Implementation, Do It Quick

I'm attending the GA Ed Tech Conference this week. Several of the ideas and needs we have been discussing at The MC have been answered by venders this week.

• Student Recommendations on Safari. I asked a Rep. how we could add this feature on our system. We knew it would be an easy "fix," but we could not figure it out, even from other librarians in the district. I got it now. Hopefully it will work on Monday!
• Request, prod, and otherwise coerce our Tech Director to pay for the WebSafari subscription we were told we would have this year...paid through district funds. This will enable us to allow students the ability to browse our library resources at home, reserve books, and help the students take more ownership of The MC.
• Get The MC set up for weekly Video BookTalks. Schedule our students and help them prepare their talks. This will be our niche in creating a Library 2.0 atmoshpere. We should also continue our talks on the Georgia Book Award Nominees on a weekly basis.
• Have our website ready by the first of December. We need to decide on Home Page content. Have our individual pages ready to view. Add the Cougar Paw'dCast to the site.

Things we should consider:

• Since we are an Acclerated Reader school, it is now possible to provide the tests online...web-based.
  
• Student blogging with edublogs.org or blogmeister.
• Create a Professional Learning day to include Galileo, Library of Congress, Google features, and other research-based tools.
• Parent night next semester. Information about Social Networking.

Some Quick Thoughts (I'll elaborate later) from the day. These are not direct quotes, more like my own Mashup of what I have taken from the day.

Thanks to Will Richardson:

Let's have a conversation about Potential Predators and Potential Teachers when it comes to students using Read/Write tools.

There are over 130,000,000 MySpace accounts, and MySpace is one of dozens. This is equivalant to the 11th largest country in the world. Social Networking is not going away. We can either teach our children how to properly leverage their network, or they can continue to post the stuff that give Social Networks a bad name in the press.

The bigger the audience, the better the work. When student work has wings (Marco Torres) the learning increases and the work improves.

It is more important to be able to find benign information (state capitals) than it is to know benign information.

Thanks to Anne Davis:

All the new tools have called for a change in teaching and learning. Research methods will need to change too.

The teacher is always the best filter. The teacher should be treated professionally: given authority to choose tools, made responsible for teaching proper use, and held accountable for the results.

Testing, though it has value, does not determine value.

Teaching is more an art than a science. Standards, though valuable, should not be a mandate about pedagogy. Taking scientific standards but present them artistically. [I have to work on this one.]

I'll hyperlink later. It's late, and early comes soon.

So much information. Great day.