and Gladstone sessions).

Sandra Lee and the TLs

Thanks to the Technology Day Organizing Committee, as well as Associate Superintendents Val Overgaard and Laurie Anderson, for all the effort, commitment, sponsorship, and support that went into putting this show on the Magee and district map. I heard nothing but positive comments; many were very excited about taking digital storytelling back to their schools, excited in ways I haven't seen in a long time. One was heard planning where to put the green wall.

Thanks again to Trustee Lombardi and CIO Lamb and Associate Superintendent Anderson for coming to join us there as well -- your juggling things to come to Magee into what we know to be an intense schedule of meetings and obligations characteristic of this time of year back at the mothership was important for Vancouver educators who I think, by their attendance alone, amply provided evidence of how keen and committed they are to find creative ways to move ahead with technology innovation and integration with teaching and learning because this is what works with and meets the learning needs of our students.

Resource Notes

I knoq I said the blog would be only about Technology Day but who can resist great "bits" for the technology integration theme that pervades our discussions of directions for school libraries and the work of teacher-librarians.

Found while poking around in the Online Conference and Alberta TL Arlene Lipkewich's blog and related links:

• have a look at the global YouTube version of Stand by Me and consider as Arlene had done with her students how such a YouTube could have been created.
  
• check this out: TIME 100, The Teaching Resource of the Century

Also, here's Joyce Valenza's Manifesto for 21st Century Teacher-librarians: you know you are one if ... and everything we are doing is keeping us "fresh" in the new learning environments. Here's the proviso I like the best: Unpack the good stuff you carried from your 20th century trunk. Rigor, and inquiry, and high expectations, and information and media fluency matter no matter what the medium. So do excitement, engagement, and enthusiasm (Valenza, Manifesto).

Have a great weekend.

Happy Valentine's Day

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Winter Tonic with a Theme of Love

This year's Winter Tonic was perhaps the BEST ever. Certainly well attended, the event at once entertained us, moved us, nourished us, and informed us, all in good spirit and spirited participation. Thanks to all kinds of people who made this a success, including the VTLA Winter Tonic organizing committee who always do such a great job, the VTLA Exec who saw the need to invite and welcome new TLs, the newbies who came and we know will be back, the presenters who "wow'ed" us, and the out-of-district TLs who always join us too.

Our Superintendent warmed to the invitation to say a few words on one or more aspect of this year's theme of Love, Libraries, and Chocolate. Using a booktalk approach, a strategy we are very familiar with and were delighted to see, Chris shared three authors' perspectives on love.

• From Robertson Davies (in When We Were Young, ed. Stuart McLean), on the subject of a young boy's realization of love and life while gazing at peonies -- for a review of McLean's collection, see page 66 of Adult Canadian Books for Strong Teenage Readers, by Margaret McKey et al, published with 10th edition of Resource Links. Davies' use of this moment in other writings would suggest it is for the child a moment poignant and exquisite, as well as autobiographical.
  
• From Shantaram: A Novel by Gregory David Roberts, the largely autobiographical story of Lindsay, later renamed Shantaram, or "man of peace," who escapes an Australian jail to become a slumdweller and petty operator out of the Mumbai slums. Writes Lindsday in the opening lines, “It took me a long time and most of the world to learn what I know about love and fate and the choices we make, but the heart of it came to me in an instant, while I was chained to a wall and being tortured. I realised, somehow, through the screaming of my mind, that even in that shackled, bloody helplessness, I was still free: free to hate the men who were torturing me, or to forgive them. It doesn’t sound like much, I know. But in the flinch and bite of the chain, when it’s all you’ve got, that freedom is an universe of possibility. And the choice you make between hating and forgiving, can become the story of your life.” No copies of this 900+ page read are available from our schools!
  
• Finally, from Buckminster Fuller, in his 1970s free verse book Intuition: Fuller coins the term synergy, seeks to explain life's complexities as well: Writes Fuller, “Love is omni-inclusive, progressively exquisite, understanding and tender and compassionately attuned to other than self.” Suggests Kelly, as are schools.
  

Mary, looking for all the world the proudest mom, was with us all for the early evening. The young performers astounded the crowd, taking us instantly from thoughts of love to high culture. Amazing, they were.

I went to see the Adult Reads this year, where Jennifer from Hager Books "booktalked" 25 books in 45 minutes. I will attach her recommended list to the tlspecial wiki (linked to this blog in left-hand sidebar) ... this was unquestionably a dizzying repertoire of reading possibilities and one of the very best we've seen do this.

I dropped in on David Brear's Web 2.0 lab session where 40 people were jammed in. Suzanne from Maple Ridge, who was extremely happy she had come in for the event, noted that the hand-out alone was worth the trip! I found the lab just as jammed when I came to find a seat for Ciara and Gwen doing databases. Fantastic amounts of work went into making databases more accessible for inquiry and curriculum-related projects.

I am hoping that people who attended Tiffany's session -- she talked about her new book, to be published in the Spring -- will add reviews of her session as comments in this blog. Also, Linda's puppets were very busy. Your reviews are important. Please use the comment feature to add to the description here.

Sales of books and puppets seemed brisk. Thanks to our friend Helen for the fantastic meal and Valentine desserts, along with the serving princesses Nancy and Sylvia whose very presence at an event makes everything more fun. Thanks to Cecil for putting up with all of us.

Allison thanked me for bringing in Dr Jason Ohler for next Friday's Technology Day. She'd heard such great things from her husband who had seen him in October and she was so pleased she'd be able to see him too.

So here's the reminder: Have you registered for Technology Day yet? We are still looking for 70 more to register. AND I need more people (10 to date are committed) to the online conference which I am sure will be something like the Summer Institute, an event you won't want to have missed.

Coquitlam's Pro D Day:

Three of us took the New Databases / Technology Integration workshop on the road and travelled out to Port Coquitlam to Coquitlam's Technology Day event. In addition to doing a workshop for 20 or more TLs, we knew we could hear their keynote speaker Marco Torres, an educator whose work with new visual and other technologies, whose message to become more involved with the verbs than the nouns, whose focus on the process, has inspired young learners in his San Fernando school and community. We attended Alan November's session as well. I also ran into Tom Grant ... and guess what? He blogs every Friday!

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Be sure to READ the GiggleIT information (Feb 10 posting) below!

What funny Canadian stories do we need to share?

I'm back ... are you still there?

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Hello? Hello? Vancouver here. Downadup be gone! My little local audience of teacher-librarians has been limited by the unthinkable consequences of the onslaught of a little-known new virus. Can you imagine doing our work without computers? Not for circulating, not for communicating across our particularly connected community, not even for working in standard software applications like Excel.

Pending are the deliberations about awards for valiant perseverance and innovative practice, for a willingness to dust off the encyclopedias and hit the books, and for the collective spirit of service delivery Gutenberg-style under the direst of cicumstances. TLs rallied ... and our Maryann ran without hesitation to stem the tide of collapsing circulation due to the faltering system. Not every location has been successfully returned, but school libraries were made a priority for inocculation and restoration, clear evidence that children`s reading and research needs are a priority for schools here. Whew!

Where I work on the penthouse floor of the Mother Ship, technical overtime ensured we were only a little more than three days down. People found lots to do in those 3+ days; at first as a visitor to the building you might not have noticed that all computer monitors were turned off. But the number of phone and personal conversations and small meetings, and focus on filing and paperwork and the FAX machine, even the dying art of writing, not evident at first, would have unfolded for visitors as they moved through floors and various work spaces.

By the third day, I had checked that my Starbucks cards were registered and moved my personal laptop and workload into a jury-rigged office in the nearby cafe. Frankly, with no audience and no computer, it felt as though everything important I needed to pass along was log-jammed in my fingertips.

I blog outside the system but count on those inside to access what I write. Weekly on Fridays I have sent the email (with link) that reminds my TL colleagues to check the blog for the lastest news. Three Fridays have passed now since our return from the arduous Winter Break which seemed, here on the balmy Canadian West Coast, unrelentingly cold and punitive. Contextualize further in the uncertainties of our economic downturn. Then this! One might reasonably ask, Why us, Lord, why us? In some corners, it is rumoured that collective sighs of relief could be heard as the pace slowed, the pressure to move with technology abated, and the focus on reading and basic literacy skills was re-embraced. Then came deadlines for such things as interim reports and groans of despair from schools became audible. Way to go, TL colleagues. You have unquestionably stood up well in the face of trying circumstances. We hope to have you all back soon.
Big News Items

• From the BCTLA Executive Meeting on Saturday -- we are almost finished a hefty agenda discussing many exciting new developments for us. Hearing about The Bookmark due in early February was amazing. More attuned to developments in relation to the work of academic teacher-librarianship now, The Bookmark will feature articles by Branch, Oberg, Asselin, Doiron, and Margaret Ruurs. Of course, you'll find regular contributors Goldsmith, Savard, and Smith. Word is we can look forward to more in this new direction.
  
  Also important is the announcement that the BCTLA proposal for a BCTF Inquiry Project was successful and a great group to TLs has submitted applications to be involved. Whoo-hoo! We are awaiting word on an application for a VSB Inquiry into Inquiry project too.
  
• POSTPONED: Plagiarism Workshop scheduled for January 27 at Gladstone after school, on the assumption that low registration is due to the local technology crisis ... and besides, with stress of last few weeks, Pat and I are still working on this. What is under development is a new webpage with lots of links, resources, and ideas about preventing, not catching, plagiarism. Stay tuned ....
  
• STILL ON: TL Studio 1 (Kerrisdale) this week with Michele and crew. Hope to see lots of you there ...
  
• Are you coming? Caroline, Nancy, and I are signed up, I think, on February 3 (4:30 to 7:30 pm) to hear Dr Leu on The New Literacies at the Italian Cultural Centre. For more information, contact Meredyth at mkezar@vsb.bc.ca. $65 includes dinner.


• Are you getting ready to meet up at Winter Tonic? Thanks for the generosity of the VTLA, all new TLs are being invited to Winter Tonic as guests. On Feb 10 at Tupper, we'll learn about databases, Web 2.0, Linda's puppets, Tiffany's new book, and some great adult reads, then eat and win prizes, as is our custom.


• Technology Day at Magee is revived under the DLS banner.
  
  You can now register online for a morning with keynote speaker Dr Jason Ohler from the University of Alaska. Jason spoke here in Vancouver in October as the keynote speaker at the CUEBC Conference -- now non-CUE members can hear The Word.
  
  
  Technology 2.0: Teaching for Today and Tomorrow:
  
  Dr Jason Ohler
  Going Beyond Essays: New kids, New Media and New Literacies
  
  Helping digital kids “write the media they read” in order to become active media creators, not simply passive consumers, promotes teachers’ moving from teaching for traditional literacy to creative and thoughtful teaching for multiliteracies. Why not cultivate students’ new media talents, incorporate art as the 4th R, and use research and narrative to create rich, compelling formats for students’ learning? With student-created media stories and articulate, transformative projects, students can imagine the world they want to create and share their work and talents within the collaborative community of the social web.
  
  Dr Ohler will also show practical tools and processes that work with new media narrative and digital storytelling projects in educational contexts. These tools are largely free digital or Web 2.0 tools. Consider with Jason questions about media assessment, media grammar, and the role of research-based digital stories and media curriculum development.
  
  Jason Ohler (Professor, Educational Technology, U of Alaska) is a well-known speaker and storyteller. Having received his PhD from SFU Communications Department in 1994 and recently delivered the keynote presentation for the CUEBC Conference at Magee, Dr Ohler is no stranger to Vancouver. He is noted for the passion, humour and intelligence he brings to his keynotes. Jason has 25 years of experience in the educational technology field; with n eye on the future, he is able to connect where teachers are to their learning and working in the Digital Age.
  
  
• TL Sandbox Session on the Afternoon of Technology Day
  
  Learning 21st Century Style: School Libraries, Web 2.0 and More
  
  As a feature of this year's Technology Day we are offering meetings for groups with similar technology interests. These are to be scheduled in the early afternoon so that you can come from Literacy Day or 4REAL Day or Math Day or many other Pro D events on February 20. Ours, the TL Sandbox, is available now for online registration.
  
  You are invited to the TL Sandbox if you are a teacher/librarian interested in learning how to use Web 2.0 to enhance opportunities for collaboration and working relationships. Teachers interested in and considering careers in school librarianship are also welcome. Here you can meet Sandra Lee in person, find out more about Web 2.0, and hear how you can enroll in a nine-day Online Conference (click link for more information).
  
  The Online Conference, February 20 to March 1
  Professional Development to Transform School Libraries with Web 2.0
  
  For just an hour a day, starting on February 20, using strategies for teacher-librarian collaboration, you can work within a flexible Web platform with featured international practitioners to explore the challenging issue: How can school libraries use Web 2.0 tools to engage teachers as well as students in learning, 21st century style?
  
  James Henri and Sandra Lee, former colleagues at the University of Hong Kong Faculty of Education, were recently here in Vancouver as co-presenters at our VSB Summer Institute, The Changing Landscapes of School Libraries. James is President of the International Association of School Libraries (IASL) and Sandra is Information literacy librarian at a private university in Canada. Both teach UBC TL courses online. They are again joining forces to organize an exceptional virtual conference to advance teacher librarianship.
  
  James and Sandra will bring you a world class collection of web 2.0, and school library, leaders who will work with you in a Web 2.0 environment. Don’t miss this opportunity to engage in flexible online learning about Web 2.0.
  
  NOTE: Vancouver TLs (and TLs-in-progress) who wish to register for the 9-day conference will be eligible for both a group discount and district-subsidized rates and should email or contact Moira about registering ASAP. Non-VSB applications to join us for the afternoon will also be accepted as online registrations.