Tag Archives: Food for Thought

Academic, General, Public, School Media Specialist, Special

Robot Teachers?

Could it be true? Are robots teaching classrooms full of children in South Korea? An article I stumbled across today on Yahoo News from AFP, titled S. Korea Schools Get Robot English Teachers describes this trend as it’s occurring in South Korea. Apparently it seems to be a success. It keeps children interested, allows shy children to express themselves more easily, and allows students in towns that have been “shunned” by foreign English speakers to learn English. Another article from CNN dated October 22, 2010 delves into this trend as well. Both articles claim that the robots are not replacing teachers, rather they are a learning tool available to students, and they act as assistants to the teachers.

Image: ‘Robot’ from http://www.flickr.com/photos/avoiretc/3441244946/

Academic, General, Public, School Media Specialist, Special

School Librarians: Headed for the History Books?

The December 11th edition of the Star Tribune included an article titled School Librarians: Headed for the History Books, which summarized the current state of affairs for Minnesota school libraries and their staff. The article brought to light the fact that a quarter of the state’s librarians have lost their jobs. Some of the largest districts in the state, including Anoka- Hennepin, St. Paul, and Minneapolis, have very few school librarians considering the number of schools and students served.

MEMO’s president, Tori Jensen, was interviewed for the article. Jensen states that if librarians are cut “ [Schools will] …be OK for three years and then find out there’s nobody there to teach kids the skills that we are experts in. It’s not a matter of bringing the resources to them, it’s about teaching them how to use them.”

Click here http://www.startribune.com/local/east/111702274.html?page=1&c=y to read this article in its entirety.

School Media Specialist

Joyce Valenza’s Inspiring Words

Have you seen Joyce Valenza’s post titled What Librarians Make: A Response to Dr. Bernstein and an Homage to Taylor Mali? This is quite an inspiring piece on the value and importance of librarians (in particular school librarians). Valenza’s post was written as somewhat of a response to an article written by Dr. Marc Bernstein that appeared in Newsday on November 24, 2010. However, Valenza’s post goes beyond a mere “response”. Valenza very eloquently states the purpose and function of school libraries, and why they’re a necessity in schools today. Her list of what librarians “do” and what they “make” is a nice reminder of the many hats librarians wear, and all they’re responsible for.

Academic, General, Public, School Media Specialist

Education Nation

1 Comment

NBC is launching a discussion, starting Monday, September 27th, on the topic of education in the United States. The mission statement for the week long segment is:

“Education Nation seeks to engage the public, through thoughtful dialogue, in pursuit of the shared goal of providing every American with an opportunity to pursue the best education in the world.”

Key political figures, decision makers, educators, parents, students, and the general public will come together to discuss all aspects of education (positive and negative), and determine why, in a nation that is founded on democracy, our students continue to fall behind.

Special events include a television interview with President Obama, a special appearance by Collin Powell and his wife Alma Powell, and an education summit with attendees such as U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, and New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

Multi-media coverage of the event will occur on the Nightly News, the Today Show, Meet the Press, MSNBC, ivillage.com, EducationNation.com, and several other news outlets.   

For more information please go to http://www.educationnation.com/.

Academic, Check this out:

Value of Academic Libraries Report

1 Comment

Value of Academic Libraries ReportThe ACRL publication Value of Academic Libraries: A Comprehensive Research Review and Report is a review of the quantitative and qualitative literature, methodologies and best practices currently in place for demonstrating the value of academic libraries, developed for ACRL by Megan Oakleaf of the iSchool at Syracuse University. The primary objective of this comprehensive review is to provide academic librarians with a clearer understanding of what research about the performance of academic libraries already exists, where gaps in this research occur, and to identify the most promising best practices and measures correlated to performance. Find the following items at http://www.acrl.ala.org/value/

  • Full report (PDF)
  • Executive summary (PDF)
  • Bibliography (PDF)
  • Report author Megan Oakleaf and ACRL President Lisa Hinchliffe discuss the report in this ACRL Podcast