Anne Johnston’s Library Blog

Glowing successfully at home, having logged on to the new portal. Now to find some victims - sorry interested colleagues and students - to try out the new Glow tools.

Also on the trail of Extreme Learners interested in developing a virtual librarian.

An interesting week and its only half way through. On Monday I attended the open exc-el group meeting at John Muir House (photographic evidence currently available on Ewan’s blog ) where the group morphed into the edubuzz open group. Tuesday morning at Prestonpans East Lothian Glow mentors got a first look at the new portal. Initial impression was that the look of the site hadn’t changed much. Thanks to further investigations by Tess at Knox Academy we now know that it has developed a great deal. I’m looking forward to being able to access the portal next week. Various colleagues in DGS and the Library Service are keen for a shufty as well.

Today’s best bit was the last period lesson. One of our S1 classes is in the Library to participate in Accelerated Reader, only many students in this class have severely underdeveloped reading muscles - can read , won’t read. We wanted to make sure that everyone had attempted at least one quiz to get them started, so tried a different approach. We read a short book to them and then everyone sat the same quiz. All seemed to enjoy the experience but the proof will be what happens next Wednesday. The relieved librarian will confess that she is really happy to discover that you can log twenty people on to the same quiz at the same time and it works - something she din’t think about until she was giving everyone instructions to log on. Nothing like forward planning!

The Space projects I mentioned in an earlier post are now complete. The work by two students was particularly impressive. Their finished presentation was their own work based on selecting appropriate, relevant information from the internet. No cut and paste job but what was particularly pleasing to see was their joint working. Using an mp3, one boy produced text and saved it. His partner then plugged the mp3 into his PC and added the text to the Powerpoint which he had been working on. He had been choosing relevant pictures of stars and galaxies and producing the look of the presentation whilst the first boy had been writing the text.

Most of our S1 and S2 classes have now begun to use Accelerated Reader. We realise that AR isn’t going to turn all students into avid readers but already we are getting suggestions for books to buy and asked if there are quizzes available for books students are reading at home. Next week we are providing time for students to give us their suggestions as to what we get with the generous funds provided by the DGS school board to alow us to expand the choice of titles available.

I sat down at my computer tonight with the intention of reviewing the edubuzz/exc-el meeting I attended earlier. Instead I wandered off into wikispaces and decided to set up a space for school librarians in East Lothian to work together on a document. A first for us. It’ll be interesting to see the end result but it seems a more effective way of producing a shared result.

I have come to realise that I am a binge blogger. I need to learn to blog little and often instead of writing up several weeks worth of experieces in one go. Let see how long the sensible blogging plan works.

The last few weeks have been hectic with S2 students working up to course choices. All classes have been timetabled for two lessons in the library using careers software (Kudos and PlanitPlus) and a third lesson, also in the library, with Marjory Armstong, our Careers Adviser. At the same time all the other classes which usually use the library are still doing so. It is wonderful to have so much space now. I rarely have to turn people away. On at least two occasions in the past week four classes have used the library in the same period, most recently on Tuesday. Two English classes share the period to select reading material - one the first half and one the second. This week a third English class borrowed a set of textbooks. At the same time an S4 class was using the library to help with their course choices for S5 and Marjory was interviewing students in the Careers area of the library, as she usually does on a Tuesday. I love seeing the library used in this way and am always pleased at how well our students work together.

At the same time Advanced Higher History students have been researching topics related to early Scotland - time for me to research and request Inter-Library Loans for books. A stimulating change from having students expecting to find everything in google images. Also much easier now that so many university library catalogues and that of the National Library for Scotland are available online.

The plea most often heard in the Library last week and this is that of the greater spotted S4 English student “Are there any free computers please miss? I have to finish my folio work”