What I did today

In preparation for this afternoon (last day of term 2), I put this list together:

Wiggle and swim
Robot
Line up - wavy arms
Walk
Sideways shuffle
Kissy hands
Stop hands
Train whistle
Wiggle
Rock climb
Walk
Slow wiggle
Guns
Thump floor
Punch down
Flap arms
Crocodile claps
Line up and link arms
Step forward
Final pose!

And no, nobody at teachers' college EVER told us about preparing lists like this.  It's a choreography list.  And before you ask, as a dancer I am a FABULOUS teacher librarian.

We have a concert on the last afternoon of term 2; performances from students and staff.  It's the finale to Spirit Week, when there are special events on each day as well as dress themes, and the kids are fundraising for charity.  So this week I have done my poor best to garb with bling, rock and roll, ninjas or pirates, and horror.  The kids have done a great job (my fave was the kid in jeans and a hoodie on the pirates or ninjas day.  I'm a software pirate, he said.  That's clever!) and enjoyed themselves.

If you look at this video, and imagine gaffer-taped stuffed animals, costumes made up of salad-cover headwear, shower-curtain dresses and headwear, balloons stapled to a garbage bag dress and, oh, a bunch more invention-of-the-moment Gaga costumery - well, you have a flavour of the part of this afternoon in which I was involved (together with one of the two faculties who did a faculty performance).



(Link: http://youtu.be/Z_bRDeY89A4 )
We finally rehearsed at lunchtime, minutes before.... we did have a colleague holding up cue cards from that list, which helped.  The students liked it, anyway!

I showed the choreography list to the dance teacher a couple of days ago.  She was very very polite; but the slight widening of her eyes was a giveaway.  Guess I haven't nailed the terminology yet....!! (but you know, it was clear enough for my equally non-dance expert colleagues, so that's what matters!)

The happy life of teacher librarians: so you think you can dance? (No.  Entertain?  More probable.)

It was fun.  And now it's hols.  YAY!

Enjoy your break, if you're having one.  See you back here next term.

Cheers

Ruth

PS The longer I teach, the more I realise about how many things they didn't tell us/teach us about in teachers' college.  Garbage bag/balloon couture, for example. 

PPS I discovered how to date myself instantly among younger teaching colleagues.  Use the term "teachers' college".

The happy life of teacher librarians: the late note

The scene: a school library.  Busyish lunchtime over, a few students in the library on study periods etc.

Polite young Year 7 boy clutching a novel: Miss?
Yup?
Miss, can I please have a late note?
Um, for what?
To get into class...
(I check the time: it's 25 minutes AFTER the end of lunch bell)
Lunch finished quite some time ago. 
I know.
So...
So I was reading in one of the seats upstairs Miss, and I didn't hear the bell.

He looks sorta apologetic, and rueful, and what the heck?  Isn't it great to know he was so comfy and happy (in the seats we have scrounged and recovered and set into a reading layout) and had so disappeared into the world of a book that the world beyond didn't register?  Yup.  It is.  A lovely compliment to the library.  He got his late note (with a cheerful explanation for the teacher).  Not that it would be good to be writing them every day, but he was genuine and it was a delightful moment.

The happy life of teacher librarians: best late note ever?

Cheers

Ruth

The happy life of teacher librarians: HI MISS!

So last Friday I spent all day at the library in the downstairs seminar room (glass walls, next to the computer area) with a group of teacher librarians for a mini-conference.

We had all brought food for recess and lunch; after recess, there was still quite a spread on the table, cake and biscuits and sandwiches and cheese and... we grazed, and talked of cabbages and kings.  Hosting this meeting, I had made sure we had peppermints on the table, because what is a seminar/conference without peppermints???

In the period before lunch, 10E8 English came to the library with their teacher for their regular fortnightly period.  Being Otherwise Engaged, I didn't spend the time with them as I usually would have done.

The boys (they're all boys in that class) are a bunch of larrikins and characters.  They were naturally curious about these unexpected goings-on right next to the computers they were working on.  And food.... (hmm, maybe a lot of their interest centred on the food...).  Being the opportunistic thinkers that they are, a couple bent their minds to exploiting this situation.

So I'm sitting facing the library, and a couple wave hello.  I smile back, and refocus on the discussion.

A couple of the boys are typing something on the computer.  They turn the screen so I can read it, big smiles on their faces:

HI MISS

I grin acknowledgement, and refocus.

More typing.  The screen is turned back towards me:

WATCHA DOIN?

Couldn't help myself, I laughed aloud.  They grinned back.  I excused myself from the meeting, picking up the bowl of Seminar Peppermints as I went, and went out for a minute or two to let those larrikins know just how obnoxious they are...and to remind them, as I offered them a peppermint (they took two, naturally) that it isn't OK to eat in the library.  They agreed, as they chewed, and I returned to the meeting. (They can do Contradiction just fine).  Thanks, miss!

I haven't had the heart to tell them that the last of the food was hoovered by the public stomachs of the same teacher's Year 7 class at the end of the day.

The happy life of teacher librarians: HI MISS

Cheers

Ruth

Blue eyes, brown eyes: Jane Elliott's exercise in prejudice

Photo used under Creative Commons license.  LINK

 Jane Elliott, a teacher, first tried her blue-eyed/brown-eyed exercise with her class in an Iowa school in the 1960s, in response to the assassination of Martin Luther King.  You may have come across mention of it in your teacher training, or after.  While Wikipedia isn't the be-all and end-all of research, it's not a bad source for an outline of what she did, and what happened next (and check the citation list for further links).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Elliott

Photo used under Creative Commons license.  LINK

This came up at school recently when one of the seniors, from a Society and Culture class studying belief systems and associated -isms was asking me to help her locate information*.  Blue-eyed/brown-eyed came up in the discussion, and while looking for information we came across this 29 page pdf which covers the blue-eyed/brown-eyed exercise and after in great useful detail (the Wikipedia article seems likely to have drawn on it, and it's not Stephen G. Bloom's only article on this topic).  Find it here:

Blue-Eyes, Brown-Eyes:

The Experiment that Shocked the Nation

And Turned a Town Against its Most Famous Daughter

By Stephen G. Bloom

http://www.uiowa.edu/~poroi/seminars/2004-5/bloom/poroi_paper.pdf

Here's an interesting fact from that document:

It was Jane, for instance, who complained to the Crayola Company about its single flesh-color crayon, and today there are ten flesh-color crayons — from ebony to sand. It was Jane who complained to pantyhose companies about nudecolored pantyhose, and today there are dozens of nude shades hosiery companies manufacture.

I have tried a version of this exercise with a senior class, some years ago: not as intensely/intensively as Jane; but it still had a distinct impact on the kids, got them talking and thinking. 

So, a link to share with your History/English/Society and Culture teachers, or any you think might find it useful.  Seemed a waste not to blog it.

The student also went away with a copy of The Wave, by Morton Rhue, a fictionalised version of a similar exercise.  Lots of different ways to approach and consider an idea.

Cheers

Ruth

* when we'd finished this discussion, the student remarked that the Pew Internet research site I'd referred her to for an earlier assignment had been just what she needed, so she had come back to me.  Nice to get repeat business from confident customers! - I hadn't remembered that occasion, as we have so many kids here and it's hard to recall every detail of every day's discussions and conversations.  I appreciated knowing.  The happy life of teacher librarians: repeat business from happy customers!



GIFSL* 66: Requests (made public) (+ Eragon, book 4)

(Two years ago)

Miss, I want to reserve Eragon book 4
Um, as far as I know it's not written yet - ?
No, it isn't.
So is he going to write it, do you know?
Probably.  Maybe.  I hope so.
Well...
I'd really like to reserve it, Miss.
OK then...

The kids know I have a collection of requests on post-t notes on a laminated sheet in my office .  This is what it looks like pretty much all the time:

It's very much in plain sight, where the kids can see it and I can too.  When a book has been requested and ordered, if it's orderable; Eragon book 4 clearly wasn't) it goes onto a post-it note with the kid's name and goes on here (the white sheet was a rather long list a kid brought in with her).  When the book comes in, we marry it up with the note and the kid/s on the list get to borrow it first.

It's also really effective (in terms of me remembering and in terms of the kid making the request feeling nicely important and valued) to, if you can, ring your wonderful local independent bookshop at lunchtime while the kid is there, to ask them to get in/put aside a copy of this title.  Kids have this happy shine when what they want is treated this way - it's good library PR too. 

I put a lot of my orders through a wonderful local independent bookshop - they know their stuff, especially with young adult fiction, and are fabulously helpful.  And it puts money back into the local area's economy.  And they put up with lunchtime phone calls when I order a single book or two at a time; so the kids also are alerted to a wonderful local helpful bookshop, which is not a bad thing either.

So cut to this week.  Same kid, two years taller, two years older (but still at school.  I'd kinda begun to wonder if he'd still be at school when Christopher Paolini got around to writing book 4....) bounces into my office with a happy smile on his face:

MISS!
Yes?
ERAGON BOOK 4!
Yup, I know, that post-it note is still there...
It's coming out in November!
What, he's written it?
YES!
Really?  Wow.

We look it up.  He has. It will.

The happy life of teacher librarians: wishes do come true.

Cheers

Ruth

GIFSL* 65: from top stand-up comedians. Yes, really!

Photo used under a Creative Commons license

I am happy to get ideas and inspiration from wherever I can find them, and so clicked through on a Twitter link to read Michael Bierut's design column on Seven Things Designers Can Learn From Stand Up Comics.

What did I find?  Seven things teacher librarians re-imagining their libraries and looking for design ideas and inspiration and all sorts of things can learn from stand up comics.  Really truly.

This is the brief version, with my own comments. 

1. It's all about the basics.  Librarywise, stuff being shelved and findable.  A welcoming, helpful atmosphere and friendly staaff.  A library that encourages and inspires.  Resources and services that the kids want and need.  You know.  So do the kids
2. Once you've mastered the basics, make the work your own.  Every school library, like every classroom, bears the stamp of the personality of the teacher/teacher librarian in charge of it and responsible for it.  The art and science of teaching is a juggle of personality and knowledge and human relations and all sorts of other alchemies.  I know, in another library space, that I wouldn't do exactly what I have done at my present school.  I know that another teacher librarian, in my current library, wouldn't do things the same either.  It's not about better or worse, but different.  Playing to your strengths, with the goal of making it as effective as you can for the kids.
3. Respect your audience.  That's kids, and teachers, and parents.  Kids, because sometimes they're so easy to respect, and sometimes difficult to respect: although I have found that exquisite, courteous interest from a teacher librarian can completely discombobulate a noxious student, opening the way to achieving a positive outcome for both.  Teachers can be irritating (late and lost resources, forgotten bookings etc) but like anything, there's a story both sides (teacher librarians can be irritating too: let me count the ways...or not; you know).  I'm not keen on a them and us mentality.  It's us, all teachers (whether teacher librarians or other classroom teachers) working together.
4. Know your tools.  The standard stuff - cataloguing and other organisational tools.  The teaching tools - methods and strategies and ideas.  More resources in print and digital form and more than we have ever had before.  The tools of character and style - patience, interest in kids, enthusiasm... We have a huge toolkit, as big and Tardis-like as the mother's bag in the Swiss Family Robinson (I've never forgotten that - whatever they needed, she'd popped in that sailcloth bag before the shipwreck).
5. Honour your craft.  Work hard, create challenges for yourself, aim to never coast and always improve.  Use your personal learning network, your willingness to be a lifelong learner hunting out new ideas from blogs, Twitter, email lists, the media, anywhere you can. 
6. Don't be afraid of failure.  Not everything I try works out.  Last week I planned an exciting lesson and realistically, on reviewing how it went, would barely give myself a pass grade.  And a prac teacher watched it.  So, why didn't it work as well as I'd planned and hoped?  How can I do better?  If we don't model coping with failure, valuing failure, using it as a launch pad, how can we expect kids to learn how important it is, learn to be resilient, learn to be brave?
7. Finally, never forget you have a special gift.  How much fun is it to work in a school library?  Huge fun!  Barack Obama in a speech to librarians some years ago, talked about libraries as being a magic threshold.  We not only get to cross that magic threshold each day, we get to influence the experience of everyone who crosses it too.  Teaching is an amazing gift - that alchemy when it works, the pleasure of the company of so many different, engaging personalities and dreams and ideas.  Lucky lucky lucky (as I remind myself on the days when I end up tired and dispirited; because tomorrow is another day, and plenty of good things happen even on the tough days).

Click on to read the article in full here, with Michael Bierut's designer observations rather than my teacher librarianish ones:
http://observersroom.designobserver.com/oblog/post/seven-things-designers-can-learn-from-stand-up-comics/27038/

Cheers

Ruth

*GIFSL= good ideas for school libraries.  An ongoing series on this blog.  Find more of them by clicking here.

The happy life of teacher librarians: should you argue with me?

Used under a Creative Commons license. 

I was having a discussion with an argumentative Year 7 boy this afternoon about some work he needed to do. Maintaining my cool and staying amused. He didn't want to work, and kept arguing.   The word "No" was implicit in what he was saying.

I stopped a couple of seniors walking past from the senior study in the library. "Will he win if he keeps arguing with me?" I enquired cheerfully.

They turned to the boy and instantly said, "NO! You won't!".

And we all laughed, and they went on their way, and the discussion with the boy was able to become a conversation, and some progress with his work was possible.

Teaching is made up of so many small, momentary transactions, and human moments, and funny moments every day.

The happy life of teacher librarians: discussions are fine, but think carefully before you argue with me!

Cheers

Ruth

I don't own this Tshirt, but maybe it could be rather fun (until I got caught out at something I really don't know!!)

It's from this shop on Cafe Press:
http://www.cafepress.com.au/+i_am_a_librarian_womens_dark_tshirt,339317322
And there are lots more librarian T shirts you might like offered by a multitude of folks with Cafe Press shops.  Try searching on 'librarian'. 

One of the English teachers pointed me in the direction of this - said it reminded her of me.  Very kind!

The happy life of teacher librarians: the books with legs

My school assistants and I have been having a lovely giggle in the last few weeks about a couple of books that seem to mysteriously grow legs every lunchtime.  They start off innocently enough - placidly sitting on the picture book display stand, usually.  But at the end of lunchtime, they're down the side of a sofa, under a comfy chair, shoved in a shelf somewhat haphazardly - anywhere but on that picture book stand, face-out.

Any guesses as to why?

See, what's really funny is that any of us can trot up to the fiction section upstairs on a given lunchtime and find the group - and it's pretty much always a group, sometimes huddled and reading together, sometimes with a designated read-alouder, a different assortment of kids pretty much every time - enjoying these picture books.  And they don't stop and pretend to be busy and important with something else when any of us appear.  They carry right on, with half an eye on us to see if we're going to react (I just grin!).  I've had some, smirking, tell me these are appalling and rude books, and shoudn't be in the library.  I say I'm appreciative of their input, and did they enjoy them?!

Actually, they're charming and fun and convey accurate information in a friendly and accessible format.  Mummy Laid an Egg is another one in this category.  I've written about them before, here: http://skerricks.blogspot.com/2009/06/gifsl-30-naughty-books-about-sex.html. 

I love having books with legs in the library!

We used to have one with the immensely promising title, Boys & Girls & Sex, which started lunchtime on the nonfiction shelf in the 613s and rarely if ever ended lunchtime there.  Another group read, although it was drier nonfiction, with some drawn illustrations (sadly added to so often that it was one of the reasons it had to be disposed of from the library).  Its thumped condition attested to its keen readership (and they could work the catalogue and library systems well enough to find it independently, because sex isn't the first topic a kid's going to enquire about from a teacher librarian.  Besides, it's a well-known fact - ask any teenager - that no teenager's parents have EVER had sex, because the thought is just too gross and embarrassing for their kids to contemplate.  Immaculate conceptions, pretty much every kid in high school.  Remarkable, really.) but it had rarely been borrowed.  By gum it got to travel around the library though! - we'd find it tucked into all sorts of unlikely shelf locations. And reshelve it in the 613s, and wonder where we'd find it next...

Ah, the happy life of teacher librarians, enjoying the books with legs!

Cheers

Ruth

The happy life of teacher librarians: Inspiration for your library is everywhere...

As I type this, I'm on hold to a major newspaper publisher (problems with our subscription).  Instead of hold music, they are advertising at me.

"Subscribe to [publication X]," the smooth tones of the voiceover guy says, "and you'll never miss an issue.  In both senses of the word."  (or words to that effect).

My ears prick up.  There is inspiration for your library everywhere.  That's a tag line/slogan that a library could burgle and adapt...

[brainstorming here]

Come to your library and you'll never miss an issue

Research at your library and you'll never miss an issue

Learn at your library and you'll never miss an issue

Ask at your library and you'll never miss an issue

.....

lots of possibilities.

Fancy it up into a sign, and you've got free promo material (it could go on bookmarks, too) that Big Newspaper Company paid good dollars for from a smart advertising agency... and you borrowed for nix apart from being attentive

(or being on hold for longer than one would wish, if I take the half-empty glass view, which generally I don't!)

What have you seen in marketing/advertising that could be adapted to use in a library?

The happy life of teacher librarians: inspiration is everywhere (and sometimes, being on hold can be useful!)

Cheers

Ruth

The happy life of teacher librarians: recorded

We're preparing for a debate, miss, and we'd like your help.
Sure.  What's your topic?
All we know are four general topics, and the one I am prepping for is politics.
So -
Excuse me, miss, before you start...
Yes?
(she produces an iPhone) Do you mind if I record you?  That means I'll have all of it and we can check back on it later.  If you don't mind?
No, um, OK.

Interesting how self-conscious I feel launching into my spiel - terminology, definitions, general sources, specific sources.  Every now and then that sense of self-consciousness recurs.  Speech is a different beastie to the written word.  More sprawling, this kind of conversation certainly doesn't involve, as a formal speech might, neat tidy sentences.  So she goes back to her table with a satisfactory bundle of sources and ideas, leaving me reflecting on a new experience.  I'm not used to being recorded as I toddle about my daily work.  More than that, I'm interested in how this is her choice of method for 'making notes', like the kids who'd rather see how to do something on YouTube than read about how to do it.

The happy life of teacher librarians: recorded.  Well, today, and likely not for the last time.

Cheers

Ruth

The happy life of teacher librarians: OMG is this 1995???

(Two girls with a camera walk into the library and up to my office door)

Hey miss, do you mind if we take some photos?
No, of course not.  What are you looking for?
It's for art, we're doing stuff with lines so we thought we'd take photos of books and spines.
Great idea!  Take them in different areas - the fiction book spines are different to the mixed sizes of nonfiction, and don't forget the graphic novels either.
Thanks miss. (They head off).

(Some minutes later, they're walking down the steps from fiction.)

Hey, those steps could be a good lines photo too.
We can't, miss
Oh?
We ran out of film...

(And we all laughed like loons over suddenly being in 1995, and not 2011 where one just EXPECTS that you can take, like, a gazillion photos on a digital camera, and hadn't had the 'run out of film' experience for years...)

The happy life of teacher librarians: OMG is this 1995???  The good new days and the good old days sometimes collide; and there's always something amusing in each working day.  Love a library with laughter in it.

Cheers

Ruth

The secret life of libraries

(The Mitchell Library in Sydney:: photo used under Creative Commons license)

From various sources on my Twitter stream, I have been following the stories about library closures in the UK.  The Guardian has a thoughtful, thought-provoking and sometimes rather amusing article about the secret life of libraries; it's by Bella Bathurst.  They have always had a dusty image – and never more so than now – but libraries are at the heart of our communities. With the axe about to fall, Bella Bathurst reveals just what we're about to lose.

Some more quotes:

Discussing the types of books stolen in various parts of the country, she observes: among all communities and in all parts of Britain, our old passion for self-improvement remains vivid.
...
But the cuts also underscore a deeper confusion about what libraries are: what they do, who they serve, and – in an age where the notion of books itself seems mortally flawed – why we still need them. What's the point of buildings filled with print? Isn't all our wisdom electronic now? Shouldn't libraries die at their appointed time, like workhouses and temperance halls?
...
The great untold truth of libraries is that people need them not because they're about study and solitude, but because they're about connection.
...

(Seattle Public Library::photo used under Creative Commons license)

...reading seems to be becoming an increasingly alien concept for children. "The pace of life is different now, and people expect art to happen to them. Music and film do that, a CD will do that, but you have to make a book happen to you. It's between you and it. People can be changed by books, and that's scary. When I was working in the school library, I'd sometimes put a book in a kid's hands and I'd feel excited for them, because I knew that it might be the book that changed their life. And once in a while, you'd see that happen, you'd see a kind of light come on behind their eyes. Even if it's something like 0.4% of the population that that ever happens to, it's got to be worth it, hasn't it?"

The article concludes thus:
The libraries' most powerful asset is the conversation they provide – between books and readers, between children and parents, between individuals and the collective world. Take them away and those voices turn inwards or vanish. Turns out that libraries have nothing at all to do with silence.


It's a terrific article, very much worth reading in its entirety.  I want to think some more about its ideas, such as connection, and conversation, and art happening, the sort of engagement involved in the act of reading.  This week, as every week, I will have the joy and pleasure and sheer bloody fun of putting a book in the hands of a kid and watching their eyes light up, or (they are teenagers after all) their body language just relax that small bit that is (in reality) a decibels-loud acknowledgement that the book and the transaction and the library were good things for them.  And so many of them have fabulous smiles, don't they?
 
Cheers
 
Ruth

The happy life of teacher librarians: solving problems

Miss, is onomatopoeia a word?
Yes, it sure is.
Really?
Yup.  It means words that sound like what they mean, like BANG!
oooooooh (strong resemblance to the little green chappies in Toy Story)


Miss, could you settle an argument for us?
O-kay.....
Who would be a better Fuhrer, him or me?
Define Fuhrer for me - leader in general, or replacement for Hitler?
Miss, you've changed the question.
Yes.  Define 'better'...


The happy life of teacher librarians.  Solving problems of all sorts.

Cheers

Ruth

GIFSL* 58: Enchantment and your school library

@brainpicker on Twitter, and the associated blog Brain Pickings, provide a constant supply of inspiration and ideas on a huge range of topics.  Not narrowcast "teacher librarian-focused stuff", but all sorts of things from left field and out there and what about?, and hey, here's something to think about.  I love foraging among the wider world to bring back good things to inform my teaching (eg. this blog! - see the intro reference to a flypaper mind).

Take this infographic from a recently published business book, Enchantment: the art of changing hearts, minds and actions, by Guy Kawasaki.  Not something I've tripped over in education circles, but a great lens to use in thinking about our business as teacher librarians, promoting our libraries and their services.

Read the whole blog entry on Brain Pickings here, including links to an enchantment aptitude test, an interview with the author, and more. 

As school library staffing is being challenged, our work as teacher librarians evaluated, the ill-informed happy to spout that 'it's all on the internet now' and so forth, this infographic is, to me, valuable professional reflection for considering what I do and why and how, and how I can do it better.

Cheers

Ruth

*GIFSL: good ideas for school libraries

The happy life of teacher librarians: Today I... (a late Day in the Life)

Today I...

• supervised the library before school and at lunch, and throughout the day
• worked with a teacher during roll call to ensure all her class had books (and buried the 'lost library card' excuse) - we had lots of great books out on the tables and they all found something to read.  One in particular was very happy to get a brand new copy of I am Number Four - film out soon.
• helped a teacher set up the digital projector
• introduced a Year 8 class to adventure fiction book possibilities and found novels for individual students
• met with the Principal and SAM regarding library SASS staffing and discussed same with my head teacher
• discussed a future lesson combining adventure fiction and film study with an English teacher, revamping a lesson I created last year for her class, which she liked and wants to repeat this year
• bought fundraising Valentine's Day jellybean bags (and gave them away to eager students)
• because I'd baked Valentine's Day chocolate brownies for my staff
• copied the file of last year's school photos for the computer co-ordinator (who ate a brownie with considerable enthusiasm)
• discussed a work issue with another colleague
• ate lunch with my library staff colleagues (we also ate brownies)
• watched a short "Batman safety video" that was an obsession of one of my students.  You must watch this, Miss!  Hmm, I still prefer the so-bad-it's-good shark scene from the '60s Batman movie
• was the recipient of three sheets of perspex from a staff member who knows I was after some (I'll show you why in a later post) - she found a cheap source and only wanted a can of Coke in return - and then was more than happy to settle for a brownie (brownie diplomacy is fine fine work!)
• added a Jeff Kinney article to the display cabinet with book and film reviews (usually of books from films - I added a bunch of new pieces there last Friday)
• lent and reserved and discussed books with students
• helped some lost Year 7 kids out with a late note
• calmed down an agitated Asperger's kid who was worried about why the book he wanted had gone from where he left it on Friday (it's called borrowing, honey, but we can reserve it for you...)
• asked the general assistant to trim a couple of pieces of MDF for our new bookcases
• admired the bookcase my school assistant had assembled (will show you soon when all three are done, they're FABBOBANANAS! - photos soon!) and helped put it in its planned location, where we all admired it again
• reminded seniors of the distinction between 'study periods' and the no-go concept of 'free periods'
• organised a student who's doing a short volunteer project with us for his Work Studies course (will post about that, too - it's a very very handy list!)
• discussed the senior study skills program with one of my colleagues, saw her presentation draft and helped with image/Flickr/Powerpoint advice for slides with impact
• organised the duplication of study skills materials
• planned the worksheets needed for my study skills presentation on Thursday (topic: Ethical Assignments, a revision/reminder of HSC All My Own Work)
• discussed/demonstrated Hipstamatic (iPhone camera app) with several people
• shared some brownies with our wonderful cleaner
• got to the end of the day and wondered about how fast the day had gone!

Today, I am sure, this list doesn't represent everything I did; but it's a reasonable, representatively varied and busy if inevitably incomplete, day in the life of a teacher librarian.  And tomorrow will be different again.  All the fun of the fair!  I wasn't at school during the sixth round of Library Day in the Life (I'm number 93 of about 250 on the wiki here), but figured I'd get to a reasonably representative day sometime. 

How did your day go?

Cheers

Ruth

GIFSL* no.56: Valentine's Day 2011

What's a teacher librarian to do to fancy up the library for Valentine's Day? (note: as ever, not just for pretty's sake, but to change the space, add excitement and buzz and encourage reading, to get them through the door.)

Cast your peepers over this idea:

That's made from free stuff, folks.  Catalogue/magazine pages.  The tutorial (and source of the picture) is here  but it's not at all a hard idea to play with.  Is it?  Maybe you've got kids who'd like to help?  Maybe you could have some with the names of favourite books/characters on them?  Maybe...

Go play.  Have fun.  Make your library special for your kids, so they say WOW and love being there.  Isn't that how it should be? And won't that be fun for you too?

Cheers

Ruth

*GIFSL = good ideas for school libraries

[headdesk!], then blushes and says Thank You!

Better late than never...

Thank you for whoever nominated (and voted for) Skerricks in the 2010 Edublog Awards!

Very kind of you, and most appreciated.  To be selected for the shortlist in such august (international) company (go read that list for some fabulous library/librarian blogs!) is a great honour.  That page will link you to the winners and the nomination list (Dopey Dora here didn't realise until, like, now, like, when it's all over and finalised!! - although mid-December last year, the end of term and the school year, was a tad busy...).

Cheers

Ruth

Library Day in the Life, Round 6, Tuesday

During the summer holidays (and with an iPhone handy) I've been in the habit of checking my Twitter stream each morning and emailing interesting tweets for later investigation on my laptop (bigger screen...).

So, as a snapshot of what I found this morning that I thought might be useful to my work as a teacher librarian - for me, or my colleagues, or the kids - here's what I emailed for future investigation.  It's a lucky dip depending on what others are tweeting and retweeting, and filtered by the people I follow (my Twitter @ruth_skerricks is my professional Twitter stream, where I follow people tweeting about education, technology, libraries, books...).  The motivational quotes are ideas for the senior study skills program I'm working on, some of the other links may or may not be useful, but it's all a great professional development resource.  I can't access Twitter at work (social networking sites are generally blocked) so if I email myself the links I can investigate them and if they prove useful/relevant to others, email them on to colleagues.

NY Public Library (@nypl)
25/01/11 9:49 AM
From our Tumblr: "We can’t behave like people in novels, though, can we?" http://bit.ly/fq6jmK

Josh Stumpenhorst (@stumpteacher)
25/01/11 9:49 AM
My video tutorial page: http://bit.ly/f5RUbv  #edchat #edtech
 
Fiona Jones (@fionareadersrr)
25/01/11 9:37 AM
RT @Infoventurer: Kathryn Greenhill Daily http://bit.ly/emzftW  ▸ stories today @curtinuni @camcd @fionareadersrr @libsmatter @jeanburgess

Motivational Quotes (@motivatquotes)
25/01/11 9:27 AM
Our attitude towards others determines their attitude towards us. ~ E. Nightingale http://bit.ly/9fOwbe

Shannon Miller (@shannonmmiller)
24/01/11 10:20 PM
RT @pgreensoup Quizlet Flashcards Now Embeddable http://bit.ly/g8TtzG  #vanmeter

Buffy Hamilton (@buffyjhamilton)
24/01/11 10:22 PM
Seth's Blog: Three ways to help people get things done: http://is.gd/kUvITS

Shannon Miller (@shannonmmiller)
24/01/11 10:23 PM
Joliprint ...Print friendly & PDF your blogs and websites http://ow.ly/3IXN0

Glenda Morris (@jasmont1)
24/01/11 10:42 PM
“@glendagregory: Top 10 sites for Creating Digital Magazines and Newspapers by David Kapuler (cont) http://tl.gd/8bq4vj 

Guardian Books (@GuardianBooks)
24/01/11 11:15 PM
Here's a primer on tonight's TS Eliot Prize, with poems from all the contenders http://bit.ly/hjrI2R  #books

Will Richardson (@willrich45)
24/01/11 11:31 PM
Reading: A project on the future of education http://bit.ly/eIJYXc  Interesting vision

Josh Stumpenhorst (@stumpteacher)
24/01/11 11:46 PM
Watching and discussing this with my team today: TED talk about engaging boys in EDU http://bit.ly/gFBJ6S  #edchat

Judy O'Connell (@heyjudeonline)
24/01/11 11:58 PM
The simplybooks Daily is out! http://bit.ly/9VRDYi  ▸ Top stories today by @booksin140 @sydneyunipress @thereadingzone @readingtub

Josh Stumpenhorst (@stumpteacher)
25/01/11 12:08 AM
What is innovation? Be innovative this week! http://bit.ly/gmI1lm  #edchat #ntchat

Publishers Weekly (@PublishersWkly)
25/01/11 12:06 AM
Our First Year With Amazon Kindle as an Independent Publisher http://bit.ly/g7rTzU

Publishers Weekly (@PublishersWkly)
25/01/11 12:16 AM
From FutureBook: what book publishers can learn from the gaming world. http://bit.ly/dS9SP6

Phillippa Cleaves (@pipcleaves)
25/01/11 7:26 AM
Imagine if our own students made a social network like these :-) RT @ITJil: 20 Social Networks for Lifelong Learners http://bit.ly/bC6zZZ
 
Judy O'Connell (@heyjudeonline)
25/01/11 8:27 AM
A New Culture of Learning: some thoughts. http://amplify.com/u/anj49

Tehani Wessely (@editormum75)
25/01/11 7:59 AM
The Shaun Tan cover art of Australis Imaginarium is eligible for nomination to the Chronos Awards! http://bit.ly/dZIx8o

Motivational Quotes (@motivatquotes)
25/01/11 7:44 AM
You cannot change the circumstances, the seasons, or the wind, but you can change yourself. ~ Jim Rohn

tripwire magazine (@tripwiremag)
25/01/11 5:21 AM
40+ Fresh and Amazing Free Fonts to Download http://su.pr/5Dljb3

Phillippa Cleaves (@pipcleaves)
25/01/11 7:52 AM
RT @RoshOR: “@willrich45:"A Tilt in Thought" from a principal. http://bit.ly/dFjThC Good stuff.” lets stop whining and just get on with it. 
 
Bobbi Newman (@librarianbyday)
25/01/11 8:53 AM
Top Ten Links 2.3 – All About Ebooks
Librarian by Day http://bit.ly/eA7Pqk

Cheers

Ruth

Library Day in the Life, Round 6, Monday

No, you didn't miss rounds 1 to 5 on this blog; this is the first time I've played.  You can read all about a myriad of librarian lives at the wiki here.

But, you say, it's not term time yet; we aren't back till Friday...

The foyer waiting for its new start-of-year display

...ah yes, but it's handy to come in and get a few jobs done while it's quiet.  Collect some paperwork and save some documents I want to work on between now and then. 

It's dark and quiet and soon won't be either!

Sniff the air, remember the roads to school, past the orchards and horses.... say howdy to the folks here (some teaching colleagues, my lovely cleaning lady, the maintenance boys)...

I made some chocolate brownies to take in for the cleaners and maintenance boys.  Went down a treat!

...and then flit off to have a tad more holidaying before the summer's done.

Thinking over the day so far, I started library work before leaving home, when I checked my Twitter stream and saved some links to follow up.  Been doing that all holidays - so many good things have come up. 

Cheers

Ruth

Until Australia Day...

Until Australia Day (26 January) we are all on summer holidays, with time to notice stained glass on wooden floors, and other such things to restore the soul and engage the eye.  Time to read, and create, and think.  If you're in Oz too, I hope you're enjoying your break.  The happy life of teacher librarians includes holidays, hurrah!

I'll show you the 2010 Christmas pictures I promised, but towards the end of this year, in time to give you some fresh ideas.

New stuff coming in late January! (I'm planning a Year 11 study skills program, among other things).

Happy New Year, and all the best to you and yours.

Cheers

Ruth