ITEM 2015 - Connect, Collaborate & Create!

This year's ITEM Fall Conference (ITEM stands for Information & Technology Educators of Minnesota) was a fabulous opportunity for learning! It was great to hear from innovative library and tech specialists from all over the state of Minnesota! Because we are often isolated as the only library/tech specialists in our schools, it is so great to have the opportunity to learn from each other! This year, keynote speakers included super energetic Brad Gustafson and the ever inspirational Jennifer LaGarde! (pictured with me in the upper left hand corner) Brad spoke to us about using digital media to amplify student voice. He even treated us to a few seconds of drone action! Jennifer travels around the nation speaking about libraries and teaching! I have had the opportunity to hear her speak before, and every time I walk away with a renewed sense of purpose about what I do everyday with children. I think it is safe to say I have a professional crush on Jennifer! 

My Lakeville media specialist colleague, Paula Hansen, and I presented a session on Promoting Your School Library.  We featured our tech and library work with students and shared our "get the word out" approach using blogs, social media, and professional writing/speaking. We used the Emaze web app to create our presentation (see below), which worked well for collaborating with each other from a distance!

We discussed eBooks, Makerspaces, Personalization, Collection Genrefication, Instagram for the Libraries, Innovative Library Spaces, Digital Storytelling & Tech Integration!  I felt like my brain was exploding with new ideas to bring back to my school and my students!

Keyboarding - An Old Skill For A New Generation!

This week I introduced keyboarding to my 3rd & 4th grade students. Later I will also introduce it to our 5th graders, who are right in the middle of creating their blogs, so I didn't want to interrupt their momentum! 

Keyboarding isn't the most fascinating topic for me to teach every year.  I find myself roaming around the lab, watching and addressing issues that arise with students struggling to keep their fingers on the "home row" keys.  It doesn't feel innovative or creative, which is my favorite part of teaching!! But whether or not it is my favorite thing to teach, I always feel like I am really making a difference in the future of my students. 

Keyboarding is a skill that will creep into every part of the lives of my students! Even when their thumbs are texting, they will be using a QWERTY virtual keyboard to do it!  There are those who believe that our students will soon be able to completely voice activate their digital world, making keyboarding obsolete. I can't deny that this is certainly a strong possibility, but I still think there will always be the need to interact with text in some shape or form. Students who can effectively keyboard will have another tool in their toolbox for communicating well with their world, and that makes it a worthy goal!  For now, it supports their learning which is why I will continue to introduce it. 

For parents looking for ways to support their child's learning, I would recommend having their child use one of the myriad of free or paid online keyboarding courses at home too!  I use Typing.com with my students. It is free and gives students feedback on their WPM (words per minute) and accuracy. 

1st Graders Go Wild With Mashed Up Selfies Using Photobooth!!

Each year I look for opportunities to get kindergarten and 1st grade students familiar with using our computers and iPads. There is a surprising array of skills that many adults just take for granted that our 1st graders need help with!  I love introducing our students to Photobooth because it gives them an opportunity to "play" while learning how to use a computer!  

Students go wild for Photobooth, a program that Apple provides for free on their computers and iPads.  I like to have students try Photobooth before introducing the same concept on the iPads because it is surprisingly easier for them to manage. It also gives them great options for effects that twist and stretch their selfies into unrecognizable messes!  Oh how they love that!! Check out our our mashed up selfies!!

Navigating the Library - New Organization, New Signs, New Year!

At the end of last school year, our entire fiction section was completely reorganized by genre.  If you haven't read all about it, check out Hacking Genrification at the Oak Hills Library!  It was a huge job!

  

I knew that the very beginning of the year would require a few lessons to help students find books using the newly genrified fiction section.  We have had two weeks of book checkout since the new school year began, and so far the newly genrified fiction section is receiving RAVE reviews.  This is a great relief to me! It was such a huge job and I really wanted some reassurance that we made the right decision. One student explained that adding genres gave him additional clues to find the book on the shelf! Another students said she liked searching for her book in a smaller genre section, rather than searching for her book in the entire fiction section. 

I also added lots of new signs to help student find books! My younger students really found the picture signs helpful.

Helping students find their books continues to be my number one goal.  If I can help them find their books while also teaching search terms, alphabetizing, sequencing and genre, then their library experience becomes both educational and fun!

Newest Addition To The OHE Library! #NothinFancy

I was super excited to add a little something new to our library over the summer! At the end of last year I asked my principal, Mr. Labatte, to purchase a whiteboard for my library.  Thanks so much Mr. Labatte!  

I know it doesn't seem very exciting, as I am usually the one in line asking for tech solutions to all of my teaching challenges.  But this new whiteboard will help my students stay connected to the learning targets for each lesson in a way that they weren't before.  So it is a little addition, but I believe will help my students in a big way.  

Tee Hee! It is double sided, so I can use the other side for teaching too!

A New Year Brings A New Website! http://isd194.org/oak-hills/

Parents at Oak Hills Elementary and throughout the Lakeville School District will notice that something has changed over the summer! The school district's web presence underwent a renovation of sorts! Along with a new brand, the district and all of the schools now have a new virtual look and web address - along with a much needed mobile version!

http://isd194.org/oak-hills/

As the Oak Hills Elementary webmaster, a title that sounds a bit more masterful that is required, I have been learning to edit in WordPress, the platform for our new site.  It is fun as I always enjoy learning new web tools! Now my focus will be on making our Oak Hills Elementary website be the best tool it can be for our parents and our visitors!

Celebrating Back To School!

It is Sunday, September 20th, and this is my first post since July! Our school year has started with a bang! From a tech support perspective, it has been more time consuming than past years, thus I am just making time to sit down and write about the most important part of my job, teaching! I wanted to find a way to celebrate the return of our students. Our school is such an animated hub of energy when school is in session!  There is no better way to demonstrate than a little time lapse video! I so enjoy having our school's library filled with their energy again!