The fourth annual Banned Websites Awareness Day makes excessive filtering an intellectual freedom issue in K–12 learning.
Fight the ‘Zombie Librarians’ | ISTE 2014
By on July 9, 2014
Jennifer LaGarde’s sold-out ISTE presentation, “How to Survive the Zombie Librarian Apocalypse!,” struck a chord among teacher librarians. Her talk hinged on a statement she’d once heard: “There are only two types of librarians: zombies and zombie fighters.”
Transmedia and Education: How Transmedia Is Changing the Way We Learn
By on June 11, 2014
SLJ explores how transmedia storytelling, or telling a story across media platforms, has cracked open possibilities for educators to teach and assess, as well as opportunities for students to learn.
Being a Savvy Social Media User
By on April 8, 2014
Recently my colleague Karen Smith-Yoshimura noted a blog post that demonstrates effective traits for using social media on behalf of an organization. Titled “Social Change”, the post documents the choices that Brooklyn Museum staff made recently to pare down their social media participation to venues that they find most effective. As they put it: There […]
What’s Not to ‘Like’? Rethinking Restrictive Social Media Policies
By on March 10, 2014
Most schools have highly regulated Internet policies that don’t address the productive use of social media by students. It’s time to revisit these rules.
Teen Tech Week 2014: Computer Tear Downs, Skyping, and Raspberry Pis
By on February 24, 2014
Maker spaces, robot construction, and computer tear-downs will figure prominently in librarians’ Teen Tech Week lineups this year, taking place from March 9 through 15.
CIPA at 10: Internet Filtering Excessive, Study Finds | ALA Midwinter Meeting
By on February 10, 2014
A decade after the Children’s Internet Protection Act (CIPA) went into effect, its implementation in schools and public libraries is problematic and the scale of Internet filtering is excessive, panelist said during the ALA Midwinter session “Revisiting The Children’s Internet Protection Act: 10 Years Later.”
EBSCO Acquires Altmetrics Provider Plum Analytics
By on January 15, 2014
EBSCO Information Services today announced the acquisition of Plum Analytics, the developer of PlumX, a tool that gives researchers and institutions a more complete view of the impact of their publications by harvesting and aggregating alternative metrics (altmetrics) data in five major categories: usage, captures, mentions, social media, and citations. Plum will continue to offer the same services, with the same management team, operating as a wholly-owned subsidiary of EBSCO.
Device & Conquer: SLJ’s 2013 Tech Survey
By on December 5, 2013
As education technology has evolved, so, too, have the kinds of digital tools that school librarians use with their students. More than 750 school librarians responded to SLJ’s survey, representing K–12 public and private schools across the country. According to the data, they make the most of what they have, learning one day and sharing that knowledge the next.
No Such Thing As Too Many Cat Pictures: Q&A With Amanda Brennan | The Digital Shift 2013
By on October 30, 2013
Social media is becoming a more and more important way for libraries to interact with their patrons, and one ingredient of that is passing along interesting pieces of information about the library’s many programs and activities. Another very important part, though, is posting the occasional cat picture or funny video, or other piece of viral content, commonly known as memes. At The Digital Shift: Reinventing Libraries virtual event, held by Library Journal and School Library Journal on October 16, Know Your Meme’s resident librarian, Amanda Brennan, offered her thoughts on how libraries can use memes to engage their patrons and boost their followings on platforms like Twitter and Facebook. We revisited that presentation, and picked Brennan’s brain on some other points, in a Q&A that offers some pointers for beginners looking to make their library’s Facebook page a must read.
