Birthday Song

A pleasant surprise. The Estudiantina came to sing The Maninatas song for my birthday. So many talented students on our campus.

Library Statistics

Well Porter Readers, you did it again. This second six weeks was just as busy as the first six weeks with everyone checking out books and magazines. In my last post I suggested that we should aim for 4000, well we hit 4003!!! That is just wonderful. The numbers are high once again in the 741.5 area but we had almost 1200 circulations in Fiction. New books are arriving soon so let's keep reading through the holidays.

Anime Club

Our wonderful Anime kids recently had a meeting in the library. They watched a video and our club President quizzed them afterwards. The winner received an Anime key chain. It was a hard quiz considering the video was in Japanese.

Cross Country Team

Good Luck to our Boys Cross Country Team as they get ready to compete this week-end at Regionals. All those early morning practices and ten mile runs paid off. "May the wind always be at your back".

Library Statistics

I knew it was a busy first six weeks but really I had no idea! We circulated over 3,600 items this six weeks. Most of our circulations are in the fiction area, how great is that?
Our other big area of circulation is of course 741.5, gee I wonder why. Porter Readers are great! Let's keep up the reading and try for 4,000 circulations.

Banned Books Week

Banned Books Week is celebrated the week of September 26 - October 3. The central message for Banned Books Week is that censorship violates the right of free expression. Observed annually, this ALA event celebrates the freedom to read books that may be considered inappropriate or express unpopular ideas.

We have set up our annual display showcasing some of the challenged titles. This display always generates interest and discussion among our students and faculty as they see some of their favorite titles in our display case.

While in Austin this past summer I visited my favorite store Book People and found the following bumper sticker : Everything I need to know about life I've learned by reading Banned Books.

From the Fields to the Stars

What an inspirational story. This just proves that "Si se puede". We are a high school that is predominantly Hispanic with a Migrant population. It takes hard work, sacrifice and dedication but everything is possible.

From the Fields to the Stars

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Oscar Casares

Porter High School graduate and author Oscar Casares was in town this past week. Mr. Casares did a reading of his new book, Amigoland, at the Brownsville Fine Arts Museum. He answered questions and autographed books for the hometown crowd.

His first book, Brownsville: stories, a collection of short stories about life in our very unique border town was well received. I am sure his new novel will do just as well. Mr. Casares has a unique style of writing, very descriptive and quite his own.

11.5 Thing # 11.5

A big thanks to Spring Branch ISD for letting me participate once again. This was much better than just being a lurker. Once again I have learned so much and am so anxious to share with my faculty when school starts.

My favorite discovery has been using screen capture and glogster. GoView is so easy to use, I love it. I am currently working a summer bridge program for incoming freshmen and have created a short video on how to search for books using OPAC. Super easy to do and even easier to embed in my wiki. Students pay attention to a video, especially a quick short one. Am still playing around with Glogster.

My learning goals remain the same. I consider myself a lifelong learner and this program if anything has reemphasized this. Even an old geezer like me can learn new things and have loads of fun. My favorite part is that now even some of the younger faculty members will come and ask me questions about technology.

The most unexpected thing for me is how quickly technology is changing the way we live. It took me a while to Twitter but now I really rely on it and all of the blogs I keep up with in my Google Reader. What sometimes troubles me is when I read the tweets of all of the people I follow and keep up with the blogs I follow I begin to feel really inferior. When do these people find the time to do so much online? Do they not have families? Do they not cook, shop, read books, visit with friends, walk their dog, go to the movies, sleep? I know I've said this before but I often feel like I'm playing catch-up all of the time.

Really I can't think of anything that could be done differently to make this experience a better one. There is always lots of support and encouragement and the whole atmosphere is very non-threatening. Thank you Spring Branch once again. This Valley girl is a big fan.

11.5 Thing # 11

Digital citizenship is a great topic and one I am glad is a part of 11.5 things. A few years ago at TLA I attended a session given by Alan November. He discussed how many websites are deceiving. He showed the audience a Martin Luther King web site which was really set up by the KKK and was propaganda. Site evaluation is one of our students' least favorite things to do and one that few teachers enforce. Every year during Freshmen orientation I mention the MLK website in an attempt to teach the students not to take everything on the web at its face value. Stephen Downes on Cool Cat teacher says that a person who reads a website and believes it to be true no matter what is illiterate. How true is that? Etti quite is another important lesson which I stress during orientation. This is extremely important to me. I tell my students that cyber bullying is wrong, if you won't say something directly to someone why is it okay to post it on the Internet? In this technology driven world we live in we need to learn to be good "citizens".

11.5 Thing # 10

This was way outside of my comfort zone. Unfortunately, or fortunately for me, the software crashed on my computer. I got an error message, seems my older laptop cannot handle the program. My new laptop will not be ready until late August. I did read all of the blogs and posts and was very impressed with the middle schoolers who are using second life. I can see how this would appeal to our techno savvy kids who have grown up with computers and gaming. Adding the education element would be as natural to our students as breathing. I, on the other hand, could learn how to do this if I attended a session and was walked through this. Maybe I will contact Mrs. Ovalle at Region One and ask her to offer second life as a possible topic for inservice.

11.5 Thing #9

I had come across slideshare previously. Often when I attend a conference it is easier to just watch and listen to presentations than try to take notes. Presenters are great about posting their PowerPoint on slideshare and I can then view at my leisure or download for further study.
What great tools for teachers. Many teachers use PowerPoint to teach their lessons, posting on slideshare or another of the hosting sites allow students access to lectures they might have missed due to an absence. Our students often have home computers but do not always have access to Microsoft Office which means no PowerPoint. 280 slides is FREE and a great tool for the students.

Five Social Software Sites that libraries shouldn't ignore

View more presentations from sirexkat.

11.5 Thing # 8

As I was reading the assignment I was brainstorming as to all of the different ways that I could use this tool. Freshmen orientation, teaching everyone how to use the DKC databases, faculty in services, etc. Then I attempted to use ScreenCastle, various attempts by the way. Not sure what I was doing wrong but my buttons would disappear and I couldn't figure out how to get them back. Tried Jing next, Sun what Sun, it never appeared on my desktop. At this point I started feeling really insignificant and went to bed. Woke up the next morning and tried GoView. What a relief, made a quick video and was able to embed. Will next try to record myself doing a quick overview of the databases and posting on my blog or wiki and let the teachers know it is there to use from their classroom before they visit the library. Great reinforcement.

11.5 Thing # 7

Video is such a huge part of our everyday experience and can be used so effectively in the classroom. Hulu, which I had visited many times before, is a great site. I must admit that I tended to go to Hulu when I needed to catch up on a missed episode of House or one of my other favorite shows. Can't wait to tell the teachers about all of the other videos located in this great site. Found videos of President Obama's weekly address, how great is that? Government teachers would love to have that for their students. Joyce Valenza as always has a great list of video resources, they are now tagged in my del.icio.us account. Had never heard of Blinkx, found a site just for teens with gossip video clips and other videos of interest to teens.
Our teachers will love the PBS site as well as some of the National Geographic videos. Often our school budget does not allow us to spend as much as we would like on videos, this is a great way for our teachers to use current videos or clips from news and documentaries that cover material being discussed in class. Great way to keep the students attention.

The first video I chose is a movie trailer for a movie that I am anxiously awaiting. Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak was a favorite of my daughters, my husband and I would read it over and over to them. A few years ago my husband surprised me with a set of all of the characters from the book. I want to display the figures in the library before the movie is released. The second video is from Google Video and is on Hurricane Katrina . Our social studies teachers are always looking for short clips to share with their students while lecturing as a way to make history more real to the students. Considering we live on the coast, this video is extremely relevant.

11.5 Thing # 6

I was really looking forward to this assignment because my goal is to purchase an IPhone very soon, thought I would be able to practice on my daughter's ITouch. Wrong, daughter was not keen on me messing with her new device. The nerve! I did, however, enjoy looking through all of the blog postings on all of the apps that are free or available for purchase. Our school recently purchased 60 IPods which we had to process. My fellow librarian and I were wondering what the teachers would use them for and we were both concerned about security. One of the blogs led me to 100 Ways to Use your Ipod to learn and study better. What a great site. Love the apps for ESL Podcast, great for our newcomers. Spark notes has a great SAT Vocabulary builder which would be great for our Juniors and Seniors preparing for the test.
So many apps to choose from, I am really looking forward to getting my new phone soon and am now feeling a little better about our school Ipods.

11.5 Thing # 5

There are so many applications for Twitter as far as classroom use goes. Just recently I was speaking to our English Chair and suggested that her AP students could set up accounts and she could have them Tweet their responses to certain questions, essays, literary analysis etc. How precise do you have to be with the amount of characters provided? Talk about checking for understanding. This is just one way that I have been thinking of presenting Twitter to our faculty. I have been considering forming a Twitter account for our school library. I can tweet about library happenings, new book arrivals and other library news. Am thinking of calling our Twitter account PorterReaders.
I formed my own facebook page about a month ago. It did take me a while to take the plunge but I'm finally in. Will be honest and say that it doesn't really rock my boat. Am I too old? I do keep up with friends, but sometimes I still think we put so much of ourselves out there for other people to see/know. Have been considering setting up a facebook account for my library but facebook is blocked from school so I am still at the consideration stage.
About 15 years ago I set up a Biology class with our old satellite dish to watch a live program , the students had the chance to call in (yes with an actual land line phone) and ask questions. Back-channeling is the Web 2.0 version of this. Participants have a chance to tweet questions or comments to the presenter or to other participants thus giving the presenter a chance to keep his/her lecture or presentation relevant to the audience. This is perfect for some of our Dual-enrollment students who listen to the professor lecture through the web and can now have a way to really feel like they are part of the class.

11.5 Thing # 4

I really don't know what it is about posting on YouTube that makes me so nervous. I Twitter, I Blog and have a Wiki. Maybe it is really putting myself out there, not just my thoughts and ideas, but an actual product created by me and graded by everyone. Insecure? You bet! Students, however, have no qualms about posting videos and pretty much everything else on the web.
Some of our English teachers that I have introduced Animoto to have had students create videos and then post them on their own Wikis that I have helped them set up. Students love seeing their finished products on the web. This has had the advantage of showing other students that if Mrs. Cavazos's class can do it, so can they.
Teachers can access some of the videos on either TeacherTube or YouTube to help them present a lesson in a different format or introduce a new concept. I have used some of the videos produced by Common Craft to introduce Wikis and Blogs to our staff. Great teaching tool.
I am really not sure I will leave my videos on YouTube for long, too amateurish.

11.5 Thing # 3

Must confess that I had heard of Skype before. Even saw it in action once, a movie or commercial I think. My daughter has an Apple laptop and she Ichats constantly. Her best friend traveled to Europe last summer and they kept in touch through their laptops. They chatted all through Europe. Pretty cool huh?
Skype has the ability to allow students to communicate with other students all over the world. Home bound students can video stream their lessons and communicate with all of their teachers as well as fellow students. The blog post about Skype based reference in the library was very interesting. I already have my email on our library's main page but adding Skype would be an interesting twist. Looked through the other apps for web based calling or conferencing, for the most part they seem to work very similar. My next big purchase will be an IPhone and am looking forward to paying the $0.99 for some of the applications I read about.

11.5 Thing # 2

Wordle is an excellent tool and so very easy to work with. If you pay close attention to advertising, word clouds are widely used. What an excellent tool to use in all subject areas. How about a Biology class listing all of the parts of an animal or plant cell?
Wordsift is just amazing. Again, how about putting all of the parts of a cell in the space provided and watch the images and links show up. Can't wait to share this with my teachers.
Will have to explore Glogster further. I want to look closely at all of the videos and try my hand at creating. Would like to use Glogster in the library setting as a way for me to display new titles. Right now my students are reading anything supernatural and are always asking for new titles. Here is a way for me to post new titles as they arrive. Animoto and Voki are old friends. I have created quite a few videos using Animoto and have presented to classes. Students have made quite a few book trailers using this great tool. My teachers love it.

11.5 Thing # 1

I had so much fun with 23 Things the first go round, I decided to participate with ESC 1 when 23 Things was offered. Now Spring Branch ISD has 11.5 Things and here we go again. This time I will skip the registration process and will participate as a lurker.
As I watched the video I was once again fascinated by the amount of information and Web 2.0 tools that are available. From Google Scholar to all of the free podcast that are easily accessible to anyone who wants the information it is truly mind boggling. As a librarian it is so easy to see my role as a facilitator to these information gatherers. We are always here to guide patrons to sites, teach how to gleam fact from opinion or propaganda and how to sort and process the information. Even now our roles as teachers and librarians are not shrinking but rather evolving as we guide our students/patrons to become efficient information users.

Beat Nite

It's that time of year again, time for our annual Beat Nite. Mr. Hixon's Senior English classes invade our library and turn it into a "Beat Cafe" right out of the 50's. Snap, snap, clapping is not allowed. It is hard to let them tear the library apart but they really do wonders and transform the library into a cool cafe where poets read and musicians play.
The Beat Movement which began in the 1950's was a term coined to describe an ant-establishment movement. Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac were two prominent poets of the Beat Movement.
The night will be filled with poems dealing with first love, first love lost, family issues, fear of the unknown (college) and some regular teen angst. Many of the poems are truly heartbreaking to hear. It makes you realize how much baggage some of our students carry around.

Book Club Field Trip

Our Book Club traveled to Barnes and Noble for our annual field trip and we had loads of fun. What a great group of kids. We are truly blessed to work with such a nice group of young adults who love to read and think that going to a book store is wonderful. We are sorry to see our Seniors leave but wish them all the best and look forward to recruiting some Freshmen for next year. So many books to read such little time.


Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

Technology Conference Day Two

Day two of the Region One ESC Technology Conference and it was better than yesterday. Attended a Twitter session which was informative and fun. The presenter was witty and kept the session fresh. The Flip Video session was so much fun!! We recently purchased a Flip camera for the library and I wanted to see how to use it effectively in the library. I'm thinking of practicing what I learned by taping the seniors signing the senior bulletin board we set up for them every year and posting the video on our library blog. The kids will love it, they are such hams. The Movie maker session was so informative. For some reason I was intimidated by movie maker, I thought Photo story was easier. Now maybe I can try my hand at making book trailers using both types of media.

As much as I have loved attending this conference, I really need to get back to work. My assistants texted me all morning about situations that required my attention. That was my clue, that although I have two more days of this wonderful conference I really need to get back to work.

I am really lucky to work at Porter High School where my administration allows me to not only attend the Texas Library Conference every year, but also other conferences which allow me to grow as a professional.

Technology Conference

Day One of Region One ESC Technology Conference. It was very hard deciding what sessions to attend, reminded me of TLA, when there are 2 or 3 sessions I want to attend and they are all at the same time. Thanks to whoever thought of repeating the sessions on different days of the conference and/or different times.
Web 2.0 is being covered in different sessions by different presenters. Thankfully, I have completed 23 Things and am familiar with many of the Web 2.0 tools. Google Docs was a good session, the presenter answered many of my questions. One great thing about the conference is after only one day I have a list of possible topics for teacher inservice days.

H1N1

Here it is, the dreaded H1N1. This is the virus that forced so many schools to close. H1N1, according to the Centers for Disease Control, is a new virus that causes influenza like symptoms and is probably spread people-to-people. Thankfully, there have not been as many people stricken with the disease. Unfortunately, one Mercedes, Texas school teacher has died from complications associated with H1N1. Preventive measures and good common sense are in my opinion why the flu has not spread as quickly or as virulently as thought.

Now we wait to hear whether we make up this week or get a waiver from TEA and end school as planned. The one positive about staying home for the week is all of the reading I have been doing. I finished reading Cassandra Clare's Mortal Instruments series and just loved it. Highly recommend.

Free Comic Book Day

Free Comic Book Day is this first Saturday in May and is being celebrated across the nation at participating comic book stores. Free comic books will be given away free to anyone who comes into the stores requesting one. Please check with stores for any rules. In Brownsville, Rogue Comics at 13 N. Park Plaza will start giving away comic books at 11:00 am. Free comics, door prizes and more, see you there!

Valentine Card Winners

We had some great cards turned in this year. Thank you to Mr. Trejo for taking the time to judge our cards again this year. What talented and creative students we have on this campus. Congratulations to our winners. Prizes were an IPOD shuffle for 1st place, and Valentine baskets for 2nd and 3rd.

Valentine's Day Contest

It has been so so long since I posted on this blog. Where does time go? It seems I was just putting my Christmas boxes away and now it is time for Valentine's Day.
Our library sponsors a Valentine Card Contest every year and we have been promoting it through our school TV station and with fliers in the library. We always have a great turnout. Some of our students are so creative and talented it is amazing. The best part is we often get students to participate who are not our library "regulars" . Our prizes will include an IPOD, gift baskets, etc. I will post pictures of the cards and the winners soon.