11 Ways to use Symbaloo in the Classroom NOTE: This is a guest post by Mimi Chau from the Symbaloo team. Edublogs just rolled out a free Symbaloo plugin available to all users that we think you’ll enjoy! What is Symbaloo? Symbaloo is a free social bookmarking tool. A fun and simple way to organize and store all your digital resources in the cloud. You can categorize your resources, share and access them from any device. Why Should You Symbaloo? Symbaloo helps teachers curate content and share the best of the web with their students. “Help, I’m drowning!” As schools start to implement 1:1 or BOYD methods in the classroom, teachers are required to keep up with the latest technology and teaching methods. And what about the “non tech-savvy” teachers that are struggling with technology? Symbaloo allows teachers to share valuable resources with their students and with each other. How do you Symbaloo in your classroom? 11 Ways to use Symbaloo in the Classroom 1. How do you share links with your students and parents? 2. Music Webmix: 3.
It's Annual Report Season! Here Are Some Tips To Help You Effectively Tell Your Story. At this time of year, many teacher librarians are working to compile an annual report: that is to say a 2-3 page summary of how their work made a difference for students and staff all year long. As someone who has crafted more than one of these babies, I understand and appreciate the work that goes into the shiny final products. Further, I know that the most effective annual reports are not simply collections of data pulled together at the last minute. What Makes A Good Annual Report: I've asked countless librarians this very question as part of a workshop I do regularly on connecting the dots between the library and student outcomes. Identify a target audience. Obviously, creating an annual report is just one way to share the story of your work, Regardless of the format, what matters is that you are sharing it. To that end, I do a lot of professional development for school districts on both school library advocacy and using data to tell the story of school library impact.
4 TED Talks That Help Librarians Explain the Magic of Libraries | New Jersey State Library Since 2006, millions have been inspired by TED Talks: short, inspirational and educational videos by speakers expounding on topics from science to spirituality to dance. TED stands for technology, education and design, and its stated mission is to spread ideas. The talks are often thought provoking and the speakers passionate about their topics. None last more than 18 minutes. While a pleasure to watch, the videos also can provide librarians with a jumping point for their own blog posts and public talks. Here are four TED Talks that you can use to help explain the magic of your public library. Lisa Bu, How Books Can Open Your Mind Lisa Bu is the content distribution manager for TED. “Compare and contrast gives scholars a more complete understanding of a topic. How to use it: This is a great opportunity to recommend and promote the public library’s collection. John Green, The Nerd’s Guide to Learning Everything Online Sir Ken Robinson, Bring on the Learning Revolution
Benefits of content curation Yesterday, I did a free NTEN Webinar called “The Unanticipated Benefits of Content Curation: Reducing Information Overload” based on my feature article in the NTEN Change Journal in June with the same title. (You can register and download the issue here for free and listen to the webinar recording here) The main idea is that good curation skills can build staff expertise and avoid the pain of information overload. I covered the basics of content curation, how it differs from social sharing, the art and practice of curation, a frameworks to get started, examples of nonprofits using curation, the tools, and some techniques for minimizing information overload and managing attention. With over 600 people registered for the Webinar, it was hard to answer all the questions as the chat stream just flew by and the 90 minutes was up before we knew it. Evolution of the Web Infographic (hat tip Dirk Slater - click for Source) A good curator also knows their audience.
The Absolutely True Adventures of a School Librarian: 5 Tips for New School Librarians (and those who aren't so new) Slideshow Link: 5 Tips for New School Librarians (and those who aren't so new) Congratulations on your new job as a school librarian! It is hands down the absolutely best job...EVER! Below are 5 tips to help you as you enter this new chapter of your life. Being a school librarian can be a shockingly isolating profession, especially after having formed tight, supportive networks while you were a classroom teacher. Find Your People Don’t wait around for your district to connect you. Where To Find Your People Twitter Twitter is one of the best places you can go to connect, share, learn and grow with other school librarians and connected educators. There are a few secrets to truly harnessing the power of Twitter. Hashtags: By following, commenting, sharing, and connecting using hashtags you will maximize your own professional learning. Don’t limit yourself to just these hashtags. Two places to find hashtags for you, your teachers, and administrators are: Facebook Be your own rock star Social Media
How Can Your Librarian Help Bolster Brain-Based Teaching Practices? | MindShift | KQED News Inquiry-based learning has been around in education circles for a long time, but many teachers and schools gradually moved away from it during the heyday of No Child Left Behind. The pendulum is beginning to swing back towards an inquiry-based approach to instruction thanks to standards such as Common Core State Standards for math and English Language Arts, the Next Generation Science Standards and the College, Career and Civic Life (C3) Framework for Social Studies State Standards. Transitioning to this style of teaching requires students to take a more active role and asks teachers to step back into a supportive position. It can be a tough transition for many students and their teachers, but turning to the school librarian for support could make the transition a little easier. As grade level and content-specific teachers begin to incorporate inquiry-based approaches into their classrooms, they should look to collaborate on lesson planning with their librarian, Jaeger said.
Content Curation Primer Photo by Stuck in Customs What is Content Curation? Content curation is the process of sorting through the vast amounts of content on the web and presenting it in a meaningful and organized way around a specific theme. The work involves sifting, sorting, arranging, and publishing information. A content curator cherry picks the best content that is important and relevant to share with their community. It isn’t unlike what a museum curator does to produce an exhibition: They identify the theme, they provide the context, they decide which paintings to hang on the wall, how they should be annotated, and how they should be displayed for the public. Content curation is not about collecting links or being an information pack rat, it is more about putting them into a context with organization, annotation, and presentation. People and organizations are now making and sharing media and content all over the social web. Content Curation Provides Value from the Inside Out Getting Started
School Libraries, Teacher Librarians & Student Achievement Barrett, L. (2010). Effective school libraries: evidence of impact on student achievement. School Librarian, 58(3), 136-139. Retrieved from Bland, D., Hughes, H. E., & Willis, J. (2013). 4 Rules of Library Advocacy AASL has just release a collection of advocacy materials for school librarians. While I am pleased to see these materials made available, like any tool, they aren't much good unless you know how to use them and realize that a brochure alone will not save your bacon. Here are some basic rules of advocacy. I am sure you've heard me fuss about them before. Johnson's 1st Rule of Advocacy: Don't depend on national studies, statistics or publications.My cynical side says that if one looks hard enough, one can find a study to support almost any educational program, strategy or theory, no matter how crack pot. Johnson's 2nd Rule of Advocacy: Build relationships and inform so others will advocate for you.One parent telling a school board how important he thinks the library program is to his child is more powerful than a dozen AASL brochures. Any other rules you care to add?
Study Vibe - Content Curation Content Curation Content curation is the collection and sharing of content such as websites, news articles, blogs, videos, pictures, tweets and any other information that you can find on the web. The term curation is not new (art galleries and museums have been 'curating' for ages) but with the ever increasing amount of information on the web it has become a popular and very useful way to 'harvest', collect, select, and manage and disseminate(share) the information that you want to keep. Much of what is here on Studyvibe has been 'curated' from hundreds of different sources and brought together for you. So how and why would you use content curation? Helping you find information for assignments As a student you have many assignments and research tasks that you have to do. Helping you create your bibliography Have you ever go to the end of your assignment and realised that you didn't write down all of the sources of information you now have to put into your bibliography? Scoop.it