Tag Archives: free

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

Two Opportunities to Meet the Minnesota Book Awards Finalists!

MNbookawards-smAre you curious about who our state’s top authors are?  Here are two opportunities to meet the Minnesota Book Awards finalists!

First, consider attending the Meet the Finalists event sponsored by Minnesota Book Awards.  This is a free event in which all the available 2013 finalist authors will gather to share their work. In addition, copies of their books will be for sale by Magers & Quinn. Take this opportunity to have your book(s) personally signed!

      Friday, March 15 at Open Book
      1011 Washington Ave. S., Minneapolis beginning at 7:00 p.m.
      This event includes a reception with wine and refreshments following the program.

Second, 2013 marks the silver anniversary of the Minnesota Book Awards Gala honoring the finalists. Awards will be presented to the winner in each of the eight book categories as well as the Kay Sexton Award and Book Artist Award. Renowned writer and comedienne, Lorna Landvik, will emcee the evening with her quick humor and wit and passion for all things bookish. Purchase your tickets today!

     Saturday, April 13 at the Hilton Minneapolis
      7:00 p.m.  Opening reception. Meet the finalists, book sales and signings, and cash bar
      8:00 p.m.  Awards ceremony. Wine and refreshments, celebrity presenters, and more
      9:30 p.m.  Epilogue Celebration with champagne, desserts, live music with Reina del Cid and the Cidizens

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

Information Literacy Webinars

ELM

How do students approach research in a digital world? 
Attend these FREE webinars offered through the Electronic Library for Minnesota (ELM) to learn more.

Primary Sources in ELM: Learn tips on how to navigate the ELM library in search of primary sources for comprehensive research assignments. This session is offered on Tuesday, March 12th or Friday, March 29th from 8:30 AM – 9:15 AM (Central Time). Click here for more information.

Online Information Literacy and ELM: Take 45 minutes and join Minitex staff to discuss best practices to identify what information is appropriate and credible for research. Also, learn how to teach effective search strategies and see ways ELM allows students to manage their research.  This webinar is being offered on Tuesday, March 26th from 2:30 PM – 3:15 PM (Central Time). Click here for more information.

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

Free Language Materials

photo
Photo by Deb Craft

Deb Craft the Media Specialist for St. Michael-Albertville High School has free teaching materials titled, “El Chino De Hoy,” or “Chinese Today,” a bilingual edition Chinese with Spanish.  These brand new materials include workbooks, CDs (Levels I, II, and III) plus teacher manuals.  If you would be interested in any of these items please contact Deb directly by email at debracr@stma.k12.mn.us.

Academic, General, Public, School Media Specialist, Special

Recommended App: Browzine

Recently released by Minnesota-based company, Third Iron, Browzine is an app created by librarian, John Seguin. According to the Browzine press release “With BrowZine, users can easily find journals made available by their library, browse titles of interest, and read individual articles or the complete journal.” It also syncs with Dropbox and box.com for easy distribution Browzineand citation of articles.

There are two different versions of the app; one version gives the user access to open-access journals, and another requires a sync to occur between their library (whether public, school, or academic) and the app — authentication gains them access to most of their library’s online database collection. In other words, the library needs to have subscribed to the Browzine service for the sync to occur. If a library is interested in subscribing to Browzine they should consider reviewing this video, and visiting the Browzine website for additional information.

The app is free to the user, and is currently specific to the iPad (though plans are in the works for an Android app). It requires iOS 5.1 or later.

Academic, General, Public, School Media Specialist, Special

Recommended App: Zite

Do you ever find it difficult to find all the news of the day that interests you? Enter Zite!

ZiteZite is a free personalized magazine for your device that automatically learns what you like and gets smarter every time you use it. Zite delivers all the great news, articles, blogs, and videos you want – and helps you discover new stuff that you’ll love. With Zite, you can select your unique interests, and the more you interact with the app, the better it’s able to highlight items that may be of interest to you.

Zite is compatible with  iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad. It was just updated December 4, and the newer version requires iOS 6.0. It is also compatible with Android and requires 2.1 and newer.