Online Books -- Too easy not to use!!

April 17, 2018

Online Books -- Too easy not to use!!

We have access to two easy to use online book resources that you can use over the Summer and not worry about fines or fees!

GALE Resources -- Mostly Non-Fiction & Profession Development (the good ones)

Here's a short video on what you can do with the GALE resources. You can research, highlight, take notes and save it all to your Drive. 

OverDrive -- Mostly Fiction

Here's a short video on how to check out a book from OverDrive. Most of the books can be read from a Kindle, Kindle app on your phone/iPad, or in a browser. If you don't see the book that you want, there is a way to make request. Those request go to my email and if I have funds available, I can get those in a timely fashion. 

 

Creating Twitter Post -- Too Cool Not to Share!!

April 10, 2018

As a new librarian I am constantly looking for ways for my Library Science students to produce a book report without doing a traditional book report. This quarter my students are reading a biography. I had read a blog from Matt Miller, author of Ditch That Textbook that demonstrated how to create comic strips using Google Drawings. I made the lesson plan and was all excited about it, and then I found a Twitter simulator! In walked CHOICE!

Now I am giving my students a choice to create a comic strip about the book or tweets as if they were the person they are reading about using Simitator.com. For their assignment, they had to create at least 25 tweets that they put in a Google Slides presentation so that I could read through them in a chronological order and they only submitted one file instead several images. I selected Slides because of the ability to present the tweets as opposed to Docs and scrolling through them.

When you go to Simitator.com you have many choices of social media to choose from as well. Facebook, Snap Chat, Twitter, etc.

How could you use this in your classroom? Below is an idea, but oh the possibilities.

What if a historical figure had a Twitter account? What would they have tweeted?

Think how students could show various levels of understanding using a tool like this. Notice that they can change the date.

The filter at my school would not allow me to use the "Download Tweet as JPG image" so I just took a screenshot.