Connie Kone and Anne Hudson were fortunate to attend this great conference Oct. 15-Oct. 17, 2008. The opening session was presented by Vicki Davis from Westwood schools in Camilla, Georgia. She discussed her international projects in which she teams with a teacher currently at Qatar Academy. Visit her projects at her Cool Cat Teacher Blog.
One of the sessions that we had looked forward to was presented by Buffy Hamilton, Creekview High School, Cherokee county Schools. Her topic was Harnessing Web 2.0 Tools to Enhance Your Personal Learning. Buffy discussed the use of wikis, Twitter, Delicious, RSS feeds, Flickr, and other tools for media specialists to create a personal learning network. You can view her COMO presentation at http://theunquietlibrarian.wordpress.com/2008/10/13/my-como-2008-presentation-personal-learning-networks-20-for-librarians/
Cafe Read-a-Latte was presented by a middle school media specialist. She had her first media center coffee shop in conjunction with her yearly book fair. It was extremely popular with students, staff and parents. The end result was to "open" the coffee shop the last Friday of each month. An incentive program for reading was set up and students had to complete 100 hours in a reading log to be eligible to come.
Policies for Virtual School Libraries presented some interesting food for thought. One major component of this presentation was the discussion of the AUP for web 2.0 tools. The presenters from Valdosta State feel that an AUP should be updated two to three times a year to keep up with evolving web tools. The AUP should include use of ALL technology tools that students may use including personal wireless devices. The presentation also included discussion of filtering software with some good audience interaction. One interesting quote, " All stakeholders should meet and decide what is to filtered and what is not." Another point to think about- all material challenges, be they book or Internet site- should follow the district policy for challenged media materials.
Assessing the Use of Your Print Collection was a research project done by Kathy Bonnell in Newton County. She studied the collections of three high school media centers. One interesting side note that she discovered a budget discreptancy between two of the schools that were the same age. One school only received 81% of the state media money from FTE that it should have received and the other school only received 67% of that FTE money. One purpose of her study was to compare the use of print and on-line materials in students research papers. In addition to conducting surveys and focus groups, she collected copies of works cited pages from student research papers and analyzed the use of media sources. This would be a great data driven project to assist in making purchasing decisions.
One of the best sessions(of course), One 4 All and All for One: Collegial Collaboration , was presented by Cobb County's own media specialists Kathi Vanderbilt and Kate Lyons, assisted by Anne Hudson, Connie Kone, and Betty Bakun also of Cobb. In the spring of 2008 Kathi and Kate came up with a great idea of recruiting Cobb high school media specialists to share in creating instructional units on media databases and media skills for staff and students. Presentations were created on Nettrekker, Destiny, RSS Feeds, Gale Literary databases, Culturegram, eLibrary and other topics for all to use. What a great timesaver to have a presentation handy to tweak and use with staff and students. The first question from the group after the presentation was, "How can we have access to these?" The creators are granting permission for all of these presentations to be posted on the Georgia Library Media Wiki so that all media specialists throughout the state can take utilizize these learning tools.
GPB Education: More Than You Can Imagine! - presented by Katherine Aiken and Patirce Weaver of GPB Education. They talked about the changes that are going in that will impact their programming: United Streaming is now Discovery Streaming, satellite feeds to schools will end Dec. 31, 2008, and there will be a new channel – GPB Knowledge, available on cable (depending on the school’s cable package).They also introduced the TIE (Technology in Education Network) www.tienetwork.org,a free professional/social networking group which believes in sharing resources, ideas and experiences while integrating technology in our public, private and home schools. A very popular set of web videos located on Teacher Tube, entitled “In Plain English”, was discussed. They are short, visually oriented “how to” or “why” videos that explaina wide variety of topics (ex. Blogs, Calculus, Wikis) of interest to educators. Unlike YouTube, Teacher Tube is not blocked at the school.
Using State Study Data to Improve Your School Library Program - presented by Louis Greco, Director of Media Services for St. Johns County Schools,FL.
In a very interesting presentation, Mr. Greco showed how he utilized data points from national, state and local school studies to change policies and procedures in his district and influence administrators and school boards in understanding “best practices” for his media programs. He used the following statistical areas, comparing his schools to state and other FL districts – staffing, professional learning units offered, budget, computers in the media center, circulation, book count, checkouts per student, hours per week the media center is open to students, and online database usage. Brochures that reflect his study, entitled Making the Grade are available at this site:
http://www.stjohns.k12.fl.us/depts/media/schools.
His presentation showed how compiling simple data from the existing program shows the positive and lasting that school media programs have on student achievement. One quote I especially liked was, “The library media center is not just the Hub or Heart of the school; it’s the Solution Maker.” How true – media specialists spend a great part of their day solving problems, and offering solutions to students and staff.
GaDOE Update – presented by Judy Serritella, state Media Services Coordinator.
At this annual update, Judy covered changes in initiatives, policies and programs. Some highlights:
- 2% cuts in DOE budget – will affect all areas of the state department, including Media Services
(Judy is now over text books)
- The new Georgia Reads DVD is coming to high and middle schools – featuring Jeff
Foxworthy, John Smoltz and Chuck Levell.
- A new DVD from the State Bar about the Jury System is being sent to high schools
- Reminder to apply for the “Picturing America” prints, made available from the National
Endowment for the Arts – they have up to 40 high quality large prints by famous American Artists,
of scenes from American History. These can be used by teachers from every discipline to spark
interest in reading, arts, and history. We applied for it on Monday 10/20/08 – hopefully, we’ll
get the prints for Pope.
How to Survive 9 Book Challenges in One School Year
– presented by Faye Curlee, Gwinnett County Schools.
Faye and her supervisor shared her experience with 9 challenges (4 of which went to the Superior Court of Georgia in the spring of 2008 – including all Harry Potter books. She emphasized the importance of her school Media Committee, and of following the procedure for challenged materials. It was a very stressful year for her, as a new media specialist in her elementary school, but with the support of her county supervisor and support at the district level as well as from her fellow media specialists, she persevered and was successful in handling the challenges. It also made me realize the powerful role that a supportive school media committee can provide – fortunately for Pope, we have a strong group of teachers, parents, and students this year.
