Library Links

"Content that might be of interest to Teacher-Librarians..."

11.12.14

Article: Reconciling learning the 'basics' and inquiry teaching

Fostering thoughtful debate
The staff of the Critical Thinking Consortium tackles the apparent conflict between Back-to-the-basics and "inquiry teaching". Worth the read!

"....Media reports frequently present a polarized debate between two camps: "back to basics" versus "inquiry or discovery learning."4 The resulting impression that educators must chose between one or the other is the kind of exaggerated position that often propels the educational policy pendulum to oversimplify and overreact. In this article, we seek to explain how learning the basics and inquiry teaching can be reconciled, and to document the effects of doing so..."

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"La musique dans ma classe"

Explore francophone musical tradition
Visit this site for links to music resources in French

"Music is essential to the study of language and culture. To fully appreciate French, it is important for students to be exposed to the rich world of French music, in particular the unique francophone musical tradition of Canada  (Québécois, Acadian, Métis, and French Aboriginal music and musicians.)"

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10.12.14

Seeing the Invisible: an animated treatment of van Leeuwenhoek

Seeing smaller than ever before


"In 1674, Antonie van Leeuwenhoek looked at a drop of lake water through his homemade microscope and discovered an invisible world that no one knew existed. His work inspired countless microbiology researchers, including HHMI investigator Bonnie Bassler, one of the narrators of this animated feature. Leeuwenhoek was a haberdasher and city official in Delft, The Netherlands. He started making simple microscopes and using them to observe the world around him. He was the first to discover bacteria and much more."

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Great Transitions: The Origin of Humans | HHMI’s BioInteractive

Key phases of human evolution: larger brains, tool use, and bipedality


Video [19m44] -> Also available for download from the site.

"Paleontologists have studied the fossil record of human evolution just like they have done for other major transitions, including the evolution of tetrapods from fish and the evolution of birds from dinosaurs. In this film, part of the Great Transitions trilogy, Sean Carroll and Tim White discuss the most important human fossils and how they illuminate key phases of human evolution, focusing in particular on three traits: larger brains, tool use, and bipedality."

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9.12.14

“Oniva”, a fun French TV show for kids - on DVD

A "magazine format" show for Immersion and FSL students
Great for Elementary immersion classes, and higher FSL grades, ONIVA is a show created for and by school-aged kids. In each show, the team travels and visits a school (in one of the four western provinces, the Yukon and Ontario) and examines a focus topic with young people. The show is presented in a "magazine format" and includes stories, interesting facts, a feature called "vox-pop", Q&As, a cooking segment and entertaining games. The student hosts are middle school aged but clips would work with junior high Immersion students, and high school FSL.

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What is a Makerspace?

Helping students be creative
This Makerspace is seperate from the school library, but the energy and excitement could easily be brought into an existing library learning commons.

"Andrew Goodin manages the GCAA Makerspace, a collaborative workshop in which students use their artistic abilities to solve real-world problems in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. He earned a B.S. in Chemistry from Washington State University and a Masters of Education from University of Missouri-St. Louis. Andrew is co-founder of The Disruption Department, an educational technology nonprofit that creates tangible STEAM learning opportunities for students from under-resourced neighborhoods in St. Louis. "

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Makerspaces Webinar with Diana Rendina

Students and stations and stuff! (video webinar)
"An ISTE Librarian Network Webinar with Teacher-Librarian Diana Rendina at a STEM magnet school on "Transforming your library with a Makerspace". Learn how she did it in her library and how you can do it in yours. (Streamed live on 22 Oct 2014)"

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8.12.14

Open a World of Possible: Real Stories About the Joy and Power of Reading (eBook)

Reading teaches us who we are and who we might become
"The remarkable authors in this volume—literacy experts, language researchers, librarians, children's authors, and poets—share the reading moments that enriched and extended the possibilities of their lives and made them who they are today.[...] These people credit reading with helping them dream of a future they hadn't thought possible.Their stories are our stories. No matter our medium—digital screen or printed book, magazine or comic book— reading can impart courage; it teaches us who we are and who we might become."

  • Practitioner's Guide
  • Bookmark
  • Complete site:
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5.12.14

MiniTFO - Vidéos

Vidéos pour les tout petits!

Practice your ABCs or 123s in French, review colours, do some "bricolage" with the Mini-TFO team.

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4.12.14

Basketball Fundamentals on Learn360

Basketball Fundamentals

Grade(s): 3-5, 6-8, 9-12
Run Time: [44:42]
Marty Schupak's, Basketball Fundamentals, provides basketball techniques that are the foundation for success for all players. Coaches, parents, and players will learn how to teach and practice all of the basketball fundamentals and skills shown in this program. Whether playing on a driveway, a playground, or for a school team, this video will help players learn or polish their basic basketball fundamentals, leading to individual and team success on the court. The video highlights: Ball handling basics , V Cut, Advanced dribbling techniques, L Cut,, Ball handling games, Passing fundamentals & drills, Individual practice routines, Slow motion analysis, Offensive plays & moves, Pick and roll, Dual purpose drills, Boxing out & rebounding, Communication techniques, Defense techniques and more!
©2011, Youth Sports Club.

To view, login using school ID and Password.
To download (as a district 38 teacher), see your TL for teacher ID and PW.

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3.12.14

Canadian "Native" Flag

A beautiful take on the Canadian flag - by artist Curtis Wilson.


"I created this design while sitting at my dinner table thinking about who I am and where I came from. I like to describe myself as coming from the four corners of the Kwakwaka'wakw territory. [...] Throughout my life, I have come to learn all the different relationships, interactions, hardships and struggles that First Nations people have faced in this country. This history goes back to time immemorial there have been a lot of negative impacts on both sides. I am a person that always tries to see the glass half full and even with all of the difficult situations we have faced, I still love the country I live in and am proud to call myself a Canadian…and First Nations Canadian. I wanted to create a design that represents both my cultural heritage and the country I live in."

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2.12.14

NoveList Plus - Readers' Advisory Toolbox

Check out some new tools for book selection


"The RA Toolbox is your one-stop shop for all the resources you need to enhance your readers' advisory skills. You'll find links to a variety of helpful content like articles about current trends, genre overviews, and so much more.

  • [A student] has read everything by author A and wants another author to try? You're in luck, because our Author Read-alikes have authors B, C, D, E, and F.
  • Do you have to get ready to lead a book discussion? Our Book Discussion Guides provide not only the questions for the entire group but the answers so you can feel better prepared.
Go to EBSCO NoveList: [LINK]
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Using Video in Class

A powerful tool for instruction
Here are some links to explore that offer tips, strategies and rationale for using video in the classroom:

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Youtube to transform your teaching?

Explore Youtube content for your classroom
Mike Christiansen, a 9th grade social studies teacher at Kent-Meridian High School in Kent, WA, uses YouTube in his classroom to transform it into a 21st century learning environment. Visit the "playlist" link to see curated playlists on a number of subject areas.

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Readers' Theatre Plays for any season

The Play's the thing...
Our EBSCO database gives us access to a magazine called "Plays" that features Reader's Theatre scenes for a range of reading levels and abilities. I've pasted a few of searches below for you to look at. (The PDF link for each "play" gives you a printable version, as if scanned from the magazine.) If you need to access the magazine from home, use your school ID and PW to view the articles - your TL can remind you if you have forgetten!

  • Search with "Christmas" as the keyword: [LINK]
  • Search with "Hanukkah" as the keyword: [LINK]
  • Search with "Kwanzaa" as the keyword: [LINK]
  • Search with "Scrooge" as the keyword: [LINK]
  • Search with "Rudolph" as the keyword: [LINK]
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"It's in the Cards" and Other Movement Activities

Playing Cards get kids moving
http://www.ascd.org/publications/newsletters/education-update/nov14/vol56/num11/£It%27s-in-the-Cards£-and-Other-Movement-Activities.aspx

"It's in the Cards," has really got my elementary students excited about math. To lead this exercise, I would get a deck of cards and post a code on the board; it may say, hearts = jumping jacks, diamonds = knee lifts, spades = straight jumps, and clubs = twists. Then, a student would draw a card from the deck, and the rest is "in the cards." The number on the card indicates the number the class counts by while doing the movement. For example, if a student would pick the three of hearts, the class would count by threes while doing jumping jacks for a total of 10 jumps (or until the count of 30 in this case). Then we would draw another card and repeat the process.

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A great resource list for life-long learners on your staff

"What do you want to learn today?"

"1100 free online courses from the world's leading universities —  Stanford, Yale, MIT, Harvard, Berkeley, Oxford and more. Download these audio & video courses (from iTunes, YouTube, or university web sites) straight to your computer or mp3 player. Over 30,000 hours of free audio & video lectures."

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Mindfulness Exercises

Mindfulness is a "particular way of paying attention"
"This page has a selection of guided mindfulness meditations to introduce you to mindfulness practice and support your existing practice.

  • Mindfulness of the Breath
  • Body Scan
  • Mindfulness of Walking
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Connecting passion with the resources to learn

Will Richardson speaks at TEDxNYED
"A parent of two middle school-aged children, Will Richardson has been blogging about the intersection of social online learning networks and education for the past 10 years at Weblogg-ed.com. He is a former public school educator for 22 years, and is a co-founder of Powerful Learning Practice, a unique long-term, job-embedded professional development program that has mentored over 3,500 teachers worldwide in the last four years."

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1.12.14

New Graphic Novels Reading Lists

Engaging GN titles that are sure to excite children
"The Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC), a division of the American Library Association (ALA), has released three new Graphic Novel Reading Lists intended for children from kindergarten through 8th grade.   PDF downloads of the book lists are available in color, and black and white.  

"ALSC's three Graphic Novels Reading Lists are full of engaging titles that are sure to excite children," said Ellen Riordan, ALSC president. Graphic novels on the list are defined as a full-length story told in paneled, sequential, graphic format. (The list does not include book-length collections of comic strips, wordless picture books or hybrid books that are a mixture of traditional text and comics/graphics.) The list includes classics as well as new titles that have been widely recommended and well-reviewed, and books that have popular appeal as well as critical acclaim.

(Thanks to Wendy for the link)
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