Isaac Asimov on libraries: a space ship & a gateway

In 1971, an enterprising children's librarian in Troy, Michigan, wrote to dozens of important people to ask for a letter to the town's children, celebrating the opening of the new library.

Isaac Asimov was one of the 97 respondents.  Isn't this great?

You can read more about the Letters to the Children of Troy here, a few on Flickr here and there are pdfs of all the letters here.  Some names I know, like Edward Ardizzone and First Lady Pat Nixon, and others I don't, but it will be fun to take time to read them and see what they say about books and libraries and reading.  And then see how I can use these ideas forty years later for the library here.

Cheers

Ruth

PS.  This is the letter from Dr Seuss.  Both letters are from the Flickr set linked above.

Found this via Twitter.

What is a good book? Nancy Pearl's answer

Nancy Pearl, yup, the one that's the model for the librarian action doll, was recently named Librarian of the Year.  In Library Journal's article about this, Nancy discusses her idea of 'a good book'.  I've highlighted a couple of bits that particularly caught my attention.

What is a “good book”?



As part of the author tour for her newest book, Book Lust To Go: Recommended Reading for Travelers, Vagabonds, and Dreamers (Sasquatch Bks.; LJ Xpress Reviews, 10/8/10), Pearl went to Westport, CT, to “talk about good books” to librarians and library patrons. “By good,” she says, “I don’t mean any literary canon, but just books that you might enjoy. A good book is a book someone likes and a bad book is one they don’t like. When someone doesn’t like a book, it doesn’t mean they will never like it. They don’t like it for that moment,” says Pearl.


“We shouldn’t be afraid to suggest a wide variety of books to people. I think libraries are the last democratic institution, small ‘d’ democratic. It wasn’t always that way. Librarians were gatekeepers.... When it comes to readers’ advisory, though, I think we need to validate a patron’s reading,” Pearl says.


“When people ask, ‘What should I read next?’ we should always try to give them three books. One should be pretty close to the one they loved. The second should be a little bit different, a bit of a stretch. The third book is the real stretch book, the reach book. The book they never would have found because it is nonfiction and they only look at Westerns,” Pearl says.

“People come into the library and head straight to the section where they have found the most pleasure.... It is our job to take them around to the rest,” she ­continues.

“I do believe that the more well-written books you read, the less tolerance you are going to have for bad writing, but the hardest thing to define is a well-written book. When someone tells you they liked a book because ‘I love well-written books,’ they usually mean books like award winners, for instance the Pulitzers. Those books win awards for the writing. You don’t have to understand what somebody means by ‘well-written,’ but you have to go beyond the awards we all know and see which books won the Governor General’s Award in Canada, or [Britain’s] Man Booker Prize. No one who reads for the story will say, ‘I like well-written books.’ They will talk about page-turners, books you stay up too late to finish,” Pearl ­concludes.

Lots of food for thought there.  I'm going to try that three book idea... I think I've been more likely, when kids ask, to find three similar rather than that three book progression.  Not always, but often enough that I should be trying to extend myself, as well as my readers.  Always good to get a new perspective!  Read the complete article here.
 
Cheers
 
Ruth

PS.

A few more thought-provoking quotes from the article:

...she is a passionate and diligent advocate for old and important library ideas: literacy, reading, entertainment, enjoyment.... She is neither snobbish about the old ways nor disdainful of new ideas. Ask her about audio or ebooks or gaming, and you’ll get an earful about the importance of stories told in their myriad forms,” says Janes.
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says Pearl. “My fear is that we don’t recognize or will forget that library service is like a three-legged stool: information, outreach and programming, and reading.”
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The book will never disappear as a piece of narrative fiction or nonfiction, according to Pearl, but it is obvious that the format, the way it is delivered, is changing. She knows people will always need escape, stories, and ways to look at the world through the experiences of others.


“I think the more you read, the better person you become, because you can see how other people respond, the way they think, and the way they behave in various circumstances,” Pearl asserts.
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“When you read a book, it is just you and the author. Even when people read the same title, everybody reads a different book.... When you listen to a book, a third person enters the equation,” Pearl says. “It is a different experience.”

What is a Library? (1)

Libraries are about books, but they're also about much more than books. They're about ideas and invention and imagination and play and curiosity and wonder and hope. Yes, libraries are all about hope. They are houses of possibilities.



Phil Shapiro, Towards a National Transition Plan for Libraries, in PCWorld
So, each one of your working days you and I walk into a house of possibilities.  So what can you (and I) do today to make it so, and make it better?

Think I might find a way of displaying this quote in my library (could be handy for one of my library pieces in the regular school newsletter, too).  I notice, on reflection, that some of the words are in my word walls already - imagine, wonder, hope.  Good.

In this article, Phil Shapiro is canvassing ideas about public libraries in the future - what they're for, how they might look, design considerations.  Worth reading.

Cheers

Ruth

Measuring your use of time

Toddling about the internet, collecting resources and ideas for the senior study skills program, I came across this article: "I shipped in 2010 - you can too" by Doug Johnson on his Blue Skunk blog.  While his main focus is on the extras he did related to his work, such as conference presentations, papers and articles, one sentence jumped out at me for its use with students.

I personally measure my days not whether they were happy or unhappy, but whether they were productive or unproductive.

One aspect of my work as a teacher is talking with students about their work.  They sit in my office and tell me their successes, failures, concerns.  Sometimes, tissues are involved. It's always been part of my work, not only through mentoring programs etc but also just because I'm findable, there, a listening ear. Thinking over what they say, often enough it is about happiness - "I feel terrible" "Nothing is working" etc - stuff related to feelings/emotions.

The rest of the paragraph reads like this:

Did I have a fruitful conversation or meeting? Did I get something finished? Did I write something worth sharing? Did I read something challenging? Did I do an hour's worth of physical activity? Did I clean up a mess, revise an article, or organize something for the future? Did I do something that made my own life or someone else's just a tad better?


Looking at this idea, it's one I plan to try with students, and see how it can be worked into the study skills program, too.  Refocusing from emotions (so much trickier to wrangle) to more measurable activities/achievements that can be done/replicated and from which positive feelings can flow seems like a useful idea to play with.  I'm not saying that feelings aren't important, but rather that this is a way to get from the tissues/tears/frustrations/sense of impotence/being stuck that some of those students have when they plonk themselves in a chair in my office, and help them onwards.  From a study skills program perspective, it also points a way from the emotional to the measurable, helping students to progress.

Cheers

Ruth

How to learn? from mistakes (Diana Laufenberg)

To start the new school year*, an inspirational TED talk about teaching



Her three key points (and please do watch the video, don't just clock these and click on in your travels - it's a great ten minutes) are:

• experiental learning
• student voice
• embracing failure

Page URL if the video doesn't work for you:
http://www.ted.com/talks/diana_laufenberg_3_ways_to_teach.html

Cheers

Ruth

*Yes, the Australian school year follows the calendar - we've just finished our summer holidays and are back for a new school year.

Hallelujah!

For ten years I used to sing in the Radio Community Chest choir's annual performances of Handel's Messiah.  Love this flash mob rendition from Canada of the Hallelujah chorus.

Original link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXh7JR9oKVE

Two weeks of term and the school year left to go.  Along with another teacher, I am one of the organisers (Archangels) of our staff secret angel scheme which runs in the last week of school.  Like the performance in the video, it's about changing the atmosphere (given that the peeps can be a tad tired in that last week), adding joy, creating fun.  We've been doing that for over ten years, and enjoy facilitating the fun that ensues for all those who participate - and of course it spills over to the place generally, all good!

If you nag me enough I could put the details of how our secret angel scheme runs here...just don't have it by me right now.

*C*h*e*e*r*s* (with fairy lights)

Ruth

PS. Have to show you our school library Christmas trees - all about books and kids!  Sometime this week, I promise! We're busy with the annual stocktake, and have the Year 6 into 7 Orientation this week, and I don't know what all.

In praise of teachers...

Feeling like it's hump day, Wednesday, a bit teacher-weary?

Read this entry on the Alien Onion blog.  It's fabulous.

If I was making my own list:

Mrs B, who let the school choir sing the latest cool music, like Fernando by Abba.  Even if it was transposed up so we had to screech in some sections.  And who taught me the soprano descant for Silent Night.  I can still sing it.

Mr B, who loved putting on school musicals, so we got to be a part of that wonderful experience - yay for Oklahoma!

Mrs A, the fiercest, most uncompromising PE teacher ever - and the one we most wanted to have

Mrs B, (a different one) who showed me a little of the beauty of mathematical equations.  I bought a calculator after my HSC and have never looked back, but still remember that aha! moment.

Ms B (a third one!), who made 3 unit English a joy - Romeo and Juliet, Ted Hughes - still some of the best literature study I've experienced

Mrs ?? whose name eludes me, but whose weekly coloured chalk illustrations from children's books made her term as primary teacher librarian when I was in grade 5 utterly memorable

Mrs E, who taught Ancient History with style, verve, and many handwritten purple fordigraph sheets: I've never forgotten that Alcibiades won the trifecta.  Or that scent of metho from freshly-produced fordigraph sheets...

At tertiary level:

WC: best English literature tutor ever.

MH, who inspired me to be a teacher librarian.  Thank you.

Who would be on your list?

Cheers

Ruth

who once had one of my Year 12 students say how much she remembered my salad sandwiches.  Right.  You never know the impact you're going to have...!!

Barack Obama on libraries

At the moment that we persuade a child, any child,

to cross that threshold,

that magic threshold into a library,

we change their lives forever, for the better.

It’s an enormous force for good.

Barack Obama

This quote, which I've used in various library documents here, is from a speech Barack Obama gave in 2005 to the Annual Conference of the ALA.  You can read the speech here.
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Cheers

Ruth
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GIFSL*: 33. Lessons from Elsewhere

I never studied marketing or merchandising in any of my tertiary qualifications.  More and more in the last couple of years I've been paying attention to what I can learn from the world around me every day.  How do shops entice us in?  What draws the eye in a particular advertisement layout? How can I borrow, adapt, rework these ideas for my library?

Last week I bought a magazine to do with Elsewhere, the life that isn't about work and teacher librarianship, but about other interests, activities, people, places; the life funded by the happy life of being a teacher librarian.  This magazine showcases craft shops, and as I read, I was finding lessons from Elsewhere.  I've only tweaked the quotes slightly... how many can you tick for your library?

• Inside, she went for the WOW! factor.  "I want [borrowers] to be overwhelmed."
• Samples sell, so she hangs dozens throughout the shop.
• "If they haven't been [reading] we want them to start.  If they don't want to [find books] themselves, we do it for them."
• "We cater for different tastes".  She includes [staff/students] in her [book-buying] decisions to ensure customers have variety.
• "I want to make the [library] fun, " she says, "to make sure it's the best experience of the [borrower's] day."
• She builds customer self-esteem by helping them finish their work, by posting photos of it around the [library].
• Customers travel long distances to visit the [library].
• Customers can [borrow] small pieces or large [quick reads or long reads].
• "We help our customers.  I don't want anyone to quit because they [can't do it/understand it/need help].
• "We give a little to our customers and get a whole lot back."
• "They appreciate seeing things in my shop that they don't see in other places."
• "I want to encourage [students] to do things they think are out of their reach."
• "Being part of this network of people who love [learning/reading] is so rewarding."
• X is a regular at the [library].  How regular? "I have to go often! They get new [books] in all the time and are always changing the [library] around."
• One of the [teacher librarian's] key goals was to create a welcoming atmosphere.  "People come to our [library] because they know we care about them and are always happy to see and serve them."
• "We carry a wide range of [books] - not just my favourites, but your favourites, also.  People come for the variety and stay for the fun."
• "The [library] is always filled with wonderful [books], with new ones introduced [highlighted] weekly.  I don't know of one [borrower] who leaves the [library] uninspired."
• The space is small, but its character compensates.
• [I'm doing] "what I've dreamed of doing," says the [teacher librarian].
• There are many artfully arranged displays of [books], making it easy for [borrowers] to pick them up.
• "We pull together [books] that go together.. [Borrowers] find these irresistible.  They're an inspirational starting point."
• Near the front of the [library] are frequently changing displays of [books].  The myriad samples around the [library] provide additional inspiration.
• "I [read] a lot, every day," says the [teacher librarian].
• "It's fun and it's exciting," says the [teacher librarian].  "I love to see [lots of books borrowed/read]; it means that my customers are happy, that we've made good choices for them and that we get to make more."
• "We asked our customers what they wanted."
• Special events, large and small, are always happening.
• [Teacher librarianship] has changed a lot.  Now there are so many directions you can take."
• "You get people hooked, show them how easy it is, and they're amazed they really can do it."
• Service with a smile is the [library's] philosophy.  "We're friendly and helpful to everyone who comes in the door."
• "It's comfortable."
• "If a student says she can't do it, I take it down to a level where she can."
• In the [library] she likes [borrowers] to browse.  "I tell people their [reading] doesn't have to be perfect.  I want them to enjoy the journey, and to feel like they want to come back - right away."
• An ever-changing array...
• "We're known for..."
• "I work hard to make sure my customers find things here they won't find in other places."
• "I take great pleasure in meeting so many people who share a passion for [books/learning/reading].  The world abounds with talented people, and I gather a lot of inspiration by surrounding myself with them."
• "We try to offer a variety, a kaleidoscope of ideas."
• "[Borrowers] are proud that this is their [school library]."

There is no way I'll tell you I ticked off on every one of these - because I didn't.  But there's great food for thought.  For the shop owners quoted above, the importance of meeting their customers' needs is of dollar sign importance, business survival, business success.  These are the strategies they are using - successfully - to get it right.  While I sometimes inserted 'borrowers', I left in the word 'customers' here and there too.

Wouldn't it be great if our kids found that a visit to their school library was "the best experience" of their day?

Cheers, Ruth

*GIFSL = Good Ideas For School Libraries

The Darien Statements on the Library and Librarians

Have you come across the Darien Statements yet?  They were written earlier this year by three librarians.  Worth reading and thinking about.  I particularly like the one about hope, and the one about choosing wisely what to stop doing.  But read them for yourself, think, agree, disagree, work out what you would say and how you see libraries now and into the future.

The Darien Statements on the Library and Librarians

Written and endorsed by John Blyberg, Kathryn Greenhill, and Cindi Trainor

The Purpose of the Library

The purpose of the Library is to preserve the integrity of civilization.

The Library has a moral obligation to adhere to its purpose despite social, economic, environmental, or political influences. The purpose of the Library will never change.

The Library is infinite in its capacity to contain, connect and disseminate knowledge; librarians are human and ephemeral, therefore we must work together to ensure the Library’s permanence.

Individual libraries serve the mission of their parent institution or governing body, but the purpose of the Library overrides that mission when the two come into conflict.

Why we do things will not change, but how we do them will.

A clear understanding of the Library’s purpose, its role, and the role of librarians is essential to the preservation of the Library.

The Role of the Library

The Library:

• Provides the opportunity for personal enlightenment.
  
• Encourages the love of learning.
  
• Empowers people to fulfill their civic duty.
  
• Facilitates human connections.
  
• Preserves and provides materials.
  
• Expands capacity for creative expression.
  
• Inspires and perpetuates hope.
  

The Role of Librarians

Librarians:

• Are stewards of the Library.
  
• Connect people with accurate information.
  
• Assist people in the creation of their human and information networks.
  
• Select, organize and facilitate creation of content.
  
• Protect access to content and preserve freedom of information and expression.
  
• Anticipate, identify and meet the needs of the Library’s community.
  

The Preservation of the Library

Our methods need to rapidly change to address the profound impact of information technology on the nature of human connection and the transmission and consumption of knowledge.

If the Library is to fulfill its purpose in the future, librarians must commit to a culture of continuous operational change, accept risk and uncertainty as key properties of the profession, and uphold service to the user as our most valuable directive.

As librarians, we must:

• Promote openness, kindness, and transparency among libraries and users.
  
• Eliminate barriers to cooperation between the Library and any person, institution, or entity within or outside the Library.
  
• Choose wisely what to stop doing.
  
• Preserve and foster the connections between users and the Library.
  
• Harness distributed expertise to serve the needs of the local and global community.
  
• Help individuals to learn and to use new tools to create a more robust path to knowledge.
  
• Engage in activism on behalf of the Library if its integrity is externally threatened.
  
• Endorse procedures only if they guide librarians or users to excellence.
  
• Identify and implement the most humane and efficient methods, tools, standards and practices.
  
• Adopt technology that keeps data open and free, abandon technology that does not.
  
• Be willing and have the expertise to make frequent radical changes.
  
• Hire the best people and let them do their job; remove staff who cannot or will not.
  
• Trust each other and trust the users.
  

We have faith that the citizens of our communities will continue to fulfill their civic responsibility by preserving the Library.

Source: http://www.blyberg.net/2009/04/03/the-darien-statements-on-the-library-and-librarians/

Creative Commons License

Cheers, Ruth

PS It's bad form for a ballerina to tell you that pointe shoes hurt like the dickens, isn't it?  Bad form for for the work to be talked of too much, or the labour involved to be dissected?  All I'm gonna say is that for assorted software reasons, I've formatted and reformatted this entry about seven times.  Because I wanted to share this text here.  Despite crashing browsers, and uncooperative blog software, and all sorts of other things.  Dang, those pointe shoes hurt like the dickens!

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Good ideas for school libraries: 10. Be inspired...

Last year, at a teacher librarian conference, I saw a picture of a school library in New York, one of those created with funds from the Robin Hood Foundation.  To make positive change in poverty-stricken areas, and for one of their programs specifically in schools, they worked out that a school library may be 5% of a school's space, but making this an exciting space can impact 100% of students.
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Our purple wordcloud wall, blogged a few days ago, was inspired by that picture I saw at the conference.  I've blogged about the wall, and provided in those entries links to the original work.
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There are some remarkable new Robin Hood-funded school library renovations: read about them here, and see pictures here.  I particularly love the natural-history-alphabet one.
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These are renovations designed by architects and artists and designers using what they describe as modest budgets.  To me, these are full of ideas to inspire, adapt, rework to be a part of my school library.  A primary school library, for example, could have a lot of fun with an 'alphabet letter of the week and artefacts that start with this letter' idea.  So what you need is a mind open to see what's possible, and how these ideas can inspire you.
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The New York Times has the full article by Randy Kennedy, and a slideshow and more pictures, here.

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Image source.

A Librarian's 2.0 Manifesto

Learned about this through oztl.

If the above video doesn't play, here's the page's URL:

http://www.teachertube.com/view_video.php?viewkey=5ff637e7984152a3531d

And the date on Laura Cohen's manifesto?  2006.  It's a journey...

If you'd like the words alone, here's her original blog post.

And for an analysis/critical perspective on this, see what Annoyed Librarian had to say in response.   And the comments left about this blog post.

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Renovation I: the wall

Most school libraries don't have spare walls hanging about, because you tend to put shelving and books on them. Very practical.



Then you get asked to clear a wall of books (3 bays, a total of 15 shelves) for the opportunity of an interactive whiteboard going there. It's a wall with that potential for all sorts of reasons, including its location, lighting and so forth.



OK. Big job to clear the wall of books (the surrounding shelves are rather more full than they were).



Then we looked at the wall. Very very very boring mid-toned brick. Undistinguished. Uninteresting.



Let's paint it, before the whiteboard comes, we said. What colour? A dark one. Black? No, what about purple???



Deep purple.



Done. Two coats, straight onto the brick (which we cleaned first) of a good quality low sheen paint.



I'd been to a conference earlier this year and in Ross Todd's presentation I saw some photos of library renovations done by the Robin Hood Foundation, as part of its L!brary Initiative (the foundation has all sorts of programs devoted to alleviating poverty). One library stuck in my head - PS 16 on Staten Island. Pictures here - and it's a slideshow of pics, so stay with it for a minute to see the various views. There's another article here, with pictures of several different schools. Many of the ideas were simply wonderful, but I couldn't see how they were achievable within our budget and time constraints.



But we weren't going to leave the wall purple and plain. So PS 16 (its design by architectural firm 1100 Architects - one of the links above leads to their site) was an inspiration.



We used a single font, photocopied transparencies of words and an overhead projector - low tech, but it worked. We traced the words using chalk, then painted them with folk art paints (I bought pretty much every colour purple, although you may be surprised if you see the ones that read green or burgundy on this wall). Some words are higher contrast with the background purple, others deliberately low contrast - you have to get close to the wall to see every word on it.



Tracing and painting was fitted in to spare slots of time, or the odd period when the library was quiet, so it's taken a while. The kids at school have been great - nobody rubbed off a chalk tracing, and a number have said how much they like it (it's cool, mad and inspiring, among other things).



Then the blow fell. No interactive whiteboard on this wall, at least for this year.



We said assorted naughty words, as you do, then set to painting more text on the wall - we'd been avoiding the centre, since this would have been obscured by the whiteboard. And may in the future.



But for now, whiteboard or not, we've got a new feature that the kids like, and that spruces up the library with graphic impact and a bunch of unmissable words expressing ideas about what a library is for and will let you do and be. We may look for some way of lighting it more directly, but that's another project. For now, here's a picture, taken with a word or two still to paint. It's come up pretty well...

We are having the white powerpoint replaced by a dark one, so it doesn't stand out. And maybe we will go back and paint the skirting board.



The art teacher who came by the other day and saw it went away talking about trying this idea in her art room, using an art vocabulary.  And Home Ec. has plans to borrow it for their area, too.



We haven't yet done the 'painted by' section we're putting on the top right, but painters included library staff, students, and a couple of others including (we insisted) our lovely cleaner - we'll all sign it and date it.



Costs: 4 litre tin of paint, about a dozen assorted purple folk art paints, plastic palettes, a couple of decent brushes capable of doing smooth edges, transparencies, photocopier access etc.



Coming soon: pictures of Renovation II that we were working on yesterday, and to which yesterday's clue colour referred.



Do leave a comment if you think you might use this idea in your library.

TED Tuesday: Redefining the dictionary.

From the TED resource of online talks, Erin McKean talks about the paper dictionary in the internet age.



To quote from the TED website:

Is the beloved paper dictionary doomed to extinction? When does a made-up word become real? And could you use "synecdochical" in a sentence, please? In this infectiously exuberant talk, leading lexicographer Erin McKean looks at the many ways in which today's print dictionary is poised for transformation in this internet era.

Pay Attention

I'm doing some presentations at staff meetings this term, about technology and internet resources, and came across this. And said to myself, why are you spending hours putting together presentations, when someone's already done one like this? I'll still do some myself, but it was an object lesson to remember to use available resources too, not try to reinvent the wheel. Oddly enough, sorta kinda one of the points I want to make to my colleagues. Ahem.

This is a great piece from TeacherTube.



The website it sends you to at the end includes some very useful links pages to things like technology integration and online teacher tools. The site is from the Jordan School District in the US.

url for video above, if it doesn't show up for you:
http://www.teachertube.com/view_video.php?viewkey=40c570a322f1b0b65909&page=1&viewtype=&category=

TED Tuesday: From 1984, four predictions about the future

From the TED resource of online talks, one from 1984, in which Nicholas Negroponte discusses convergence in technology.



To quote from the TED website:

Speaking at the first TED Conference in 1984, Nicholas Negroponte waxes prophetic on the converging fields of technology, entertainment and design. Years before anyone was using the word "convergence," Negroponte was thinking about TV screens as the "electronic books of the future" and computers as the future of education. In excerpts from his 2-hour talk (this was before TED's 18-minute time limit), he foreshadowed CD-ROMs, web interfaces, service kiosks, the touchscreen interface of the iPhone, and his own One Laptop per Child project. Oh, and there's also a fascinating project called Lip Service, which, well, let's just say it's still ahead of us ...

TED Tuesday: 18 minutes with an agile mind

From the TED resource of online talks: Clifford Stoll, 18 minutes with an agile mind.




To quote from the TED description:

Clifford Stoll could talk about the atmosphere of Jupiter. Or hunting KGB hackers. Or Klein bottles, computers in classrooms, the future. But he's not going to. Which is fine, because it would be criminal to confine a man with interests as multifarious as Stoll's to give a talk on any one topic. Instead, he simply captivates his audience with a wildly energetic sprinkling of anecdotes, observations, asides -- and even a science experiment. After all, by his own definition, he's a scientist: "Once I do something, I want to do something else."

How to fuel your idea machine

...is the title of an excellent article on lifehack.org.

The gist of it?

Read books.

Quote:
Reading books, fiction and non-fiction, fuels your idea machine. It gives you fodder to think with. The brain is essentially nothing more than a computer (albeit much more complicated); it takes an input, processes it and produces an output. In other words, you can’t create ideas without inputs. Life experiences and memories are your starter inputs; books allow you to branch out into the experiences of others, in the non-fiction section, and fiction allows you to reach the realm of fantasy - experiences nobody has really had. Fantasy breaks all the normal rules, and so do the best ideas and solutions, so what better place to start?

Pimp My Library

...before you have a Spasm, take a squizz at this librarian blog.

Pimp My Library (out of New Jersey in the US) has lots of good ideas and links, from the sublime and useful (Teaching with Wikipedia) to the sublimely ridiculous (Dress up a librarian - !). One of the bloggers belongs to a library committee, Highlands Regional Library Co-operative, with some useful handouts explaining topics such as blogs and wikis - find them on this page.

Technology, Entertainment, Design: resource of online talks

Sourced from Ali Edwards' blog (her entry is here), I found Technology, Entertainment, Design.
To quote from the TED site:

TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design.

It started out (in 1984) as a conference bringing together people from those three worlds. Since then its scope has become ever broader.

The annual conference now brings together the world's most fascinating thinkers and doers, who are challenged to give the talk of their lives (in 18 minutes).

This site makes the best talks and performances from TED available to the public, for free.

Click here to go to the TED site and explore an extraordinary range of talks to see and hear, online. For example: Sir Ken Robinson on "Do schools kill creativity?"



which is part of the theme How We Learn.

It's the kind of place where individual teachers should explore to see what they can find for their subject areas and interests. The A-Z list of themes (each theme has a number of talks) is a good place to start.

Each Tuesday on this blog, I'll highlight a different talk from this amazingly rich resource. They'll all be labelled with the tag TED, so you can look at them at a group if you wish.