Booked Inn

NSW schools are almost ready to break for a well-earned two-week vacation, but there is already activity over on the “Bear & Chook” books rap blog site. This book rap, based on two picture books, “Bear & Chook”, and the newly-released “Bear & Chook by the sea”, is aimed at students in Early Stage 1 (Kinder) and Stage 1 (Years 1 & 2). It officially commences Term 4 Week 2 (26 October, 2009). But please, by all means, drop by rapblog6.edublogs.org/ and have a look around any time.

Several schools have already introduced themselves, there are some great comments turning up on the Teachers‘ section, and there are already things to look at in the Gallery. This book rap will also feature participation by the author, Lisa Shanahan, and illustrator, Emma Quay. An online video, of Lisa and Emma reading “Bear & Chook by the sea” at Caddies Creek PS, and answering students’ questions, will be an exciting addition to the usual teaching resources. The rap is being coordinated by Jenny Scheffers (TL at Caddies Creek), “Scan” editor Cath Keane, and yours truly. Interstate and international schools are welcome, and there is no cost involved in book rapping.

Please join us, and spread the word! Don’t forget to bring your warm honey toast!

Happy holidays!

In preparation for next term’s “Bear and Chook” book rap, our library’s own Bear and Chook travelled by taxi to Caddies Creek Public School to meet author Lisa Shanahan and illustrator Emma Quay.

But they also were able to meet Caddies Creek’s infamous Mr Barden (a new resident to the nursing home next door to “Wilfrid Gordon McDonald Partridge”, created during a book rap last year), and a sleuth (or sloth or pack) of friendly bears.

What a great day!

“When will that taxi ever arrive?”

Bear and Chook meet Mr Barden

There’s a Chook in there – and bears as well!

First day of Term 3, yesterday. Bear and Chook have moved into
our school library and made themselves right at home!

Stage 2 students will be working with them this term.

Yesterday I found the perfect stuffed polar bear I need for a school project (for the book rap on the children’s picture book “Bear and Chook”) at a local Salvation Army “Salvo’s” charity store. I’ve been pricing toy polar bears all week, and this one was just $2. He was actually dressed for Christmas (in July?), but even his garments are worth way more than $2! (Boy, am I glad I didn’t buy the one I saw for $130 during the week!)

Even better, Bear’s the perfect scale for my battery-operated “Choke-a-Chicken” (below), who’ll be standing in for the character of Chook. (Remember “Choke-a-Chicken”? A real novelty hit several Christmases ago. He does the Chicken Dance, and squawks in agony when you pick him up by the neck!)

It was the most amazing day. I was dropped off at the station, to head into Darling Harbour and have lunch with friends at the Meat and Wine Co. I had just missed a train, so I headed off to the shops for a while, and then decided to check out the stuffed toy section of the “Salvo’s” charity store on High Street. Sure enough, there was Bear, waiting on a couch and looking resplendent in his Christmas outfit. You could have knocked me over with a feather when the woman serving me said, “$2 please”!

Of course, I then had to take Bear into the city with me – and pay an extra 95 cents for a recyclable carry-bag – but who cares when I’d just saved $128! I also managed to miss the next fast train into the city, which was also frustrating, but again – who cares when I’d just saved $127.05!

Introducing “Bear and Chook by the sea”: Emma Quay, illustrator, and Lisa Shanahan, author.

The “Bear and Chook” series book rap commences in Term 4 for students in Early Stage 1 and Stage 1! Watch this space!

Dr Ross J Todd observes, over at School Libraries 21C that, in many schools, outcomes and impacts are often “assumed some how to be lurking in there”. When a new syllabus comes in, educators often try to bend existing units of work to fit the new document, rather than to use the new outcomes to plan new, statistically-valid, pre- and post- tests that will enable staff to prove that learning has occurred. I’m guilty of that myself, trying to stretch old print-based resources to fit new units when library budgets are too tight.

Unless a school has cause to collect measurable data of the students’ achieved outcomes – eg. schools defending expeditures in Priority Schools Programs; teacher librarians undertaking post-graduate study (and requiring valid results for their assignments); etc – that all-important post-test, and results analysis, often get lost in the shuffle in the end-of-term mayhem, and that often happens four times a year, of course.

In a previous school, long before outcomes appeared in every KLA syllabus, we had our first taste of the power of collaboratively-planning valid, measurable, pre- and post- tests, when we re-examined our school-based science and technology units, spent a considerable amount of money on relevant resources that truly supported what we were hoping to achieve, and ensured that every S&T unit maximised the capacity for Talking & Listening (in English).

Schools need to plan for constant revisiting of syllabuses and evaluation strategies. I was going to say especially in schools with a high turnover of staff but, no, every school needs to do this in a structured, cyclic way.

Certainly, I’ve noticed renewed opportunities for the teacher-librarian to be more involved in collaboratively-planning valid, measurable, pre- and post- tests as a result of my voluntary role as an editor of several teaching colleagues’ half-yearly student reports. When educators have to clearly articulate just where on the learning continuum each student is, and for each key learning area, the traditional, waffly comments of yesteryear just don’t wash. I can see where certain gaps are exposed, and then I try my best to lend assistance.

Statements about students’ achievement, at our school, now have to be written in terms of outcomes. The new online reports, as daunting as they are, do seem to be assisting with providing a strong focus on value-added results. Of course, the new reports have brought in an additional problem: many outcomes sound too much like eduspeak, and that can really make some parents feel even more out of the loop.

And, of course, sometimes the best ideas for how something could have been evaluated come too late. (Hurray for cyclic programs, which can be improved each time the units are revisited.)

Similarly, a few years ago, I volunteered my services as an editor of the Annual School Report, and we noticed that the library had, previously, not really rated a mention in the ASR. The last few years have seen added paragraphs about the interrelationship of this school library with other important, high-profile school programs and events: Holiday Reading Is Rad, reading picnics, visiting storytellers, participation in annual community artshows, book reviews in the local newspaper, Circle Time, Premier’s Reading challenge, book raps, and a wiki.

This year, I hope to add OASIS Library borrowing statistics, too, and this is another easily-obtained set of data.

How to ensure that higher order thinking, and pre- and post-tests, are vital elements of the teaching program?

Well, I’m a great advocate of the online book raps and event raps run by the School Libraries and Information Literacy Unit (NSW DET). Programming and planning (including evaluation strategies) are provided. At the conclusion of each rap, we have solid data of learning progress, and the students’ jointly-constructed responses to the rap points remain online, for parents to visit via home or local library computers.

While the maximum benefit from book raps would, ideally, include teachers and the teacher librarian working collaboratively on the rap points, we have also used a highly effective “withdrawal of rappers” strategy, that requires the students reporting back to their classmates. We timetable what is achievable, and that can vary. Because book rapping takes place in the school library – and the new interactive whiteboard arrived this term, and is also in the library – the profile of the library is constantly being flagged (and raised).

Our school wiki (which I instigated, and made a point of branding as the Penrith PS Library Wiki (see “Scan” vol 28 no 1, 2009, pp 30-37) has several pages dedicated to outcomes-based annotations of the students’ progress, much of it in the students’ own words – pre-, during and post- tests, as gathered through whole-school Talking & Listening programs, such as Circle Time (see “Scan” vol 26 no 4, 2007, pp 4-7).

Aboriginal storyteller, Boori “Monty” Pryor,
visits my school in the lead-up to NAIDOC Week.
Note that no students are recognisable in this shot.

Today, my school was visited by Aboriginal storyteller and author, Boori “Monty” Pryor. He was a huge hit with the students and teachers. They listened, asked questions, danced, mimed and generally had a great time.

Boori expertly guided the action: when the students were paired up to perform a dance about the crocodile and the fisherman, he kept both groups, the “crocodiles” and “fisherman”, as active as possible, but with minimum instruction. Everyone knew they’d get their moment in the limelight as the carnivorous crocodiles because it was explained that they’d eventually be switching positions with the fishermen.

The students’ reactions are featured here!

The School Libraries & Information Literacy Unit at State Office, NSW DET, is asking for comments on the question, “Do we need a school library in 21st century schools?”. There is a School Libraries 21C blog and associated readings.

Today I added thusly:

I love those reports from country towns, where their tiny public library facility would be under threat of closure – and many of the people who turn up to the town meeting would be residents who’ve never actually stepped foot into the library. But they realise its importance, and they don’t wish to contemplate the possibility of life without a public library. Just in case…

Even for myself, I tend to buy most books I want/must have/need to read. My own ventures into libraries unknown (public, university and school) – as a then-class teacher, when a mature age student, and also when researching a commercial piece of freelance writing – are quite sporadic, but the thought of a 21st century that’s somehow “moved on” from the concept of a physical library space is quite abhorrent.

But I think I am ready for any future library to have a different size, shape, location (partly in holographic or even cyber space?) or collection. I stare at my amazing, new iPhone – which is so reminiscent of Dick Tracy’s funky little two-way wrist radio/computer in comic strips of the 50s – and am lost for words. I mean, I only just discovered that my iPhone has been diligently copying across all songs I’ve been downloading from iTunes to my Macbook Pro, ever since I bought it last September. I simply hadn’t thought to look in that bit up till now!

The other day, while doing a presentation about wikis and blogs, and relying on a live Internet connection, the link went down and we had to call for a replacement computer. Only later, I remembered that all of my extended notes, on another page of the wiki, were accessible via my iPhone’s internet connection. I had my palm cards, of course, but the PowerPoint material and much more were only a few button-presses away!

An off-the-cuff mention of Tasmania tigers yesterday, during Year 6’s library lesson (we were looking at a unique picture book, “How WEIRD is that?”, one of this year’s Crichton Award CBCA nominees), permitted the impromptu calling-up of 1930s b/w moving footage of Australia’s last captive Thylacine, and now we can display him on the IWB at point of need.

Library books aren’t going away – I’m especially reminded on those days when air-conditioner-overload causes yet another blackout in the library, but the power of us having so much instantaneous information is both exciting, and another whole can of worms (as to helping students to be able to sift their way through it all).

Today Emma Quay, illustrator, and Lisa Shanahan, author, launched their exciting, new children’s picture book, “Bear and Chook by the sea”, at our very successful teacher-librarians’ professional development day.

I can’t wait for Term 4, when Jenny Scheffers and I coordinate a book rap based on their two “Bear and Chook” titles.

Last year the School Libraries and Information Literacy Unit of NSW DET conducted a rap, Identity: Sharing Our Stories for Stages 3 and 4. Due to the success of this rap, via the Edublogs blogging facility, it is being run again this term!

The rap addresses outcomes in English, HSIE, PDHPE, Music and Aboriginal Studies. It draws on a range of contemporary texts, including personal stories, to explore Aboriginal perspectives on what builds strong identity. The rap is helpful for cultural understanding for all students. It also supports the Stage 4 secondary COG unit, “Cultural identity”.

Many teachers complain that they find it difficult to make sure they address Aboriginal perspectives in their programs correctly, and to find relevant resources to support their units of work in this area. Even if your school is not planning to participate, I would again urge teacher-librarians to visit the pages as the rap unfolds. Rapping is a great learning experience – for students, teachers, teacher librarians, AEOs (Aboriginal Education Officers) and community members. A range of excellent online resources is available, including: programming and planning, proformas, music, and online factual texts. This rap offers an excellent way to develop an educator’s familiarity with blogging as an educational tool, embedded in your program of work.

This year, our Year 5 students will be working in groups on the rap activities, and utilising our brand new interactive whiteboard (IWB), which is located in our library. Now that’s exciting! The new version of the Identity rap starts the week of 18 May 2009, and runs for about six weeks. Schools can use as much or as little, as suits their unique situations.

Today, a teacher-librarian colleague asked for what she called “an idiot’s guide” to getting started with a school library blog.

It got me thinking back to where it all began for me. In 1996, just after getting my first home Internet connection, I was eager to start my own home page immediately, and I bought the book “Creating websites for dummies” – which warned that the biggest mistake new web composers made was not exploring what’s already out there, good and bad, before creating their own site. Nothing worse than a pretty web site that took many minutes for the graphics to upload. “For dummies…” recommended a good three months of ‘Net surfing first.

Extrapolating that warning to Web 2.0, which was a whole new learning curve, I would encourage potential Web 2.0 educators to become a surfer and commenter on other people’s education blogs, wikis and library sites first – to satisfy themselves as to what works well, and what doesn’t work. Also, they can sample the list of blog links of their favourite library blogs. They’ll hopefully start to realise the strengths and weaknesses of various Web 2.0 software, the importance of currency/relevance of information, how well each web composer responds to their commenters, and so on. With Web 2.0, you can really only learn by doing. Try some links off this site’s blog roll, for example.

Then, I suggested, make notes of what your dream school library blog might include. What pages can be static, and what parts could be regularly updated via a blog or wiki? Are you planning to permit indivisual responses (beware of cyber bullying, and who will “approve” messages), or will group-negotiated student responses be done in cooperative cohorts with teacher guidance?

My colleague had asked for an “Idiot’s Guide” – I really like the commercial “For Dummies…” format myself, so if you feel you need such help after a few months of browsing/commenting, I’m sure there’s a great “Wikis and blogs for dummies” title out there. Also, most Web 2.0 sites have excellent user services attached to their pages. Edublogs has a bbs where questions, no matter how dumb, can be answerered by other users and Edublogs volunteers.

As for wikis, “pbwiki” is now known as “PBworks”, and all old “pbwiki” URLs are automatically reverting to the new confiiguration for the moment. I have found “pbwiki” to be very easy to use, although the new upgrades have taken some getting used to.

My school library wiki, which has been referenced in several “Scan” articles, is now at:
http://penrithpslibrary.pbworks.com

Our school’s two Kinder wiki projects are fully annotated – with attached pages of pre- and post-evaluations, student comments, teacher decision-making, etc. – so those pages might be useful for teachers wondering just how to take the plunge into Web 2.0.

I recently received an email from the “PBworks” team congratulating me on the popularity of our school library site. I don’t have any analytics program attached to it, so it was a nice surprise to realise how heavily it is being used across the world. I also recently noticed that our wiki URL popped up during a search for resources on “TaLe”. Here I was, looking for good online sources of activities using nursery rhymes, and my own work from the previous year was being suggested to me!

I also suggested trying the next rap (using blog format) from NSW DET. This strategy gives a fledging Web 2.0 educator a change to see a blog working that is fully integrated into a school or class program, addresses outcomes, and encourages cooperative learning and collaborative teaching. There’s always a “Teacher” section, where teachers and teacher-librarians can chat about their learning curve, and receive prompt advice re problems.

The “Identity: sharing our stories” rap starts very soon, but there are also links to many completed raps and book raps on that menu page.