Tag Archives: App

School Media Specialist

My Report on the EduTech Smackdown Open Mic Night with Joyce Valenza

In one of last week’s blog posts we highlighted EduTech’s Smackdown Open Mic Night with Dr. Joyce Valenza, which took place Monday (December 3rd) at 7:00 PM. Though there were maybe other places I would’ve rather been at 7:00 PM on a Monday :), I have to say I turned out to be very glad to have attended this online (Blackboard Collaborate) event. It was a great OpenMic_SimonScott_TLCafe12experience all around! The “open mic” approach was really quite fun, quick, and refreshing. Attendees that wanted to share a resource with the virtual audience had been asked in advance to create a slide and embed it in the larger slideshow so that they’d have a “spot” in the line-up of presenters. As the night progressed, one-by-one each slide appeared on the screen and the mic was turned over to the presenter.

The host of the evening was Dr. Joyce Valenza, along with a few other (big name) moderators. Throughout the hour-long open mic webinar scads of helpful tools, apps, and other resources were shared. I literally have four notebook pages full of tools/resources with helpful ideas and suggestions for how to effectively utilize them. I anticipate that I may be sharing some of these resources/tools/apps in upcoming blog posts, but know that they ranged from holocaust survivor story websites, to apps like Reflection, to storytelling sites/apps, to poster making resources. Really, the whole gamut was covered here! It was an energizing experience, and I definitely plan to attend similar events in the future.

Lucky for you if you missed it… There is an archived version of the webinar now available! If you participated as well, we definitely want to hear from you! Please share (in the comments area) the ideas and resources you found the most useful!

Academic, General, Public, School Media Specialist, Special

Apply today for MILE 2013!

From MILE 2013:

The Minnesota Library Association’s Institute for Leadership Excellence (MILE) will help you discover the leader within yourself and give you tools to learn how to lead effectively today—even if your current position isn’t one of leadership.Leadership

During this four-day conference, selected participants will spend their days in an intimate conference setting with 24 other emerging library leaders from across the state. They will learn about using improvisational humor and creative idea generation to foster creative approaches to problem solving and strategic planning, discover their personal strengths, and learn to lead no matter what their current library position may be. Participants will also become involved in an ongoing mentoring relationship.

Applications for participation will be accepted through Friday, January 11, 2013. Accepted participants will be notified in February.

Learn more and apply today at  http://milethirteen.weebly.com/index.html

Public, School Media Specialist

Recommended App: P2K Money

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The helpful website, Parents to Kids Money, has a fantastic free app available to teach kids about the responsibility of money and budgeting. The P2K Money app will teach kids how to create a budget, track their expenses, save their money, and spend wisely. It is an interactive, easy to use, app that allows them to input their “income” (allowance, mowing the lawn, babysitting, etc), expenses, and items on their wish list. Overtime, as they learn the value of careful spending, they will see their “available money” increase as well as the funds they’ve put aside for their wishlist item.

The P2K Money app is compatible with iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad. The app requires iOS 3.2 or later.

Academic, Check this out:, General, Public, School Media Specialist, Special

50 Great Mobile Apps for Librarians

The theme of the 16th annual Internet Librarian Conference this year was Transformational Power of Internet Librarians: Promise & Prospect. As the conference planners point out, Internet librarians have been revolutionizing the Net for many years, and are poised to transform their communities in exciting new ways. Technologist  keynote speaker David Weinberger said, we have to “build networks that make us smarter.” This event showcased leading-edge tools, strategies and techniques for transforming campuses, communities and organizations.  One of the presentations that might interest you was given by Richard Le, SanRafael Public Library, and Tom Duffy, San Francisco Public Library. Together they shared the 50 mobile apps most useful to them as librarians. Its always interesting to compare your favorite tools to theirs to see how many are a match.

Go to their  slideshare presentation at http://50apps.weebly.com/presentation.html and who knows, maybe you will pick up at least one new tool that perfectly suits your needs. I know I did!

Public, School Media Specialist

Recommended App: Grammar Jammers Primary Edition

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Pearson Education, Inc. has developed a kid-friendly app for learning grammar usage and mechanics. The primary edition of this app promises “catchy animated songs and rhymes [to] make English language arts exciting!”  Grammar Jammers Primary Edition includes unique animations and quiz questions on the following topics: adjectives, contractions, nouns, pronouns, punctuation, sentences, and verbs. The app is free and is compatible with iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad. Requires iOS 3.1.2 or later.

Check out this YouTube video for a nice sampling of what’s available on the app. I absolutely love the music and imagine that both kids and adults (parents & teachers) could enjoy listening to it (unlike some cartoon/kids music!).

Grammar Jammers is also available in Elementary and Middle Editions. However, these editions of the app typically cost around $2.99.