On Google vs Textbooks, iPad vs Kindle, and More

From Campus Technology, a site that just might have light to shed on the path ahead for K-12, as it should.  Try these articles:

Student Research: Can Googling Replace $168 Intro to Psych Textbook?
By Dian Schaffhauser 02/16/11

Read about the Digital Bookshelf Project to provide alternative "texts" for first year Psychology students at UOhio.

Blackboard Launches Free Web-Based Course Platform
By Dian Schaffhauser 02/10/11

Evaluating the iPad for Education
By Bridget McCrae 02/02/11

McCrae offers comparative review of e-reading functionality as well as classroom and other learning considerations, all boding well for the multipurpose tablet as a tool with shelf life. 

Egypt: The Terror of Free Information, The Promise for Higher Education
By Trent Batson 02/16/11

Writes Batson, "Choosing the autocratic/control face of ICT and not the freedom/democratizing face may not serve us very well at all."

District Technology Day: Questions of Access

The annual District Technology Day began with a plenary of District and student "experts" on teaching and learning supported by technology and was enhanced by a fantastic brunch and many different workshops on blogging, wikis, social media, Wolfram Alpha, video use, digital storytelling, Prezi, and more. 

Epic Wins and Reading ... Teen Features in a Digital World 

Stealing the opening plenary show were Digital Immersion students Ben and Laks.  Ben, a self-admitted internet addict, was a confident speaker who both charmed and worried an auditorium full of teachers; up to 15 hours a day on the internet "absorbing" its truths, he told us confidentially, assuaged his thirst for knowledge; while emerging from a learning experience deep in the net often gave him the feeling of "the epic win," Ben conceded that the social aspects of schooling were important.

Hmm!  I wondered about Googling for The Truth.  I couldn't help comparing this young man's deep fascination with the "epic win" with Csíkszentmihályi's notion of "the flow," the state that takes over during the search for and production of knowledge or creative expression, a journey that takes the seeker into "the zone" or "the groove."   He was ready for inquiry-based learning.

But it was young Laks who shared her view of the important aspects of digital schooling, whose love of books and reading was clearly paramount -- "We should visit libraries more often," she said -- after all, she told us, you can't do anything if you can't read!  I think I know which two Vancouver TLs can take credit for stoking some of her enthusiasm.  Here's one young woman already launched into Inquiry in both the reading and learning contexts.

Mmmm-hmmm!  The mouths of babes were a compelling first dimension to the morning plenary. 

Access: Not Such a Simple Concept

Dr Jordan Tinney spoke about the significance of access in educational contexts being transformed by technology, making the second dimensional connection to what Michele and I were going to talk about; we were going to be "on" today, on the same page, the button, the mark!  

Access -- not such a simple concept, in fact.  I was prepared with the slides and Michele with the activity to share the complexities of access with the group of more than 40 who attended our workshop.  Access begins simply enough as the notion of providing tools and resources to find and work with information in an age where that is expanding exponentially.  The Information Age is characterized by

• rapidly changing tools,
• increasing numbers of resources created by the digitization of text, image, and artefact,
• more demands for users to be critical, creative, communicative, and collaborative consumers of the information,
• evidence of the needs for skills for lifelong learning where citizens are able to apply what they learn to do in the workplace, post-secondary institutions, and life.

Access becomes a far more complex and essential consideration as more technology is delivered into our system.  Resources are no longer simply the textbook; they come in multiple formats, print, digital, and human/expert.   Tools, no longer simply the pen or word-processing packages, are complex, having multiple iterations, purposes, and applications.  Students and their teachers are learners who need support -- in classrooms and in professional development -- for both physical and intellectual access to these; they need support and time to learn to transform information into knowledge, to share and store (or curate, as Stephen Lamb, quoting Maryann Kempthorne, told us) the resources that increasingly they will create as well as consume.   Teachers need support in effectively integrating technology with teaching and learning.

In classrooms that strive to move beyond the textbook, in school libraries, in the hours during and beyond the school day, educators will be seeking to have access even as they work to redress the imbalances that enable some students to have more access than others. The resources, tools, and information found "in the communities" of functionality -- educational, local, global -- are at once universal, national, social, and personal; they need to be equitably distributed, current, accurate, age-appropriate; they need to reflect the wide range of interests, skills, and abilities of our students.  There needs to be freedom to make personal and pedagogical choices amongst resources and tools, to read and learn widely and deeply, to participate in a culture of reading both for pleasure and for information. 

Finally, to optimize the value of tools and resources, the system needs to be able to provide flexible access:

• to a school library as the "hub" of learning, re-designed as the Learning Commons in schools, 
• to the expertise and services of teacher-librarians as learning specialists whose work is to support access in this broadest sense,
• to production facilities that enable new possibilities for products and learning,
• to technology in differentiated instructional and learning configurations,
• to tools, including software and adaptive hardware for special needs students, 
• to real and virtual resources and services, 24/7. 

These were important links to the workshop Michele and I would be doing on the Inquiry-based approach to reading and learning, the Points of Inquiry model which supports teaching and learning for deep understanding and which is enabled by access to the services of TLs as learning specialists as well as to technology tools and all kinds of resources.

But, while the District Technology Day plenary had provided some lovely connections for our workshop around access, the need to be perfectly ready and to begin seamlessly can so easily be disjarred WHEN YOU CAN'T GET ACCESS TO THE WIRELESS INTERNET!  I had spent two hours the day before getting set up.  I have never developed a smooth recovery from the initial disappointment and stress of the bad start you get when things don't work as they should!   Thanks, Michele, for your unflappable enthusiasm and capacity for flexible delivery. 

Off my game, I failed to utter a single tweet!  For those of you interested in the site-based Twitter discourse, check it out:  #39edtech.  I have tweeted THANKS ("sent a tweet-out") today to the many TLs who attended Tech Day and who gave workshops:  Michele, Frances, Denise, Fred, and Aaron were presenting.  Thanks also to tech-keen others, like Sylvia, who presented at or attended the Livingstone SmartBoard Academy.  And thanks, Patsy and Audrey at the helm as key organizers of the event which was all very good. 
 
Here's the link to the TL Special Wiki and our Presentation, with the sources and tools: 
 
C21L & Inquiry-based Learning: Start with the Teaching & Learning

Another Look at PISA + Interesting TED Talk

Another Look at PISA

Suspect this response by Dr Diane Ravitch, New York University, is true for BC as well ... it's not simply the erosion of investment in resources and specialist teachers but the persistent failure to remediate the negative effects of poverty for children that so dramatically impacts academic success.

Also, thanks Elly for bringing this this amazing TED talk by Indian educator Sugata Mitra to my attention.  It's 17 minutes that will make you laugh AND think:



Mitra begins by noting that the best teachers don't go, and the best schools don't exist, where they are most needed.  Further, any teacher who can be replaced by a machine should be!  Based on the simple concept that children -- regardless of their socio-economic status -- learn what they want to learn, supported by Arthur C. Clarke's thinking that education happens when children have interest,  Mitra puts a single computer into a collaborative "discovery" environment and leaves the children to their own devices ... with astounding results.  Do take your prep to check this out for the New-Year inspiration you may be looking for.  The Future of Learning for 1 billion children, predicts Mitra, will be dramatically reformed with 100 million mediators, like the grannies, 10 million self-organizing learning environments (SOLEs), 180 billion dollars, and 10 years. Bring on The Granny Cloud!  

Digital Learning and the Digital Library Page

Have you seen the new look of our Webcat? How about the Digital Library (click on tab on Webcat page)? See also on Digital Library page: Video tab (includes image banks) as well as Recommended Links and Teachers' Professional pages. Nice work, our Maryann. Thanks. We are really looking forwarding the picking up the virtual circulation this year ... but it would be precipitous of me to release any news yet of heightened expectations for a new foregrounded district location for these invaluable learning resources. Sssshhh!


While here in the Digital Library, you may notice three new features: Scholastic's Bookflix (a literacy resource, it pairs fiction video storybooks with non-fiction e-books, and it's interactive), Passport to the Internet (an internet literacy tutorial for grades 4 to 8), and Gale's fantastic new Global Issues in Context (upper intermediate to senior, it looks at global, social, environmental, and other issues from multiple perspectives: includes a truly global title list as well as such recognizable titles as CBC, Globe & Mail, Maclean's, Toronto Star, and Time Canada; Newsweek International, The Economist, USA Today, NY Times, Sunday Telegraph, Sunday Times; PC Mag and PC World, as well as Wired; and my favourite, New Internationalist).


Our colleagues and students are going to get access to these amazing resources. Plan to take these to the first PAC meeting of the year. Ask to be put onto the next staff meeting and/or Pro D day agendas? We are anticipating seeing greatly improved stats for usage, and I have no doubt Vancouver is one of the top districts for usage as it is. Way to go, colleagues.


While I am on the topic, thought you might like to poke around in Aaron Mueller's Master's e-Portfolio (UBC, MET) entitled Digital Libraries and Information Literacies. He offers an introductory video that helps guide you into the structures. Thanks, Aaron, for this inspirational look at your vision for Digital Library, VLN style, and congratulations on finishing that degree.

And why not introduce your teachers and students to Twiducate for social networking to enhance communication in learning. Another Michele recommendation! Do we need to do TL Studio / Digitally Yours this year at a school? Maybe we could "twiducate" ourselves, Michele convening! Just kidding ...

What's New?

• eduTecher: It's a lovely uncluttered site with links, tools, and ideas for teachers who are integrating technology with teaching and learning.
  
  
• Readability: This is an amazing tool from Arc90 Labs -- once installed on your favourites bar on your computer, you can use it to "declutter" any page of online text you like so that reading it is less likely to be subject to the distractions of ads, pictures, and other parallel or inset bits.
  
  
• For more like the above sites, you need to get into Kathy Schrock's Guide for Educators from Discovery School. One dimension of her rich website is the SOS Sites of the Week, of which the above sites are the two most recent. She archives these so go here to check back on what she has found. This isn't the first time I have mentioned this site!

• From EducationWorld: Why not share this "toolbox" with your administrator? Administrator's Desk offers lots of timely ideas for thinking about their practice, especially with using technology, including blogging the newsletter.
  
  
• Great TL Cafe at Moberly this week. Thanks, Kam and Gwen, for the organizing and supporting the new(er) TLs. The group moved on to the Elephant Walk for an in-depth look at school libraries in Vancouver.
  


• Andy Hargreaves ( co-author with Dennis Shirley of The Fourth Way) was back in Coquitlam to work with their educators; a number of us from Vancouver were invited to join them. Things work differently in Coquitlam. It's so nice to see Tom in the middle of such a lively learning community, and nice for the morning to be free to think about the great possibilities for education, given the severity and constraints we are facing.
  


• Next week, a group of Vancouver elementary and secondary teachers and TLs will convene at the Ed Centre for a discussion of e-textbooks and e-resources. We have been doing some reading:
  


• Plans are under way for the year-end VTLA dinner. Hope to see lots of our group there, as usual. This is always a fun evening.
  


• Have you signed up for the May Update sessions? 89 have. These Update sessions are the way we keep current on the rapidly changing nature of the work we doo. They are starting this second week of May with sessions for our Annex and for French Immersion TLs. We are bringing customized materials and do need to know which one you will be attending.



• The last TL Studio II (now called Digitally Yours) is to be held at Gladstone next week. The focus, building a simple website for your library. This focus has come in response to demand at the TL Cafe and will feature Weebly, used by Kam for the Fleming library webpage and some additional Web 2.0 tools, including shutterfly which is the one Ciara uses for Kingsford-Smith's library webpage. We are going to have to cancel the last TL Studio session scheduled for May 26 at Kerrisdale due to a conflict, so we do hope to see everyone at Gladstone on Wednesday this week for it too will be the last session of the year.
  
  
• And while we are on the subject of school library websites, take a look at what Joyce Valenza has to say and show you about school library websites. In her Neverendingsearch blog entitled "School Library Websites Part 1" for SLJ, she explores the instructional capacity of school library websites and suggests that TLs are the instructional CIOs (Chief Information Officers) of their schools.
  


• Do you want to be a "tribe" with a micro-mag? Check out Seth Godin's blog entry. I attended an online conference with Godin this week on the future of education. I am no clearer about what that might look like. It was pretty "quick" stuff recommended by our own MK -- that is, it made me feel slow!

On Being an Educational Bobsledder

The Jamaican Bobsled Team: An Athletic Metaphor ...

We are getting there, that's the message from those of us planning District "Digital-Everything" Technology Day in mere weeks, not months. The sled is in motion -- new team members and workshop offerings have been added and pared down. The demand for labs to provide hands-on learning opportunities for teachers exceeded what we could initially provide, but that's sorted out. Rooms are assigned; presenters' technology needs are factored in. Everyone coming should now know that lunch will be provided, and the sushi "boxes" are ordered. The student helpers are raring to go. Wirelessness has been assured. People have been told to bring digital cameras and/or laptops if they wish. Stress is elevated. The keynote speakers have advanced their themes; we've got their technical requirements. There are fewer than 60 spaces left, and we expect those to be gone by early next week.

When one's professional life devolves to a single obsessive focus for more hours a day than one likes to admit, one might, as I do, seek relief in humour. (I am wondering if this is what Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi meant when he advanced the notion of "flow.") As we tumble towards the District "Digital-Everything" Technology Day, I have come to see the only method we, the organizing committee, could utilize was "the Jamaican bobsled team" approach. Can we once again assemble the talent, garner the resources, shape the day, and retain good professional relations as we work under real time and other constraints to pull off a great District day -- a real contender -- one that district colleagues/educators will be delighted with, in consideration of the time they spend getting there, attending sessions, and hearing speakers? I would say, resoundingly, Yes. Teachers who come for technology learning are, in my experience, happy to have the opportunity to be able to get together for support and new ideas. Theywill forgive the small shortcuts. They have come to anticipate their Day together, of coming "into the zone." The "bobsled team" is assembled out of its own enthusiasm for technology in teaching. We are excited about THE DAY and there is a feeling, a new district spirit, of enthusiasm for technology integration with teaching and learning.

Have you signed up online and shared the Day's information with your colleagues? Need more information? All can be found when you go to the online registration listings. You can also sign up here. It's great to see such staff participation from Laurier, Henderson Annex, and VLN.

Best Wishes, Professional Reading, Online Resources, and Calendar

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Happy New Year and Welcome Back

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If you didn't get to this before or over the Holidays, now is your chance. Please check the upcoming events which I will keep current until posting again on January 16.

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Downtown
Bay Window

Hudson's Bay Company, 1916
Library and Archives Canada / PA-122005

Best Wishes

... for a restful and joyful holiday from the staff "downtown" who support strong school library programs in our diverse school communities:

ME, Diane, Maryann, Irinya, Thyrza, Donna, Jesse,
Fay, Ingrid, Mike, Larry, Sharon, Frank, and Val.

Where's Santa? Google for Educators is a great place for new ideas for information and tools to empower students and expand the frontiers of human knowledge. Or how about enabling kids of all ages to learn about geography as they follow Santa on his Christmas Eve journey around the world. Google works with NORAD to track Santa's progress (in six languages) on December 24, with daily updates and surprises until the 24th.

Mark Your Calendar: The busy season is coming so you will need to rest up! New professional development opportunities for January are now online. Many more events to choose from as well.

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Resolve to attend one or more of the following:

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January 21: Assessment For Learning and Descriptive Feedback, part 2 of the Provincial Webcast Series, 2008/9, at DT, 3:30 to 6:00 pm.

Each session will include the webcast program with experts and facilitated discussion, electronic copies of all materials, and handouts. Archived materials from earlier webcasts are available here. Assessment is a hot topic in the district so be sure to share this with your colleagues. Register online.

January 23: Family Literacy Day; consider registering your school. Break the Guinness World Record™ for Most Children Reading with an Adult, Multiple Locations by reading Robert Munsch. See email notification sent December 18.

January 27: After-school workshop at Gladstone: Strategies for Reducing Plagiarism; see Miscellaneous and register online. Invite colleagues.

January 28: TL Studio 1, Kerrisdale. Register online.

February 3: 4:30 to 7:30 pm -- Dr Leu on The New Literacies at the Italian Cultural Centre. For more information, contact Meredyth at mkezar@vsb.bc.ca. $65 includes dinner.

February 4: TL Studio 2, Gladstone. Register online.

February 10: Winter Tonic, Tupper. Watch for flyer and email details.

February 20 (am) Of particular interest for TLs at District Day:

Literacy Day at Killarney (check link from online registration under Literacy to view program and get registration information)

Technology Day at Magee. Alan November, keynote speaker. More information about sessions and speakers, will be available in January. Registration will be online.

PLUS

NEW! Online Conference for TLs: 21st Century Learning: Transforming school libraries with Web 2.0 tools -- 1 pm to 2 pm at Magee.

After Technology or Literacy Day events, you can attend the official launch of the 9 days of online sessions and discussions amongst TLs from Switzerland, New Zealand, Australia, Canada and elsewhere. James "the Guru" Henri and Sandra "Web 2.0" Lee will be hosting more of what we saw in August. If you missed them at the VSB Summer Institute, or if you want more of the same, watch for details of how to pre-register in January. I will let you know when registration will be available online. Cost for VSB TLs ($60 per person) will be subsidized, and lunch will be provided.

February 25: TL Studio 1, Kerrisdale. Register online.

______________________

Some Professional Reading for those Quiet Times

Linking into and from the BCTLA's Virtual Bookmark provides TLs with lots of reading for professional development in the quiet moments of the holiday. Here are a couple of articles posted by online editor and Kelowna TL Al Smith, with links to deeper reading on the topics:

Students Struggle with Information Literacy, by Justin Appel, Assistant Editor, eSchool News:

For additional relevant articles on eSchool News, check here: Measuring 21st Century Skills

Strategy for Overcoming Resistance to Technological Change, by Tom Haymes, Director of Technology and Instructional Computing at Houston Community College Northwest

If technologists just build it, they (the users) won’t come—you need to shape users’ behavior by acknowledging their world view rather than your own as a technology implementer; here is the link for the complete with the 3E strategy (that is, those charged with technology change need to build user awareness that the innovation is evident, easy-to-use, and essential) in EduCause.

Educational Leadership (Dec 2008/Jan 2009): Data: Now What? The New Stupid, by Frederick M. Hess.

An interesting read about assessment and accountability trends in the US, interesting in light of the recent FSA vote! "Educators have made great strides in using data. But danger lies ahead for those who misunderstand what data can and can't do." The New Stupid, writes Hess, is characterized by "an enthusiastic embrace of data [that] has waltzed us directly from a petulant resistance to performance measures to a reflexive and unsophisticated reliance on a few simple metrics—namely, graduation rates, expenditures, and the reading and math test scores of students in grades 3 through 8."

Launch of A Great New Online Digitization Project:

The British Colonist (1858-1910)

A great digital resource became available last week: The British Colonist Digitization Project is a joint effort by the Times Colonist, the University of Victoria, and a consortium of British Columbia libraries. The website covers the period from Dec. 11, 1858, to June 30, 1910, and offers 100,544 pages. Because the digitizing is only as good as the original or microfiche, you can try searching on the site but may also want to use the Index of Historical Victoria Newspapers.

NCTE (National Council of Teachers of English)

INBOX blog:

Most read blogs for 2008 Inbox on NCTE were about effective writing assignments and strategies for teaching nonfiction along with the summer series on 21st century tools for the classroom. Check out the IRA's ReadWriteThink Resources linked here too. For the rest of this excellent NCTE newsletter, click here. You can subscribe and get this every week.

Great Science Resources to Pass Along

Learning Science:

Here's a really useful site for online tools for teaching science. Collaboratively developed by teachers and Eucation faculty in Pennsylvania, it features the best science interactives and resources from around the world. SFU site-reviewer Linda Hof writes that Learning Science is divided into seven sections: Physical Science, Life Science, Science & Society, and more. Browse through teaching resources: web-based lessons, pedagogical tools, and links to external resources. Particularly good, says Hof, is the "Tools to Do Science" section: find printable rulers, a printable protractor, a stop watch, and printable graph paper. Or search the entire site via a convenient search engine and send along comments.

YT or no YT?

The New Media Literacies on YouTube is a video explanation of how various literacies enable students to have more skills and confidence that will prepare them for the 21st Century.

New Literacies for a New Age on YouTube is the history of how heffalumps brought new technologies to the education system and caused havoc as standardized testing benchmarks and students' abilities to memorize began to falter.

Education from the Outside on YouTube makes the case to bring the images from popular culture into classrooms to teach our students to read them and to learn ourselves.

Web 2.0: Cool Tool for Schools is a wiki full of social networking software programs that can be integrated with classroom learning processes and projects.

And finally, Teachers: Is There a Place for YouTube in the Classroom is the product of the research of a Toronto-area TL on the pros and cons of using YT in the classroom.

Storytelling and Booktalks
From the Honorary Ambassador for the IASL!

This list of suggested resources was compiled by Margaret Stimson, Retired Library Media Co-ordinator (Manitoba), and received via IASL post from Gerald Brown, Honorary Ambassador of the IASL:

Totlol. Developed by a Vancouverite, this video directory is intended for use with younger children, although more senior users like us will enjoy many of the selections. The site is moderated. It's powered by YouTube.

Book Video Ning. Visit or join the ning to find or share videos about books. The ning
was initiated by Joyce Valenza on December 12, 2008. As much as anything, the
ning serves to show us what is possible in the area of booktalks.

Speakaboos. If you like Storylines, you'll love this site as well. There you'll find online books, celebrity readers, teacher resources, and technology that enables kids to make their own recordings.

CogDogRoo Story Tools: This blog is more about making digital stories (or booktalks). Alan Levine offers 50+ web tools you can use to create your own web-based story. He provides several samples that have been made with each tool. In fact, the story of Dominoe the dog is told repeatedly using all of the tools.

Also from Gerald Brown in Winnipeg:

"I wish you a day of ordinary (library) miracles and little things to rejoice in.

Eight hands that go up to request the title you've just book talked.
A computer that goes for an entire day without crashing.
A less-than-successful baking experiment taken to the teachers lounge, gratefully
eaten before 10 am.
A child asking for another book "just like this one."
A software installation that does not cause another program to crash.
A parking spot close to the school door.
The principal saying a sincere thank-you.
An unexpected larger amount on your paycheck or a smaller amount on your mortgage payment.
A new book just published by your favorite author.
A student who is actually concerned about the quality of his work.
A dozen doughnuts as "thanks" for service above and beyond the call.
A quick and pleasant response from a technician.
A kid who wants to help you.
A human voice on the phone when you expected a recording.
A student who wants to become a librarian when she grows up.
A chance to show a tech-tip to a teacher who thinks you are a "guru."
A library with windows and sunbeams in the winter.
A request to use the library for a meeting because " it is the nicest room in the school."
A smile of accomplishment from a student who shows you how to do something on the computer. A quickly-answered reference question asked by a teacher.
A library aide you like and who likes you.
A student so absorbed in a book, he doesn't hear the bell ring.
A call from a parent about a lost book found while cleaning.
A student who wants to hold your hand.
Students who give genuine praise to each other.
A small space of time to read for pleasure!

What strikes me, says Gerald, as I read this list of "ordinary" miracles, is how we, ourselves, often make them happen. It is by treating others well that good is returned to us.

__________________________

Blogging off now for a rest from the pace.

Delicious Links

WWW / Working With Wikis

Researchers Build a Wiki at Moberly

This blog is being written today (Thursday afternoon) at-the-scene, live from the school library where I have been invited to help grade 7 students get started on their wiki assignment. They are going to build pages for the whole-class project -- a wiki -- on Ancient Greece. Students will research subtopics in pairs and create a report with images on pages linked to the wiki-assignment page. They have recently been introduced to and are using del.icio.us to collect the best websites for their research. They will use pbwiki to publish their work.

The product is emerging at: Ancient Greece. You will need to click on Sidebar to see the linked student-project pages.

Teacher Ms J is happy to see the students enabled by the technology to use both their creativity and their learning to create new products such as wikis. She appreciates the engagement that such assignments offer her students.

On seeing that the students are happily and fully engaged, that they are easily helping each other venture into the world of wikis, that they don't really need my expertise at all, I have found a computer, opened up this blog, and am about to interview a few of the participants to capture the "feel" of this learning experience.

The teacher is Ms J. She tells me, without hesitation,"This is the future, the new literacy that they will need to develop and understand .... It's great to see them taking steps that will help them in their futures." Ms J has been teaching for three years and is currently doing a master's degree in Language and Literacy Education. She recently took a UBC course, the same one taken by "our Mary," called The New Literacies with Instructor Dr. Marlene Asselin. She loves working with Gwen, the TL, and sees how Gwen is always looking ahead. Clearly Gwen and Ms J are deeply exploring Web 2.0 with their students.

So what do the students think of this learning experience?

• Student Monica finds that it's faster, neater, easier to use, new, and fun to learn this way. It is something you can use on your own and when you're older. She has been here at Moberly since Kindergarten and always likes coming to learn in the library.
  
• Suchjot finds it interesting to learn something new about the internet; it's "portable," she says, "so you can use it anywhere on-the-go." Suchjot thinks it's a much better way to learn because you can add and others can too, and everyone can build it and learn from it. Suchjot's words, colleagues ... can you imagine this!
  
• Harveer adds that it's cool making your own webpage; if you travel you won't have to use (or risk losing) your flashdrive because you have a wiki you can post to. It's interesting to learn new things -- the first time (learning these new and useful tools in the library) is always a privilege, he tells me. He says it's better working with the teacher and the teacher-librarian together because they know a lot of different things and it's always nice to work on the computers.

Thanks, Moberly, for the invitation! You are inspirational.

Linking Delicious Things

In keeping with Wendy C's Hot Reads talk at the February Winter Tonic where several recommended novels and mysteries included recipes, I have been meaning to include some too, yours, not mine. Tillicum-visiting with TL Sharon just before the Break yielded her wonderfully and delicious recipe for chocolate, and it's really easy -- or so she says:

Tiger Butter

3 cups white chocolate dipping wafers
½ cup milk chocolate dipping wafers
2/3 cup smooth or crunchy peanut butter

• Microwave white chocolate wafers slowly until melted (3-4 minutes in one minute intervals).
• Add peanut butter and beat until mixed.
• Spread on waxed paper to 1/8” thickness.
• Microwave milk chocolate until melted (1 minute on high).
• Spoon milk chocolate onto the white chocolate in rows 1-2” apart.
• Drag a knife or tip of a spoon gently across the rows to form the pattern.
• Air dry until hard and cut into 1” squares.

TIP - I had to ask about the chocolate "dipping wafers"; they are about the size of a nickel and are available in the bulk foods section of Save-on Foods. Sharon's Tiger Butters were perfectly peanutty squares of chocolate about the size of AfterFive Mints.

NOTE: Thanks, Barb McB and VP Darren at Tillicum for the invitation to your lovely school, and thanks, Sharon, for the tour and recipe. I am so impressed with this little annex and its lovely large library, Smartboard, lab, and program of technology integration, that I am planning to have the May Update session for Annex TLs here. We can call it "On the Urban Edge" as you will need to plan to travel to the Far Eastern reaches of our city. We are working out a date for this. Can you let me know which day of the week would be best (you can email me)?

Technology-Integration / Linking Readings for Deeper Consideration

Edutopia is a great website for keeping up with technology integration. Underpinned by the awareness that social change is faster-paced than ever before, the George Lucas Foundation envisions a new world of learning, an education system where innovation is the rule, not the exception ... well, you can read this by clicking onto the "about us" page. But there are some great articles to be considered from amongst the Priority Topics. I offer this suggestion as a starter:

Adopt-and-adapt: shaping tech for the classroom by Marc Prensky (or, 21st century schools need 21st century technology). Prensky (2005) posits the notion of "digital immigrants" and "digital natives." Many of us, he would suggest, are the "conservators" of our culture and are resistant to change but resisting today's digital technology "will be truly lethal to our children's education"! He's pretty provocative, is Prensky, and I actually don't agree with him.

Here's what I think: Learning anything new takes time ... something many of us in education don't have a lot of ... and there is heightened anxiety attached to our "adult" learning about technology that needs to be acknowledged. We need not be viewed as "immigrants" but as students on the learning continuum who need to be "scaffolded" across the points of frustration.

Not immigrants, but learners, we are also educators steeped in critical capacities that enable us to offer students the thinking skills as our part of the technology-learning equation where often they are the teachers. Certainly their sense of adventure in the technological learning environment is what leads us on ... but this is not a colonial enterprise; it's a partnership where our relationship to what is being learned has changed. We have not changed who is the expected master or authority for learning and who is the "slave" or obedient recipient of knowledge, but rather we are seeing a flattening of the leadership roles -- a blurring of the boundaries or borders -- in relationship to acquiring and transforming knowledge. We are all required to become lifelong learners. The statement about the importance of being a lifelong learner is not just for our students. We are not "behind" our native students trying to catch up but rather "beside" them bringing different capacities to the collaborative learning experience.

How's that for an analysis? And Ms J and her students are right: every student needs to leave school knowing how to do these things and how to think about them.

You will undoubtedly want to read more from the Edutopia Priority Topics page. Here's Prensky's (Feb 2008) concept of literacy explained. Prensky is a little too techno-bedazzled in his thinking for me, but it's a great place to start in considering your own place and the place of your school library program, as well as district directions for school libraries in relation to these ideas.

Check out the free Edutopia teaching modules too.

Here's a great article: "U.S. educators seek lessons from Scandinavia High-scoring nations on an international exam say success stems from autonomy, project-based learning," by Meris Stansbury, Assistant Editor, eSchool News. I thought it advisable not to ask about the recent e-testing! Abstract for the article reads: "A delegation led by the Consortium for School Networking recently toured Scandinavia in search of answers for how students in that region of the world were able to score so high on a recent international test of math and science skills [PISA]. They found that educators in Finland, Sweden, and Denmark all cited autonomy, project-based learning, and nationwide broadband internet access (emphasis mine) as keys to their success."

Thanks, again, Moberly and Tillicum too: you've got us thinking! You are engaged in cutting-edge learning.

November in February: District Tech Day a Big Success

Dear Mr Alan November:

Thank you so much for infusing excitement amongst us about the possibilities for technology in relation to teaching and learning. Although the day leaves me reeling with the un-learning we'll have to do, un-learn we must! You left us with so much to think about ... my boomerangs, skype, global voice, podcasting, screencasting, iPod learning, jing, del.ici.us, archive.org, epals, Google Custom Search, and more that I missed as I felt a need to see what else there was going on during the day ... well, I am struck by your profound use of the quote, "The past is over"!

I am compelled to find the youtube clip, Shift Happens. I need to see if I can make a screencast too. I want to explore how we can place greater value on the contributions children make to learning with classroom teams like your little podcasters and do more to encourage our teaching of invention and re-calibrating both teaching and learning experiences, like the education system in Singapore. I need to go back to see if I can read what they wrote in Turkey about the riots created by the Pope's speech on Islam. I want to read Dan Pink's A Whole New Mind which envisions an education system where music and art are valued in the learning experience. I want to see us stop answering questions and begin re-thinking the ways we have "bolted" technology onto our archaic learning structures.

Engaging our children means meeting them where they are and leading them to manage their learning, as you suggested, and to maximize their critical and creative capacities. It means moving beyond the bounds and the legacy of boundaries and checking the sense of entitlement against the global realities. It means attending to what kids do and know how to do. As you told us, the new role of the teacher will be to explore how everyone's knowledge can be shared with everyone. Heady stuff!

Thank you for your reference to school libraries as a place where this kind of learning often takes place in schools and for your work in support of teacher-librarians as key to technology integration with teaching and learning. Your Alan's Information Literacy Resources page and article entitled Designing Libraries: Learning for a Lifetime are also important resources to support our work and provide impetus for the much-needed re-visioning of our role in the learning equation. We need to accept the challenges and begin to engage in the transformation into 21st Century Teacher-librarians:

Beyond going to the library to do research--simply accessing existing published ork--students need to be engaged in producing content of their own. The growing trend toward online learning, more personalized instruction, and collaboration on a global scale also challenge librarians and media specialists, who are positioned to lead the way as technology adopters in their schools.

ME

Click here for Alan's website, November Learning.

Web 2.0 - Why Should We Know About It?

What is this Web 2.0 phenomenon? What makes Web 2.0 dramatically different from Web 1.0 that in itself has radically transformed our notion of what constitutes information and resources is its social / interactive / collaborative capacities. Yes, I know it's hard to keep pace with the rapid pace of technology change and ways to work with it in schools. In fact, as many of you know, the tendency to embrace change is neatly and quite definitively offset by the natural inclination to stasis until such time as the pressure to change is overwhelming. This means technology learning is often called "just-in-time" learning and is usually accompanied by heightened anxiety.

CommonCraft video clips make plain sense of some of the Web 2.0 applications. The webpage says their product is explanations in plain English.

TLs Gwen and Mary, along with Susan from UBC Libraries, gave their "New Learners" workshop at Technology Day. Mary addressed the nature of the very steep learning curve for many educators as well as the benefits of the ascent from her own experience. I can tell you that the hardest course I ever took was David Brear's online session, "On the Ramp to the Information Highway." Those who attended David's workshop today left with insights and ideas about how teaching and learning are being transformed yet again by the Web 2.0 phenomenon.

At the blogging mini-workshop I gave for some co-workers at the "mother ship" this week, the STAR pupil was Meredyth: check this one out! There are more coming ...

DE Tools of the Trade is John Goldsmith's technology blog for educators and it's full of news and ideas about new applications of technology. John recently forwarded this Digital Natives video clip to the BCTLA Forum.

Whoo-hoo! Now you can go to TeacherTube.

Here are some more Youtube clips worth checking out:

A Vision of Students Today
NOTE: This clip from the U of Kansas Anthropology Dept was used by Gwen, Mary, and Susan in their workshop at Tech Day earlier today.

Bringing 21st C Learning to Your Classroom

A Vision of K-12 Students Today

The Machine is Us/ing Us

Information R/evolution

Did You Know 2.0 -- Thanks for this one, Lana.

ShiftHappens -- Love that U2!

Happy Viewing!

See you Tuesday .... Gladstone, 4 pm

Happy Rabbie Burns Day!

Lib/bloggin’ away …

Although I can’t imagine why, the title of this week’s blog is sung to the tune of Simon and Garfunkel’s song, the refrain for which is:

Slip sliding away, slip sliding away
You know the nearer your destination,
the more you slip sliding away …

This week's blog is a late Friday posting … lots of meetings this week as well as planning for meetings, scheduling and preparing for Pro D, and getting out to schools. Wednesday evening I attended Marlene Asselin and Keith McPherson’s Literacy for Today’s Youth session at the Burnaby Public Library, a Family Literacy event sponsored by the BC Coalition for School Libraries. This afternoon I was off to Maple Grove and Linda’s bright, inviting, and organized collection was a joy to behold. I checked up on Joanne there as well … she’s just fine, but who would doubt that!

If you haven’t seen the National School Library Day youtube clip in which Dave Cubberly speaks in the Legislature about his meeting with TL Aaron Mueller at Killarney, you can click onto it on the lefthand sidebar of this page. It brings tears to your eyes.

With feedback from Aaron, as well, I thought I had figured out how to implant comment options within a weekly entry so you don't have to scroll down to the very bottom but I didn't. I guess I need a one-on-one lesson, Aaron! Soon you will be able to comment on information within the sections. That is, it is my hope that you will soon be able to use the interactive feature of this social networking (Web 2.0) tool.

I have been checking out some really cool ways that blogs are used for teaching and will soon have some local blogs for you to use. Lana at Byng suggests that webpages have been replaced by blogs and wikis -- food for thought, my friends.

The biggest joy this week has been having a parent thank me for access to the free newspaper subscription ... her TL had sent the information home to parents in a newsletter about this resource and so she was now reading the news online. I told her to look at the other resources on the Databases page of Webcat but she knew this too. Way to go, Chris!

RESOURCES

From this week’s Webbits by Linda Hof from SFU: Google for Educators – The Best Features for Busy Teachers is an article by Sara King from Edutopia that identifies “user-friendly tools to you’re your [classes] inspired, inventive, and organized.”

Karen Lindsay, BCTLA VP, Advocacy, posts regularly and frequently to the BCTLA Forum. This week she draws out attention to these great resources:

• Docfish/Pageflakes: Karen writes, "Please share this page with your science teachers. I don't think I've ever seen anything so rich. It has also blown the doors off what I think a web page is. Enjoy. (Warning, the page loads slowly, even with cable, but it's worth the wait.)"
  
• “The IFLA/UNESCO Information Literacy Resources Directory has been redesigned and includes the just-published latest version of the State-of-the-Art report on Information Literacy in different countries.”
  
• Joe Landsberger’s Study Guides and Strategies in multiple languages.

HOT NEWS! FOR FRENCH IMMERSION SCHOOL LIBRARIES! World Book Kids (French) is due in mid-March: This news item comes from David this afternoon.

Email from Maryann Kempthorne: “I noticed this course …” and, well, she thought of you! (She hopes you are all well.) Please check out the schedule for web conferences and workshops offered by the “ei” (education institute) of The Partnership (Provincial and Territorial Library Associations of Canada). Let me know if I should be looking into scheduling us into any of these in the upcoming months.

For Secondary School Libraries, News about Freedom to Read Week: Click here for information about Freedom to Read Week Feb 24 to March 1. Thanks, Anne S., for bringing this to my attention. Kits have been ordered for the secondary schools.

Reminder -- I need DRAGON BOOKS for upcoming VSB Display (Note: opportunity here for student field trips).

EVENTS

Technology Day at Magee has big-name keynote speaker Alan November. Check out his weblog and website. There are 21 different workshops to delight both TLs and their colleagues. There are 7 TLs from Vancouver giving workshops and 2 from North Vancouver as well. These sessions are for teachers as well as TLs so encourage your colleagues to attend. Register online (see "Information Technology.") Although there are lots more to choose from, here are brief summaries of workshops provided by TLs:

Mary Locke and Gwen Ingham will work with Susan Atkey from the UBC Libraries to present a session about "the new learners," including teachers (and TLs) as
newcomers to learning about and within the more highly technical learning
environment.

Katharine Shipley and Frances Renzullo-Cuzzetto are presenting a session on electronic resources that are successful with French Immersion teaching. Look for information about a blog that is under development with electronic resources for using in French Immersion classrooms.

David Brear from Coquitlam -- yes, he's related to one of ours so he counts! -- will bring everyone up to date on the Web 2.0 phenomenon.

Virginia Lam and Ciara Kelly are doing an introduction to using electronic databases with both elementary and secondary students. These two TLs are the BIG users of the databases as resources to support inquiry so they will have lots to share about what works.

Sylvia Zubke is presenting with teacher Heidi Cyr on using Smartboards in classrooms and school libraries and again later you can see Sylvia with student William on social networking software.

Pat Parungao and I are doing our session on plagiarism – "Just Copy, Cut, and Paste: Phooey on Academic Integrity" - strategies for teachers and TLs on making it hard to do, not on how to do it!

North Vancouver TLs Lesley Edwards and Hazel Clark will show yograydonu how to enhance research through the use of MS Word, including new note-taking techniques such as highlighting, commenting, and creating tailormade graphic organizers. You may also want to check out how Lesley is using blogs as a means to build online assignments with appropriate resources. The example: Canadian poets.

Other sessions of interest: Raza Mirani from Gladstone on videostreaming; Diane Potts from UBC on the Multiliteracies; Drs. Wanda Cassidy and Margaret Jackson from SFU on the Cyberbullying research in Vancouver schools; Alan Zisman on using technology to create School Newspapers; Gerry Kent on Classroom Discussion using
technology; Alan November has a workshop for teachers and there are lots more
… see online registration for more information.

Register NOW for Literacy Day (see last week’s blog for more information) or go online to view Current Professional Development Opportunities. You can’t register online but you can go online to print out the form, than attach your cheque, and blue-bag it in to Pat Dymond ASAP.

Shari Graydon – she’s here to speak to Vancouver educators about on Feb 6, Room 400, VSB 4 pm to 5:30 pm. I sent out the electronic flyer this week. Please post/copy the flyer liberally, and promote/attend this event. Register online. [NOTE: Please encourage your colleagues, including counsellors, Home Ec and Planning 10 teachers, teachers involved with school-based social responsibility initiatives, Language Arts/English teachers, and others.] Or see Shari later the same evening at 7 pm at the Metrotown Burnaby Public Library, a free event sponsored by the BC Coalition for School Libraries.

ANNOUNCEMENTS

Excerpted from Val H's Vancouver Retired Teachers' Association blog, sad news:

Karen Bailey (1942 - 2008) passed away peacefully on January 5 at VGH after a long and courageous battle with breast cancer. Born in Vancouver, Karen completed high school in Vancouver, graduated from Simon Fraser University, and later completed her library science training at UBC. Karen was an active member of VESTA who will be remembered as an amazing classroom teacher and teacher-librarian at several East Side Vancouver schools. After her retirement in 1999, Karen continued to be involved with children with special needs. No service will be held at her request, but donations may be made in Karen's memory to the BC Cancer
Agency or to the SPCA.

Happy New Year!

I have saved this link to as a reflective holiday greeting: What is eaten in one week (by one family around the world) is for consideration in our own New Year’s planning or for use with social studies or social issues lessons.

I will be away from my desk on Tuesday and Wednesday next week. Yes, I am off to give a workshop in School District #6, Rocky Mountain, in Invermere, BC. I will be using our "Role and Responsibilities" document (sent to new and nearly-new TLs this week). For anyone else who may wish to review the scope and nature of the wonderful work you do, check this 6-page document in section 1 of your TL Handbook.

Heidi, Literacy Mentor here at the VSB, sends the following clever “marketing” youtube link of interest for TLs.

Our first TL Studio Workshop of 2008 had 15 registrants but only 5 showed up. I hope that people just forgot and have not lost interest. Michele showed us all kinds of new “open source” resources like Froguts and Scratch, as well as what can be done with the Smartboard. We met John, the new Online Learning Consultant, resisted chocolate, and considered how we might use the new tools. Attendees submitted comments in response to my blog!

I hope you find you can respond to this blog by going to the end of this January 11 entry and clicking onto “Comments.” You can mark this http://tlspecial.blogspot.com/ as a favourite and come back to it at any time.

NOTE: A blog is an online diary – we discussed possible applications for Reader Response but the jury is out on educational applications for these. It is a Web 2.0 tool in that it is interactive. Where wikis are a tool that can be collaboratively developed, blogs are written by one person and responded to by others. In blogs, the first entry is the most recent. Older entries are “archived” or scrolled through. I am still learning how to do this and will be looking for how to make it searchable. But I did choose the background and video clips, post my photo taken from a window of the Bodleian Library in Oxford, and successfully enter the emails I sent you previously. Stop reading when it begins to feel as though you’ve seen this before!

Little Library in Malawi: I got a call this morning from Deanna to say thanks for the donations of really fine reading materials and supplies for the new library in Malawi. She was able to take some books with her and has just sent off 90 lbs more (with the help of a $450 community donation).

UPCOMING EVENTS:

District Literacy Day, Feb. 8: Information will be in the schools next week. 34 workshops to choose from. Be sure to promote workshops with your colleagues, and check out the ones given by TLs.

District Technology Day, Feb. 8: Check the workshops for the Faces of Technology Conference 2008 online.

______________________________________

Don't forget to register for:

EBSCO Training for Teacher-Librarians

Wednesday, January 16, 2008, 4:00 pm - 6:00 pm

Prince of Wales Secondary Library, 2250 Eddington Drive (just north of 25th and west of Arbutus) with our David and presenter Dennis Staples, Education Specialist, EBSCO Publishing.

This is the last opportunity of the year to get first-hand answers from the company rep. We have asked Dennis to be prepared to "customize" his workshop for the questions and interests you have.

We need more sign-up for this session!

________________________________

What Research Says About Improving the Literacy Achievements of Students of Diverse Backgrounds

Sponsored by BCLCIRA, this evening of professional development with Dr Kathryn Au will be held on Thursday, January 31, at the Italian Cultural Centre from 5 pm to 8:30 pm. For the registration fee of $55 (before Jan 17) and $65 (after Jan 17), you will have a full Italian dinner, an educational evening, and an opportunity to socialize with other literacy-minded educators.

Dr. Au, VP, International Reading Association and Dai Ho Chun Professor of Education at University of Hawaii, has authored numerous books and chapters on multicultural classrooms, diverse learners and effective literacy instruction for all students. Based on research on language and culture, Dr. Au will present evidence-based, practical instructional strategies that address the needs of all literacy learners.

Email Meredyth - mkezar@vsb.bc.ca – if this sounds like an evening for you:

Nick Glass, Founder and Principal of TeachingBooks, makes a webinar offer

If you would be interested in attending a free TeachingBooks.net web seminar, or if you think a group of our colleagues might like this, let me know. Glass writes, “This live training session would enable your librarians, reading teachers, and anyone in your district who uses books to learn directly from TeachingBooks staff about how this electronic resource supports their existing library and reading initiatives.”

He continues, “What we ask is that we have an audience. Your colleagues could be gathered in one place, spread out throughout the district, or a combination of the two. Webinar attendees need only a computer with Internet access and headphones or speakers …. The webinar would have value both live and beyond. We will record the seminar and provide you with a link to share the recording throughout your district.” Call Moira if you would like this set up.

From VPL and Hastings Library -- Teen Book Club and Palmistry for Teens

It’s back! Saturdays, 2:30 to 4:30 pm, Jan 19, Mar 1, Mar 29, Apr 26, May 24. It’s FREE. They provide the books and snacks. Registration is limited to 15 and has started already. Call 604-665-3959 to register or to get more information.

Or how about another exciting program, Palmistry for Teens, coming on Jan 26, 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 pm. Again, registration has started. Limited to 15.

More Teen-focused workshops are anticipated. Says Karen Sharkey, Teen Services Librarian at the VPL: “We will be having a gaming program, a beauty bootcamp and a graphic novels workshop coming later in the spring and I'll keep you posted.”

Karen also thanks TLs in Vancouver for promoting the Teen Bookmark Contest. “We had over 200 entries and the 2 winners are both from Vancouver. I am working on finding an event to present them with their cheques and the big 4 foot bookmark that we give them with their art. If you have any suggestions about school events where we could do the presentation, that would be great! I am going to see if the city youth team has anything where we could do the presentation.” Stay tuned.


RESOURCES

Vancouver Kidsbooks: Pre-Sale Event for Teachers and Teacher-librarians

Phyllis Simon sends her personal invitation:

"To all our wonderful teachers!! We invite you to our Annual Sale Teacher's Night Preview for fun, refreshments and first kick at our 20% off sale."

The Pre-Sale Evening will be held at all three stores (Broadway, Edgemont, and South Surrey) from 6:30 to 9:00 pm. RSVP 604-738-5335.

The Annual Sale with 20% of all stock and 30% off Christmas stock will run from Thursday Jan 17 to Sunday Jan 20.

Please promote this event … and come with teacher colleagues. Flyer sent by email.
___________________________________________________

NFB Learning Resources Catalogue:
Order by calling 1-800-267-7710

Lots of new titles on the environment, diversity, history, government, Language Arts, aboriginal studies, science and nature, media issues, teens, and more.

You can shop online at www.nfb.ca/store, search the free online study guides at www.nfb.ca/guides, and know that NFB DVDs are cleared for classroom use and public performance where no entry fee is charged.
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From Elizabeth Graves of ULS comes news of the January Blowout Sale:
January 14 - 19, 2008
Discounts up to 36% off on all Hardcovers (in house purchases only)

Extra bonuses include:
• A huge clearance section of 80% off titles
• 50% off selected French Books
• Free Shipping
• Lots of Reading Power titles in stock

Sale Hours:

Mon., Jan 14: 8:30am - 5:00pm; Tues., Jan 15: 8:30am - 5:00pm; Wed., Jan 16: 8:30am - 5:00pm; Thurs., Jan 17: 8:30am - 5:00pm; Fri., Jan 18: 8:30am - 4:00pm; Sat., Jan 19: 9:00am - 2:00pm (NOTE: Saturday opening)

101B - 3430 Brighton Avenue, Bunaby BC V5A 3H4
604-421-1154 or toll-free 1-877-853-1200

Elizabeth Hennessey Graves, Sales, BC Schools & Libraries
United Library Services, 101B 3430 Brighton Avenue, Burnaby, BC V5A 3H4
T: (604) 605-8926 F: (604) 605-8961 e: egraves@uls.com


Awesome Stories – The January issue

I know I’ve talked about this site before. The January Issue is available now. And there is a subject index , a separate section for learning tools such as animations, online games, and virtual field trips, and streaming audio recordings of their stories. You don’t have to load a player; just click on the green arrow at the top of each recorded chapter and off you go. Look for podcasts of stories soon. We have now got an academic membership using 39vsb as the password.

Writers In Electronic Residence Launches 20th Year

Jan. 14: Linking Canada's Writers with Canada's Schools

Imagine having Wayne Gretzky assess your stick work, or Elizabeth Baird test your butter tarts. Then imagine that their advice was part of a free exchange of ideas among other students, teachers, and the pros, culminating in everyone joining in a practice hockey game or sitting down to eat the final creation. This captures the reality of Writers In Electronic Residence, where the coaches are prominent Canadian writers, working online wth students and teachers in elementary, middle and secondary classrooms across Canada--Iqaluit to Toronto, Vancouver to St. John's.

WIER's winter term will open with its usual two-week "introductory period" on January 14, 2008. Space is available in each of WIER's online writing programs--elementary, middle school, and secondary school levels. The term will run until April 5.

Please visit http://www.wier.ca/ for program information, student writing samples, author biographies and the like. Here's a quick link to WIER's registration FAXBACK FORM.
WIER is administered by the Canadian Education Association in alliance with OISE/UT.

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From former TL Val, now Co-ordinator, Artists-in-Residence Program, here at the VSB:

WORKING LIVES: A MUSICAL HISTORY OF LABOUR AND ENTERPRISE IN BRITISH COLUMBIA

This year celebrate BC’s 150th birthday using this new online learning resource: http://www.workinglives.ca/. It provides a uniquely creative perspective on BC's social and economic history. Collaboratively developed by a TL and a singer/songwriter John McLachlan, Working Lives works well with the Social Studies 10 BC Resources unit. Historical figures are kept alive through the songs they inspired.

Each of the 10 songs can be downloaded. Archival photographs and pen and ink drawings give the songs a visual context, while background information and learning activities in a PDF format encourage students to actively engage with the website. Extension activities and extensive bibliographies enable further research. Working Lives was classroom tested during the development process.

To launch Working Lives as a classroom resource in BC schools, request one of the FREE CDs (limited number) from BCTF Lesson Aids: 604- 871-2180. A $5.00 charge for postage and handling will apply.

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New Book The Evergreen Country: A Memoir of Viet-Nam
By Thuong Vuong-Riddick

Some of you may know Mimi, Settlement Worker in School (SWIS) at Churchill. Her sister Thuong Vuong-Riddick has just published her second book. Mimi has emailed me to say Chapters doesn’t have enough copies at the moment so you can contact Thuong directly thuong_riddick@hotmail.com with questions or ordering information. Five secondary schools have her first book of poems, Two Shores : poems = Deux Rives: poemes

From EdInfo Digest, Jan 3: A BC ARCHIVES Website: THE AMAZING TIME MACHINE

If you haven’t looked at this resource, you should do. It caters to school age children and provides access to British Columbia historical documents, images, and other multimedia information in a format that they can relate to.

http://www.bcarchives.gov.bc.ca/exhibits/timemach/index.htm

Archival documents (photos, newspaper clippings, drawings, paintings and pages from people’s journals etc.) are grouped into 11 collections that range from “Families in B.C. History” for grades K–1, “First Nations Art in B.C.” for grade 4 and “Women in B.C. History” for grade 11.

http://www.bcarchives.gov.bc.ca/exhibits/timemach/galler01/frames/index.htm

http://www.bcarchives.gov.bc.ca/exhibits/timemach/galler03/frames/index.htm

http://www.bcarchives.gov.bc.ca/exhibits/timemach/galler10/frames/index.htm

The Time Machine is the winner of various awards and “best-of” lists and received a five-star rating from the Encyclopedia Britannica Online.

And finally, this week …

A REMINDER: Sun/Province AFFIDAVIT WEEK IS COMING UP! Here's a suggestion from a TL colleague: Fill in every blank except the date (# of licences = the number of students in your school), photocopy it 6 times so you have enough to send in until June, then each month you only have to fill in the date and FAX as required.

New TL Directories have been sent out. Please replace the ones from the Fall. Some changes have been coming in. We will send these out by email so that you can make relevant changes on your print copy.

Have a great weekend!