Library Links

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

24.5.13

Random House Reader’s Circle Bookclub

A selection of thought-provoking books

Belong to an adult book club? Here are some book suggestions and associated discussion questions.

"We're here to help readers make the most of their book club experience thought-provoking books selected because they have compelling narrative guaranteed spark a lively discussion.

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Book recommendations podcasts for kids and YA readers

Podcasts for Grades 6-12 providing families, educators, out-of-school practitioners, and tutors reading recommendations they can pass along to teen readers. Each episode features in-depth recommendations of titles that will engage and excite teen readers.



As mentioned in a previous post:

Podcasts for Grades K-5 includes chats with kids, parents, and teachers about the best in children's literature for ages 4 through 11. Discussions include reading tips and fun activities to do with children before, during, and after reading.


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Invitations to Reading: 2012 Notable Children’s Books in Language Arts

Invite young readers to interact with excellent books

The Notable Children's Books allows young readers to interact with excellent books highlighting many and varied uses of language. The collection of books selected for the 2012 list invites readers from kindergarten through eighth grade to participate in language play and use innovative texts as models for their own writing, to observe and marvel in the natural world surrounding them, among other things.

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CK-12 Foundation Science texts for Gr 9 and 10

Build your own textbook

Check out these two science texts assembled from CK12 materials that align with units in Grade 9 and 10 science. View them online or download the "book" as a PDF, mobi or ePub for use on portable devices. If you like, sign up and assemble your own!

"CK-12 provides free access to high-quality, customizable educational content in multiple modalities suited to multiple student learning styles and levels, that will allow teachers, students and others to innovate and experiment with new models of learning.


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Collecting graphic novels and comics

Random House titles in graphic novels

See what Random House is selling. Most of titles here are either YA or Adult.

"In collecting graphic novels and comics, remember that variations are included under the graphic novel umbrella: bound volumes of comics, novel-length original works, and Japanese manga series are all graphic novels for a library's purposes. Japanese manga, defined as print comics from Japan, broaden the audience for any graphic novel collection, particularly drawing in young and female readers.

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Marketing Libraries to Men

Reaching guy readers

Here's an interesting post on marketing public libraries to men. While some of the conclusions may lean towards the typical male stereotypes, I think for the most part they are valid. We may find some good takeaways here for our school libraries and boy readers (or non-readers as the case may be.) ie. DYI, non-fic general interest, genres, etc.

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22.5.13

Digital Citizenship Education - Microsoft

Create an awareness of the rights related to creative content.

Microsoft has released what they call a "turnkey instructional program" to develop student respect for creative rights. The audience is grade 8-10. Divided into 4 sections, students are asked to think about the rights of artists, and what implications these rights have for end-users. (Note: Registration is required to download.)

"Students interact with music, movies, software, and other digital content every day. Do they understand the rules that dictate the ethical use of these digital files, and do they understand why these issues are relevant?"

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PowerPoint Alternatives for Creating Great Presentations

These tools to help students do their very best work

"We've all endured "death by PowerPoint." It's a painful experience for the audience and probably not all that fun for the presenter either. To help my students deliver effective presentations—free of those deadly bullet points—I have my go-to applications."

Richard Byrne recommends using tools such as Text2MindMap, Penultimate (iPad app), Google Slides, Empressr, Slide Rocket. and for the iPad Haiku Deck. Read his post for more details.

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Pixabay - Free Images

Find and share outstanding free images

Beautiful images for project work! (Note: when you search for images, the top row of results is from their sponsor - Shutterstock. The free images are in the grid below.)

"Finding free images of high quality is a tedious task - due to copyright issues, attribution requirements, or simply the lack of quality. This inspired us to create Pixabay - a repository for stunning public domain images. You can freely use any image from this website in digital and printed format, for personal and commercial use, without attribution requirement to the original author."

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Modern Bards Read Some Favorite Poems

Actors reading the ancient forms

"Long before the printing press, before parchment and papyrus, poetry was a strictly oral form... Right this very moment, in cities across the world, poets and audiences gather in bars, cafes, bookstores, temples, and libraries to hear poems spoken, rapped, sung, chanted, etc. ...Today we bring you some modern gods reading the ancient form, beginning with the great, gravel-voiced Tom Waits, then Bill Murray, and finally, the unmistakable voice of Sean Connery.

At the bottom of the page you'll also find links to several others, along with a couple of writers—Tennessee Williams and Harold Bloom.

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Common Core Webinar Series (ASCD)

Professional Development Webinars from ASCD

While we are not directly impacted by the Common Core initiatives in the States, there are always some useful ideas to be gleaned from these ASCD webinars. You can sign up to "attend" the presentations live, or scroll down the page to view the many archived sessions. Some are narrowly focussed on Common Core issues, but others have a much wider scope. Hear perspectives from leading thinkers in education.

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21.5.13

Bringing Web Tools to Gatsby's Party

Wordle and Google Books Search

Using simple tech tools like Wordle and GoogleBooks Search lets students explore the power of words in novels they study. This article focusses on the latest novel to movie sensation - The Great Gatsby.

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10 Expectations From Students for teachers

What do students expect?

We hear often of the "high expectations" schools must have of and for their students, yet we seldom hear of the expectations students have of their schools. Students' expectations constitute the new "rules of engagement" in the relationship that young people want with their schools.

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Some French reading resources

Looking for French reading resources?
Try these....

Scholastic Mags (4 levels from beginner to better!)

Other French Reading (look at Quad9 and Mon mag à moi)

Les Débrouillards is a good option (Science-y mag for kids)

Futura Sciences is another (more science)

1jour1actu (current events)

Don't forget the Digital Orca collection under the Visual Tab in your Destiny Catalog.

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Everybody is a Genius....who said that?

Dedicated to Tracing Quotations

"Everybody is a Genius. But If You Judge a Fish by Its Ability to Climb a Tree, It Will Live Its Whole Life Believing that It is Stupid." Who said this? Was it Albert Einstein? Amos Dolbear? Matthew Kelly? or simply apocryphal?

And how do you go about tracking down the origin of a "famous" saying? Try looking on the QuoteInvestigator. QI does its level best to find the originator of clever saying, and delivers an interesting backstory at the same time.

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Use Texting In The Classroom To Assess Student Learning

Text What You Learned

Sarah Brown Wessling uses a texting strategy to display student responses. (TodaysMeet could do the same for an iPod/iPad lab.)

Some questions to consider: How does this strategy benefit both the teacher and the students? If all your students don't have cell phones, how could you adapt this strategy? What does using word clouds add to this strategy?

Sarah has provided some handouts and handholding in the "Supporting Materials" section.

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Use PowerPoint to Create Custom Stock Images

Create professional looking custom images

As a teacher. you are likely working with limited graphic editing resources. How can you create professional looking custom images and slides?  One suggestion is to use the many free images available on the Microsoft site and personalize them with background images and text. Powerpoint can be used as a basic image editing tool. (You can do very similar things with Notebook software as well.)

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