Hanging Tight

Started today with calling Scholastic to do my financials with them. I am just going to put the little bit of money I collected into my own account and write them a check. That was how I can do it! Thank goodness I didn't have any checks! With no office and no access to our bookkeeper, I'm glad there are no checks made out to the school I have to figure out! Then I went onto a call from technology and it appears that I cannot reset passwords because I am on a personal device instead of a district device. So, I had sent out instructions yesterday, and now I have to modify them already! Of course! I put that out in a meeting with the teachers today. I also accessed my IA instructions and have two classes I'll support so I've asked the teachers to bring me in to those. I'm packing up my Scholastic monies and am going to deposit those! Had the classified meeting today and I am involved with two teachers for support and for resources for the school. Cool beans! This afternoon I took the deposit of the Scholastic monies to the bank and wrote out the check, printed the invoice and got that ready to go in the mail tomorrow morning. Checked in here and there. I also went to my Aunt's house this afternoon because the mask I made her didn't fit the way she wanted! We went to elastic over the ears and had a nice distance chat while I hand sewed on the ear straps. 

Starting all Over

Today is the first day of our Long Distance Learning, so we are all learning! Staff and students! Today I am concentrating on getting all my book reviews up on my blog here. It had been a long while and I often use it for book recommendations for students (and staff). I had to get my Leslie Library history list and my Salem Public Library list together and I have a few books that are my own. After I finish with the two that are my own, I'll put them out in our Little Free Library and set them loose! It's getting a lot of action out there! Got all my reviews done with morning. Had two Microsoft Teams calls, one with our office manager on how to get a student signed into their Chromebook and another call with a teacher on getting her student logged into our Axis360 program. Great to be able to help! I also downloaded flipgrid and thought I'd do my own videos, but I found Words on Fire online! So I sent that out to Language Arts team. 

Should be Friday!

Had two meetings today, our noon staff meeting and then a meeting with our Superintendent of schools. As we gear up for long distance teaching, good to have the reassurance of those in charge that we will get through this. Plans for keeping our sanity. That being in community even if only online is a good thing! I started reading my first book talk book today, Restart by Gordon Korman, and am enjoying it! I will work on the Flipgrid when I get done! I wish I was a video guru! I could have so much fun with this! Worked on a few things with our LMA team. Resources for students and I ended up connecting them back to our district English 6 Digital Learning Standards Map 2020 - since they were already there. I did link up our DLC staff to the Tumblebooks access. I often wondered why we had Tumblebooks on our webpage, but now I know! Because one day our DLC kids would really need this great resource! Was nice to sit on my patio this afternoon and read, and knowing I was working! Have a great weekend and remember to be kind humans!

What Day Is It?

I have to really think about it sometimes! Today I contacted our Scholastic warehouse to let him know that I never unpacked all the brown boxes that came with the book fair. Sent an email to our LA 6th team about Opposing Viewpoints for their Argue Issues unit they are to be working on. I went over Opposing Viewpoints to check it out first! That was fine, now I'm into Books and Authors and I'm seeing a summary, but not sure if I can load the book! I'm seeing if it will load on my district cloud! We'll see! Argh, had to write my PA to ask if they are just snippets or if we can download the entire book. I wish!!! Going through all the Google Classroom trainings. So glad I'm not a teacher! They are on such a learning curve! I'm also going to look at flipgrid for book talk videos! I also sent an email to our Language Arts teachers that I can be a support in helping students with finding books and reading books and also sent a resource path to social studies teachers to use for their students. Already have an add into Ms. R's class and she put in an assignment for them to put in a book recommendation! That was from my talk with my PA who asked for suggestions for eBooks! Yeah!

Virtually Done

Middle School Magic virtual conference was all morning! Then our noon staff meeting. I'll be back later, probably tonight with more about the conference. After all that time sitting in front of my computer, I made the choice to walk over to the school and pack up the Book Fair since I didn't know if we'd be let back in after today. It's a little over three miles, a nice day and I cut through the neighborhoods to angle over to Leslie. There's a beautiful patch of forest and meadow I got to walk by that I felt I could just breathe, relax and take in this gorgeous space just a couple of blocks off one of our busiest streets. When I got to the school, one of our IA's was happy we met, she had taken one of the Chromebooks home before we left but didn't have the power cord, so I took her down to the library and yes, it was there in the cart! She was so happy. She also said they had just announced that the schools were closed for the rest of this school year. Oh my. I called my hubby and asked for him to bring the car so I could bring home my personal items. I had two pictures at least that would not be fun to walk home with and I could bring home a box of books for book talks! Yeah! I got the book fair all packed up and talked to our custodian on duty about the time frame, would they be there and how that would all work out, seems that it will be fine since custodial will be there. Hard to realize how much I miss our students, my aides, my online students for first period, my drop in students working on projects, even just standing in the halls during passing greeting students. I often dreaded having students in during lunches, because some of them really should have been outside, not using their energy in the library, but yes, I even miss them, the ones that were quiet, the Makerspace getting it out and cleaning up. I don't think I realized how much of my day was spent interacting with students. Feeling it. We'll make it through!  Be safe, be kind and keep reading!

Sun!

The sun is shining right onto my computer face, ugh, will have to move it or maybe the sun will move behind one of the trees behind me. Starting the day with reading over the guidelines coming up for long distance learning. The Distance Learning Resources. In the Secondary Education Distance Learning Guidelines there is a point in there that students need to read at least one hour a week. That is quite a low minimum, but so very glad that we have been beefing up our online books the last several years! The Middle School Distance Planning Overview. I am looking at all of these since I've signed up to be a resource for the Language Arts classes and I need to know how they are going to work that and be ready for questions about not only book access, but also our other resources. Mondays will be a key date for seeing what lesson plans are for the week. Now to check out the Language Arts shared documents. Looking at the ELA Grade 6 Digital Learning Standards Map 2020: Looks like they are doing Argumentative Essays, so I will be sure to direct them to the Opposing Viewpoints in our OSLIS portal. Love, love, LOVE all the reading resources at the bottom of that! Great job Kari Caulder for getting those all in one place!! Amazing! Love the Library of Congress link! Grade 7 is going to be working on Creating Literature - that would be the Writing Fiction area. I'll have to go through our online resources, I have lots in the library, but not accessible. Perhaps direct them to being Pen Pals? Like I Will Always Write You Back - even though it is non-fiction, just the idea of sharing your life, and letting the writing take off from there might help some of the students. Perhaps even share Camp Nanowrimo for some ideas. April is also poetry month and a lot of students are getting into that with Kwame Alexander and our novels in verse. Now onto 8th grade - Utilizing Narrative Skills. I'll have to look at some things. Maybe suggest plays? Those are all narrative! I know the teachers will have their own ways to handle things and I'm just another resource for them to use. I am always so impressed by our teaching staff and they are so way beyond in their thinking of how to teach students. Just amazing to watch them work and see what they do. Sent a note of encouragement to our IC - she gave me a great note months ago, so I'm turning it around and back at her! Not much for the math DL, but checking them all out anyways. Science too. Social Studies, there we go. Aztecs, Indigenous peoples, Oceania and Africa - all great for our resources. Justice and Equity and Equality for the 8th graders. There are some links, but not to our media resources. I'll bring that up at our LMA meeting today. That's it for now, I'll be back later. Had our noon meeting, they are getting shorter and shorter! There is so much work for the teachers to do, it's a good thing. Checking in once a day is good, information is good, then let us go to work! I have another meeting at 2, and will be working on some other things between now and then, like lunch! Our LMSS meeting went for over an hour and it was the first time we'd all gotten together. We talked that technology is the only ones who can reset passwords (we used to be able to do that!). Asking for feedback on what eBooks we might purchase or beef up for online use. Moving our Axis360 move up the Library page so it's easily seen. That teachers can add time for individual reading over the district's one hour a week requirement. And one LMA used Flipbooks to start doing book talks so she sent us an example. I'm sure there was more, but those were the main ones I jotted down. Have I mentioned yet in this time that I love my job?? Yes, I do.

Contact

Today I put a link into a resource sheet for our students on the eBooks, Axis360 that we have. She had a lot of other reading resources, but not that one. I let her know! We had our all staff meeting at noon and after that I contacted all my student aides by school email:

Hi xxx,

     I hope that you are doing all right, taking care of yourself and your family.  Just want you to know to not worry about any library aide grades. You did great work! And I know you would continue to do well if we were at school. We are not sure where the next few weeks will take us, but I hope at some point to have you back as an aide again.

     I hope you are getting in some reading. Don't forget about all the great eBooks we have on our Axis360 platform through the school! Your Language Arts teacher should have the link right on their page. If you need it, please let me know I'll make sure you have that information.

     Let me know if there's anything I can do for you.

     Please be safe out there, 

I hope I get back some responses and they feel comfortable in reaching out to me if they want. I also put that into our LMA Team drive for other LMA's to see if they wanted to do.

3 Best Parts

Had two meetings today with our school network and then with our Superintendent. Our school meeting went fairly quickly, and I spoke up on how amazing it was without knowing that this event would flip our world, that technology started two years ago to replace all computer labs with each classroom having its own computer cart. Today and yesterday the district gave out literally thousands of computers to students to take home to start long distance learning. If they hadn't been proactive at taking that stance that our district needed to do that, we would not have had the ability to equip our students for learning from home. Kudos to Technology and the folks who pushed to make that happen.

Our superintendent asked us to reflect on the three best parts of this week and three of the best learning ideas you did this week.

Best Parts:  Teachers excited to teach, even if remotely; getting to work on the bond work that includes the library; able to send out resources for our teachers to use

Best Learning:  Microsoft Teams! We'd already done quite a bit in our Library Media group, but now with teachers and meetings, quite the learning curve;  Getting back into our digital learning resources with Gale; setting up my home computer to be able to work from home!

All in all, an important week as I did really a lot of things just from home. I miss my aides, and the student contact I get. Walking around my library and playing with the books. But I was amazed at what I accessed and worked with just from here at home. We've been tasked with doing nothing work related for the weekend, and I'm all for that!

Thought it was at 2

So, I had two meetings today and I thought one was at 2, but no, it's at 3! Oh well. So working on this instead. I attended at Webinar from Gale learning on using their school platforms. It has changed a bit, but it was only half an hour long, so they did a lot in just that half hour with high school programs and a bit on the elementary side. I started working on an email out to all our teachers on how to access that from our OSLIS page, but they also had a great page on how to teach from the corona side, and I can't find that web address and we're supposed to get that emailed to us, and I haven't gotten it yet. Then we had our staff meeting and I asked to talk about all our resources available and they let me come in and encourage our staff to use them and for staff to encourage our kids to use them. I also checked out our OSLIS news and they have a virtual summit coming up on April 8th, so I signed up for that and let our other LMA's know about it. Now, I thought our Bond work team was to meet at 2, but no, we are meeting at 3. I think when we set up the meeting, we thought we'd have to wait until school was out for the day. There is a place in Leslie's bond work to do some things in the library, and that's why I want to give some input! We had a great meeting online and I got to speak with several of the people involved in getting Leslie ready for their bond work. Our Director of Design and Construction, our Head of Construction and one of the architects! The scope of what they need to do is amazing and the library is just a small part of what all needs to be accomplished! I'm looking forward to seeing what the library will look like!

Just You and Me

I'm going to just try and add to this when I work on something. This morning I went onto our Insight 24J and found the Teacher Professional eBooks that we have and sent the link out to our staff. Our IC asked why she couldn't get on there, and figured it out that it didn't need her full work email, just the last and first name from before the @. Then she asked how I was doing, so I replied with what I've been up to and that yeah! I finally got in my picture for the student slide encouragement show they want to put on! This was mine!

I like it! I also sent an email out to the teacher who is across the hall from the library to see how he is doing. I dorked around on the Insight 24J and tried to get into our Academy for Teaching and Learning, but there's no access at the moment. I was hoping to find some OnLine classes. Maybe because most of them are meetings? I'll have to find out. I also went in and edited our email overdue book notices, I changed the details from email to "Internal" - I just need to remember to turn back on the email notices if we come back! We may not I have heard. I also posted in our LMA Teams a reading log for us to post what we are reading. Noon - getting set for our virtual school meeting. I wasn't in the right one, but then yes, we are live. We are still mandatory reporters. Check for concerning comments. Our PA also did a post on Teams about audio books so I added in that Amazon is also offering audio books for free as long as the schools are closed.