Library Ties

DAY 2

Yesterday I kicked off the day with a run through the exhibit hall. We ran through about 1/3rd of the hall hitting various vendors and catching up with friends and colleagues.

From there I headed to the AASL President’s Program. The program was kicked off by awarding the Spokane Mom’s the Crystal Apple Award. Meeting these amazing women was a highlight. It was so exciting to see the passion they had to preserver and improve their school libraries in Washington. Wouldn’t it be great to see this grassroots effort happening in every state! Read more about their efforts at: http://www.fundourfuturewashington.org/

In the afternoon I presented along with the assistance of Jay Bansbach the AASL 101 session. This program gave newbies information about AASL and how to get involved. While the crowd was small, we were able to share information about AASL and spending time in individual conversations.

I had a little more time for exhibits after the session and was able to catch-up with several vendors.

I ended the day at the ALA Scholarship Bash at Disneyland. There were a lot of people, but we had a great time!

DAY 3

This morning was AASL Affiliate Assembly. This is my last meeting on the Executive Committee as I now cycle off following my term as Past-Chair. Affiliate Assembly is a wonderful forum for sharing concerns with the AASL Board and for AASL to share with the states all that is happening. AASL President, Sara Kelly Johns, AASL President-Elect, Ann Martin, and a whole host of AASL Committee Chairs provided insights and updates on to what is happening in our organization. We also discussed and voted on several concerns and commendations that will now be sent to the AASL Board to consider. It was a very productive meeting.

In the afternoon I shared a brief AASL 101 in the exhibit hall. It mostly became a one on one conversation with a library school student, but it was a great chance to share about the wonderful things AASL does as an organization.

I caught a little of the Demco Book Cart Drill Team competition before calling it a day!

Tags:   AASL · AASL Affiliate Assembly · ALA · ala08No Comments.

Bright and early I left Indianapolis (7:00am) and arrived in California around 10:00am. After getting settled in the hotel, I took a nice long nap. Working for C.L.A.S.S. this week on top of the early wake-up call this morning (4am) had just worn me out.

ALA started for me with American Association of School Librarians’ Affiliate Assembly meetings. The Executive Committee met first followed by Affiliate Assembly 1 from 8-10pm tonight. Affiliate Assembly is the heart of AASL. Each state affiliate sends two representatives. This body shares with the national organization the issues and concerns from all the states in the country. It allows our national organization to know what areas it needs to focus on across the country. Tonight we talked about lots of issues and Affiliate Assembly will vote on the most critical areas to send to the AASL Board on Sunday.

Even with my nap, it has been a long day. But, glad to be in Anaheim and ready to enjoy a great conference!

Tags:   AASL · AASL Affiliate Assembly · ALA · ala08No Comments.

This week is always one of my favorites every summer because I get the opportunity to work/attend an amazing professional development event - C.L.A.S.S.Works! C.L.A.S.S. (Connected Learning Assures Successful Students was founded by Barbara Pedersen almost 20 years ago.

From their website, C.L.A.S.S. exists to:

? Translate brain research into practical classroom application
? Provide research-based techniques that drive successful learning
? Prepare current and future educators to become exemplary practitioners
? Create a philosophical foundation in the school community that empowers the growth of students in becoming productive contributors in society

C.L.A.S.S., Connecting Learning Assures Successful Students, is a comprehensive curriculum model and philosophy. The C.L.A.S.S. Model provides a philosophy of teaching and learning, standard-based curriculum development, and research-based teaching strategies based upon the constructs of brain-based learning.

Even though I am part of the presentation staff, I always come away learning tons for the participants and other C.L.A.S.S. staff. This year I helped in the curriculum strand helping teachers develop year-long plans based on mapping their academic standards. I also shared some sessions on Literacy, and how the C.L.A.S.S. model works with the library media program. Summer Institute is always just a positive week to rejuvenate and think about how we can set-up our schools, classrooms, and library media centers to be a successful learning experience for students. Our entire district has adopted the C.L.A.S.S. model, so I am always working to make connections and including the C.L.A.S.S. strategies in our library media program.

Tags:   C.L.A.S.S. · C.L.A.S.S.Works 2008 · Library Media ProgramsNo Comments.

At the end of this week, I’ll be heading to ALA and hope to be sharing some of the interesting stuff I find in sessions and meetings on the blog! Check out the AASL blog which is just one of the places where other school librarians will be sharing about the conference!

Tags:   ala08 · ala2008No Comments.

In The Sloppy Copy Slipup, Brian is sure he is in trouble for one again not getting his rough draft done over the weekend. Over the course of the day, he shares the entire story with the teacher and finds out that while he thinks he has nothing to write about, he quickly figures out that the eventful story of his weekend was more than enough for an interesting and compelling story. This book screams to be read to students who think they have nothing to write about. I can see a lot of my teachers clamoring over a chance to get to it first this next year. Brian’s amazing well to tell a story can easily be a pattern for teachers to use with students — storytelling is a great way to help students become great writers, too!

Tags:   Sloppy Copy Slipup · YHBANo Comments.

Jacobson’s book was a wonderful short novel that helps kids figure out what they are best at doing. Sometimes it isn’t the most obvious thing or something that we work hard at, but everyone has something the do that makes them the best — for Winnie she hopes it is drawing. But, as the story progresses we figure out that while she is a great artist, she is a better friend! A great story for talking about friendship and doing your best, Winnie at Her Best is a great book to share with students of all ages.

Tags:   Winnie at Her Best · YHBANo Comments.

Every summer I read the 20 books nominated for the Young Hoosier Book Award in both ther Intermediate and Picture Book level. It gives me a chance to be ready to discuss these books with our students, plan our Read N Feed incentives, and this next year we’re planning to set-up a Moodle between my building and another in the district where the students can talk to each other about the various books! So far it looks like the 08-09 list looks to be very promising for some great reads! As I read them, I’ll try to post a little blurb up here on the blog. Below is the first book I finished on the list.

Rules by Cynthia Lord was a Newbery Honor Medal winner as well as a Scheider Family Book Award winner. This amazing story tells of a young girl, Catherine, trying to deal with her brother’s autism. Throughout the book she learns that sometimes you can’t protect people, it is ok to be willing to be different, and that the best things in life are making friends and taking a leap to do something new. I started this book late one night and couldn’t put it down. As we help our students adjust and be aware of the autistic students in our building, I’m sure my teachers will be able to use this novel as a way to talk with kids about autism.

Tags:   autism · Rules · YHBANo Comments.

I just read the April/May 2008 issue of AASL’s Knowledge Quest and really related to the article by Gail Dickinson titled The Questions….When Should I Move Up to the National Level?. Gail does a wonderful job of explaining options, choices, and reasons why you may or may not opt to move into being involved at the national level and the ramifications about when in your careers. I got the bug early and have never regretted it. Sure, attending national conferences isn’t the cheapest addiction, but I am so blessed with the friends and colleagues I’ve met over the years. The opportunity to learn and be involved in shaping our professional organization have brought many a return on the dollars I’ve invested in traveling to conference. The conversations and connections have helped make me a better library media specialist for my students and staff. So, if I were answering the question, “When should I move up to the national level?” I would say as soon as you possibly can. You certainly won’t regret it.

Tags:   AASL · Gail Dickinson · Knowledge QuestNo Comments.

Today I’ve been at a wonderful workshop put on by Annette Lamb. AIME (Association for Indiana Media Educators) does a summer workshop focused on a single topic. This year Annette is sharing Web 2.0 and practical applications. All of the resources from the workshop can be found on the Eduscapes website that she and her husband Larry Johnson maintain at http://www.eduscapes.com/sessions/slms2. My head is spinning with ideas for the fall. This last year we branched out and had a few classes that tried wikis, so I’m anxious to expand our use of these tools next year.

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Last weekend I was one of the more 300,000 fans that attended the Indianapolis 500. Growing up literally right across the street in Speedway, Indiana from the most famous 2.5 mile oval track in motor sports, it is no surprise that I’ve been going to the race for the past 18 years. My elementary school was less than six blocks from the track. In May all the windows were open (no air conditioning) and you heard the cars make those laps around the track. It wasn’t distracting because we didn’t know any different. This year was a wonderful race day! The weather was perfect. The race was a great battle for speed. There were several wrecks, but no one got hurt. Drama in the pits with the fire in A.J.’s car and watching Danika storm down the pits to take on Briscoe.

As I was thinking this week, I realized that the Indy 500 is a great analogy to the race for library media specialist working collaboratively with teachers. Sometimes we wish that collaboration was a quick endeavor like qualifications and everyone wants to get in the big dance, but unfortunately it takes time and persistent and going the full distance in the race to get teachers to work with us.

Sometimes there are many factors like the weather that are out of our control. Things like schedules, budgets, and time are often obstacles that we can’t control. Just like on race day, the weather is never a sure bet. But, we have to look for that window in the the weather when we can make it possible. Sometimes it might be a comment a teacher makes in the lunch room, or it might be a request for books that we can use to spark a conversations about what teachers are doing in their classrooms.

As we work collaboratively with teachers, sometimes we have to take pit stops to evaluate what is working right and what alternations can we make along the way to make the lesson/project more successful for students. Do we need more resources (more fuel)? Do we need to change resources (new tires)? Maybe we need to take a minute to reteach (realign the wing)? The great thing is just like in a pit crew, by working together the LMS and teacher have two people that can work to make the project more successful.

Sometimes our best projects hit the wall with a loud crash. Hitting the wall often ends the race for that project, but it shouldn’t end our attempts to collaborate. We need to take the car back to the garage, repair the machine, and try again at the next race. We need to take time to reflect on what caused the wreck. Was it our resources? Was is the project? Was it the rubric? Was it the timing? Was it our lack of teaching students the skills they needed? Did we not have students interested?

The Indianapolis 500 is called the Greatest Spectacle in Racing and we should strive that our collaborative projects provide the interest and motivation for students to want to be involved in the project. We should hopefully pass along our excitement that we have when we watch those car in the battle for the lead. As LMSs and teachers we hope we can help guide our students down towards those checker flagged. We can’t drive the car for them, but we can help provide the resources, support, training, and skills to help them get there.

As we win races with teachers, other teams of teachers will want to join on the bandwagon. 500 miles is a long gruely race, but the rewards at the end make it worth all the effort. Collaboration is much the same way. It is a lot of work for teachers, LMSs, but the rewards and opportunities it provides for students is well worth it.

Tags:   collaboration · Indy 500 · school library media programsNo Comments.