Well, my interest in makerspaces has only grown. I love the cooperative, creative atmosphere makerspaces offer, and I am excited by the possibility of using materials to exhibit learning. We are so lucky to have Rochester Makerspace, a not for profit community space with equipment available to all in our community. This page describes the organization's goals and services it provides: http://www.rochestermakerspace.org/faqs/
I visited Rochester Makerspace a few times and met the people who started it and who use it most frequently. I spoke with the founder to learn about his vision and describe my own interest in Makerspaces. The conversation ended with the hopeful possibility of bringing some of my students on a field trip to the space! We are very excited about this possibility and I have been doing a lot of work to make this happen. I have a friend who is very active with them, and she has been helping with the work necessary on their end to allow the field trip to happen.
Also, I wrote a grant project that utilizes the idea of makerspaces to purchase books and materials so that students at this school are able to participate in makerspace type activities. I don't want to talk specifics about my planning work until I am able to secure a grant, but do think I will be able to find someone to fund it.
Rochester Makerspaces is interested in utilizing some of the activities I am planning to do with my students and offering these activities in their space to young children as a way to raise money to purchase additional equipment. This is an interesting idea and I am considering moving forward in this manner to build relationships and community.
I visited Rochester Makerspace with my own two children, and they were scanned and reproductions of their heads and shoulders were made on the 3-D printer. It was quite cool. I hope to ad photos to this blog post in the near future.
Now I have a date set for a field trip. I am bringing 18 second grade students, and we will explore possible careers in the STEM areas. More info to follow.
Wednesday, April 29, 2015
Monday, February 23, 2015
Thing 23: Makerspaces
Well, I am supposed to be track one, not track three, but when I saw that my friend who works at Fairport Public Library was involved with a second grade field trip to Rochester Makerspace, my interest in this was piqued. This is something that I should know about.
I began to explore the concept of Makerspaces. So basically, I understand the idea of makerspaces to be open forums where "makers" can come in and tinker or experiment with materials to solve a problem or create something new. My inner child wants to jump up and down and sing at this concept. I think I just found Cloud Cuckoo land, and I get to play the part of Princess Unikitty from the Lego movie if I can do this with my students. Yes, we need to play with Legos. How do I get my hands on Legos for my school library? Like I think I really need like two Lego Classic large sets. I would offer broad design challenges inspired by comics in the Lego Club magazine or Lego easy reader books. Or I would just let the kids sit at a table and play with Legos.
As a Pre-K through second grade school, I am also inclined to think that making should involve construction paper, glue sticks, scissors and crayons or colored pencils.. Like this project is open-ended and useful:
http://makeitatyourlibrary.org/play/corner-bookmarks#.VOtS4Mco7bg
I also came across this really cool game that I myself want to play, and I think the kids might enjoy it too, as a bonus:
So seeing as how I just spent nearly $200 in my imagination, perhaps it would be best to stop before my imaginary wallet is too thin to see. I think what I will actually do is do my best to take Mr. Finch's class on a field trip to Rochester Makerspace and consider the creative inspiration of the makerspace concept in planning my lessons here in the library.
I began to explore the concept of Makerspaces. So basically, I understand the idea of makerspaces to be open forums where "makers" can come in and tinker or experiment with materials to solve a problem or create something new. My inner child wants to jump up and down and sing at this concept. I think I just found Cloud Cuckoo land, and I get to play the part of Princess Unikitty from the Lego movie if I can do this with my students. Yes, we need to play with Legos. How do I get my hands on Legos for my school library? Like I think I really need like two Lego Classic large sets. I would offer broad design challenges inspired by comics in the Lego Club magazine or Lego easy reader books. Or I would just let the kids sit at a table and play with Legos.
As a Pre-K through second grade school, I am also inclined to think that making should involve construction paper, glue sticks, scissors and crayons or colored pencils.. Like this project is open-ended and useful:
http://makeitatyourlibrary.org/play/corner-bookmarks#.VOtS4Mco7bg
I also came across this really cool game that I myself want to play, and I think the kids might enjoy it too, as a bonus:
Thing 1: Blogging
I am the new library media specialist at Early Childhood School #57. I somewhat hesitate to call myself the "library media specialist" because up to this point there has been a whole lot of library but very little of the media. I am looking forward to the Cool Tools professional development series as a path toward changing that.
My school is the only PK-2 school in the Rochester City School District. There are two preschool classes, three kindergartens, three first grade classes, and three second grade classes. There is one special education at each grade level. There is a mix of experienced staff and relatively new teachers.
The library is about half the size of a classroom with just over 6,000 books in the collection. I have four computers: two for student use, one for circulation, one laptop and a SMART board. Every classroom in the school has a SMART board, and K-2 classes have iPads for students to use. We have a great tech guy that helps with any hardware issues, but does not work with students at all. I plan to do a lot with planning lessons this year, and Cool Tools will be a part of that. :)
This is my first year working in a school. I don't mind dating myself, because when talking about technology I believe that it is relevant. I am among the oldest of the millennial generation, meaning I grew up with (several) computers in my home. My parents were/are early techies. My high school started allowing students to use the Internet for research when I was in 10th grade (slow dial up with impossible filters). After school I put myself in danger by hanging out in chat rooms, emailing strangers, and even arranging personal meetings with brand new Internet friends at the local mall! Cell phones started to become very popular when I was in college. Pagers were incredibly cool in middle school.
In contrast, the past few years of my adult life have been mostly technology poor. I had two children while completing my master's in library science, and then, overwhelmed, I took a few years off of work so that I could focus on raising my children. Our family budget was tight, and we weren't able to replace broken computers and went down to one family car. We didn't even have Internet access in our home or anything, so I used the public library for Internet access. It was a different lifestyle in which I found a greater connection to the people around me and enjoyed better concentration and focus in many tasks. Now I am working in a school library, so I get to get back into technology use. I straddle the digital divide - I do!
This is great! I really enjoy taking technology courses because I can pick up using the tools much easier and faster than if I need to learn them by poking around. I am excited about Cool Tools!
The Read-Aloud Scaffold by Judy Bradbury
At the children's book festival on Saturday, I took advantage of the opportunity to listen to Judy Bradbury speak. She was prepromoting her latest book, which I think that if we are able to implement some of the plans she presents might just have the potential to get our kids off to a great start as readers. I am really looking forward to her new book which will be out in March.
So, even though I don't have my p-card yet (thus I am unable to use district $ to buy books), I did buy another one of her books for my own self. I will even share it with you if you come visit me in the library before or after school because I am just that nice. The reason I bought this one is because I was totally sold on her message
Some people think that there is no room in the Common Core for fiction read aloud. We all know in our hearts that this is not what is best for our kids. The key is in how we understand the term "informational books." Informational books means that books we use to find information. Fiction books DO contain information, but it may be embedded within a story or a poem. In this awesome reference book she offers many examples of how to gather information from fiction texts including resource lists by subject, extension activities, time requirements, author stories, and citations of poems that may take only 30 seconds to read but reinforce information beautifully and can be used any time throughout the day. I was impressed. She has so many ideas of how to use fiction read aloud an effective part of the curriculum.
So, even though I don't have my p-card yet (thus I am unable to use district $ to buy books), I did buy another one of her books for my own self. I will even share it with you if you come visit me in the library before or after school because I am just that nice. The reason I bought this one is because I was totally sold on her message
Some people think that there is no room in the Common Core for fiction read aloud. We all know in our hearts that this is not what is best for our kids. The key is in how we understand the term "informational books." Informational books means that books we use to find information. Fiction books DO contain information, but it may be embedded within a story or a poem. In this awesome reference book she offers many examples of how to gather information from fiction texts including resource lists by subject, extension activities, time requirements, author stories, and citations of poems that may take only 30 seconds to read but reinforce information beautifully and can be used any time throughout the day. I was impressed. She has so many ideas of how to use fiction read aloud an effective part of the curriculum.
Tuesday, November 11, 2014
Native American month
American Indians in Children's Literature (AICL): Some thoughts about Native American Month and Thanksgiving
Perry Ground's article in the recent Genesee Valley Parent magazine <3
Examples of stereotyping Indians in children's literature:
Here's some balance to the traditional Thanksgiving story:
Lesson planning resources to teach sensitivity to American Indians:
Mainstream Thanksgiving lessons:
Scholastic's attempt at offering an alternative perspective frustrates me. On a surface level, the article appears to contain a ton of detailed information about the Wampanog, which is important. However, it is really too much for primary level students. Furthermore the tense of the article is confusing, which I see as a major problem because kids need to understand the difference between Wampanog history and present time.
Perry Ground's article in the recent Genesee Valley Parent magazine <3
Examples of stereotyping Indians in children's literature:
Here's some balance to the traditional Thanksgiving story:
Lesson planning resources to teach sensitivity to American Indians:
Mainstream Thanksgiving lessons:
Scholastic's attempt at offering an alternative perspective frustrates me. On a surface level, the article appears to contain a ton of detailed information about the Wampanog, which is important. However, it is really too much for primary level students. Furthermore the tense of the article is confusing, which I see as a major problem because kids need to understand the difference between Wampanog history and present time.
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