Final Vision Post # 3: Project Development

Library Website Development 

 

My final vision project is underway. To review, my final vision for the future is to create a school library website that includes a number of things that would benefit teachers, staff, students and parents, including a library blog for up to date information about what's happening in and around the library.

 

I recently opened a Weebly account and started creating my school's library website. I am maybe halfway through setting it up, although I plan to make it a continual project by updating regularly, which means that it will never be complete as it is will be an ongoing project or a "living document."

 

What I have learned so far about using Weebly...

 

1. Weebly is easy to use.

2. There are lots of options to choose from for designs and layouts.

3. If you get stuck on something, Weebly has helpful tutorials on whatever you need help with.

4. Can easily change a layout by adding or deleting options.

5. Easy to navigate around.

6. Most of all, I am really pleased with the way it looks so far! It's beginning to look as I envisioned.

 

Here is an example of what my home page looks like so far...

 

 

 

Overall, I would definitely recommend using Weebly to others if they want to start a website.

 

Some things that haven't worked out as planned.... First, I had to request from our school district a Weebly account and password, so that I could create a website under our school districts Weebly. Although I requested this a while back, the tech department for our school district has been super busy with myEd B.C. tech problems and had to put my request farther down their list of things to do. Therefore, I went ahead and created my own account and I am currently still waiting for the school district account. My hope is that I can take what I have created so far and add it to my school district, so that I won't have to recreate everything. Also, I am constantly rethinking what I plan on adding to the website.

 

Again, there is so much information that I would like to include, but I need to step back and not make it too overwhelming for myself or my intended audience. I need to make sure that I stick to my intentions and make a website that is useful, helpful and easy to navigate.

 

 



Final Vision Post # 2: Elaborating on my Ideas, Scope and Direction

What Quigley Elementary Library has to Offer

 

My focus this week is to continue to develop my final vision by elaborating on my ideas, scope and direction. After reading fellow classmate's final vision blog posts, I started to rethink my own vision. My initial thoughts were to create a library blog, however now I am thinking of creating a library website with a link to a library blog. Also, my target audience was originally geared more towards teachers, now I would like to make the library website for our whole school community of teachers, staff, students and parents. I want to create a library website that can be easily accessible and easy to navigate around. Therefore, I took the idea of using Popplet from Jen Lane to organize the menu headings and subheadings for my library website.

 

 

Now that I have a clearer idea of what direction I would like to go with my final vision, I have a more focused rationale.

 

My rationale for this project is to provide a source of information to everyone at Quigley Elementary School about the Library, such as, what's happening in the library, who's in the library, new books, why libraries are important and also, research information, including digital and media literacy and links to web tools and anything that will be useful for all teachers, staff, students and parents of Quigley Elementary School. 

 

Elaborate on your audience, their needs, and how your final project is going to address this goal: I would like teachers to have a place to go and find out about digital and media literacy, about inquiry-based learning, about web 2.0 tools, etc. Also, a place for teachers to see how valuable the library is to teachers and students. For students, I want them to be able to see what is happening in the library and how to be a part of it. For parents and staff, they can use the website to help with projects, homework and see everything the library has to offer.

 

Why a website? I am choosing to do a website rather than just a blog for my final vision project because I wanted to make it easier for everyone to navigate through all the information that I wish to include. Also, our school district uses Weebly for schools and teacher websites. I have never used Weebly before, but I know that many teachers in my school district have their own Weebly classroom sites and I like how they look and are easy to navigate around.

 

References:

 

Lane, Jen. (2015, November 11). Vision Post #1: A Virtual Library Learning Commons. Schoollibraradventures. Retrieved from: http://blogs.ubc.ca/schoollibraryadventures/2015/11/11/vision-post-1-a-virtual-library-learning-commons/

 

Quote by Boyd, Billy. Retrieved from: http://www.quotehd.com/imagequotes/authors41/tmb/billy-boyd-quote-nothing-was-ever-set-in-stone-and-we-have-very-much.jpg

 



Final Vision Post # 1: Available Library Services

What the Library can do for you! 

 

 

My final "Vision of the Future" of Teacher-Librarianship is to advocate for the school library by creating either a blog and/or prezi about all the library services available to teachers at my school and thus their students. I will need to consider what library services to add to my "Vision of the Future", my audience and how I will present each service. 

 

Library Services available to consider:

• Curriculum Resource Centre (CRC) available to all teachers in our school district. Show teachers how to access these resources (example: EBSCOhost)
• How to effectively use our Library OPAC
• Research tools available to teachers and students and teaching researching skills: How to do Research
• Book clubs: highlight books being read and shared. Have students write book reviews and/or recommend books.
• Helpful Web 2.0 tools: highlight and recommend new Web 2.0 tools (example: Powtoon)
• New books: introduce new books added to the library collection and how the new books can be used in the classroom (example: Adrienne Gear's Reading/Writing power books). 
• Introduce the importance of Makerspace activities: share what students are making and creating and how they are actively engaged.

 

• Emphasize the importance of reading and the library.

 



•  Emphasize how important teacher-librarians are to classroom teachers and what teacher-librarians can do for them: 10 things classroom teachers need to know about modern school librarians

References:

Dambruoso, A. (2014, July 18). 10 things classroom teachers need to know about modern school librarians. [Blog post]. Retrieved from https://libraryallegra.wordpress.com/2014/07/18/10-things-classroom-teachers-need-to-know-about-modern-school-librarians/

LArepresents. (2014, February 16). Dr. Stephen Krashen defends libraries at LAUSD Board Meeting. [youtube video]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JAui0OGfHQY

Makerspace picture. (2014, June 28). Retrieved from http://orchardschoollibrary.weebly.com/library-makerspace.html

Your School Library picture. (2011, May 23). Retrieved from http://timgauntley.blogspot.ca/2011/05/who-needs-school-libraries.html



Inquiry Project # 5 - Summarizing Topics and Interests

Summarizing Topics and Interests

 

What are your key takeaways, learning and direction after all this exploration?
I have learned many things over the past few weeks. Some key things that I have learned is how to blog, which I hope to continue by creating a library blog accessible and applicable to everyone in my school community. Also, I've learned how valuable Twitter is for finding, learning about, and sharing information and I've learned what a PLN is and how important it is to my professional development as a Teacher-Librarian.

Some other key takeaways, just to name a few...

• Never stop learning
• Network, network, network
• Promote a reading culture
• Share ideas
• Explore
• Research
• Collaborate

What are the new avenues for development in your personal and professional practice?

 I would like to continue developing my ICT skills, pedagogy and professional learning. Overall, I have learned that educators and professionals are connecting and sharing their learning through Twitter. By simply, following such educators and professionals, I will be able to maintain my connections and networks, to further develop my knowledge, experience and skills.

 

What are you going to take with you, moving forward from your own explorations and also from the explorations of others in this class?
I am going to take my Personal Learning Network including my blog, my gmail, Twitter, my Symbaloo, and feedly.

 

Other things that I would like to take along and remember include from Heather Brooks, the idea that the first person who reads a new book, and tells about the book, gets a sticker placed in the book showing their name, grade and date when they read the book. Example: This Book Was First Read By.

From Alexis Tsougrianis, I really liked his thoughts about equal access for mobile devices in which he states that "it's important for schools to provide access to all students, not just those with their own devices."
From Jen Lane the article she mentioned about Teacher Librarians as Thought Leaders, Teacher Librarians as Thought leaders (and light bulbs) by Joyce Valenza.
From Julie Brown, the image of what teachers want for professional development and the youtube video about Teacher-Librarians and Classroom Teachers as collaborative partners:
 

 

 

 

If you could pick just one topic that resonated with you, which is it and why?

 It's hard to pick just one topic as I found that I have learned a lot and I connected with most of the topics. However, if I had to pick just one topic, it would be fostering reading cultures in schools because everyone needs to learn to read so that they can read to learn and I love getting students excited about reading. Most importantly, this topic resonated with me because I'd like to continue making the library a fun and exciting place to learn and through this topic and sharing with our PLN, I have found new ways to do this, which I am looking forward to trying at my school.

References:

Aguilar, Elena. Ten Ways to Cultivate a Love of Reading in Students. Edutopia. November 4, 2015: Edutopia article Listing 10 ways to Cultivate a Love of Reading.

Brooks, Heather. (October 7, 2015). THE LOVE OF READING: Fostering it in School Libraries. LibraryLook Blog. Retrieved from: https://libraryvirtualblog.wordpress.com/2015/10/07/the-love-of-reading-fostering-it-in-school-libraries/

Brown, Julie. (October 24, 2015). Teacher Librarians supporting Teacher ICT ProD. Julie Brown Blog. Retrieved from: http://juliebro.blogspot.ca/2015/10/teacher-librarians-supporting-teacher.html

Lane, Jen. (October 15, 2015). Inquiry Blog #2: Building Relationships, Connections and Networks. School Library Adventures Blog. Retrieved from: http://blogs.ubc.ca/schoollibraryadventures/2015/10/15/inquiry-blog-2-building-relationships-connections-and-networks/

Tsougrianis, Alexis. (October 29, 2015). Inquiry Topic #4 - Mobile Devices, Mobile Libraries. Mr. T's Library Journey Blog. Retrieved from: http://mrtlibrary.blogspot.ca/2015/10/inquiry-topic-4-mobile-devices-mobile.html.