We’ve probably all enjoyed some version of Carly Rae Jepsen’s song “Call Me Maybe.” (My favorite is probably Cookie Monster’s version.) But thanks to my Pinterest obsession I found this, and with the dedication of some hard-working library science students, we made this bulletin board. Students can scan the QR codes to watch the trailer and then check out the book of the one they like! Fun with a purpose is always a good thing.
Holly Frilot, Collins Hill High School
By now you’ve probably seen an infographic or two – they are popping up everywhere. Infographics are an interesting way to display statistics for the media center, whether to administrators or to teachers and students. I also think this has tremendous potential in the classroom as a meaningful way for students to represent information. However, they are not easy to create for those of us who are not graphic designers. That’s where Piktochartcomes in handy!
I’ve played around with and it’s easy enough to use that I’ve recommended it to one of my teachers that is willing to try new web tools with her students. After creating an account, Piktochart provides 5 templates to choose from. (Think making a brochure with Publisher.) Our plan is to have kids use piktochart to represent each time period in American Lit. Last year she said her students had trouble connecting one time period to the next, so we’ll be sure to include that as a requirement in the infographic (i.e. What were the people in this time period reacting to from the previous time period?) We’ll print them and use them in the classroom as a refresher before tests.
I’ll try to remember to update this post after we complete the project. In the meantime, I wish everyone the best for a happy and productive school year!
~Holly Frilot, CHHS Media Center
As summer has set in and I look back over 2011-2012, I am reminded that school library media specialists are some of the most creative, resourceful educators in the teaching profession. With every year and semester that passes, I see my students generating more and more innovative strategies and activities in their programs. Teachers (and students) are incorporating a vast number of web 2.0 tools in their teaching and learning. The large number of quality web 2.0 tools that surface on a rather constant basis is sobering. I often hear, “There’s just too much. How do I know what’s best to use?” The answer is simple: it depends.
Now, while the answer is simple, the process is a little more complicated. Indeed, it does take time to explore “what’s out there” and how specific tools can best be integrated at the most relevant point of need. For example, while powerpoint might be a tool that works great for an in-class presentation, sliderocket allows you to go mobile and show your presentations on the move. Prezi is a wonderful way to present ideas, but animoto might be the better way to go with presenting photos/pictures. If the idea is to focus on history, the best tool might be museumbox. Maybe sharing information in a variety of formats is your need, so LiveBinders could organize and provide a forum for sharing the data for you. The point is, with exploration and some time commitment, capitalizing on the right tool for the right event for the right group is worth the investment.
Just for fun, I’ll share an example of how the right tools were used at the right point in time…
Recently I was asked to prepare “something” to show a group of program evaluators what we do in school library media and ways in which our program attempts to adapt itself to respond to input from our stakeholders and to changes in the profession. I considered a variety of free web 2.0 tools because I wanted to impress upon the visitors that much of what we can produce here and in P-12 schools is good quality and is FREE. So, I gathered pictures from public domain sources and found the perfect background songs on youtube. (Song creator Bryant Oden gave me full permission to use his songs in the presentation and on the GLMA blog.) I had to strip the audio using the video2mp3 free download. Next, I used audacity to put the 3 songs into one file and uploaded the file to animoto (educator’s edition allows for full length videos…free). I organized the pictures in animoto so the sequence would work well with the music, then produced the video. The final product is linked here.
Summer may provide you with a great opportunity for time to take a look at some of “what’s out there” at your leisure. I encourage you to test the tools, explore, and provide a true adventure for your students and teachers as they find just the right tool for just the right moment. Perhaps I’ll share some of my creative student work (which will far outshine mine!!) later in the Fall. Some creations just need to be shared!!
Dr. Phyllis Snipes
University of West Georgia
School Library Media & Instructional Technology Department
What does learning in a 21st century classroom look like? We had the opportunity to visit the Georgia Department of Education’s Center for Classroom Innovation. The room is setup with different spaces depending on the kinds of learning and collaboration taking place. The room also offers flexibility with some mobile furniture such as rolling chairs, rolling tables, and screens that divide the space into different learning areas. The spaces include:
This visit began taking shape several weeks ago when we were invited to bring a class to the space to engage in a lesson and be filmed. Our collaborative wheels immediately began turning as me, Mrs. Selleck (fourth grade teacher), Mrs. Foretich (art teacher), Mrs. Yawn (2nd grade teacher), and Mrs. Hunter (gifted teacher) began planning. We chose a 4th grade unit focusing on the social studies standards about how price incentives affect people’s behavior and choices. Ultimately, students would design a t-shirt for our temporary home at Barrow 2.0 while our new school is being built. Their role would be to establish themselves as a business, create a design, consider wants/needs/cost, and create a marketing plan for their new shirt.
Several pieces of our project took place at our school before we made the journey to Atlanta. Our principal created a video charging Mrs. Selleck’s class with the task of designing a new shirt.
In class, Mrs. Selleck established 4 groups of students. Each group had a manager, an accountant, a designer, a technology specialist, and an advertiser. The groups created names and logos for their companies. Mrs. Selleck also did a lot of work with wants and needs as well as developing products and advertising slogans. In art, Mrs. Foretich worked with the students on their designs and discussed multiple art elements that they might consider in creating an effective design for a shirt. In the media center, the technology specialists met with Mr. Plemmons and Mrs. Hunter to go over many technology options that the groups might consider while developing their advertising components of the project. These included Glogster, Animoto, and Prezi.
At the Center for Classroom Innovation, several things happened:
While all of this was going on, the Department of Education had 2 videographers documenting the day. They will 
eventually edit this video into a model video for how this space can be used with students. It was an exciting day. Our next steps will be to continue the project, but also to reflect on how this space served us in the kinds of work that we want to do with students. This will inform the design of our new classrooms in our new school. We loved how productive students were in this space. The flexible divisions of the space allowed students to create their own private nooks and work spaces. Even though there was a rumbling energy in the room, groups did not distract one another from the tasks their group was trying to accomplish. The space was a big component responsible for this success. The space also supported students with a strong infrastructure for technology. We did not have any problems with computers connecting and staying connected to wireless. The large Mondo boards were very dependable for displaying student work as well as video conferencing through Skype. We had one of the best Skype connections I’ve every experienced. The size of the room wasn’t extremely large, but again, the divisions of the space provided multiple ways for students to be productive and engage with technology and other forms of documentation. Seeing students work in this space is inspiring. We have already been doing this kind of learning in our media center and classrooms, but today showed us how a space and tools can strengthen 21st century learning.
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Here are the 3 Animoto videos created by groups today:
Here’s a link to the Glog created by one group:
Andy Plemmons
School Librarian
David C. Barrow Elementary
Athens, GA
Over the past two years I have worked with the Senior Language Arts teacher to change the “Senior Memory Book Project” into a digital “Senior Portfolio.” Different teachers have varations of the requirements, but basically it includes selections from personal writings they have completed over the year, thoughtful answers to cumulative questions, and illustrations of some kind (pictures, videos, etc.).
Talking about presentations tools with students is one of my favorite things to do. We’ve been working with Prezi, Popplet, SlideRocket, and Mixbook. All of these tools offer something a little different, but they also allow a student to share a link with a teacher. This is important for us, since many teachers want to have something they can refer back to when grading without having to deal with knowing student log-ins and passwords. However, I do warn students to be careful with the personal information they post, as most of the “free” tools are public.
If you know of any other free, student-friendly presentation tools, please comment!
Holly Frilot
James Cambell at Lee Street Elementary in Jonesboro is an awesome Media Specialist with a difficult situation who has come up with a great solution that does a whole lot of things on many different levels.
He is without a clerk or any regular volunteers and has to not only do Specials classes, but has many classes coming through. He decided he wanted to promote the GA Picture Book nominees but his voice gave out when he tried to read them over and over again. Also, that can get a bit mind-numbing as I’m sure you’re aware.
So he spends a couple of weeks over the summer with a pile of picture books, a scanner and some software and makes his own Reading Rainbow-style videos of all of the nominees. Sometimes he even gets other people to read the books. Examples can be seen on his website here. These videos engage the kids, save his voice, and allow him some breathing room to check books in and sorted before continuing with a great lesson.
He takes the time to write to each nominee and ask them or their publisher for permission to do this. Many times this is the first indication the authors and illustrators have that they’ve been nominated! He’s only posted the ones on his website that he’s gotten explicit permission for, but plays the rest in his media center. As you can see he also goes to the trouble of adding all kinds of great links for more information surrounding each nominee. It’s such a great idea that the official GA Children’s Book Award website has a link to Mr. Cambell on their Teacher Resources page.
One more short bit about the GCBA this year. On Friday afternoon I wasn’t really into any of the breakout sessions and thought I might check out the vendors while it was quiet. I crossed the autographing area and all the authors and illustrators were still there with no line! I ran to the bookstore, stocked up and went back to have some one-on-one time at the autographing table. I had my fancy new smartphone and thought about photos, but was inspired to try shooting some video. I asked each one if they would mind saying a greeting for my morning announcements show. They were all delighted to do it! Carole Boston Weatherford busted out with a poem! Mike Wimmer said some inspirational things about books. I also got Meghan McCarthy, Jody Feldman and Barbara O’Connor. They all said, “Good morning Partee Elementary, I’m _______ and I’m the author (or illustrator of) __________…” and then said whatever they felt like. It wasn’t the highest quality, obviously. I didn’t have a tripod and there was some background chatter, but the kids and teachers loved it when I showed a different one each morning for the following week. Now I will say, if you try to steal this idea, that’s fine but do make sure there’s no line behind you when you ask an author to do this. You would not make any friends holding up a line trying to shoot a video.
I think I might contact the conference organizers and urge them to set up a camera on a tripod in a corner with a backdrop and get them to do this same thing each year. They could say “to the students of Georgia” and the GCBA could post the videos on their website for all the media specialists to download and use in their morning shows. Wouldn’t that be cool?
Here’s a link to Barbara O’Connor’s greeting for an example. What were some of your conference stories?
Thanks,
Jim Randolph
Partee Elementary
Snellville, GA
Gail Giles, a YA author that has appeal to guys, girls, high and low level readers, Skyped into Collins Hill HS a few weeks ago. I was a nervous wreck, anticipating the many things that could go wrong when you combine teenagers, technology, and the first attempt at something new. However, it was a resounding success! Gail Giles was witty and fun, and our students did a wonderful job asking questions and keeping the conversation going. If you want to see the highlights, see our short video here. If you want more details, keep reading…
Amy Golemme, my co-media specialist, and I brainstormed authors that would have mass appeal. Gail Giles was our first thought, so I took a shot in the dark and emailed her. She emailed back quickly and we got the details planned out – one test session a few days before, then 2 sessions during our 2nd and 3rd periods. We decided to use the media center to keep it cozy and inviting, rather than a larger space like the commons area or theater. I made signs for the hallways and classrooms and the media center. I went into all the 9th and 10th grade LA classes to promote it. Students that wanted to participate had to read at least one of her books, answer a few questions, and write a few questions they’d like to ask her. For those students, I gave them a pass out of class during 2nd or 3rd period and they were our VIPs. I also invited two language arts classes per session and any media specialists from the around the county that could come.
In Gwinnett, we aren’t allowed to use Skype, but we do have an alternative – Polycom and the Blue Jeans network. We use those tools and the author uses Skype. Kevin Tomlinson from the county was excellent technical support for us and helped put my technology fears to rest. On the day of the event, we set up about 80 chairs in the media center, created VIP seats, put out a breakfast spread, set up the technology, and hoped for the best! Gail came on, introduced herself, and then we had the students come up to the computer to ask questions. We had a webcam and external mic hooked up to my laptop. The students asked good questions, and Gail was entertaining, funny, and informative. When I polled the students after the event, they all said they had a positive experience and many expressed interest in doing it again. One student even turned in a top ten list of authors she’d like to Skype with!
If you have any questions or want templates for signs, the handout students filled out, or any other details, don’t hestitate to email me at holly_frilot@gwinnett.k12.ga.us or call at 770.682.4126. It was a lot of work, but a great experience for us and for the students.
Holly Frilot, Collins Hill High School
Call it a backlash. This holiday season increased the world of e-books and e-readers by something like a jillion fold according to my highly scientific sources. So in January we had a couple of e-book grouches unload on this new budding trend.
Travis Jonker had an article in the School Library Journal (of all places) called snippily enough, “Fine. I Got an E-Reader. Now What?” I already responded to him on my own blog. Doug Johnson took it even further in a post on his blog, calling Mr. Jonker “reactionary” and in the comments said that the SLJ promoting his views was “detrimental to the profession.” Ouch.
Now we have Jonathan Franzen, the world’s grumpiest writer, getting into the fray. Not only does he not like e-readers, he fears “it’s going to be very hard to make the world work if there’s no permanence [like printed books]. That kind of radical contingency is not compatible with a system of justice or responsible self-government.” Link to the whole grump here.
Huh? E-readers are somehow going to lead to the downfall of civilization as we know it?
Science writer Carl Zimmer steps ups to defend e-readers in a wonderful article from Discover magazine. In Franzen’s diatribe he uses The Great Gatsby as an example of a text that “doesn’t need to be refreshed.” This leads Zimmer to muse of the differences of Fitzgerald’s minor masterpiece in print and digital formats. “It’s certainly true that ebooks are an awkward young format that’s still sloppy and hard to manage,” he says. Then he goes on to speculate, “I expect ebooks will follow much the same trajectory as paperbacks. They will start out being frowned upon as shabby, and then they will deliver literature conveniently to millions of people who might not otherwise have read it.” To hear more of Mr. Zimmer’s cogent thoughts, listen to him interviewed on this topic (and answering callers) on a podcast from Wisconsin Public Radio.
Jonathan Segura has a defense on NPR’s Monkey See blog called, No More E-Books Vs. Print Books Arguments, OK? The gist of his argument is similar to one I’ve made before: “It’s not an either/or proposition. You can choose to have your text delivered on paper with a pretty cover, or you can choose to have it delivered over the air to your sleek little device…We should worry less about how people get their books and — say it with me now! — just be glad that people are reading.”
Last year, I began a journey with 5th grade that integrated multiple social studies standards into one big project. The teachers put students in cross-classroom groups and assigned them social studies topics for a unit on the turn of the century. Each group made a glog about their topic after using print and digital resources to gather information. We were amazed by the leadership, collaboration, and innovation that took place in that project, but we made a lot of mistakes along the way too. You can read more about last year here and here.
This year, we almost didn’t do this project. The teachers were feeling even more overwhelmed by the content this year because they had to teach 3 social studies units and 2 science units in 9 weeks. You would probably feel overwhelmed too if you knew you had to teach these units in that amount of time:
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Even the district planner recommends a total of 12 weeks for the units, but requires that it be done in the 3rd quarter (9 weeks).
After multiple combinations of meetings between me, the 5th grade social studies teacher, the gifted collaboration teacher, and the instructional coach, we developed a plan for how this year’s content might look. Each of the 3 social studies classes were assigned a unit. Within each class, topics were assigned to individuals as well as groups of students. These students made plans of how to divide the content among their group. On Mondays and Fridays, the social studies teacher and gifted teacher did direct teaching of some of the content from all 3 units. On Tuesday-Thursday, students came to the media center to research their topics in online databases, websites, and books. Last year, students just took notes as they read, but this year we wanted students to have a better structure that was based in questions that came from the standards. The gifted teacher combed through the standards and created 2 different graphic organizers with questions for students to consider. The organizer also had space to document resources used. Some students chose to use digital copies of this organizer while others chose to print it out and write their notes.
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Once again, I pulled together a pathfinder divided up by topics. This pathfinder gave each student a handful of websites about their topic. I also showed them how to search the databases found in Georgia’s Galileo collection. My paraprofessional took the topics and searched through our print collection. If a book matched one group’s topic, she put a post-it with their names on the book. If a book spanned multiple topics, she put it in a shared stack.
To begin our journey, I briefly introduced the pathfinder, graphic organizers, and how to take notes (not copying and pasting entire paragraphs of information from websites). I also showed a glog from last year’s students to give them an idea of what they would ultimately be doing. We chose not to introduce how Glogster works at the beginning. We also chose to not give students logins and passwords to Glogster. Students then began a week of research. The social studies teacher, gifted teacher, student teacher, my paraprofessional, some college students, and me began working with students as much as possible to support them in their search.
After a week, I introduced how Glogster works by showing a very basic run-through of the kinds things it can do. Students continued to research, but as they finished, they checked in with one of the adults. Most of the time we offered additional guiding questions and support so that they had the most complete information possible. Once students reached a point where they had enough information, they received their username and password to Glogster.
Most students began Glogster with deciding on their wall background. Then, they moved to adding text from their organizer. Eventually, students branched out to include photographs from public domain searches and linked their pictures to the sources they came from. Some students also did audio introductions to their glog or recorded audio for various parts of their glogs. Some students used Screencast-o-matic to do screencasts of timelines from PebbleGo or tours in Google Earth. A few students used webcams to record themselves talking. One group even did a webcam video of their resource list rather than just creating a text box for it.
You can view some of the finished or in progress glogs here:
Recovering from the Great Depression
US Contributions and Treaty of Versailles
Stalin, Mussolini, Roosevelt, & Churchill
Pearl Harbor, Iwo Jima, & Hirohito
Once students finalize their glogs, they will present them to the rest of the 5th grade to share the responsibility of teaching and learning this massive amount of content.
Andy Plemmons
School Librarian
David C. Barrow Elementary
Athens, GA
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Disclaimer: If you read this post earlier and couldn’t find the sock puppet app in the iTunes store, it is now back, so go to the iTunes store and get it while you can 
Today as part of our storybook celebration, students who came to the media center had a chance to try out an app on our 10 iPads called Sock Puppets. The sock puppet app allows students to choose up to 4 sock puppet characters, multiple props (some moveable, some not), and multiple interchangeable backgrounds. Students use the selections to create a 30-second puppet show. They simply press record and then begin moving the various objects and puppets around on the screen. Each time a puppet is touched, the iPad places an arrow above that puppet’s head so that the students know which voice to record. After 30 seconds or when the students press stop, the app scrubs up students’ voices to make them more sock puppet-like.
Today, students in 3rd, 4th, and 5th grades tried out this app. Instead of taking them step by step through the process of making a puppet show, I simply said: “Go to the sock puppet app and use it to create a 30 second story.” In a matter of minutes, students were figuring out how the app worked. Of course there was lots of silliness, but in this time of exploration, students had permission to play and have fun without worries of being right or wrong. Even though students were doing impromptu puppet shows, they created some very creative and humorous pieces. I only wish that I had student access to Youtube so I could share some of them with you. At the close of each session, we talked about how we might use this app in the future, and students were excited about the possibility of writing 30-second scripts that would make their puppet shows more cohesive. I wonder if that same excitement would have existed if I had made the students start with writing scripts or watching me make a complete sock puppet show on the smart board before they had time to explore?
I think this free app has a lot of creative potential, and I’m glad that I was able to offer a space for students have time to play.
There are many examples of sock puppet videos on Youtube. Here’s an example.
Andy Plemmons
School Librarian
David C. Barrow Elementary
Athens, GA