Tag Archives: Digital Resource

School Media Specialist, Tech

AASL Best Digital Tools 2021: Typing.com

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AASL released its list of Best Digital Tools for Teaching and Learning 2021! This year’s list took into special consideration how well these tools work for remote/distance students. The resources enhance learning and encourage the following qualities:

  • Innovation/Creativity
  • Active Participation
  • Collaboration
  • User-Friendly
  • Encourages Exploration
  • Information/Reference

We share these resources every year and you can explore our archive of past recommendations here.

Typing is such an essential skill and this engaging tool makes it fun for students to learn! Plus, it fulfills ISTE and Common Core Standards. If your students like earning badges or winning competitions, they’ll definitely enjoy using this resource!

Grades: K-12

“Typing.com is clean, colorful typing practice for any level  with Common Core and ITSE standards correlations. Scope and Sequence curriculum engages students with gamification opportunities to self-direct towards achievement with class competitions and other games to participate in and badges, stars, and certifications to achieve, print, and share with friends, parents, or colleagues. Class level settings and customizable lesson modules allow educators to  differentiate instruction to accommodate students at any level and pace.”

Common Sense Education has this review of the app and Clever.com gives this overview of the resource which includes many reviews from teachers.

Watch this 4 minute video and learn how to setup the app and use it with your students!

Academic, General, Public, School Media Specialist

The Blue Skunk: Why digital resources go unused, and what to do

Blue SkunkDoes your media center’s digital resources suffer from low use? Maybe you’ve promoted it, but students, teachers, and faculty just aren’t using it. Well the Blue Skunk to the rescue! In a recent blog post he talked about why digital resources might be unused. He also offers some suggestions to increase their use. Interestingly, one suggestion he really sees as an opportunity to build relevance and relationships with teachers and the administration.

The growing use of our learning management system, Schoology, makes this an opportune time to work with teachers to select content-specific digital resources. – The Blue Skunk.

Here’s what he sees as the problems with digital resources:

  1. Out of sight, out of mind.
  2. Difficult to promote.
  3. Low comfort level by staff. 
  4. Inadequate access to technology.
  5. Free, popular digital options.
  6. Slow change in assessments.
  7. Generic, not targeted.

Read the whole blog post now!

Academic, General, Public, School Media Specialist, Special

An Introduction to Digital Preservation

PrintManaging Digital Content Over Time: An Introduction to Digital Preservation

What Will be Covered? Organizations of all kinds create and use a wide variety of digital resources in the course of business. These resources represent each organization’s intellectual capital and, as such, have value and need to be carefully managed and preserved. While many of the traditional resources found in libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural heritage institutions—books, photographs, objects—can survive for years with no intervention, our digital content is much more fragile. Managing it requires ongoing care and preservation activities to ensure continued access far into the future.

This online training series—based on the Library of Congress Digital Preservation Outreach and Education (DPOE) Program—introduces fundamental concepts for managing your digital content over time through a series of six modules delivered in three sessions. The sessions include: Identify and Select, Store and Protect, and Manage and Provide. Viewers can choose to register for all three sessions, or just one of the three.

Who Should Attend? This introductory series is for staff of any library, archive, museum, or other organization concerned about the long term care of their digital resources. No previous knowledge about the topic of digital preservation is assumed.

To Register Visit: http://tinyurl.com/nalzeeg

 

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

23 Mobile Things Preview Notes

23MobileThings_Banner_Green23 Mobile Things is a new program that allows library personnel to learn about apps and to stay up to-date with the latest devices.  Content will be arranged under 23 basic categories including; Thing 5: Note Taking, Thing 7; Content Saving and Sharing, Thing 11: Library Reference and much more. Each of these categories will be comprised of a list of apps for program participants to select from.

On December 5th, Minitex hosted a webinar by LeAnn Suchy from Metronet; the Twin Cities multitype library system. If you missed the 23 Mobile Things Program Preview, you can still obtain the information. Click on the link to listen to the recorded session and access the program PowerPoint =>http://tinyurl.com/mwtnugs.

Registration for this event will open on January 15th. Check back to our site for additional updates next month.

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

Recommended Apps: Shazam and SoundHound

Image by Berlin Career College. Retrieved from Flickr. Used under Creative Commons' licensing.
Image by Berlin Career College. Retrieved from Flickr. Used under Creative Commons’ licensing.

Have you ever been listening to the radio, heard a great song, and wondered about the title and/or artist? CMLE recommends using Shazam or SoundHound. Both of these apps identify songs and other media utilizing special sound recognition software. Results can be made available  in under a minute, allowing the user to view lyrics with an option to purchase the song. Interested in learning more about a song that you can’t seem to stop singing? SoundHound has an added feature in which the user is able to hum or sing the lyrics to initiate a search.

Note: Both of these products have a free version compatible with Apple, Android and Windows operating systems.

Tip: If you receive a device for the holidays, this is a quick and fun app to kick-start your learning.  Incorporate this technology into a mini research/trivia activity to engage your library users.