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Spanish Class Mystery Hangout

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Mystery Hangout

Sra. Rossell’s AP Spanish students had an engaging challenge on February 3. We connected them via Google Hangouts with Sra. Díaz-Ross’s Spanish 3 Honors class at Menlo School in Atherton, CA. I was able to make the connection between the two classes when I reached out through the Google+ GlobalTL community, and Cathy Rettberg, the Menlo School Librarian, responded and put me in touch with Sra. Díaz-Ross. Sra. Rossell’s class has been blogging for some time, and we wanted to find her students an audience outside our school for their postings. Sra. Díaz-Ross is interested in the possibility of having her students blog, and she welcomed having the two classes meet through a mystery hangout.

Here is how a mystery hangout works. The teachers or librarians find each other and set a date for the two classes to meet in a Google Hangout or Skype session. The students know about the event, but not where the other class is. They prepare for the get together in advance by brainstorming a number of questions and possible clues to share with the other class. The game rules are that each class alternates asking questions that require a yes or no answer. The goal is to be the first class to identify the school of the other class. We teachers decided, due to time restrictions, to also allow limited clues if no one guessed the location after about 25 minutes. Each of our class members had different “roles,” including introducer, questioner, photographer, videographer, and recorder. All of the students participated in being researchers, attempting through Google maps and other online sites to narrow down where the other school was based on their answers to our questions. The trick is thinking of the best questions to narrow down possibilities as efficiently as possible.

Classes around the world have been participating in these mystery events recently, using either Skype or Google Hangouts, and the activity works for all age levels. See the list at the end of this posting for some resource links. And, of course, our event was conducted entirely in Spanish. Our students found the fast pace exciting and challenging, as they had to use their critical thinking skills and come up with fast questions based on the previous answers. They were also proud to be the winners! We now look forward to receiving comments on their blogs from Sra. Díaz-Ross’s class. Unfortunately, I forgot to start the recording at the beginning of the session, but recorded a bit of the end of the hangout. You can see that below, along with some photos and short video clips taken by the videographers:

Photos:

Student Videographer recordings:

End of hangout recording:

Here are some resource links:

Skype in the Classroom

Google+ Community for Mystery Hangouts

Google+ Community for Mystery Hangouts for Foreign Language Teachers

February 2-13 at the Library

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The first two weeks of February were packed with activity. Laura Clarke’s 10th grade English students visited for help with a research project on British poetry and poets, David Piorek’s 11th grade English students learned about good research databases for speeches they are writing on a controversial topic, Ian Uhalt’s Social Studies classes got help with preliminary research on an important historical event and its impact, and William Brown’s English students learned about and practices writing meaningful comments on each others’ blog postings. Here is the list of tips we went over together for the commenting discussion.

And, a highlight of the two week period was Sra. Rossell’s AP Spanish class’s Google Mystery Hangout activity with Sra. Adriana Diaz-Ross’s Spanish class at Menlo School. Stand bye for a separate posting about that activity.

In addition, I attended the California School Library Association’s Centennial Conference at the Hyatt Regency, San Francisco Airport from Wednesday night, February 4 – Sunday afternoon, February 8. I wrote a posting before the conference on my personal blog about the presentations I was doing there. Stand by for a posting here focusing on conference take aways.

Dec. 8 – 19 2014 at the Mira Costa Library

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Before the New Year comes, I wanted to fill you in on library activities the last two school weeks of December.

Class Visits

As always, we were busy with class visits, including Ms. Vaughan, Ms. Cabrera, Sra. Rossell, Ms. Chen, Ms. Wachell, Mr. Wheeler, Mr. Reichardt, and Mr. Davidson. I worked with Ms. Vaughan’s Freshmen finishing their Of Mice and Men research project and with her Sophomores on a short lesson on how to incorporate quotations in essays. Here are the slides I shared as part of that lesson.

For Ms. Wachell’s Freshmen, I provided lessons on research skills, using our databases, EasyBib for notes and citations, evaluating sites, and finding and giving credit to images using Google Slides for their Mythology Research project. I taught Mr. Reichardt’s Ceramics classes a short lesson on finding good sources for their research in preparation for creating a sculpture on a social issue.

Mr. Davidson’s Period 5 class visited for a two-day digital citizenship lesson. You can see details about the lessons in my last post where I shared about his Period 0 and 2 classes.

Weeding the Reference Section

Weeding the Reference Section
Joan Kramer helps me weed the Reference Section

I was very fortunate and grateful to have Joan Kramer, a wonderful teacher librarian friend who is now retired, visit to help me plan and launch a major weeding project in our Reference Section. Every library needs to make a practice of discarding unused books to make room for new books and make the newer holdings more accessible. We made a lot of progress on the day of her visit, and you will see big changes in the New Year. Our remaining Reference books will be integrated into the main Nonfiction Section, and the “prime real estate” where the Reference Section has been will become a Fiction Section.  Please look for a complete write-up on this weeding project coming soon.

Empty Reference Shelves
Empty Reference Shelves

Hour of Code

Hour of Code at Mira Costa

During the week of December 8, we hosted sessions of Hour of Code during lunch each day in the library, facilitated by Geeks Club and Girls Only Coding Club members. Students were also able to participate in Mr. Braskin’s lab and the Math/Science Lab. Participants had a fun and rewarding experience getting quick introductions to computer programming, and they can also continue on their own at any time with the many fun options on the Hour of Code Site.

Other Activities

As Chair of our school Curriculum Committee, I led a meeting of the group on Monday, December 8. Our group is working on a goal, tasked to us by Ed Council, to better communicate to students and parents what the expectations are in Mira Costa courses, focusing on AP courses, electives, pathways and overall expectations in all classes. To facilitate our work and allow for as much virtual communication as possible, I set up a shared Google Drive and Google+ Community. We look forward to accomplishing our goal this Spring in time for the 2014-2015 registration period. I also represented the Curriculum Committee at the bi-monthly Ed Council meeting on December 16.

I also attended a meeting of the District Technology Committee on December 17. I am on the Professional Development sub-group of the Technology Committee, and contributing to the development of a three-year plan.

Happy New Year!

I wish all of you a happy holiday season and a wonderful New Year.

Happy New Year

Nov. 17 – Dec. 5 2014 at the Mira Costa Library

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The week of November 17 was a short week at Mira Costa, since we were closed on Tuesday and Wednesday, but we packed in a lot of activities on Monday, Thursday, and Friday. Mr. Zeoli’s 9th grade English classes started a multi-day Mythology research project, which included lessons by me on good quality sources, the importance of citing sources and taking good notes to avoid plagiarism, using EasyBib.com for recording sources and taking notes, and finding and crediting images in Google Presentations/Slides. Ms. Mullen’s 12th grade English students also visited to continue work on their research projects exploring mental and physical disability issues and used our library books, ebooks, and databases, and tracked their soures with EasyBib.

Games Week

We celebrated Games Week, and students played chess and some of our new great new board and card games:

Games Week
Students playing Yu-Gi-Oh Trading card game
Vaughn & Shane with chess table
Chess board makers Vaughan & Shane

Ask at the library any time if you would like to play one of the games.

After Thanksgiving

From December 1 – 5, after Thanksgiving Break, Mr. Zeoli’s classes continued their research and research lessons, and Ms. Vaughan’s 9th grade English students visited for the first three days of a multi-day research project on topics related to their reading of Of Mice and Men. During their visits, I provided lessons on finding and evaluating good sources; using books, ebooks, and databases; and using EasyBib to record and cite sources and take notes.

On Thursday and Friday, Mr. Davidson’s Period 0 and Period 2 Health Class students visited for a two-day lesson in Digital Citizenship. We talked about online safety; online etiquette, good manners, and cyberbullying; building a positive digital footprint; and respecting intellectual property. Here is a link to the lesson file with some of the videos we watched and discussed. Students also completed a short homework assignment including Googling themselves and checking Facebook settings. On the second day in the library, they completed this activity in which they:

  • thought about a topic they care about and that they might be able to share about online and build their digital footprint,
  • searched for blogs they could follow related to their topic of interest
  • found Creative Commons-licensed images related to their topic
  • searched Twitter for tweets related to their interest

After school on Wednesday, December 3, our Library Club participated in our monthly Google+ HOA (Hangout on Air) with other library club #SWVBC (Somewhat Virtual Book Club) partners in a discussion of Butter by Erin Jade Lange.  Our club members were pleased to be joined by some students from Ms. Wiseman’s English classes. I was very proud of our students’ insightful contributions to the discussion. We record each session and store it in the SWVBC YouTube channel, so anyone interested can watch later:

In addition, our Geeks met and prepared to Facilitate Mira Costa’s Hour of Code the week of December 8. Students will be visiting the library and other computer labs on campus during lunch to participate in activities to teach them about computer programming. And, the Library Club and Geeks agreed to join efforts to participate in Mira Costa’s Operation Happiness and provide gifts for a child in need during the holidays.

I also participated in meetings of the Education Council, School Site Council, and Curriculum Committee. And, on the evening of November 17, I was pleased to participate as one of the California School Library Association (CSLA) guest panelists on the monthly TL (Teacher Librarian) News Night. This live news program features a different state library association each month. As one of the CSLA representatives, I shared about the making of the new CSLA advocacy film, “Does Your School Have a Teacher Librarian?” Please watch it if you haven’t already:

Hour of Code Coming to MCHS

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Hour of Code at Mira Costa

Did you know that computer coding is becoming one of the most in-demand skills in the workplace?And, even in careers you might not think of, coding comes in handy.

Next week (December 8-14, 2014) the Geeks and Girls Only Coding Clubs are teaming up to bring the “Hour of Code,” an international event, to Mira Costa. The idea is to give students of all ages an exposure to this increasingly important skill. To support the event, organizations such as Khan Academy, Codecademy, and more have created a large selection of self-paced online tutorials.

We are still in the midst of getting the effort set up, but you can check this webpage in progress that has links as well as (coming soon) a signup form. Right now, you can see an introductory video and several tutorial links here. During the week of December 8-14, students can come to the library or one of the campus computer labs during lunch, and, facilitated by our Geeks and Girls Only Code Club members, work on a tutorial. They can also complete tutorials at any other time at home or school. Students may also be able to earn extra credit from some of their teachers for participating.

And, here’s just a quick personal story —Back when I went to Library School to earn my MLS (Masters in Library Science), I found out I had to take a programming class. I was an English Major, and thought, “that’s not why I decided to go to Library School, to learn programming!” To my surprise, I enjoyed what I learned, and it has stood me in good stead throughout my careers in public libraries, technical writing, and as a teacher librarian. While I’m not a programmer, knowing a little about how it works has been helpful over and over again for me as a software user and blog and website creator. And, I have had fun going through some of the Hour of Code tutorials. I am working now to review and strengthen my HTML skills that help me tweak formatting and more in this blog. While current blogging and website software don’t require coding skills, they definitely come in handy.
So … do please invest an hour in a coding tutorial the week of December 8! Teachers and parents can participate also.

Celebrating Games Week @ Our Library

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Games Week

November 15 was International Games Day. As a member of the American Library Association, I was invited to sign our library up for this event and fortunate as a participant to be able to request free board games from different vendors. The great news is that we got eight brand new board games from generous vendors! These games will be a great addition to our new chess table. So, since the games arrived too late to celebrate before November 15, we’re making the entire week of November 17 – 21 a Games Week at the Mira Costa Library. Come by the library any time this week, play one of the board games or chess, and you will be entered in a drawing to win a gift certificate.

Many thanks to Konami Digital Entertainment, Inc., Steve Jackson Games, and Looney Labs for sending us these great new games.

Nov. 3 – 14 at the MCHS Library

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As always, we had lots of classes and lessons in the library during the last two weeks.

Mr. Brown’s Blogging Project

blogging

I am delighted that Mr. Brown is having all of his English students (grades 10 and 12) start individual blogs, and the five classes came to the library for two days to get them started. Blogging is a wonderful tool that allows students to practice writing skills and find their writing voices, reflect on and share about personal interests, build a positive digital footprint, and learn about and practice all the aspects of digital citizenship. Along with discussing what a blog is and the benefits of blogging, I taught lessons in different aspects of digital citizenship they will need to be aware of as they blog, and I helped them set their blogs up using Google’s blogging software. Here are some of the short films we watched as part of our class discussions on their first day in the library:


This film launched a discussion about what digital citizenship is, and how it doesn’t mean just being cautious online and staying safe; it also offers wonderful opportunities for making global connections.

We watched this film and talked about building a positive digital footprint:

We watched this film, and talked about protecting privacy and being careful about what you post in blogs and any other form of online communication to protect your own privacy and that of your friends and relatives from potential predators and to avoid sharing anything you would be less than proud of later:

We also talked about how online communication lacks tone of voice and body language clues present in the live world, meaning students need to take extra care to avoid accidentally insulting someone in their posts or their comments. We watched this film as a reminder to avoid engaging in any behavior that could be construed as bullying another person:

On the second day in the library, I showed the students how to set up their blogs and what to include in their first posting. You can see the directions I shared with them for reference here.

We also watched this film about Plagiarism, Copyright, Public Domain, Fair Use, and Creative Commons, all important concepts for students to understand for blogging as well as all their writing and other creations on and offline:

Along with the film, we viewed and discussed the court case related to the famous Obama Hope poster, as an example of fair use/copyright disputes. I shared that justifying Fair Use in published works like blogs can be very difficult, and that we are very fortunate to have many options for finding copyright-friendly images and other material to include in the students’ blogs. I demonstrated how to find Creative Commons-licensed images using the Flickr.com and Google Image Advanced Search options. You can see screencasts of the techniques I demoed for both of these sites on the directions page.

I was very excited to launch this project for Mr. Brown’s students, and look forward to working with them on it throughout the year. As the next step, once they write their first posts, they will then read their classmates’ postings and practice writing good comments. As we discussed, one of the big benefits of blogging is the ability to engage in conversations both with classmates and even globally with the commenting feature.

Other Lessons and Class Visits

I provided introductions to research project lessons for Ms. Parks AP Art History class and Ms. Mullen’s 12th Grade English class, worked with Adam Geczi’s World History classes on identifying the bibliographic information for citations and using EasyBib.com to assist with saving and formatting the citations, and introduced a new blog post assignment about La Llorona for Sra. Rossell’s AP Spanish Literature class. The library also hosted class visits for Ms. Bledsoe and Mr. Oystrick’s science classes, and I consulted with Ms. Nielsen on a project for her AP Chemistry students.

SWVBC – We Were Liars Discussion

Our Library Club again served as the moderators for our monthly Somewhat Virtual Book Club (#SWVC on Twitter) discussion on November 5. This month’s book was We Were Liars by E. Lockhart. I am very proud of our group of students who moderated, and they received kudos from the librarians in the other participating schools. Here’s our recording of the Google Hangout:

Our next SWVBC discussion will be on December 3 at 3 PM Pacific Time. We will be discussing Butter by Erin Jade Lange, a riveting contemporary realistic fiction book about a morbidly obese, outcast teenager who suddenly becomes popular when he creates a website advertising his plans to commit suicide. All Costa students are invited to join us for the discussion in the library lunchroom. Please come by the library to borrow a copy of the book and get more information about the discussion event. For a preview of Butter, please watch this engaging book trailer by Cathy Jo Nelson, the librarian at Dorman High School in South Carolina, one of our SWVBC school libraries:

Dorman High School will be hosting and moderating the December 3 book discussion.

Geeks – Planning Costa’s Hour of Code Participation

Our Geeks club, which offers tech support to Mira Costa students and parents, met this week and learned about the upcoming Hour of Code international event December 8 – 14. from Jeanne Reed, a technology consultant at the MBUSD District Office. The club enthusiastically agreed to work as facilitators and promoters for this event in partnership with the Girls Only Coding Club. Mr. Braskin, computer teacher and advisor of the Girls Only Coding Club, and I will serve as advisors for Mira Costa’s participation in the Hour of Code week. All of the schools in our district will also be participating. Stand by for more information about this event very soon.

“Does Your School Have a Teacher Librarian?”

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Fortunately, at Mira Costa, we do.

Watch this new film just released by California School Library Association about what teacher librarians do, including how we nurture student interests, integrate technology, teach information literacy, prepare students to be college and career ready, and provide professional development to faculty and staff at our school sites and for our school districts.

In the film, you will see the Mira Costa Library as one of the featured libraries, and you will hear some of our teachers and students interviewed.  You will also see some sobering statistics about the state of school library staffing in California. Even in MBUSD, we only have a teacher librarian at Mira Costa, not in the elementary or middle schools.

Oct. 20 – 31 at the Mira Costa Library

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Here are some highlights of the last two weeks at the Mira Costa Library:

Lessons Taught

Webquest

Laura Clarke’s 9th Grade English classes visited for a research project supporting their study of Mythology. We based the unit on a webquest I had developed a while ago and customized for her class. Each student researched a different god and prepared a slideshow to share with class members. As they did so, I provided lessons which included plagiarism avoidance, respect for copyright, using databases, evaluating websites, using EasyBib to create bibliographic citations and take good notes, and using the Google Slides Research Tool to find and credit copyright-friendly images. In addition, we had the students practice using Google Classroom.

And, probably the most fun portion of the unit, we had the students each create Twitter accounts for their gods and practice using this social media tool in the role of their gods dealing with today’s world. You will start to see their tweets over the next week at these Twitter hashtags: #ccmyths2, #ccmyths3, and #ccmyths4. (If you don’t have a Twitter account, just go to search.twitter.com, and enter a search for each of those hashtags in turn.) I am a strong supporter of the educational value of Twitter and tweet frequently, both on behalf of the library and, very actively with my own account. This Twitter activity proved a learning experience for Ms. Clarke and me. For example, we found that tweets from new accounts can take several days to become searchable; so if you search for those hashtags, the tweets won’t show up right away. We found that some of the students had challenges establishing their accounts if they didn’t have a cell phone to receive an activation text. The good news is that I believe it is valuable for students to see that teachers are learners also, and don’t always get everything right. And, Ms. Clarke and I have valuable experience for tweaking this activity in the future.

Adam Geczi’s World History classes visited for another research lesson and work session. This time we focused on learning to use our EBSCO eBook Academic Collection and Academic Search Premier to find both ebooks and academic journals. They also learned how to use EasyBib to record bibliographic citations and take notes.

Shawn Chen’s 9th Grade English students visited for lessons and research time for their project researching topics related to their study of Oedipus. I helped them learn to find quality sources, record their sources and notes in EasyBib, and how to find and credit images using the Research Tools feature in Google Slides.

Glen Marx’s 12th Grade Government students visited for a lesson research skills, plagiarism avoidance, finding and evaluating quality sources, recording citations and notes in EasyBib, parenthetical citations, and more. You can see the slideshow I used here.

Anita Rossell’s AP Spanish Literature class visited for another session to work on their blogging project. This time, Sra. Rossell and I had them post about domestic violence. Here is the assignment we crafted for them, along with links to their postings.

In addition to these class visits for lessons, a number of other classes visited to continue research projects, take advantage of the computers, and select books.

SLJ Summit

While the library was taken over on Friday, October 24 for district hearing tests, I headed to St. Paul, Minnesota for School Library Journal’s fabulous Leadership Summit. Please read about it in this posting I devoted to that event.

Committee Work

As the new chair of the school Curriculum Committee, I attended a meeting of Ed Council on October 21, and participated in that body’s work setting goals and priorities for the Curriculum Committee, as well as the other two new standing committees for Calendar and for School Safety and Culture.

On October 28, I attended a meeting of the interdisciplinary group led by William Brown planning complimentary units related to water. I have volunteered to post group work on the library website, and began a resource list here.

I am delighted to be serving on the District Technology Committee again this year, and enjoyed attending the committee’s first meeting on October 22. I look forward to contributing to this group’s work.

Chess Table

I am thrilled with the library’s new chess table, made for us by Vaughn Rossi and Shane Taugner. See information and photos here.

Halloween

Halloween is one of my favorite days in the library. I love seeing students both work and hang out in their costumes. This year, we also had a Halloween story contest leading up to Halloween, an idea developed by our Library Club. The club members wrote the starting sentences for four different scary stories. Then, students had the opportunity to contribute the next sentence to the story of their choice. We ended up with four entertaining narratives! One participant will be selected by random drawing for a gift certificate prize. Participants had a lot of fun writing their contributions. Here are some photos from Halloween and the story writing contest:


Created with flickr slideshow.

School Library Journal Summit 2014

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SLJ Summit 2014

I was very fortunate last week to attend School Library Journal’s annual invitational leadership summit. This year’s summit took place October 25 – 27 in St. Paul, MN. It was truly a teacher librarian’s dream come true. This mini-conference brings together approximately 200 of the most cutting edge, enthusiastic leaders in the school library field from across the nation. Had we simply gotten together for the weekend without any of the formal sessions, I would have come away with second-to-none new knowledge and ideas through the networking with friends from all over the country I have met before live or via my social media personal learning network (PLN) and new friends I made there for the first time. While the networking was incredible, we did, of course, also have an amazing collection of sessions that added to my expertise as a school librarian, inspired me to work smarter to better serve my students and staff, and supported our district’s top priority of Common Core State Standards (CCSS) for professional development this year.

As a teacher librarian, I support the needs of CCSS  in many ways. Below are just a few of the key ways, along with some related takeaways from the summit.

Research Support

Although research is not isolated as its own topic in the CCSS, even a cursory reading makes clear that it is a key element in the Writing standards. In fact, research is one of the highest frequency words in all the standards. I help students learn good research skills every day through class lessons and one-on-one help on how to find, evaluate, cite, and use research sources; pathfinders I provide curating quality resources on topics being researched; and online tutorials on the library website.

One of the outstanding panels at the summit, the Mooresville Graded School District (MGSD) group from North Carolina, led by Dr. Mark Edwards, National Superintendent of the Year, shared the district’s experience transitioning to a 1:1 laptop model. The librarians play a pivotal role in supporting this model. Five of the district’s eight librarians (the district has one credentialed librarian and one assistant at every school and two librarians at the high school) participated in the panel. We were all inspired hearing how they fulfill their “every child, every day” motto with engaging teaching, resources, and curriculum. I have ordered and plan to share Edwards’ book,  Every Child. Every Day: A Digital Conversion Model for Student Achievement, with our district. On the research topic, the librarians shared the importance of having a research method that is scaffolded from the early grades through high school. The research model MGSD uses is the extremely well-respected “Big 6” strategy. I actually implemented this model when I was a middle school teacher librarian in my previous district, and I continue to share elements of it with classes that visit the Mira Costa Library, but I have never felt like I have enough teaching time during class lessons to fully implement it at Mira Costa. Listening to the MGSD librarian panel is making me rethink my priorities; I want to move to implement it in a more formal, explicit way at Mira Costa to help students better understand research as a process of steps.

Another session at the summit, delivered by Jole Seroff and Tasha Bergson-Michelson, librarians at Castilleja School in Palo Alto, inspired us to ponder and get in touch with our own research techniques that we exercise tacitly, and to model those techniques for students. For example, when students begin research on a topic for which they have little or no background knowledge, we can help them build stepping stones to good search terms and questions by having them scan introductory texts to find keywords to search for and questions to explore as they move forward.

Reading and Reading Materials Support

Reading both informational and literary texts are important components of the CCSS. One vital role I play in the library is building a culture of reading. By developing a collection of quality literature and fiction, literary nonfiction, and informational text, I provide appropriate reading materials for our students curricular needs. And, equally important, I promote reading books students want to read, since I know that the more students read and get to read about what interests them, the better readers they become, and the more prior knowledge they will build and have available to apply to curricular texts.

I attended a pre-summit session led by Deborah Ford from Junior Library Guild that helped me not just with ideas for new titles to enrich our collection, but, more importantly for me, with strategies to weed the many old and outdated books our library owns. I have not been able to keep up with this very important task at Mira Costa. I plan to make this a priority this year and at least begin an extensive weeding project which will make the remaining newer books more visible and accessible to our students.

I also benefited from visiting with a variety of vendors that supply materials that could better support our collection. I am currently working on creating an order with Mackin, one of the vendors, to purchase digital, downloadable audiobooks for all our core English literature. I will also be taking advantage of exciting new offerings from some of the other vendors, and I appreciate discount opportunities for summit attendees provided by several of the vendors.

Supporting use of digital media

Students’ use of digital media plays another important role in the CCSS. I support our students by helping them use digital media appropriately and effectively to learn and to create products to demonstrate mastery. This Fall, we significantly increased our library’s digital offerings by adding EBSCO’s Academic ebook collection of more than 130,000 titles along with EBSCO’s Academic Search Premier database, giving us access to more than 4,600 academic journals. Another takeaway from the summit was ideas I can use for better promoting our new ebooks that are replacing outdated print titles. Some schools, for example, are using old VCR cases to “stand in” for ebooks on the library shelves. These cases include ebook titles and QR codes to allow students to access the ebooks. I will be working this year on a variety of strategies to promote the rich electronic sources we now have from EBSCO and other vendors.

And so much more

This is just a few of my early reflections of my experiences at the summit. I know I will be able to take advantage of many more of my experiences there to enhance the library program this year.

And, as I mentioned at the beginning of this posting, the networking was incredible. Here are just a few examples:

  • I got to see Michelle Luhtala and Shannon Miller, two members of our#SWVBC (Somewhat Virtual Book Club) and plan some strategies for our ongoing book club meetings.
  • I connected with Joyce Valenza, Andy Plemmons, and Deb Shorganizers of the Global TL network, and got to exchange ideas about building meaningful global connections for our students. At Joyce’s suggestion, I am considering submitting a proposal to present about the Somewhat Virtual Book Club at the Global Education Online Conference in November.
  • Andy was one of the people I recently got to know through my virtual PLN and had the pleasure of meeting in person for the first time at the summit. We also have in common that we both attended a Google Teacher Academy and became a Google Certified Teacher last summer, and we exchanged ideas about what we learned at our academies, his in Atlanta, and mine in Mountain View.
  • Another librarian I was honored to meet live for the first time at the summit was Michelle Colte, School Library Journal‘s School Librarian of the Year, coming all the way from Hawaii. During the weekend, she and Elissa Malespina, another PLN friend, filled me in on their Virtual Poetry Summit plans for National Poetry Month in April, and invited me to join. I plan to recruit Mira Costa students to participate.
  • Fellow California School Library Association friends Sue Heraper and Liz Dodds and I had a chance to connect live and exchange ideas we can use to enrich our association’s activities.

Here is a wonderful video created by Capstone, another of the vendors, we saw during the opening of the summit that shows the vital role of libraries and trained librarians supporting our students’ engaged learning:

Many thanks to School Library Journal and all the organizers, exhibitors, and presenters who made the summit possible.