Adventures of the New Library Cricut

Meet the newest addition to our family: the Cricut Explore Air 2.  

To be honest, it has been sitting in my office for over a month because I knew it was something I needed in my library, but I had never used one.  So I am definitely what you would call a "novice," sine I have only cut out 2 different shapes.  Nonetheless, I'm always ready to try something different to improve the library's facilities.  I finally had some time earlier this week to dedicate to the Cricut.  So here we go.

In anticipation of using this machine, I first turned to Youtube.  That was a tremendous help.  There are a lot of Cricut videos out there; however, I should have watched a few more videos.  My first experience with the Cricut was not good. FYI . . . do not use construction paper. . . EVER.  The paper sticks to the mat and ruins both your project and the mat.

Cricut - 1 win, Tahaney - 0 wins.

After that, I experimented with poster board and colored copy paper.  My shapes looked much better, and they did not stick to the mat.  Yay!

So if you're keeping count that's Cricut - 1, Tahaney - 2

 (poster board)   

                                                                (copy paper)

Then I really got brave and tried using butcher paper. I know what you are thinking, and yes, I like to walk on the wild side.  It turned out just as successful as the others.

(butcher paper)

So that's Cricut - 1 and Tahaney - 3.

With my new found success, I tweeted out our latest library acquisition.  Now I am hoping there are other teachers and students who can teach me.  My limited knowledge is just dangerous enough to ruin another mat.  However, I am happy to pass on what I have learned.

For those of you who are paying attention, I did say that I cut out 2 different shapes.  The ornament is one, and these cute hot cocoa shapes are the second one.

As our budget is limited, so are the materials we can provide.  We have poster board, copy paper, butcher paper and, of course, the Cricut that anyone can use for free.  Those who wants the fancy adhesive vinyl or even just the regular card stock will have to bring their own.  We don't have the t-shirt attachment yet so anyone with aspirations to make their own shirt will have to wait.

What will I do next with all this new found knowledge?  I think I am ready to punch out some letters for our next library book display.  Yep, that's me . . . living the dream.

Despite my reluctance to pull the Cricut out and dedicate the time to learn something new, I am pretty excited about the possibilities for the library, the teacher and the students.

Happy Holidays!

"Pop Up" Library and "Bathroom Book Talks"

Two new developments at the SHS Library are the pop up library and bathroom book talks. To be honest, I am still in the beginning phases of each of these ideas, but I thought I would talk about them while they are fresh in my mind.


The Pop Up Library

The pop up library came about out of necessity.  Our initiative this year is independent reading in the classroom.  That means more business for me in the library because students are definitely checking out books.  Yay!  In conjunction with this phenomenon, I have more teachers using the library.  So I have teachers coming to the library while other teachers are sending students to check out books. Hence, the library is a bit too congested from time to time.  Good problem to have. . . Enter the pop up library.

The first time, I took my laptop, a scanner and a cart of books to the English hallway and parked myself there for the last 45 minutes of each block.  Students could renew a book, turn in a book and/or check out a new book from the selection I brought with me.  In 2 days, I saw roughly 145 students who either renewed or checked out a new book.  Another 50 or so just returned a book without checking out a new one.  Therefore, I am declaring my first pop up library a success.

              

As you can see from the pictures, it was originally called a mobile library, but I think pop up sounds more modern, and if truth be told, I stole that phrase from the multitude of Hallmark movies I watch featuring "pop up" themed restaurants or "pop up" shops.  So now I have new signage.

My second pop up library happened this week.  Ms. Boykin and I have been working on a fast food restaurant introduction activity to go with her food sciences projects.  The first day she scheduled the activity is the same day the library hosted the district Academic Decathlon.  So again, we had to find another place.  We arranged to meet in the back part of the cafeteria (lovingly called the Jag Room).  I brought my activities and cookbooks out to the Jag Room and conducted the lessons there.  I also brought my laptop and scanner in case anyone wanted to take a cookbook home.  No takers this time, but I am always hopeful.

               

When I become more confident about this concept, I plan to travel to the lunch room.  Eventually, I want to bring a fun activity or two with the book cart to give the students more choices and more reasons to love their library.


Bathroom Book Talks

Now let's discuss the bathroom book talks.  This idea was not mine, but I do love to steal great ideas from great librarians.  I belong to a couple of Facebook librarian groups, and someone posted they were going to advertise books in the bathroom stalls.  Genius!  Everyone eventually goes to the bathroom.

So here is my first attempt, The December 2018 In"stall"ment of Bathroom Book Talk . . .

I know you can't possibly see all of this, but I decided to showcase 3 fiction and 3 nonfiction books each month.  I have included titles, pictures and a short summary for each selected book.  I am going to hang them in all of the faculty restrooms and the student bathrooms that are closest to the library. (I believe in encouraging all patrons, even the adult ones.)  The December edition is going out this week.  I hope to see these books fly off the shelves, but only time will tell.

Have a great day!

Being Busy Feels Good

I can hardly believe we are into the 2nd grading period of the 2018 - 2019 school year.  It has been an exciting year so far.

Our new initiative is literacy this year which makes me happy.  English teachers are bringing back SSR (Sustained Silent Reading) in the classrooms which means the students need books.  Yay!  In addition, all core teachers are using literacy strategies with their students.

So I have been to department meetings, checked out boxes of books to classrooms, hosted a few rounds of book speed dating in the library, and I have introduced my 2nd Family Literacy Contest of the year.  I also have a weekly Twitter post called #wordywednesday.  One of the SPED teachers started to bring his students to the library every other week for a good old fashioned story time.  Of course I call it "Read Alouds and Book Talks" to dress it up for the high school crowd.  Lastly, I brought back the "Jags Read" signs for the teachers to model reading to our students while keeping track of what they have read.  To top it all off, the Mansfield High School Librarians met with the Arlington High School Librarians to talk shop and share ideas.  Being busy feels good.

My book speed dating is not new, but it is still fun.  Here are a few pictures of what that looked like this year.  For a more in-depth account of book speed dating, here is my blog post about our 2018 TCEA presentation "Socially Booked."

The Family Literacy Contests are taking the place of the monthly book challenges.  Last year, I had individual activities for the students to finish once a month to help encourage reading.  This year I have created the same activities, but I am trying to encompass the whole family.  I guess I feel that a family that reads together will become life-long readers.  I only had a handful of families that participated in the first go-around, but I am always hopeful there will be more as the year progresses.

I did all of the usual advertising... social media, website, morning announcements.  Then I thought to ask Mr. Taylor (our principal)  if he would include the literacy contests in his weekly email out to the SHS families since our initiative (we call it our "one thing") is literacy.  He was more than happy to do that.  Thank you, Mr. Taylor.

The 1st six weeks we did a family literacy BINGO game. . .

 and this six weeks we are doing an online website scavenger hunt.

#wordywednesday came about after a faculty meeting where we found out our students' knowledge of ACT vocabulary was lagging.  I had already seen library social media pages with "SAT word of the Week" or "SAT word of the Day."  So I adapted that to meet our campus's needs.  I researched top ACT vocabulary words and went with the top 15 words according to Prep Scholar,  https://blog.prepscholar.com/act-vocabulary-words-you-must-know

Then I put each word on a PPT and converted each page into a jpeg so the words could be loaded onto all of our social media platforms with ease.  Here is an example or two of what the #wordywednesday posts look like.

#wordywednesday on Sept. 19th https://twitter.com/jagsread/status/1042415125733539840 

#wordywednesday on Sept. 26th https://twitter.com/jagsread/status/1045041321042481152


I think I am most excited about "Read Alouds and Book Talks."  So once every other week, Mr.Scretchings brings his English I and II students down to the library.  I read one book aloud to the group, and I introduce vocabulary, ask the students about the characters, plot, setting, etc.  Then I book talk 3-4 other books.  Somehow the book talk books are related to the book I read aloud.  So then we have to make that connection.  After that, we check out books.

I decided to open up the class to anyone who has "B" Lunch, but so far there are no takers.  Here's my latest tweet which served as both an introduction to the books and advertisement for the class.
https://twitter.com/jagsread/status/1044685266622054400


Here is an example of our "Jags Read" sign.

I first introduced this to the faculty after a math teacher introduced it to me.  This year we started at the beginning of the school year.  I have asked the teachers how many books they read this first 6 weeks.  So far we are at a total of 107 books read.  Not too bad!  https://spark.adobe.com/video/mJfYJDIMvFBs2 

Here is a picture of our first meeting between the Mansfield and Arlington high school librarians.  Thank you, Pam Pinkerton for taking the picture.

I hope this is just the first of many meetings with our Arlington friends.  I love learning from others.  We talked about our goals, the strongest element of our program, where we could grow, and discussed ways to do just that.  It was a fabulous way to spend an afternoon of PD.

In the midst of all this, we still managed to do a bit of decorating to make the library more inviting.

In the end, being busy feels great, but exactly how busy were we?  

I share with you the 1st Six Weeks usage report for the SHS Library.

·         First Six Weeks, at a glance   

      https://create.piktochart.com/output/33099919-shs-first-six-weeks-2018 

·       First Six Weeks, the detailed report https://docs.google.com/document/d/1zjcSbdbe989jsWL9uquQ2jzIwBhZnATRrTNOP62FiEw/edit?usp=sharing

More Books Thanks to School Library Journal

I just finished another review for SLJ, and this one gave me pause because I realized this is the first time I have reviewed a book and it sequel.  I read and reviewed Kingdom of Ash and Briars about 2 years ago, and I just finished Realm of Ruins.  Same world, set about 100 years apart.  So maybe it is not a direct sequel, but it was fun to revisit the magical world of Hannah West.  For those who like YA fantasy, I highly recommend this pair.

Another recent SLJ pick I would recommend is Stand Beautiful by Chloe Howard.  This is a memoir of a young lady battling her handicap.  It's a story with grit and compassion.  For those who like to hear how ordinary people do extraordinary things, this is the story for you.

The last book I am going to recommend is also nonfiction.  It is called This Moment is Your Life by Mariam Gates.  This book is aimed at the young adult population, and it teaches them about meditation, yoga and just being mindful of who you are and where you are in the moment.  I know a lot of people who preach the importance of this, but few actually break it down to tell you the how and why.  I definitely recommend it to anyone who is stressed out.  Just reading the book calms me down.  There are a lot of DIY meditations and journaling along with the book.  Definitely one you shouldn't pass up.

Just in case you needed a book or two to add to your summer "I need to read that list."  Here you go.  You're welcome.

Every day is an adventure!

Summer Tech Conference

I recently attended the Region 10 Tech conference with my good friend & former coworker, Karen McQuaid.   We both agreed that the presenters were really good; some were better than the presenters at TCEA.  I was exhausted by the end of the day, but I picked up a lot of good information.

My favorite session was #Edusnaps.  Here is the slideshow if you are interested.

This presentation went beyond booksnaps, where students can take a picture of a book they are reading and annotate it (search #booksnaps on twitter).  The presenter also talked about how these snaps could be relevant when explaining a lab in science, a movement in an art painting, explaining an algebra equation, etc.  So instead of booksnaps, she called them edusnaps (which can also be searched on twitter, #edusnaps).  I was so inspired by this presentation, that I did a couple of edusnaps myself.  They were both booksnaps, but you have to start somewhere.

I'm not going to lie.  I have a sSnapchat account, but I haven't been using this social media platform... at all.  So my first booksnap took way longer than I anticipated, but the second was a little easier.  Of course the presenter also said a snap can be done in Google slides, PicCollage or SeeSaw.  Since I need more practice with Snapchat, I chose to use that platform.

Here are my results... which I also posted to Twitter and Instagram using #booksnaps.

        

I really think this is something I can bring back to my school in the fall and use in my reading program I am attempting to design.  So I am going to practice this summer.

The other sessions I attended were also very good.  They were ...

Driving into Digital Choice Boards  - which is a choice board with different technology tasks for the students to do.  Of course, back in the day, my choice boards when I taught first grader were all pencil/paper.  LOL!  Maybe I can incorporate some of these into my reading challenges next year.

Podcasts for Learning - this session gave me a really good list of podcasts I should be following.  Once the presenter started talking about how to create a podcast, I lost interest.  Not that it seemed complicated, but I was more interested in who to listen to and follow.  I'm not sure I am ready to commit to making my own podcast.  It seems a little daunting.

Ideas for Sketchnoting in the Classroom - which is a visual map of your notes.  This is another concept that can be adapted to any subject.  The tech piece was this cool tool called the Rocketbook which will send your sketches into the cloud after the initial set up.  I guess it is a "smart notebook."  Might just have to try one. 

Overall, it was a very productive day.  I enjoyed the sessions and hanging out with Karen. My next learning opportunity is coming up on June 20th at the Library EdCamp.

Every day is an adventure!

May Already?

The end of the year is such a paradox.  Trying to wind down as the year comes to a screeching halt while attempting to keep the students engaged until the end is definitely a balancing act.

So we have a few new decorations to show off, and I did create one more reading challenge to attempt keeping the students interested.

Our book displays...

Here's a close up of the "Read Box." (Swiped from Pinterest - of course)

The reading challenge I designed was a bit more tricky.  We are picking up all the library books on May 16th, but school isn't out until May 23rd.  So I decided to push the Open eBook app.  As a Title I school, Summit students are eligible for this collection of eBooks... and it's free.  There are thousands of contemporary titles for all ages.  This service was available a couple of years ago, but I am just starting to push it now.

This library of ebooks would not even be possible without the great sponsors who donated to the cause.  Thank you to First Book, Digital Public Libraries of America, Baker & Taylor, the NY Public Library, and many more.  To read more about Open eBook and to see if your school is eligible, here is that link: http://openebooks.net/

So I wanted to create a challenge where the students would need to download the Open eBook App, read one of the books, and then respond to that book on Flipgrid.  I've heard so much about Flipgrid this year, I decided to hop on the bandwagon.  So I have a SHS Library Flipgrid with not much on it yet.  I just created it a couple of weeks ago.  This is my first challenge to incorporate the tool.

Here is the challenge... 

And here is the Library's Flipgrid, https://flipgrid.com/5crv9i

Like I said, there isn't much on it yet, but I hope to remedy that with this challenge.

Some of the students are resisting this challenge because they prefer print books.  I was hoping they might decide that an eBook is better than no book when they have no access to the school library and limited access to the public library this summer.  In addition, using eBooks also allows me to extend the deadline to the last full week of school.  I don't have to collect the eBooks!

Every day is an adventure!

TLA Conference

It's nice to revisit the learning that took place at a conference.  Reflection brings these new ideas to the front of my brain and reminds me of all I said I was going to do now that I have this new information.  For some reason, TLA really resonated with me this year.  I have always considered TCEA just as relevant as TLA.  Now that both have a little bit of library and a little bit of technology, I am beginning to think I need to alternate years and not go to both in the same year. Anyway, enough about that.


I brought mom along since TLA was in Dallas this year.  She came one other time when we were in San Antonio.  I thought she might enjoy going again and seeing all our friends and the authors.  In fact, some of our best sessions were author panels.


We started off by attending the Conference Orientation session because the DHS Librarians, Blanca and Alleasha, were on that panel.

Under normal circumstances, this would not be a session I would attend.  It was mostly for first-timers, but one should always be there to support a friend.  Mom and I weren't the only experienced conference goers in this session...

It was good to see all of my former colleagues who are now some of my closest friends.  Lots of librarians were here this year since the conference was in our back yard, so to speak.

After the orientation session, mom and I went to two author sessions, one for Texas authors and one for YA with strong female characters.  It is always refreshing to hear an author talk about his/her own work.  The following day we also went to the LGBTQIA author panel, and that was the most entertaining one of the bunch.  We laughed and cried all the way through that session.

Of course one of the highlights of the whole conference was listening to Rick Steves. 

He makes me want to travel again.  I even bought his book, "Travel as a Political Act."  He made a lot of interesting points about how travelling can help us understand cultures we don't know much about or even fear.

One of my favorite sessions that was not an author panel was about Escape Kits. The speakers with the lock boxes came from the public library and the school library.  It was nice to have both perspectives.  Some things I took away from that session...

• how to organize a whole class around one lock-box
• creating them for general circulation after using them with a class
• if you create your own game, have someone run through it first to catch the mistakes

Another noteworthy session included another former Duncanville librarian, Gabby Brown, who is now in Rockwall, did a bang-up job explaining how her summer library program works.  She is a school librarian who opens her library once a week for family programs and book challenges.  There were other presenters at that session, but for my money, Gabby had the most practical set up.

Friday morning, we went to Teri Lesesne's book talk where I generated a really big list of "must order" books for next year.  I snagged one at Barnes & Noble just a couple of weeks ago, and it was fantastic.  I highly recommed "The Poet X" by Elizabeth Acevedo.  It is a quick read, but it is powerful.

All in all, mom and I attended 11 sessions.  I' m not sure if I really clicked with TLA this year because of the new perspective I have working in Mansfield.  However, I do feel as if my job has been more about the books and getting students to read than it has been about technology this year.

Every day is a new adventure!

It's April. How's that New Year Resolution Coming Along?

For those who are following along, my 2018 New Year's Resolution is to make my reading more visible.  I have to say, in doing so, I think I am actually reading more.  That was not the intention, but I guess it is a happy accident.


Here is a look at my library bulletin board now.  Actually this was almost a week ago, and I already need to update.

 I finished Deep Dark Blue by Polo Tate a couple of days ago (book 15),

and now I am reading On Texas Backroads (book 16) by Carlton Stowers.

I am enjoying Carlton Stower's collection of Texas short stories more than I did Polo Tate' memoir of her time at the US Air Force Academy.  There wasn't much I could relate to in Deep Dark Blue.  My dad was in the army, but I would not call us a military family.  In addition, Polo went through a lot of heartbreak and violence I honestly found depressing.  Again, not really applicable to my college life... thank goodness.

On the other hand, Stower's stories of his adventures in Texas are interesting and places I know and have visited.  So it is probably safe to assume I will be finished with book 16 this weekend, and will need to revisit my stack to select book 17.

March Madness

There are lots of things to do during March.  In addition to helping our Junior English classes with their research, we also swapped out our winter displays for something more appropriate for Spring.

For Women's History Month ...  

For Spring ... 

I also organized my first March Madness book bracket.  Blanca always did the whole shebang with 64 books.  That seemed a bit daunting for my first try.  I decided to stick with the "Sweet 16."

Before voting, I had to build some hype.  So I advertised early, and I even put up a poster in the Commons area for easier access to the voting ballots.

The part I was not looking forward to was making the bracket.  I went to Pinterest to see what I could find.  I ended up with this.

Then I had both teachers and students vote for their favorite books to set up the tournament at the start.  We ended up with quite a range as you can see.  I provided both written and visual brackets for everyone.

We have made it from the Sweet 16, to the Elite 8 ...

Next week will be the Final 4.  After that we will vote for the Top 2 and the Champion in the same week.  Both the students and faculty members are anxious to see how this first March Madness ends.  It's fun to talk to people in the hallway about how this game has unfolded thus far.  However it may end, the library wins because both students and the faculty are talking about books.

Every day is an Adventure!