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Lights, Camera, and an Idea Worth Spreading

Student presenting his Ted-ED Club presentation

Most of us are familiar with TED Talks, a nonprofit devoted to spreading ideas through short, often powerful, talks. As librarians, we can use the format of a TED Talk to engage students and teachers with research and encourage them to spread their ideas.

We chose to incorporate TED-ED into our ninth-grade programming — with excellent results. In fact, we are now hoping to spread it to eighth and fifth grades as culminating projects during those capstone years in our district.

Making Trivia Masters: Using Trivia to Turn Students into Explorers

A woman looks for a book in the stacks.

A few months ago on Programming Librarian, I talked about asking a trivia question as part of your passive programming. Now, I've taken it a step further to create a Trivia Master Challenge that encourages students to search the library’s catalog, explore our nonfiction section, and learn how to search successfully within a book.

National History Day and Teacher/Librarian Collaboration

NHD Logo

National History Day (NHD) projects have been part of our collaborative library programming for years. They are a great way for students to learn the research process in a deep and meaningful manner, meeting many National School Library Standards. It's also a great way for students to practice the various literacies: news, information, media and digital. 

Resources to Support OER Programming in Your Library

students looking at computer

Last month, we talked about utilizing open educational resources (OER) in your school library programming, and we offered some simple suggestions for how to get started.

This month, we’re going to look at some resources you can utilize to find great openly licensed materials. We'll also share some programming ideas you can infuse with those resources. But first, we'll start by sharing our favorite OER resources.

100 Days/100 Books

Wall of 100 books read by students on the 100th day of school.

Every year in late January or early February, children all over the country celebrate the 100th day of school with all sorts of clever projects — bringing 100 items to school, wearing “100th-day” glasses, listing 100 things they love to do. Why not add a reading activity to this list? Ask a group of younger students to read 100 books on the 100th day of school in one hour!

LibraryGame

Submitted by cwolfe on Wed, 2018-05-16 14:56

One finished game made by a student.

The Librarygame project teaches fifth graders the concepts of storytelling, technology and project management through the creation of video games. The program is a collaboration between Sacramento Public Library and local Title I schools, many of which lack the funds to hold this type of program without a partner.

Kindergarten and Media Literacy: Using PBS' 'Arthur' to Start the Conversation

Kids watching a show on an iPad

Information literacy skills are a cornerstone to school library instruction. Teacher librarians have taught them for years. Why revisit them now? Before we get into how to use "Arthur" to teach media literacy, we thought it might be nice to give you a little background on why our passion for information literacy programming in school libraries was re-energized and renewed.

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