presentations

School Librarian Leadership Academy

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Dates for the 2012 School Librarian Leadership Academy are Set!
August 6 – August 10th, 2012!

LS 591 3 credit class

For those of you getting your summer plans in order please plan on attending this year’s school librarian leadership academy. In partnership with the Alaska Association of School Librarians the Alaska State Library will put on this year’s academy August 6th – August 10th on the UAA campus. We will have travel assistance stipends available again this year.

The academy will run from 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. each day, and will include a working lunch session. This three credit graduate level course is a great way to take care of recency credits, and even more importantly it is an opportunity to spend a focused week with colleagues from across the state and leaders in the library profession.

We have a number of exciting presenters in the wings including to our delight, national presenter Teri Lesesne of Making the Match: The Right Book for the Right Reader at the right time, Grades 4-12 fame.

As in past years, a percentage of the available seats to attend the academy will be reserved for school librarians outside of south central Alaska. I encourage anyone interested to submit their application of interest ASAP. Registration will be available online through UAA’s online registration system soon. Don’t delay contact at Jacque.peterson@alaska.gov for an application of interest.

ALA Annual Conference Report

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It’s been over a month, and as I think back on the conference these are some of the highlights for me.

Orson Scott Card. (Note Janet’s picture in her entry) Like many middle school librarians, I love Enders Game. It was great fun to listen to Orson talk, and to pick up the first book in his new YA series called the Lost Gate. BTW – It’s awesome. Readers will note similar character traits between Danny and Ender, even though this new series is fantasy instead of science fiction.

2.0 to P21 – Using Emerging Technologies to Embed 21st Century Skills into your Library’s Instructional Program: Michelle Luhtala, the Librarian at the New Canaan Library in Connecticut is doing some amazing things with her students. Her students won the ALA “Why I Need My Library” video contest, well worth your viewing time. It’s on her website at http://www.nchslmc.org/ She blogs at http://bibliotech.me/. Great reading. I’d love to have come up to Alaska! I left her very short session jazzed and ready to try new things. Oh, and she’ll be in Minneapolis this fall, just in case you are going.

AASL’s Best Websites for Teaching and Learning: It’s always better to have someone demonstrate websites for you, but this session also included video clips of the creators chatting about their sites. Check out the sites for yourself at www.ala.org/aasl/bestlist.

And finally…. QR codes are coming to your library soon! They were everywhere at the conference. When I got home I noticed they are even on my phone book. To learn more about them check out http://lib-girl.blogspot.com/2011/07/holy-bodacious-barcodes-using-qr-codes.html.