Making Your Library Googlicious

A joint presentation by Joanna Sanders Bobiash and Terry Pon, Regina Public Schools
RPSD, RCSD and PVSD Teacher-Librarian Professional and Learning Day
Regina, SK - October 25, 2011

Here is our presentation. (link) Please explore the links in the presentation and provide feedback using this form.

A new year and a new role

The new school year has begun. Students have been back at school for two weeks now and Teachers for a few more days than that. This year is a new adventure for me as my role in my school has been redesigned. I'm now serving as half-time Teacher Librarian and half-time Social Studies and Science Teacher for 6/7/8. I'm thankful to still be in charge of my inquiry studio where I deliver my classes for Social Studies and Science. I'm hoping that my new role will compliment my teaching and give me more opportunities to work and share with other colleagues.

Although my role has changed, my interest and passion for integrating technology into my teaching has not. This week, my library will open up to students for the first time to do book exchanges. Instead of preparing a formal presentation on the dos and don'ts of the library, I made an orientation video. I was fortunate enough to work with a fellow teacher librarian, Terry Pon, five years ago on an orientation video for his library at the time. I revamped some of his video and made it current for my students and situation. (Thank you for the footage Terry!) Now that we are a French Immersion Centre, I had to make the video in French. I still need to find some copyright free music to re-edit the music track, but I will post if for now and replace it when I have a final version. I hope you enjoy the draft version of my video. Welcome to the Resource Centre at École Wilfrid Walker School.

Integrating Technology in Heritage Fair for Teachers and Students

I am passionate about teaching Canadian History and Heritage. One of the ways I share this passion with my students in our involvement in Heritage Fair every year. Most of my students look forward to this time of year. They can't wait to get started in this project based learning experience and start talking about their topic in September. I think it is because they have the chance to explore a topic they are interested in and that they get to choose themselves. Their enthusiasm for the project makes it my favourite time of year as well.

A video I have created and have used in many ways is a promotional video for Heritage Fair. I have used this video in school to get students excited about their projects. I have also used this video to introduce teachers to the Heritage Fair process during the professional development workshop I give to interested Regina Public Schools teachers on Heritage Fair every year. Thank you to Dean Shareski for giving me the video footage of the Moose Jaw Regional Fair to use in my video.

I have also ventured into wikis with the creation of my first public wiki. On this Heritage Fair wiki, I have accumulated a number of documents, links and resources for teachers including a link to the video. It has now been used in a number of schools in my system and it has even been used in other districts for the promotion of Heritage Fair.

Another addition to my Heritage Fair file has been the creation of a custom Google search engine developped with Terry Pon. I was first introduced to the concept of custom search engines by Alan November at the TLt Summit in Saskatoon last year. This was the first one that I have used with my students and it has been quite successful. We chose Canadian websites to send students to such as Historica, the Canadian Encyclopedia and the Government of Canada collection as well as the CBC. By using this custom search engine, I have found their online research to be much more productive this year than in years past. The main problem with online research using regular Google for this grade level (4/5) is that they tend to use the first website that pops up in Google and then they think they are done their research. Because their topics are so diverse, it is hard to just direct them to a website or two.

The other challenge I'm experiencing is having them realize the importance of mainting a list of sources for their project while doing their reasearch (in books, online, etc). I find that I'm constently repeating myself when talking about crediting sources in their projects and that "Google" is not a source. There is always an endless number of opportunities to teach "digital citizenship" when working on Heritage Fair.

Great digital storytelling workshops over the years

Over the past few years, I've been lucky to have had the opportunity to attend a number of workshops on the use of educational technology in my classroom. I have had many favourites, but the ones I enjoyed the most were when I had the chance to produce something I could share with others later. During my workshops on digital storytelling with Dean Shareski, I got to make a number of digital stories I like to use as models for my students. Here are a few of the products produced during two summer short courses in 2006 and 2007...

A MasterCard ad that was made using Power Point slides and PhotoStory:

Using the same programs, I also made an Aboriginal Art Story that is linked to the Grade 5 Saskatchewan Social Studies Curriculum:

English version:

French version:

My friend and fellow teacher, Terry Pon and I created a video for his library orientation using Windows Movie Maker. I hope he doesn't mind me sharing it on here. It got rave reviews from the students:

The following summer, I got to make an "all about me" type video using Google Earth, Powerpoint and Photo Story:

These projects have definately served as inspiration on how to incorporate technology into my teaching. In fact, digital storytelling is not only a professional persuit, it has also become a personal pursuit as well. In future blog posts, I will share some of my students' work and some of my other personal projects. Stay tuned!