Thing 23-I am Done!!!!!

Yea for me....I finished on time! It is Monday the 13th and 2 days ahead of my deadline! Congratulations everyone!

Thing 22-Staying Current

Wow, I made it. I cannot believe it's almost over. After a few glitches, like ending up with 2 blogs under the same name, getting rid of the bogus one & then finding out the url was now spelled wrong, workmates blogs not being accounted for, etc,we finally got it together. Have we learned a bunch? You bet! Was it things we never would have learned otherwise? For certain! Are we going to use any of this in the future? I do believe we will try!
I know personally that I am going to go back to the beginning and review some of this stuff, refresh the almost 40 year old brain, and try to use several applications in different places. And the coolest part is that now when I come up on a new application, I am not going to be as hesitant to try it. As long as my computer is not smoking,I will try to figure it out. I would like to see us do a workshop on all the student friendly applications and study tools before the next school year begins.

"I hereby resolve to maintain my blog, use the tools I know, keep up with new tools, and apply them in my library. I will also make every effort to allow a few minutes a day to learn something new for myself, for my job, and just for fun!"

Thing 21-Student Tools

The RPC looks incredibly cool. I think back to my school days and what I had to go through to write a term paper or thesis. Research was definitely more time consuming, notes were hand written, outlines were sketched and redone several times. Our biggest worry was doublespacing as we used the old Smith Corona. But now everything is technologically driven and kids want their assignments done fast and in a hurry. I think that teaching students how to plan a project and how to manage their time wisely is an essential skill. Teaching how to discern whether a site or resource is reliable is necessary too. All of the PDF materials in the Teacher Section are great...a whole handbook ready to go. While I can't think of any immediate uses for the library, I can see possible uses for individual projects with a deadline. It would keep me on track! And I know for sure it's going to get used at home for my 8th Grader!