This blog is an elaboration to my post on the class Moodle. The process of developing a storyboard was somewhat difficult than what I was use to in telling a story, but meaningful nonetheless, partly because I had to decide what was important to write, then providing an illustration to showcase the story being told.
As discussed from some of the readings, “a storyboard is an outline, generally illustrated, that is used in the planning of a television show, movie, commercial, or play.” In more recent years, the readings noted, “the word has also been applied to video games and webpages and a storyboard is an illustrated flow chart.” The illustration therein is somewhat similar to the art in comic books.
Furthermore, reading “Knight Digital Media Center Training on multimedia storytelling” helped me to understand and take note of the various dimensions to story creation, specifically how to decide on a story, the layers such as history, and people, the importance of “shell” (the background), how to read and look at images (defined as some combination of text, still photography, video clips, audio, graphics and interactivity presented on a web site in a nonlinear format). One of the most interesting aspects of “Knight Digital” was the example of Dancing Rocks Rough Storyboard that was broken down into the following parts (click here for full text):
• Nonlinear parts -- Home page with four inside pages. The four parts are the quest (research), a bio (of Messina), the rocks (how they move), and the site of the dancing rocks, Death Valley's Racetrack Playa (its colorful history).
• Video -- Anticipate video from the field trip: Messina mapping the rock trails, assembling her gear, the trip to and from the playa.
• Audio -- Anticipate audio from the field trip: Messina explaining how she works, what the gear does, and why she does what she does. Maybe what the Racetrack Playa sounds like.
• Still photos -- Available from Messina's Web site, and professional photographers, if necessary. Anticipate grabbing still photos from video of wide-angle shots of the playa, rocks and trails, maybe Death Valley National Park rangers.
• Graphics -- Existing aerial photo, maps and rock trails.
• Text -- History of research, history of the Racetrack Playa from interviews with Messina, other researchers, and the park rangers.
Transitioning to “Reading Comics,” Carol L. Tilley, a professor of library and information science at the University of Illinois writes, “comic books are just as sophisticated as other forms of literature, and children [and let me add adults] benefit from reading them at least as much as they do from reading other types of books.” Additionally, it was noted that many people, even librarians who willingly add comics to their collection, often dismiss its importance. However, compared to reading “real “ books, “comic appears to be a simple task compared to books, where reading comic might be preferable.” Tilley further writes, “After all, comics do have words/plentiful pictures that seem to carry meaning.” Lastly, comics have several common structural elements that are used to communicate effectively, and between the readers.
Despite the fact that librarians and teachers have long embraced picture books, and not comics, as suitable text for young readers, there is much that can be learned. Additionally, comics differ in some important ways from standard picture books; comics tend to have multiple panels per page instead of a single page. Similarly, comics integrate words and images indicating a greater extent than many traditional picture books. “Yet, teachers and library media specialist can employ the same instructional techniques with young people for both picture books and comics.”
Like some of my classmate who noted on the Moodle, from the readings, I too get the general impression that comics and digital stories are quite distinct forms of expressions, not just for youth, but all readers. And, to understand comic book’s importance as vital forms of learning, one needs to have a firm understanding of different ways all people learn. Having this information/ background knowledge helped me to construct my own storyboard (provided on the Moodle), albeit general, to share an aspect of my life related to applying to graduate schools.
The creation of a storyboard was a good follow up to the comic strip generator exercise our class looked at GSLIS two weeks ago while in class, including that illustration/ images are not only used to tell a story, but serve a unique purpose.
Monday, March 14, 2011
Sunday, March 13, 2011
Lots of Extracurricular Media Literacies
What with the time change and my busy week-end schedule, I'm not feeling particularly rested as I head into Monday morning, but I did have some time to contemplate some media literacy during my extracurricular activities. The big event this week-end was a Saturday fundraiser at the Cub Foods grocery store in Bloomington with my yearbook staff. We spent 7 hours bagging groceries for tips. As I watched the kids work and interact, I spent some time thinking about how media literacy is involved with the yearbook. At first, I dismissed the idea--the only literacy I could initially think of was print literacy as the students write the text of the book. But then I thought harder. Our book is a combination of many skills. There is certainly visual literacy in the graphic design aspects of the book. We spend a great deal of time analyzing qualities of good graphic design. The book employs technology skills because the design program is online and requires learning and using the publisher's software. Even using our digital cameras to capture images, download them, edit them, and upload them into the book is a kind of visual literacy. One of our goals is to tell the story of our school year in pictures, so graphic storytelling has a role as well.
As we worked, the kids commented on the store's music and made jokes about plugging their iPods into the store's sound system, but ultimately decided that forcing people to select cereal while listening to Lady Gaga might not be a wise sales move (although it might perk things up in the meat department). Because they weren't allowed to have any electronics in sight during the work, a couple of my kids took quick breaks to respond to their buzzing phones or check their messages. All in all, it was a successful fundraising event and I realized that media literacies are all around us...even in our extracurricular activities.
Next, on Sunday, I attended a "Celebration of Life" service for an elementary student who died earlier this year. You might wonder what media literacy had to do with this occasion, but even in this event I found media literacy. First, as people entered the lobby of our school, the big-screen TV was scrolling a slide show of our student during her school years. During the service itself, special songs were performed or played. Poetry was read. There was a second video montage of music and photos. Lastly, the "Cassidy Collection" of books was unveiled. Later, I learned that Cassidy's mom has kept her cell phone account active...because Cass's friends still occasionally send a text message.
Media surrounds us. It adds entertainment and fun. It educates us. It helps us communicate our stories and our feelings. It can help us to listen or to speak. And maybe, if we use it well, it can even help us to grow.
As we worked, the kids commented on the store's music and made jokes about plugging their iPods into the store's sound system, but ultimately decided that forcing people to select cereal while listening to Lady Gaga might not be a wise sales move (although it might perk things up in the meat department). Because they weren't allowed to have any electronics in sight during the work, a couple of my kids took quick breaks to respond to their buzzing phones or check their messages. All in all, it was a successful fundraising event and I realized that media literacies are all around us...even in our extracurricular activities.
Next, on Sunday, I attended a "Celebration of Life" service for an elementary student who died earlier this year. You might wonder what media literacy had to do with this occasion, but even in this event I found media literacy. First, as people entered the lobby of our school, the big-screen TV was scrolling a slide show of our student during her school years. During the service itself, special songs were performed or played. Poetry was read. There was a second video montage of music and photos. Lastly, the "Cassidy Collection" of books was unveiled. Later, I learned that Cassidy's mom has kept her cell phone account active...because Cass's friends still occasionally send a text message.
Media surrounds us. It adds entertainment and fun. It educates us. It helps us communicate our stories and our feelings. It can help us to listen or to speak. And maybe, if we use it well, it can even help us to grow.
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Words With Friends...with Students
A portion of the faculty at my school has become obsessed with the game Words With Friends, and my fiancé is leading the charge. He first downloaded the game on New Year’s Eve when two of his friends showed it to him. Within a week he’d found two more friends to play with and by late January he was starting conversations with “Do you have an iPhone?” If the answer was yes, the instant follow up was “Have you downloaded Words With Friends?” On several occasions he has then taken the person’s phone, downloaded the app, and set up an account for him/her so the game could begin immediately. Currently, he is simultaneously playing 21 different games and most of his opponents are our co-workers.
Have I mentioned that he is a math teacher?
Yes, the non-reader of the family is exercising his vocabulary with great enthusiasm. With so many resistant readers in my classes, I wonder how teens would respond to this game especially as I overhear teachers talking about words and point totals as they walk through the office or see them covertly playing during faculty meetings. Some schools are purchasing iPads to serve as e-readers for the student population, and if my school did so, I would love to have the opportunity to set up a Words With Friends tournament in my classes.
For those completely unfamiliar with the game, it is a social version of Scrabble. You play online, typically from your phone, which means you can play anytime, anywhere. Games can last for days as users are notified when their opponent has made a play. There is also a chat feature to allow players to communicate with each other. Of course this social aspect is what would draw the teens in and the challenge and drive of competition is what would keep them hooked. We’re more apt to learn if we’re having fun while doing so. The only other way I’ve gotten students excited about vocabulary in the past was through the website www.freerice.com , a United Nation’s sponsored site that will donate 10 grains of rice for every question you get correct. The kids become obsessed with seeing the rice bowl fill with grains that they forget that they are learning. Words With Friends could have the same effect; helping them not only improve their vocabularies but also develop math, strategy, and problem-solving skills as they have to carefully select tile placements to be the most advantageous for points and blocking opponent’s moves. They can play as many games at a time as they want, and with all of tricky two-letter words, triple word scores, and multitude of word possibilities, they’ll be learning and having F-U-N (8 points, if you're keeping score).
A few Words with Friends resources:
“A Beginner’s Guide to Words With Friends” OS X Reality 1 Jan. 2010. http://aasl.metapress.com/content/n58189jm02h42r51/
The Unofficial Fan Site for Enthusiasts of Words With Friends
The Unofficial Stat Site for Fans of Words With Friends
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
A Day in My LIfe -- Part One: Elementary School
One of the amazing things about being a school librarian is the infinite variety, but sometimes I feel like I’m the only one who is aware of exactly how varied the job can be. So I thought I’d share what a typical day is like for me. Part one—a day at Heyworth Elementary School. HES teaches Pre-K through 6 and we have approximately 550 students. On Tuesdays I am all day at the Elementary (on Mondays I’m all day at the High School, the other days of the week are split).
My day began at 7:45 when I ran into the high school while dropping my own daughters off for school. I delivered 4 inter-library loan books to my HS assistant and gave her some instructions for changing the window display. Because Heyworth is small, we share our inter-library loan delivery with the public library, so I usually stop by there twice a week on my way home from school to check on incoming/outgoing materials. By 8:00 a.m. I was checking email in my grade school office, which is beginning to resemble a book warehouse. I placed a large book order last week and that has begun to arrive in various shipments right alongside a second order from four different vendors which is a collection of books that is to be displayed during a memorial service this Sunday for a 6th grader, Cassidy, who died in an auto accident at the beginning of the school year. Her family chose to give some funds to the library and specified several topics that were near and dear to Cassidy. I have designed commemorative bookplates and these need to be printed and placed in the books as we catalog them and prepare them for the shelf. Because I have such a limited budget in this school, I do all my own shelf prep, which adds to my time, but helps the bottom line. So, despite the boxes of books surrounding me, I focused on answering emails from several teachers needing books (note to self…need to design a handout explaining the online catalog to the staff and encourage them to use it) and other library-related questions answered. By 8:15 I was turning on computers and making sure my lesson materials were ready to go.
At 8:30 my class of 6th graders filed in and they set about finishing a booktalking project using Audacity. By this point in the project, the students always seem to be at various stages of completion: some are completely finished and need something else to do while others are desperately trying to finish before the 30 minutes is up. I move around and around the room answering individual questions and keeping students on track or otherwise occupied. At 9:00 a.m. the 4th graders are filing in and the 6th graders are leaving…although there are a few 6th grade hold-outs still clinging to their keyboards. One of the biggest challenges I deal with daily is my tight schedule. My classes are scheduled at 30 minute intervals with no passing period time in between. To help transition students in and out of the room, I’ve trained them to line up on either side of a long bookcase. There is “the side for coming in” and “the side for going out” ---just like the automatic doors at the grocery store! Library time is prep time for the classroom teachers, so I’m always hoping that they won’t be early dropping off and that they won’t be late picking up their classes! The 4th graders are finishing a simple research project in which each student located a book about their country (use of online catalog), filled in a worksheet about their country (research, reading, and notetaking skills), Used Microsoft Word to type the document according to a set of written formatting parameters (technology skills), and cited their source in MLA format. This was the culminating project after spending several weeks working on these skills individually. Again, I worked my way around the room, answering individual questions and troubleshooting. This class is frustrating me because they seem to have forgotten everything they ever knew about citations. They certainly aren’t connecting those citation lessons from a few weeks ago with the project they are trying to complete today. I make a note to have the 4th grade review citations for a few more lessons. At 9:30 the 4th graders are leaving and the 2nd graders just arriving are asked to report to the Star Carpet so that they can see the SmartBoard. This class has been learning about the difference between fiction and non-fiction and today we’ll review that before I challenge them to a game using the SmartBoard. The class does not seem to tire of watching the SmartBoard game judge their answers. I’ve really found that the interactivity and visual nature of the SmartBoard is riveting to students. I try to use mine daily. This lesson finishes a little early, so I fill the extra 7 minutes by having the students take all their books and put them in ABC or Dewey order. At 10:00 the 2nd graders leave while the 5th graders arrive. This class is doing a scavenger hunt by following clues I’ve planted throughout the various computer drives. This activity really sorts out who understands this skill and who doesn’t. As I walk around the room, I can quickly pick out a student who is at a loss and re-teach the concept to him/her individually. If the students are successful, the final clue instructs them to print out a small picture. The students seem to like these and set about trading them with each other (I purposely made the final few clues individual so that no two would be alike). Sometimes it doesn’t take a lot to please them…and I like finding these little enticements because I don’t give grades, so sometimes a little incentive is useful. It’s 10:30—and hip, hip, hooray—I’m making a grande mocha in my microwave because I have a 15 minute break before the next class arrives. I check email, get the circulation desk computer going, and nip into the faculty lounge to pick up my mail. I tidy the overflowing book drop and quickly drink the coffee before the 1st graders arrive at 10:45. The class sits in the storypit to hear parts of three different ABC books before moving to the Star Carpet so that they can watch the SmartBoard while I explain that we will be using our new Microsoft Word skills (opening program, changing font size and color, Saving, and closing program) to create our own ABC book. They look at an ABC book made by last year’s class and then we brainstorm ideas for their own book. We run out of time, so we’ll save their list of ideas and make a choice next week before we get started.
It is now 11:15 and I’ve taught 5 classes. From 11:15 to 12:45 I attack the chaos in my office by unpacking books and checking packing slips against my purchase orders. I make note of what’s missing or backordered. I notify the district bookkeeper how much should be paid and to whom. Check the email again while I wait for my lunch to finish cooking in the microwave. I eat it while talking to the parent volunteer who has just arrived to begin checking in books and shelving. I lost my grade school library aide last year and with the state’s financial crisis, I’ve been told not to expect that position to be reinstated for the foreseeable future. This means that the 200 or so books in my office will need to be carted over to the high school so that my HS aide can help catalog and do shelf prep. It also means that I will need to continue to recruit parent volunteers to work in the library to help with book check-in/check-out and shelving. I’ve discovered that this is a mixed blessing: although I’m grateful for their help, the truth is that supervising them and rectifying their mistakes takes time. I now take time to “walk the shelves” looking for out of place materials, and I’ve had to sort out various circulation issues with students and teachers. Also, volunteers tend to come and go, so I’ve discovered that I’m constantly recruiting new people and training them. I need to come up with some written training materials, too, but just haven’t had time. Before I get ready for afternoon classes, I update the Computer Lab sign-up page on the wiki and scan a few comments on the junior high Love of Literature wiki. Have a quick phone call from the Assistant Principal at the high school who wants me to teach some technology lessons to staff during in-service days.
From 12:45 to 2:45 I teach 4 sections of 3rd grade. These students are having a guided lecture on encyclopedia terms in preparation for the annual “Encyclopedia War.” It’s rather nice to have the same grade level back-to-back for a change.
From 2:45 to 3:00 I tidy the room, shut down computers, and check email one more time, then scoot out the door before the busses start arriving because I’m the junior high Scholastic Bowl team coach and we have to set up for a match which kicks off at 3:45.
5:00 p.m. – the match is over (we lost…bummer) and we cleaned up. My older daughter acted as scorekeeper in one of the competition rooms, but now she’s in a hurry to get home because she wants to eat and run over her lines before returning to the high school at 6:30 for play practice.
6:30 – We are back at the high school. Senior Daughter goes to play practice while Freshman Daughter and I go to the Winter Sports Awards Ceremony. She was on the dance squad and I’m the Yearbook Sponsor, so I take notes, just in case my Sports Editor doesn’t manage to turn up. I don’t see him in the audience anywhere.
7:30 – Freshman Daughter also reports to play practice and I head home…briefly considered stopping by the GS to work on a bulletin board I’m trying to finish (Citation Station which features citation format and several space aliens on their space station), but decide to head home and write this blog entry instead!
That is my day. It never really slows down. I often compare my job to a constantly moving gerbil wheel. I just get on and run, run, run trying to keep up! Over the course of 5 days I teach 26 fixed-schedule sections of elementary school and three of junior high. I’m very fortunate to have very supportive administrations backing me in both buildings. The teachers, too, are very complimentary of the curriculum I’ve instituted. (Before I arrived 4 years ago, there were no library classes). I’d like to be able to do more collaboration, but the truth is that when I’m not directly teaching classes at the elementary, I need to be at the High School running that library. I do my best to accommodate special requests (“I need my kids to be able to use Power Point by October”), but I don’t get much opportunity to go into the classrooms for true collaboration. I try to balance my curriculum between library/literary lessons and technology lessons. (There are no separate tech classes. I’m it.) Many of the administrative tasks of running a library (budgeting, reading reviews, placing orders, updating wikis, defining/refining procedures, ILL, cataloging, etc.) I either do during the high school portions of my week, or I do them on my own time after school and on week-ends. But even though I’m madly busy, I still love being able to design my own curriculum and assignments. I like teaching technology and connecting that to books and literature. I can’t imagine doing anything else!
My day began at 7:45 when I ran into the high school while dropping my own daughters off for school. I delivered 4 inter-library loan books to my HS assistant and gave her some instructions for changing the window display. Because Heyworth is small, we share our inter-library loan delivery with the public library, so I usually stop by there twice a week on my way home from school to check on incoming/outgoing materials. By 8:00 a.m. I was checking email in my grade school office, which is beginning to resemble a book warehouse. I placed a large book order last week and that has begun to arrive in various shipments right alongside a second order from four different vendors which is a collection of books that is to be displayed during a memorial service this Sunday for a 6th grader, Cassidy, who died in an auto accident at the beginning of the school year. Her family chose to give some funds to the library and specified several topics that were near and dear to Cassidy. I have designed commemorative bookplates and these need to be printed and placed in the books as we catalog them and prepare them for the shelf. Because I have such a limited budget in this school, I do all my own shelf prep, which adds to my time, but helps the bottom line. So, despite the boxes of books surrounding me, I focused on answering emails from several teachers needing books (note to self…need to design a handout explaining the online catalog to the staff and encourage them to use it) and other library-related questions answered. By 8:15 I was turning on computers and making sure my lesson materials were ready to go.
At 8:30 my class of 6th graders filed in and they set about finishing a booktalking project using Audacity. By this point in the project, the students always seem to be at various stages of completion: some are completely finished and need something else to do while others are desperately trying to finish before the 30 minutes is up. I move around and around the room answering individual questions and keeping students on track or otherwise occupied. At 9:00 a.m. the 4th graders are filing in and the 6th graders are leaving…although there are a few 6th grade hold-outs still clinging to their keyboards. One of the biggest challenges I deal with daily is my tight schedule. My classes are scheduled at 30 minute intervals with no passing period time in between. To help transition students in and out of the room, I’ve trained them to line up on either side of a long bookcase. There is “the side for coming in” and “the side for going out” ---just like the automatic doors at the grocery store! Library time is prep time for the classroom teachers, so I’m always hoping that they won’t be early dropping off and that they won’t be late picking up their classes! The 4th graders are finishing a simple research project in which each student located a book about their country (use of online catalog), filled in a worksheet about their country (research, reading, and notetaking skills), Used Microsoft Word to type the document according to a set of written formatting parameters (technology skills), and cited their source in MLA format. This was the culminating project after spending several weeks working on these skills individually. Again, I worked my way around the room, answering individual questions and troubleshooting. This class is frustrating me because they seem to have forgotten everything they ever knew about citations. They certainly aren’t connecting those citation lessons from a few weeks ago with the project they are trying to complete today. I make a note to have the 4th grade review citations for a few more lessons. At 9:30 the 4th graders are leaving and the 2nd graders just arriving are asked to report to the Star Carpet so that they can see the SmartBoard. This class has been learning about the difference between fiction and non-fiction and today we’ll review that before I challenge them to a game using the SmartBoard. The class does not seem to tire of watching the SmartBoard game judge their answers. I’ve really found that the interactivity and visual nature of the SmartBoard is riveting to students. I try to use mine daily. This lesson finishes a little early, so I fill the extra 7 minutes by having the students take all their books and put them in ABC or Dewey order. At 10:00 the 2nd graders leave while the 5th graders arrive. This class is doing a scavenger hunt by following clues I’ve planted throughout the various computer drives. This activity really sorts out who understands this skill and who doesn’t. As I walk around the room, I can quickly pick out a student who is at a loss and re-teach the concept to him/her individually. If the students are successful, the final clue instructs them to print out a small picture. The students seem to like these and set about trading them with each other (I purposely made the final few clues individual so that no two would be alike). Sometimes it doesn’t take a lot to please them…and I like finding these little enticements because I don’t give grades, so sometimes a little incentive is useful. It’s 10:30—and hip, hip, hooray—I’m making a grande mocha in my microwave because I have a 15 minute break before the next class arrives. I check email, get the circulation desk computer going, and nip into the faculty lounge to pick up my mail. I tidy the overflowing book drop and quickly drink the coffee before the 1st graders arrive at 10:45. The class sits in the storypit to hear parts of three different ABC books before moving to the Star Carpet so that they can watch the SmartBoard while I explain that we will be using our new Microsoft Word skills (opening program, changing font size and color, Saving, and closing program) to create our own ABC book. They look at an ABC book made by last year’s class and then we brainstorm ideas for their own book. We run out of time, so we’ll save their list of ideas and make a choice next week before we get started.
It is now 11:15 and I’ve taught 5 classes. From 11:15 to 12:45 I attack the chaos in my office by unpacking books and checking packing slips against my purchase orders. I make note of what’s missing or backordered. I notify the district bookkeeper how much should be paid and to whom. Check the email again while I wait for my lunch to finish cooking in the microwave. I eat it while talking to the parent volunteer who has just arrived to begin checking in books and shelving. I lost my grade school library aide last year and with the state’s financial crisis, I’ve been told not to expect that position to be reinstated for the foreseeable future. This means that the 200 or so books in my office will need to be carted over to the high school so that my HS aide can help catalog and do shelf prep. It also means that I will need to continue to recruit parent volunteers to work in the library to help with book check-in/check-out and shelving. I’ve discovered that this is a mixed blessing: although I’m grateful for their help, the truth is that supervising them and rectifying their mistakes takes time. I now take time to “walk the shelves” looking for out of place materials, and I’ve had to sort out various circulation issues with students and teachers. Also, volunteers tend to come and go, so I’ve discovered that I’m constantly recruiting new people and training them. I need to come up with some written training materials, too, but just haven’t had time. Before I get ready for afternoon classes, I update the Computer Lab sign-up page on the wiki and scan a few comments on the junior high Love of Literature wiki. Have a quick phone call from the Assistant Principal at the high school who wants me to teach some technology lessons to staff during in-service days.
From 12:45 to 2:45 I teach 4 sections of 3rd grade. These students are having a guided lecture on encyclopedia terms in preparation for the annual “Encyclopedia War.” It’s rather nice to have the same grade level back-to-back for a change.
From 2:45 to 3:00 I tidy the room, shut down computers, and check email one more time, then scoot out the door before the busses start arriving because I’m the junior high Scholastic Bowl team coach and we have to set up for a match which kicks off at 3:45.
5:00 p.m. – the match is over (we lost…bummer) and we cleaned up. My older daughter acted as scorekeeper in one of the competition rooms, but now she’s in a hurry to get home because she wants to eat and run over her lines before returning to the high school at 6:30 for play practice.
6:30 – We are back at the high school. Senior Daughter goes to play practice while Freshman Daughter and I go to the Winter Sports Awards Ceremony. She was on the dance squad and I’m the Yearbook Sponsor, so I take notes, just in case my Sports Editor doesn’t manage to turn up. I don’t see him in the audience anywhere.
7:30 – Freshman Daughter also reports to play practice and I head home…briefly considered stopping by the GS to work on a bulletin board I’m trying to finish (Citation Station which features citation format and several space aliens on their space station), but decide to head home and write this blog entry instead!
That is my day. It never really slows down. I often compare my job to a constantly moving gerbil wheel. I just get on and run, run, run trying to keep up! Over the course of 5 days I teach 26 fixed-schedule sections of elementary school and three of junior high. I’m very fortunate to have very supportive administrations backing me in both buildings. The teachers, too, are very complimentary of the curriculum I’ve instituted. (Before I arrived 4 years ago, there were no library classes). I’d like to be able to do more collaboration, but the truth is that when I’m not directly teaching classes at the elementary, I need to be at the High School running that library. I do my best to accommodate special requests (“I need my kids to be able to use Power Point by October”), but I don’t get much opportunity to go into the classrooms for true collaboration. I try to balance my curriculum between library/literary lessons and technology lessons. (There are no separate tech classes. I’m it.) Many of the administrative tasks of running a library (budgeting, reading reviews, placing orders, updating wikis, defining/refining procedures, ILL, cataloging, etc.) I either do during the high school portions of my week, or I do them on my own time after school and on week-ends. But even though I’m madly busy, I still love being able to design my own curriculum and assignments. I like teaching technology and connecting that to books and literature. I can’t imagine doing anything else!
Programming ideas for YA sci-fi
After reading Unwind by Neal Shusterman, I've been wildly searching for programming ideas. As a high school student I was very interested in books like 1984 and Brave New World. Today, many science fiction books are aimed at high school aged youth. Books like Little Brother by Cory Doctorow are aimed at issues that are very relevant to today's teens.
Both Unwind and Little Brother present different solutions to today's world problems, and their fallout. Both books show that problems like terrorism and the abortion debate can easily get out of hand and destroy lives. The idea that technology can monitor our every move or be used to reorganize our body parts into the body of another is shocking. And yet, like all good fiction, these books are both based on facts.
Unwind includes a BBC article about the stealing and selling of newborn's body parts as well as a post to eBay on the sale of a human soul. The take home message is that we are almost at the point where ths novel could take place. We do harvest organs from one body and use them in another. There have been examples of murders that occur because of people's reactions to abortion. This is the reality our world.
One display idea would be to put of fact or fiction posters along with facts and have patrons vote on whether or not it was true. This would help form a background as to the strangeness of our world. These fact or fiction displays could be physical posters or on the library Web site. They could be surveys that go out to an entire school, or a question of the day board.
For both books, it would also be interesting to have maps on display that show the action in the books. By showing users the locations of the action, it will help them to interact with a book's plot on another level.
To reinforce the information from Little Brother, a library could invite a hacker to come speak, or an engineer to show students how things work. It would even be interesting to get donations of old electronics and take them apart and put them back together again.
Both books fall outside the typical gendered nature of teen books for girls are mostly about love and teen books for boys are only about adventure. They both feature male and female main characters. They both give full voice to the difference in perspective that males and females have in any given situation. They both allow young people to imagine what could happen if certain rights are signed away by the government. Both books also show the power that teens can have to make the world a better place.
Another programming option for students would be to brainstorm a way to solve societies problems based on a local youth movement. The library staff could research and present examples of actual youth movements and their affect on the local community.
Also, the librarian and book group could talk about copyright law and creative commons licensing. Little Brother has a Creative Commons license and is available for free download online. Fans have translated the book to various langauges and uploaded it to the Web. Students could discuss licensing, copyright and the rights of users to materials.
Sources:
Cory Doctorow's site for Little Brother; http://craphound.com/littlebrother/
"Bongs, Virginity and Other Stuff You Can't Sell on Ebay" by David Kravets. Wired Magazine, February 11, 2009. http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/02/bongs-virginity/
"Ukraine baby theft claims probed" BBC News, August 26, 2005. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4189558.stm
Neal Shusterman's site for Unwind; http://www.storyman.com/books/unwind.html
Both Unwind and Little Brother present different solutions to today's world problems, and their fallout. Both books show that problems like terrorism and the abortion debate can easily get out of hand and destroy lives. The idea that technology can monitor our every move or be used to reorganize our body parts into the body of another is shocking. And yet, like all good fiction, these books are both based on facts.
Unwind includes a BBC article about the stealing and selling of newborn's body parts as well as a post to eBay on the sale of a human soul. The take home message is that we are almost at the point where ths novel could take place. We do harvest organs from one body and use them in another. There have been examples of murders that occur because of people's reactions to abortion. This is the reality our world.
One display idea would be to put of fact or fiction posters along with facts and have patrons vote on whether or not it was true. This would help form a background as to the strangeness of our world. These fact or fiction displays could be physical posters or on the library Web site. They could be surveys that go out to an entire school, or a question of the day board.
For both books, it would also be interesting to have maps on display that show the action in the books. By showing users the locations of the action, it will help them to interact with a book's plot on another level.
To reinforce the information from Little Brother, a library could invite a hacker to come speak, or an engineer to show students how things work. It would even be interesting to get donations of old electronics and take them apart and put them back together again.
Both books fall outside the typical gendered nature of teen books for girls are mostly about love and teen books for boys are only about adventure. They both feature male and female main characters. They both give full voice to the difference in perspective that males and females have in any given situation. They both allow young people to imagine what could happen if certain rights are signed away by the government. Both books also show the power that teens can have to make the world a better place.
Another programming option for students would be to brainstorm a way to solve societies problems based on a local youth movement. The library staff could research and present examples of actual youth movements and their affect on the local community.
Also, the librarian and book group could talk about copyright law and creative commons licensing. Little Brother has a Creative Commons license and is available for free download online. Fans have translated the book to various langauges and uploaded it to the Web. Students could discuss licensing, copyright and the rights of users to materials.
Sources:
Cory Doctorow's site for Little Brother; http://craphound.com/littlebrother/
"Bongs, Virginity and Other Stuff You Can't Sell on Ebay" by David Kravets. Wired Magazine, February 11, 2009. http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/02/bongs-virginity/
"Ukraine baby theft claims probed" BBC News, August 26, 2005. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4189558.stm
Neal Shusterman's site for Unwind; http://www.storyman.com/books/unwind.html
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
The Art of Seeing
“Any fool can learn how to paint. The trick is learning to see.” ~ Dorothy McCarthy
In class, we discussed what it means to really “see” art. The responses indicated that many people in the class felt that a person should have an understanding of the art or artist in order to “see” the art. I began to question that assumption, though. Do I need to know the difference between cubism and impressionism in order to “see” a painting?
I think it is important to understand what we mean when we say we are “really seeing” art. To me, “seeing” art is to look at it through my own filter of human experience, and forming a reaction to it. Anna shared with us her own response to artist Richard Serra, explaining that her response to his art is so deep that it is not just emotional or intellectual, but also physical, as she feels a sense of calm as she views his work. It seems to me that this response has nothing to do with what she “knows” about the art or the artist, and everything to do with her own reaction to it.
As humans, we feel the need to create. When we look at art, we are reacting to another’s creation with our own recognition of the creativity within ourselves. When we look at a piece of artwork, we are projecting ourselves onto that piece of work in order to interpret how it fits into the scaffolding we have in place which forms what we know.
The practice of seeing art, for most people, is separate from knowing about the artist, or about an artistic movement, or an artist’s motivation for creation. Understanding an artist, and having a reaction to his or her artwork are two entirely separate things. With this in mind then, what does visual literacy mean? Does a person need to understand techniques of art creation, or perhaps art history to be visually literate?
This is something I have thought about a great deal. I have a confession to make: I don’t “get” most modern art. When I lived in London, I worked five minutes away from the Tate Modern. After several visits and hearing both intellectual and emotional arguments for many of the “installations”, I was left scratching my head. What was I missing? As a smart woman, why didn’t I have any reaction to this art beyond bemusement? The refrain in my head when I walked through installations or stood in front of sculptures was, “why?” Why is this art? What makes the person who created this an artist?
This is in strict opposition to my reaction to the art of the old masters, which, to me, are indicative of a clear talent, the ability to render, with paint, an emotionally evocative, relatable picture that “says a thousand words”. I personally need to admire an artist’s talent, and I have a hard time recognizing talent in much of the modern art I have experienced. I can recognize the value in modern art. I can learn the influences and motivation behind any given modern artist’s work. But can I really “see” it? When I don’t have an emotional reaction to it, I can say I’ve seen it, but perhaps I have missed the essential connection. Art seems to me to be about a connection between the eye, mind and heart. If one of those is missing, have we really “seen” the art? I can have the connection between eye and mind, but the connection to my heart is missing.
On the other hand, the works of the Pre-Raphaelite brotherhood, on the other hand, stir my soul, providing the calm that Anna described, completing the eye-mind-heart connection. After one “sees” art, and establishes one’s reaction to it, it would seem that it is the critical analysis of that reaction which comprises visual literacy.
Though there are technical underpinnings and a media-specific body of knowledge accompanying not just visual art, but each of the media we discuss, I question whether one needs this technical knowledge to be literate in the consumption of that media. When viewing film, or listening to music, in order to teach youth to become more literate in these media, we must encourage the awareness of each individual’s response to the media. Is it critical thinking that forms the basis of media literacy, as the opposite of mindless media consumption? As librarians and educators, we can illustrate to our youth that in analyzing the “why” behind their reactions to media, they are analyzing both the media and their own identity – both of which are key in youth development and education.
At Seventeen, She's a Lunatic
Her world thrums with life, it beats
and swells and
drums with life.
Always hurried, insistent, incessant -
it's a pain; it's a pang.
All her world's a stage.
Her days are symphonies -
Beethoven or Dvorak -
on repeat at the long, slow melancholy melodies.
They're Romantic novels -
Jane Austen or Jane Eyre -
with wide, foggy meadows, and tall flaming turrets.
She steps, she slides,
she runs with life.
She hums in place with life.
Her world is the forehead of a boy -
his dark, dramatic hairline,
his clever fingers drumming
on his desk,
on her brain.
Her whole world is the forehead of this boy,
filling her retina like the waxing moon.
He's Darcy and she's Elizabeth;
He's James McAvoy and she's Keira Knightley;
He's Henry Miller and she's Anais Nin.
Her nights are Frank Miller stills -
stepping out past curfew with her girls,
her only loves,
and finding them in the shadows
by the whites of their eyes.
She finds them in the city streets
like Nine Inch Nails,
thrumming and insistent,
driving ever forward.
Her dreams are Charlie Kaufman films -
Eternal Sunshine or John Malkovich -
labyrinths of consciousness,
wistful and desperate.
And her days, again, are Van Gogh swirls,
Botticelli curls,
Debussy whirls.
She thrills and trills and
spins with life; she fills and spills
and bursts with life.
Her world is one big, rosy, throbbing organ,
sensitive to her touch,
to her molding,
and always tilting slightly forward,
flushed and hushed,
waiting on its toes.
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