Linda getting with IT

As a high school English teacher, the notions of literacy, technology, and digital/media quite literally intersect on a daily basis. My students are ninth and tenth graders in a rural South Carolina high school, and they are routinely charged with using technology to research, filter information, and cite responsibly to complete assignments. We are a 1:1 district, and these are digitally native kids. They Google like they breathe, often and deeply.  I generally choose to begin with research before a big unit. It helps with mindset, background knowledge, and “hooks” as students dive deeply into the Salem Witch Trials while simultaneously noticing that McCarthyism looks a great deal like the Puritans. As hysteria and herd mentality prevail, students must navigate an admittedly choppy ocean of information. My pleas to use Discus databases and avoid Wikipedia often fall on deaf ears. Or worse, students fall into a pit of Prezi presentations created by students muc...

In reading through the articles in the May/June 2019 issue of Knowledge Quest, and in seeking  to compare and contrast the new AASL Standards Framework for School Libraries with those of ISTE, I was particularly helped by Courtney Lewis’ contribution “Collaborating to Communicate. ” In the article she states, “The impact this reading group has had on our daily practice cannot be overstated” (p. 40), and I find it apropos that as she points to the value of shared reading, understanding, and collaboration, these are the very cornerstones of the standards themselves. Throughout the study, librarians met in person, through a Google group, and through Slack, a backchannel chat group. Throughout the meetings, the members were truly able to dig deep into the standards in order to make sure they were understood and faithfully implemented. The most helpful reference in Lewis’ article was the Crosswalks document that offered a side-by-side look at each set of standards. Foun...

I have long been a consumer of the written word, and with this blog I will become a contributor. That seems both a thrilling and an awesome endeavor. Thanks for connecting on this journey. As Seth Godin says, let's "Go make a ruckus!"