I’m starting a Minecraft in my school. I’ve been anxious about the idea because I feel like I don’t know enough about the game. Why did I feel I had to do it? Because I’ve been reading Minecraft posts by Sarah Ludwig and I admire her practice. And, most important, there is a Minecraft club at our middle school—and I’ve got to keep up with them!
by Alida Hanson
By now you should know that I’m interested in new media and how we can use it in schools. I researched and wrote an article about school librarians and social media which was published in the winter 2013 issue of Young Adult Library Services. YALS is the journal of the Young Adult Library Services Association, a division of the American Library Association.
The main things I learned were don’t expect perfection, be realistic, and anticipate and validate the anxieties that most stakeholders have about using social media in school.
Thanks to Linda Braun for asking me to write the article. Now I’m interested in learning more about how educators construct Acceptable Use Policies, so maybe that’s next.
Can We Talk: How school librarians discuss social media with stakeholders
I signed up for this free online Google course and took the first lesson last night. I’m sharing my notes here with you. There are five more lessons coming, I think. If I pass the midterm and final I will earn some kind of certificate. Wish me luck. Notes follow after the jump.
I played around with the free iPad app Haiku Deck tonight and think it’s an excellent way to present a short lesson. It’s also a nice summarizing tool for students. You must create presentations on the iPad but you can view them in any web based browser.
The presentations have a fresh design, and great pictures to choose from. It’s not completely intuitive, but after a few tries I got it down. I suggest making nonsense-trial slide decks until you figure out how it works. It took me about 45 minutes to figure out how to use it and make the following presentation. (Just click on the picture to advance to the next slide.)
This is the best mind map I’ve ever seen to get kids thinking about what kinds of information they should be sharing online. Bravo Commonsense Media for creating this excellent resource.
You can download your own poster, too.
I’ve had a Kindle for almost two years and have used it once or twice for a total of one hour. Does that mean I’m not “ereading?”
No.
I’m always signing up for new platforms online. Sometimes it’s like shouting into the void ( Visual.ly?) but usually I learn something exciting that has applications to education.
I signed up for Vook a few months ago and heard back from them earlier this week about getting a beta tester account and taking training. I just finished the training and am impressed with the ease and flexibility of this tool.
Vook makes
Marissa Mayer, a top executive at Google, asks job candidates the following questions during interviews to see what inspires and influences them.
“What’s the coolest thing you’ve seen in the past six months?”
“What do you own that you love?”
What a great self-assessment tool to uncover treasures often buried beneath a pile of tasks!
Read the entire article by Alexa Tsotsis over at Tech Crunch.
Image courtesy Flickr user Photos by Stan
As librarians and graduate students, we know that citations are the basis of scholarship. Academic careers are made and broken on the strength of citations (academics track citations of their own work, which increases their influence and value).
But what about high school students? Yes, they need to know how to cite and make bibliographies for papers, and it’s a tool to consider plagiarism. But what do students actually learn from citations?
Enhanced versions of novels and nonfiction are coming out in ebooks and ipad apps. Penguin calls their ipad app of On the Road an “amplified edition.” These apps can be preloaded in library ipads, and librarians can keep their students informed about free apps (like this one from the British Library) to download on personal devices.
On the Road app costs about $16.00.
Alida Hanson is a high school librarian in Massachusetts. She is interested in media, literature, art, technology and lots of other things.
