Happy Thanksgiving week!
Wow, this semester has flown by. I have one week left, that's it! Class is over in one week.
Last week, I posted that I had to create flyers for my parent night. Welllllll, fail. I made them, hung them up, and then the parent night had to be moved, again.
Go figure, right?
It has been pushed until December 11th at 5:30 pm.
We are sending home permission slips and everything that night so that students will be able to use the NOOKs after Christmas.
I found a really neat video that I want to show the parents when they come. It'll serve to educate them on how to use OverDrive. I wonder how many parents will use this themselves.
Something I've been thinking about a lot is: Why didn't the public library really advertise when they acquired this service? It's still relatively new for the system, but no one told anyone. I found out from my media specialist that our county now had access to OverDrive. Had I known that, I would've been using it from the beginning. I think listening to Audra talk about how she's advertising the things her middle school media center is doing makes me wish that the public library had something like that to keep us all informed.
Audra's project has given me some really great ideas for when I have my own library as well. I'm definitely going to be utilizing social media to get things out there for parents and the community to see how fantastic the media center really is. I love that this project has inspired me to do more!
Tuesday, November 25, 2014
Tuesday, November 18, 2014
Blog - 11-18-14
Oh, planning parent nights is always so much fun.
So. Much. Work.
It doesn't look like parent night will work until December. I was hoping to have this project completed by then, but I guess I will have to wait.
Planning a meeting is a lot more complicated than I had anticipated. First of all, it has to be after a certain time because of work schedules, after school activities, etc.
Sporting events have blocked out some dates. We wouldn't be able to get into the media center other dates. December 3rd is the earliest we can have this meeting.
The night after class. Of course.
I wanted to have pictures to show what I was doing.
Guess I better start making flyers. Sigh.
So. Much. Work.
It doesn't look like parent night will work until December. I was hoping to have this project completed by then, but I guess I will have to wait.
Planning a meeting is a lot more complicated than I had anticipated. First of all, it has to be after a certain time because of work schedules, after school activities, etc.
Sporting events have blocked out some dates. We wouldn't be able to get into the media center other dates. December 3rd is the earliest we can have this meeting.
The night after class. Of course.
I wanted to have pictures to show what I was doing.
Guess I better start making flyers. Sigh.
Tuesday, November 11, 2014
Blog - 11-11-14
Remember the incentive I blogged about last week? Ram Cash?
BIG SUCCESS. I was hoping we'd have 20 kids show up with a public library card. We just had student number 53 show us the card today. 53! I know in school of 500+, 50 doesn't seem like a lot. It is. In my area, these students will barely do anything if it counts for a grade, let alone just because we ask them to.
We've given out a ton of Ram Cash this week and we are going to continue giving it out for the rest of the semester. We aren't going to announce the prize any more after this week, but students will be able to show us their card all year and we will give them Ram Cash.
We also found ourselves needing to get homeroom lists from every homeroom teacher so that we could cross off students when they show us their card. Sneaky rascals tried to come back and get a second Ram Cash. I didn't even think of that. They're smart.
We've decided that the next step would be to have a parent night. This will benefit our school in general, because Title I requires so many parent meetings, but also because it's always great to have parent involvement.
I'll blog more about that next week!
BIG SUCCESS. I was hoping we'd have 20 kids show up with a public library card. We just had student number 53 show us the card today. 53! I know in school of 500+, 50 doesn't seem like a lot. It is. In my area, these students will barely do anything if it counts for a grade, let alone just because we ask them to.
We've given out a ton of Ram Cash this week and we are going to continue giving it out for the rest of the semester. We aren't going to announce the prize any more after this week, but students will be able to show us their card all year and we will give them Ram Cash.
We also found ourselves needing to get homeroom lists from every homeroom teacher so that we could cross off students when they show us their card. Sneaky rascals tried to come back and get a second Ram Cash. I didn't even think of that. They're smart.
We've decided that the next step would be to have a parent night. This will benefit our school in general, because Title I requires so many parent meetings, but also because it's always great to have parent involvement.
I'll blog more about that next week!
Saturday, November 8, 2014
Citing Your Sources in APA
Alright guys, it is getting close to that time where you're going to need to learn how to cite your sources in your paper.
I'm going to give you the basic run down in this blog as to how to cite scholarly journal articles within your paper as well as how to create the bibliographic entry you'll need at the end of your paper.
First, let's start with how to create the bibliography.
Citing scholarly articles in APA is relatively simple. Just follow the following formula:
Author, A. A., & Author, B. B. (Date of publication). Title of article. Title of Journal, volume number. Retrieved from http://www.journalhomepage.com/full/url/
For example:
Kenneth, I. A. (2000). A Buddhist response to the nature of human rights. Journal of Buddhist Ethics, 8. Retrieved from http://www.cac.psu.edu/jbe/twocont.html
Make sure you indent your second line of your source entry.
In your bibliography, follow these simple rules:
1. Indent the lines after the first line of your entry. (Hanging indent)
2. Alphabetize your reference list by author's last name.
3. Always include the full journal title, which means you spell things and punctuate things exactly.
In-Text Citations:
If you are using a short quotation from your source, you need to use the author, publication year, and page number for the reference. Always introduce the quote using the author's last name and the year.
For example:
According to Jones (1998), "Students often had difficulty using APA style, especially when it was their first time" (p. 199).
For longer quotations (40+ words), you need to leave off the quotations marks and put the quote in its own, indented block of text. Still introduce the quote using the author and year of publication. Add the page number at the end.
For example:
Jones's (1998) study found the following:
Students often had difficulty using APA style, especially when it was their first time citing sources. This difficulty could be attributed to the fact that many students failed to purchase a style manual or to ask their teacher for help. (p. 199)
If you are summarizing or paraphrasing material from a source, you just have to include the author and year of publication. It's a good idea, though, to try to give the page number even though it is unnecessary.
I'm going to give you the basic run down in this blog as to how to cite scholarly journal articles within your paper as well as how to create the bibliographic entry you'll need at the end of your paper.
First, let's start with how to create the bibliography.
Citing scholarly articles in APA is relatively simple. Just follow the following formula:
Author, A. A., & Author, B. B. (Date of publication). Title of article. Title of Journal, volume number. Retrieved from http://www.journalhomepage.com/full/url/
For example:
Kenneth, I. A. (2000). A Buddhist response to the nature of human rights. Journal of Buddhist Ethics, 8. Retrieved from http://www.cac.psu.edu/jbe/twocont.html
Make sure you indent your second line of your source entry.
In your bibliography, follow these simple rules:
1. Indent the lines after the first line of your entry. (Hanging indent)
2. Alphabetize your reference list by author's last name.
3. Always include the full journal title, which means you spell things and punctuate things exactly.
In-Text Citations:
If you are using a short quotation from your source, you need to use the author, publication year, and page number for the reference. Always introduce the quote using the author's last name and the year.
For example:
According to Jones (1998), "Students often had difficulty using APA style, especially when it was their first time" (p. 199).
For longer quotations (40+ words), you need to leave off the quotations marks and put the quote in its own, indented block of text. Still introduce the quote using the author and year of publication. Add the page number at the end.
For example:
Jones's (1998) study found the following:
Students often had difficulty using APA style, especially when it was their first time citing sources. This difficulty could be attributed to the fact that many students failed to purchase a style manual or to ask their teacher for help. (p. 199)
If you are summarizing or paraphrasing material from a source, you just have to include the author and year of publication. It's a good idea, though, to try to give the page number even though it is unnecessary.
Tuesday, November 4, 2014
Blog - 11-4-14
This week has been much better.
It's nice to say that and really mean it.
After sitting down with the media specialist, we've decided to do something really awesome for the students - RAM CASH!!!!!
Ram cash is a red slip that students receive that allows them to get a free concession at school events - dances, sporting events, after school activities, Ram Fest (which is coming up in a few weeks), etc.
Now, how will they receive this Ram Cash you ask!?
Simple.
SHOW US THE LIBRARY CARDS!
Students are going to have to have public library cards in order to use OverDrive. We knew that, without incentive, students were not very likely to go out and get a library card. However, with an incentive, we figured that a lot more students would go to the library and get a card. The more students we have with library cards, the more students we can reach with this program.
I'm excited! Maybe I'll show my library card so I can get Ram Cash too ;)
It's nice to say that and really mean it.
After sitting down with the media specialist, we've decided to do something really awesome for the students - RAM CASH!!!!!
Ram cash is a red slip that students receive that allows them to get a free concession at school events - dances, sporting events, after school activities, Ram Fest (which is coming up in a few weeks), etc.
Now, how will they receive this Ram Cash you ask!?
Simple.
SHOW US THE LIBRARY CARDS!
Students are going to have to have public library cards in order to use OverDrive. We knew that, without incentive, students were not very likely to go out and get a library card. However, with an incentive, we figured that a lot more students would go to the library and get a card. The more students we have with library cards, the more students we can reach with this program.
I'm excited! Maybe I'll show my library card so I can get Ram Cash too ;)
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