It was a pretty slow day today for subbing, so I was able to get some library work in. The students who I worked with yesterday on the CultureGrams were in the library and the library's computer lab working on their research paper. I helped them out when I could throughout the day with any questions they had either about the CultureGram site or general research questions they may have had. For the most part, the students did a great job. They must have been listening and paying attention yesterday when I was in their class. I also helped other students check out books, find books, and reserve books while they were in the library.

At the middle school, I helped out the library aide with her ongoing inventory project. She is going through the entire collection, scanning every item, and pulling the books that are not in the system. Then the items are entered into Alexandria and put back onto the shelves. I entered books into the system myself using some of the skills I have learned in my cataloging class. I entered the title, author, publisher, copyright date, a summary (if listed), Dewey number, physical description, and subject headings; all which make up the MARC record of an item and I got all the information from the physical book.

High school hours today: 2
Total high school hours: 21.5
Middle school hours today: 1
Total middle school hours: 18

Total Secondary hours: 39.5

Day 4

Yesterday, I spent the whole day in the high school, bouncing back and forth between freshman English classes and the library media center. When I was with the classes I focused on showing them two different resources for getting information on their cultures research paper. I started my lesson by just asking the question, "What does culture mean, and what words come to mind when you think of culture?" Next, I went over a couple key items from their research paper handout and explained to them where I will be helping them today. I then went on to show them how to use Alexandria's Researcher to find materials in the media center. Once I found some decent items, I went on to explain the Dewey numbering system with the 900s meaning Geography and History, and then the 940s, 950s, and so on each being a different continent, followed by then next digit representing a country or group of countries. I then showed students the culture gram binders that they could use for class, followed by a short two minute video introducing the CultureGram website. Next I passed out the handout I created about how to get to and use the CultureGram website and demonstrated how to use the website with the class. I also brought to the room all the hardware and software needed for the lesson and set it up and took it down. I brought an LCD projector, a laptop, a power strip, extension cord, and all the connecting cords needed between them. The students were very attentive during the class and asked some good questions. Today they are in the computer lab working with the CultureGrams themselves. I'm going to check in on them when I can to see how everything is going.

In between my lessons I worked in the library checking out laptops to students and helping them troubleshoot their technology problems. I also helped students find materials they needed, checked in and out books, and re-shelved books. I also supervised students that were sent to the library from their classes to find various bits of information along with the student aides who were present. I also pulled some of the books that the students from the freshman English classes will be using for the culture research assignment. We have a large collection of books on countries and cultures set aside for easy access for the students. Today was a good taste of a variety of library media specialist responsibities.

On a totally different note. I was offered and accepted a job in Spring Green, Wisconsin for the Library Media Specialist position as River Valley Middle School. I am very much looking forward to starting that position come the end of August.

high school hours today: 7.5
total high school hours: 19.5
total middle school hours: 17
total secondary hours: 36.5

Culture Grams

Today I had a few slow moments during school so I was able to get together with Deb and plan out and gather materials for my lesson I'm doing with freshman English students on Monday. They are doing research papers on cultures and I'm going to come in the class and discuss what culture means, what they will be researching, how to do a subject search for materials in the library, and how to use the CultureGrams database which the school district has a license for. I also created a handout for them that explains how to get to the website, how to log in, and has a general description of what the site can all do. I also downloaded a short video that explains the site that I will show them. I also plan on walking through a search with the students.

high school hours today: 2
high school hours total: 12
middle school hours total: 17

Total secondary hours: 29

Day 3

I started my day out in the high school library today. One major change since the last time I worked there was that the main desk was rotated and moved to a better location with a better view of everything. Apparently theft is becoming an issue, and with no security system in the library, a lot of materials have been mysteriously disappearing. Also there has been issues with vandalism in the computer labs. The new desk location gives both a better view into the computer labs and of the entrances and exits for the library.

My first tasks were checking in and shelving the books that were recently returned, which is minuscule compared to the number of books to be re-shelved at the elementary school. I also added some notes to items in Alexandria stating where certain materials where being kept. Later on I helped two students with papers they were writing for their respective classes. The first student wanted her article review proofread and she also needed assistance getting it in the proper APA format. I think I offered ample assistance because in my 573 class I just wrote two article reviews and they had to be in APA format. The second student was writing an essay on "To Kill A Mockingbird" and I helped her think of ideas and to get the writing started. I also found time to put bar codes and spine labels on some newly donated materials and I checked in and circulated the new magazines. I spent the last part of my high school time going over my practicum checklist with Deb. We discussed what I have done, what I can still do, and what I won't be able to do or is not possible to do with her. She also showed me some more functions of Alexandria.

Later in the afternoon I headed over to the middle school. I was there for two homerooms which kept me busy checking in and out books and helping students find the materials they were looking for. I also played around with Alexandria some more and I feel very comfortable with it now.

high school hours today: 6
middle school hours today: 1.5
high school hours total: 10
middle school hours total: 17

total secondary hours: 27

Today I worked in the middle school library in the afternoon. I had two homeroom classes come in, primarily to check in, renew, and check out books. Some students also use the computers in the library and to do homework. I helped a couple students find materials in the library and also shelved books after I checked them in. There also were students in the library who take a reading class on a wiki to discuss books they have read. The experience went well and I am getting a lot more comfortable using Alexandria.

middle school hours today: 2

middle school hours to date: 15.5
High school hours to date: 4
Secondary hours to date: 19.5

Day 2

Today I worked with the 8th grade language arts classes on website evaluation. I created a lesson and taught it to two classes at the same time, about 55 students each hour. We met in the computer lab which has a large meeting area with a computer hooked up to a large projection LCD player and then two labs for students to use on each side. I started out the lesson with a large group discussion about what students already know about good websites. Some of the most common answers were checking for an author and seeing what was at the end of the web address like .gov, .edu, .org, etc. Next I passed out a handout about the 5 W's of website evaluation and we read through it together. Then I showed them 3 questionable websites on the LCD player and had them look for red lights on them. The three sites I picked came from a site created by Kathy Schrock, (along with the 5 W's handout) and were about he history of Fisher Price Airplanes, a google technology post from an April Fool's Day, and the Ban Dihydrogen Monoxide (H2O) page. Then I passed out an "Evaluating Websites" worksheet that I created with a little help from Kathy Schrock. The students are working on a persuasive essay and needed to find a website related to their topic and evaluate it. The worksheet had a series of yes/no questions about the site and then at the end it asked the students to give it a ranking from 1-10 and then explain why they would or wouldn't recommend it for use with their project. The last part of class everyone came back to the main room and I showed them an excellent site that the district provides for them, SIRS. I walked through a couple searches with them on the site and how they have information on both sides of an issue.

Overall I thought it went well. There were a few hiccups along the way. Initially first hour I couldn't figure out how to get my computer image projected on the screen through the LCD player. Help did come fairly quickly and showed me what I was missing. Then, during sixth hour, the screen was showing just a blank blue screen at the start of class so I had to skip the questionable website portion, but I was able to get it up again, just in time for the fire drill that we had toward the end of the hour. Then seventh hour the screen went out again towards the end and I wasn't able to go over the SIRS with them. Other than the couple technological glitches and the fire drill, everything went well and I think the students got a lot out of today. They will be working in the computer lab tomorrow as well and I hope a lot of the students will put to work what they learned today.

middle school hours today: 7.5

middle school hours total: 13.5
high school hours total: 4
secondary hours total: 17.5

Yesterday at the end of the day and after school I was able to meet with the 8th grade language arts teacher who's classes I will be working with next Monday. We planned the lesson that I'm going to do on evaluating websites and using the middle school's online resources to help with their upcoming persuasive essay. They will primarily be using the SIRS site which the district has a contract with. They will choose a website on their own and evaluate it with the checklist I created for them. I also will be distributing copies of Kathy Scrhock's 5 W's of website evaluation. I'm looking forward to working with these students as something other than a substitute teacher. I'm curious to see if their behavior will be any different.

middle school hours today: 2

total middle school hours to date: 6
total high school hours to date: 4
total secondary hours to date: 10