Image by Caitlinator. Retrieved from Flickr. Used under Creative Commons’ licensing.
Danielle Hartman, Literacy and technology integration specialist, provides tips and tricks to teach PreK-8 students vocabulary. Hartman emphasizes the importance of creating a fun and engaging environment for students. She stresses that the key is variety and outlines the following four activities for you to try in your lesson plan this month;
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Many librarians teach formally and informally patrons/students how to conduct research. Dawn Casey-Rowe, a high school teacher and prominent writer for Edudemic, targets best practices for educators. This October, Casey-Rowe published an article titled, 10 Web Resources to Help Teach About Primary Sources. In this post, she talks about her experience with students after assigning a research paper pertaining to current events. She stated, “There is such an overload of information. Students need to be able to identify and decode sources, then make a decision as to what they mean in terms of causes and consequences.” Sound familiar? Casey-Rowe goes on to list resources that you might also find helpful, regardless of the researcher’s age.
One of the most common stumbling blocks in research is not understanding the best practices to conduct a search. In a related article, Holly Clark talks about the new “digital divide”as it relates to students’ ability to effectively find and process information while conducting searches. Here is a link to Clark’s full article, “Do Your Students Know How to Search?” also posted on Edudemic’s site (October 2013.)
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Would you like help selecting the best devices for a specific grade level?
If your school services various devices, or if you are thinking about purchasing additional devices, this article may help. Edudemic posted a brief review of the following four technologies, 1) OS, 2) Netbook, 3) Notebook, and 4) Tablet. Author David Matheson provides a brief overview with pros and cons of each type of device. Then, he links these uses to the general tasks needed at various grade levels. Click here to read the full article, How to Pick the Best Devices for Your Grade Level (August 2013.)
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Regardless of what type of library you work in, fall can be an extremely busy time of the year both professionally and personally. Also, as work environments become more collaborative, it introduces the possibility of additional interruptions. Ultimately, this has implications faculty/staff’s ability to focus on a singular task from start to finish.
If you are one of those can-do multitaskers, consider reading the following posts by Edudemic.
Image by Charles Jeffrey Danoff. Retrieved from Flickr. Used under Creative Common’s licensing.
All librarians/media specialists teach! Some are assigned specific courses, others work with classes throughout the year and many collaborate with other teachers to identify resources and develop appropriate curriculum.
Dawn Casey-Rowe wrote an article for new teachers sharing her experiences, and offering sound advice that is applicable for first year newbies to seasoned veterans. This post includes lists of resources and adoption tips; stressing the importance of mentoring, developing checklists, managing behaviors, etc. Even more valuable may be the links to additional resources. Click here to read the full article, 10 Digital Resources for New Teachers (August 2013.)
Tip: A learnist board is a visual repository of articles and resources. While reading the 50 Different Bulletin Boards for Your Classroom, I navigated my way to a “how to” learnist board about writing. Click here to view the board.
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