Better Late Than Never: Kindles and Library E-Books

I have owned a Kindle for a year and have been very frustrated that up until now Amazon has not let me borrow e-books from the public library on my Kindle. I looked enviously at those who had the Nook from Barnes and Noble and other e-readers that enable you to download library e-books. Plus, to make things even worse, my friends who have Kindles in England have been able to download e-books from their public libraries onto their Kindles for a while! Well, this is going to change soon because Amazon has finally created Kindle Library Lending using Overdrive, which is already used by public libraries for e-audio books and e-books. Here is an article that explains it all. Fantastic!

One World, Many Stories

 SUMMER READING AT THE PUBLIC LIBRARY

 Are you wondering what to do with your time this summer? Would you like to travel around the world? Do you like games and puzzles? Do you like hearing or reading a good story? You will find lots to do at your local public library where the theme of the summer reading program is One World, Many Stories. During the summer, public libraries will be offering exciting free programs and events based around this theme. You will be able to sign up for the program online or in person at your local public library.

The New York State Summer Reading Web site has links to lots of games, puzzles, booklists, arts and crafts, coloring pages and other fun stuff. When I was exploring the site, I found this colorful elephant jigsaw puzzle  on the games page and this origami fortune teller and animation game on the arts and crafts page. When you explore the fun and games on the New York State Summer Reading site, you can play for free; you don't have to buy any of the books.

Battle of the Books 2011

Do you love reading? Do you like to remember facts and trivia? Do you enjoy participating in competitions? Are you entering grades 6-9 in Fall 2011? If you answered yes to any or all of these questions then you'll have a lot of fun joining fellow book enthusiasts in a Battle of the Books that will take place during the summer and fall at your local public library. The Battle of the Books is a nationally recognized literature contest where you answer trivia questions based on specific books you've read.
I am excited to announce that this year I will be helping to run the Battle of the Books program at Adriance Memorial Library in Poughkeepsie during the summer and I am hoping that some you will participate in this fun competition. Let me know if you are interested participating in the program and I will give you more information about it.

Battle of the Books Booklist
Peeled by Joan Bauer
Airborn by Kenneth Oppel
After Tupac and D Foster by Jacqueline Woodson
Peak by Roland Smith
Keeping Score by Linda Sue Park
A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle
The Name of This Book is Secret by Pseudonymous Bosch
Al Capone Does My Shirts by Gennifer Choldenko

Colonial Life

Here are some useful resources for students who are learning about daily life in Colonial America.

Street Scene in Colonial Williamsburg. Photograph taken by Steve Canipe (Pics4Learning).


Colonial Williamsburg
This is a fun interactive Web site about daily life in Colonial America. There are fun interactive activities such as learning to write with a quill pen, growing a garden, and trying out for the drum corps. You can also see slide shows about different types of jobs, create a colonial postcard and send it to friends, and solve the daily jigsaw puzzle.
From PBS:
Daily Life in the Colonies
Colonial House - Interactive History
On this interactive site you can tour typical colonial houses, watch videos where different types of people in costume talk about their daily lives during colonial times, and play interactive games that introduce you to more information about colonial communities.
A Colonial Family and Community
How would you like to go back in time and become a history detective? On this Web site you can collect clues and answer questions about daily life in a community of farms.

Photographs for Multimedia Presentations

 Boatbuilding on Manhattan Island from Clipart Etc (Florida Center for Instructional Technology)

There are many Web sites that allow schools to use photographs and artwork for educational purposes without asking for fees or permissions. Here are some useful Web sites and links where you can go to find photographs for Glogs and other multimedia presentations:
Pics4Learning: Colonial History 
ClipArt Etc.: Colonial America
Flickr Creative Commons: Colonial America photographs

These are a collection of photographs that you can use for your school reports and presentations as long as you say who took the photograph and/or the Web site you used. Sometimes it is hard to know when you can use an image (photograph or picture) that you find on the Internet. Please contact me if you need help with this. You can also use the links in the Copyright-Friendly Resources list on the right-hand panel of this blog.

Ancient Greece

Photograph of the Parthenon taken by Amanda Holtschlag, from Pics4Learning

I have created an Ancient Greece pathfinder on the school Google Library Site where you will find links to online encyclopedias, E books, and databases. You can also use the resources I gathered on this blog, including Web sites and books, in an earlier posting about Ancient Greece.Don't forget to explore Discovery Education Streaming Plus (DE)  for videos and other multimedia about Ancient Greece. If you forget your user name and password to use DE please contact me via email.

Markets Around the World - Resources for 1st Grade

 Hoi An Market in Vietnam. Photo taken by Terry Rosengart, from Pics4Learning

This research project is one of my favorites because of the colorful dioramas that the first grade students make to present the information they have found about markets around the world. The students love this research project, too! You will find many resources about markets around the world in an earlier post on my blog. Click here to read the posting, which I have updated to include some additional resources. All the books about markets have been borrowed by the first grade teachers and you will find the books in your classrooms. There are many books in the library, including encyclopedias, about countries around the world so don't forget to come in and look at them. You'll also find many books at your local public library. Read my earlier post for useful information to help you with your research.

The Gigantic Turnip by Aleksei Tolstoy & Niamh Sharkey.

During their library classes, the 2nd grade rewrote and illustrated their own version of The Gigantic Turnip by Aleksei Tolstoy and Niamh Sharkey.

Bethel Woods Center for the Arts

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

Bethel Woods Center for the Arts has an amazing museum devoted to the 1960s and a department with programs and resources for schools and teachers. Resources include two traveling trunks filled with artifacts, information and documents about Personalities of the Sixties and Music Around the Globe.
Personalities of the Sixties includes artifacts and documents related to Liberalism and the New Left , Vietnam War,  Black Freedom Movement, Women's Movement, and Conservatism.
To learn more, or to reserve a trunk for your class, email Education@BethelWoodsCenter.org or call 845-583-2097.

Visual Writing Tools

The Web provides an exciting array of tools for developing students' language and literacy skills. Technology enables us to use multiple formats to engage students' interests and to customize their learning according to individual learning styles. Students live in a world where they encounter and interact with multiple "texts" at home, at school and in their communities. These "texts" include books, movies, podcasts, music, video games, social networking sites and applications on a variety of computers, iPods, Smartphones, and other hand held computer devices. Students also need to be able to read, evaluate, manipulate, and create visual "information" in a variety of formats in order to develop multiliteracy skills. Here are some examples of visual writing tools that are sure to get students excited about communicating their thoughts and ideas.

A word cloud of Sarah's Blog generated by Wordle

Word Clouds
ABCYa for grades 2-5. This is a simple, easy word cloud generator and a great place to start.

Wordle is a step up from ABCYa and offers more functionality. Students can make visual art from their poems, essays, research projects and other literary creations.
Tagxedo: This is a more elaborate word cloud generator and you can create word clouds in different shapes. The Tagxedo blog has a great presentation illustrating 101 Ways to Use Tagxedo.

Comics and Animation

Comic Life A comic book creation program. You can create comic book pages using digital photographs that you have in your collection. 

MakeBeliefComix is a free online comic maker for all ages that is easy to use. 
Pixton for Schools
Chogger for older students
GoAnimate. Create animated videos
ToonDoo.  Create comic story books  

Online Notice Board Makers

Stixy: You can create a Stixyboard where you can post notes, photos, documents and to do lists for your personal use or invite friends, students or colleagues to work on a collaborative project.
Padlet: A very simple interactive noticeboard that is great for all ages. For example, you can embed videos, images, and music into the wall and invite students to post sticky notes onto the wall with their comments or responses. Click here to read students' sticky notes they posted in response to a video of a Chinese fable they viewed during library time.

AMERICAN FOLKLORE - 4-5s

There are many different kinds of stories among the folklore of North America, For example, there are tall tales, Native American legends, trickster tales, and many stories from Canada, Mexico and other areas on this continent. Here are some links that take you to retellings of traditional stories from our area of the world.

American Folklore from American Folklore.net
Aaron Shepards' Folktales. Fairy tales, tall tales, trickster tales and legends from around the world retold by the award-winning author.
Native American Lore Index.  
Folktales from Mexico. This is the section with stories from Mexico but if you explore the whole web site you will also find stories of mythical lands, creatures, gods and goddesses, and even tall tales from over fifteen different cultures and nations!

IN OUR LIBRARY

If you explore the folktale and fairytale section of our library (398.2) you will find many great stories from all around the world. Here are some titles of special interest:
Classic American Folk Tales retold by Steven Zorn 398.2 ZOR
Just a Minute: A Trickster Tale and Counting Book by Yuyi Morales 398.209 MOR
Lies and Other Tall Tales collected by Zora Neale Hurston 398.2 MYE
In the 398.2 section you will also find collections of stories:
The Barefoot Book of Animal Tales From Around the World retold by Naomi Adler 398.2 ADL
The Lion Storyteller Book of Animal Tales by Bob Hartman 398.24 HAR
Paul Goble has retold and illustrated many Native American folktales and you will find the individual books at 398.2 GOB

Note: Sometimes you'll see the term folktales as one word and sometimes you'll see folk tales as two words.

Digital Citizenship

Integrating technology into students' learning is an integral component of our curriculum as it prepares children for the challenges and opportunities of the 21st century. This article, "Why Integrate Technology into the Classroom?" from edutopia explains the reasons for this model of education. It's a good place to begin the discussion . . .

Cyber Safety
Under faculty supervision students at all grade levels in our school have the opportunity to create multimedia projects using a variety of digital tools. So, learning to behave respectfully, safely, and ethically on the Web is an important part of the school library and class curriculum.  We are lucky to have many resources at our disposal to ensure that students learn these crucial 21st century skills as they take advantage of the numerous Web 2.0 communication tools.
     Both the library and classroom curriculum includes discussion about safe and ethical behavior on the Internet. Some of the safety rules we discuss are:

1. Keep your personal information private.
2. Never give your password to anyone else.
3. If you receive an online message that makes you feel uncomfortable, do not reply and tell a trusted adult as soon as possible.
4. Never give out your photograph, address, phone number, email address or password to someone you meet online.
5. Keep your user name neutral.

You can continue the discussion at home and these are some resources on the Web you can use with your children to reinforce safe behavior on the Internet.

Web Resources

BrainPopJr for younger students contains a free animated movie, activities and games on the topic of Internet safety. You do not need a user name and password to access this topic. However, all the other content of this informative and lively database is password protected. We have a subscription to BrainPopJr so please contact Sarah in the library for our school's user name and password, which you will need to access the rest of the database.

BrainPop for older students contains animated movies, activities, and information on a variety of technology issues including digital citizenry. Please contact Sarah in the library for our school user name and password, which you will need to access the database.

ConnectSafely.org is a project of Tech Parenting Group, a nonprofit organization to help everyone - adults and children - learn how to use the Web safely together.
Family Safety Tips from Google
Growing Up Online from Carolyn Jabbs.


OnGuardOnline.gov's Net Cetera campaign provides information and resources, including short videos, about helping kids make safe, responsible decisions when they're online. For example, here is a short animated video for students from OnGuardOnline about being mindful about what you post online.
NetSmartz from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children contains many resources for parents and guardians including videos, tips, discussion starters, and information handouts.
Safekids: Online Safety and Civility created by Larry Magid a technology journalist and author.
A Thin Line from MTV and other media partners teaches teenagers and young adults about safe behavior on the Internet. The site includes information, advice and quizzes on a variety of topics. The resources on this site are for older students.

Webonauts Internet Academy from PBS Kids Go! Elementary age children participate in missions and graduate from the academy with knowledge about media literacy and digital citizenship. The site includes interactive games.

Parent Media Tips from Commonsense Media. Short videos, newsletters, handouts, Web links and other resources to help parents talk about using media responsibly with their children.

BOOKS
Cyber-Safe Kids. Cyber-Savvy Teens: Helping Young People Learn to Use the Internet Safely and Responsibly. By Nancy Willard, 2007.
 MySpace Unraveled: What It Is and How to Use It Safely. By Larry Magid and Anne Collier, 2006.
"Own Your Own Space - Keep Yourself and Your Stuff Safe Online" Digital Book for Teens by Linda McCarthy.The entire book is available as a free download.

PUBLIC LIBRARY

The Health Information Project at your public library has books and DVDs available for loan that will help teenagers and parents safely navigate the Internet.

Ethical Behavior

One of the responsibilities of being a twentieth-century learner is behaving ethically on the Web. In other words, students need to cite the sources of information they find on the Internet in whatever format - text, images, video or sound. Sometimes, it is hard for students to know what they can or cannot use from the Internet, in what format they can use the information or multimedia, and how to cite their sources correctly. In order to motivate students to be creative with their research and to behave ethically with the information they use, we have a subscription to NoodleBib. NoodleBib takes students through the different stages of the research process with guidance and support at each stage. Ask me for our school's username and password to access this tool.

FABLES

 The Crow and the Pitcher   Source: Annalee Blysse

A fable tells a story and but also teaches you something about life. This is the "moral" or secret message in the story that you can find by reading closely and inferring what the message could be. When you watch this video of a Chinese fable you'll see there are no words to go with the pictures. However, if you look closely you can infer what the story is trying to tell you. If you would like to share your ideas about the message in the fable, post your ideas on the "sticky notes" on the Padlet wall. 

• FABLES: STORIES, ANIMATIONS, GAMES AND PUZZLES

Click here to play Aesop's Cube and read 6 fables by Aesop.
Read fables and play games
Animated Aesop Fables from education students at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst

• MAKE A PUPPET SHOW OR DRAMATIZATION

If you would like to retell a fable or create your own, you might find this planner helpful.

• SUGGESTED READING IN OUR LIBRARY

Aesop's Fables illustrated by Nora Fry, edited by Lois Hill
398.2 AES
Aesop's Stories for Pleasure Reading by E. Dolch, M. Dolch and B. Jackson
398.2 AES
The Best of Aesop's Fables retold by Margaret Clark
398.2 CLA
Aesop's Fables selected and illustrated by Michael Hague
398.2 HAG
The Big Book of Animal Fables by Margaret Green
398.2 GRE

• WEB SITES

Aesop for Children from Aesopica: Aesop's Fables in English, Latin and Greek
By Gosh Aesop's Fables
Fairy Tales 4 U
Ivy Joy's Domain
Several web sites about fables recommended by the University of Missouri
For teachers: Fables and Trickster Tales Around the World 

• MORE RESOURCES ON A VARIETY OF TOPICS INCLUDING CHILDREN'S LITERATURE

Great Web Sites for Kids from the American Library Association
Myths and Legends from E2BN