Marketing in Libraries with animation software

Today, we participated in a Webinar with Gwenyth Jones (The Daring Librarian), who spoke about how school librarians can use animation software to connect with students. She demoed Xtranormal and Goanimate. One thing that she said that struck me was that kids really respond to animation, even for public service announcements or little blurbs.

We also played around with Flips. They have limited functionality (zoom), but that is what made them so easy to use. I thought that they were a great little tool that students could use to create documentaries or short movies. It is really easy to pull the flip videos into Imovie or Windows Movie maker to edit and narrate them.

In my sidebar I created a GoAnimate 12 second movie. It was a really cool and fun software to use. I could see using this to create a little advertisement that would appeal to students.

Flips and other animation tools would be great for visual, kinesthetic, musical, interpersonal and intrapersonal learners. They also help students create content and demonstrate their knowledge of a topic.

Comments on The Traditional Model of School Librarianship

While reading Buffy Hamilton's post about the 'Traditional Model of School Librarianship', two thoughts occurred to me. The first was the realization that I have often wondered how a school librarian would be able to accomplish everything that they should be doing (outreach, information literacy, creating relationships, ordering supplies, cataloging books, running the library) with a small or non-existent staff. It is simply impossible to do everything, or do it well. Which could be one of the reasons why administrators/purse string holders think that libraries are not essential.

My other thought is that the "new" model Ms. Hamilton is talking about is what college and university libraries have been doing for years with the liaison or subject specialist model. Having even two librarians and one support staff person for 1000 students would still be a better model. Being part of a team (both a library team and a instructional team) would help lessen the workload, create better educators and help with the creative process. Is this a model that we, as librarians, could suggest to our administrators. What is an acceptable ratio of students/staff to librarians?

This topic may be outside of the "technology in teaching" topic, but it is an important one to consider. How will we have the time to include new technology into our teaching if we are barely keeping up with everything else? As Ms. Hamilton said, media and technology take time (and can have a huge positive impact on learning), but if we have inadequate staffing levels are we setting ourselves up for failure? Are we fulfilling the idea that libraries/librarians do not have a large impact on teaching and learning?

Commentary on School Library Websites - J Valenza

Today, I was reading Joyce Valenza's post about a tour of school library websites. She writes that it is EXTREMELY important that school libraries have a virtual/web presence. In my current position as a distance education librarian, I cannot agree more. For me as I try to change careers, I find it SO FRUSTRATING to see boring, out-of-date, or worse, poorly created websites. This is a disservice to the students. As the librarian at St. Andrews Episcopal Upper School,Barb Jensen, said it's great to work with teachers to create class specific wikis that showcase "resources that students will use to satisfy requirements and show and evaluate their results".
Joyce also showed examples from Buffy Hamilton who uses multimedia and social networking applications on her site at Creekview High School. There are other librarians out there incorporating RSS feeds, Twitter Feeds and LIBguides, to name a few other technologies.

I think it is important to use any technologies we can to connect the library with students and students with resources. How can students do that with websites that lack lists of resources or are not visually appealing or even well-organized?

@hand - mobile technologies in academia and medicine

On April 21, I attended a symposium held by the University of Maryland HS/HSL library on the use of handheld devices in academia and medicine. While this conference was geared towards academia and medicine, I kept thinking of how this could be applicable to school library media specialists.

Students are using more devices and at younger ages. They are creating and receiving information in ways that most adults couldn't even dream of. If medical schools and universities are using handheld devices as a way to read students, maybe middle and high schools could be trying to do this as well. While I am not sure *how* this would be done exactly, I am envisioning this as more of a one more point of contact for students. There may be some inexpensive and relatively easy ways to incorporate the hand-held technologies that students are already using.

One way that was suggested was to create a mobile library website. Another, was to create resources designed specifically for viewing on a mobile device. School libraries could also use previously created content. Medline Plus has a mobile web/health information that could be easily used by students (or the general population) for consumer medical research. Showing students how to access reputable information with their phones would be a great way to incorporate information literacy into life long learning (AASL Standard 1.1.8 Demonstrate mastery of technology tools for accessing information and pursuing inquiry and AASL Standard 4 - Pursue personal and aesthetic growth ).

Windows Movie Maker

I'll have to agree with my classmates in saying that I enjoyed using Windows Movie Maker. It was easy and intuitive to use and I liked the way that you could toggle between the storyboard and timeline views. It was easy to import video and sound and to add captions to the photos. Another student commented that it lacks advanced editing features. While this may be a drawback, I didn't think it would have a huge impact on the tool, depending, of course, on how one was going to use MovieMaker.

One of the best features of this program for school librarians is its ubiquity - almost all, if not all, Windows PC's come loaded with it. So there is no extra cost involved in procuring it. I think students would like using it to create videos and presentations. It would appear to a variety of learners - experiential, visual, intrapersonal, interpersonal,logical, kinesthetic, logical, etc.

Megan D's audacity on Voicethread

I really liked experimenting with Audacity. However, I found it much less intuitive and harder to use than Captivate, but it's free so... My fading in doesn't work very well and I could not figure out how to start the voice AFTER the music started. (I loaded the music last).

I could see this being useful for kinesthetic, interpersonal and intrapersonal, as well as musical, and of course, audio learners. I'm not sure how much a visual learner would get out of this, in terms of having to use one, but they might enjoy creating one.

Personally, as a student I'd prefer a tool where I had both audio and video available to me.

Our Trip to Ireland