Tales from a Loud Librarian

Book Buddies: 7th graders work with the 1st graders at King Charter School We had a new to us middle school ELA teacher at our school this year. She has around 12 years under her belt with gifted 6th graders in New Jersey. PFTSTA was so lucky to get her. Every time that we talked about lessons and activities, I was amazed at her ability to think everything through ahead of time. She is very detailed oriented, and it showed in her lessons. She took our 7th grade Ninth Ward unit and turned it on its ear . Her students were required to create a product using Google Slides that would showcase all that they had learned about New Orleans and Hurricane Katrina including the rebuilding efforts. They were required to conduct an interview with a family member who was effected by the hurricane and we took them on a field trip to view the rebuilding efforts with our own eyes and complete some service learning when we visited an elementary school in the Ninth Ward . Some of the products we...

For Teen Tech Week , I wanted to create some kind of contest where I would provide a grand prize. The contest would be designed to have students submit some sort of written piece, and then I would randomly draw two names for the grand prize winners, one from middle school and one from high school. I like the idea that the winners are selected randomly and that just by entering the contest all students had an equal chance to win. Thinking about it, I decided that I would ask the kids to submit a review of a book, movie, or game that they would like to recommend to their friends. I gave wide parameters of what they could review. The students had to submit one paragraph with a brief summary and one paragraph explaining why they would recommend the book, movie or game to their friends. I created a Google form for them to submit, so it was easy to share on the library website and in emails. The students chose from new and old and below is a pie chart showing what they chose to review. It w...