Library Lingo

Hi everyone! Break is almost upon us, and I thought that you would want the gift of another blog post, so...here it is! I am presenting with the gift of Creative Commons licensing. I know  it's just what you've always wanted! Creative Commons is a type of copyright licensing. In essence, the copyright holder of a work gives permission for said work to be used or modified freely, depending on the Creative Commons license (there are six different types). It is important to note that attribution still needs to be given to creators of works no matter what kind of copyright or Creative Commons license their work has. Since we're a school, we fall under fair use for almost all works (meaning we can use small parts of copyrighted works legally), but it's good to get in the habit of using works that have a Creative Commons license, since our students won't be in school forever. I find Creative Commons licensing especially valuable for images and music, especially if stu...

Hello, everyone! So, I've mentioned once or twice that librarians love research, right? Bearing that in mind, something that is incredibly important to me is making sure students have access to quality research materials. Now, I know it's oh-so-tempting to send them to the Internet and have them Google their hearts out for information. But, as you all know, the interwebs is a fickle place - full of everything from high quality information, to completely false information, to everything in between. I've heard the grumbling from students when I talk with them year after year about evaluating websites (a conversation for another post), and the good news is that there's a way for them to easily find quality information...databases! Now for my quick spiel on databases. They are collections of authoritative, reliable information and are a paid subscription service. Databases have information from reputable sources from a variety of formats. Some databases have original cont...

Did you know that our library has digital audiobooks? These are available to staff and students! Our collection currently has about fifty titles, but more will be on the way very soon. The audiobooks can be listened to by logging in to your library account (hey cool...did you know you could do that?) and can be accessed on almost any electronic device. You can either go in through our library catalog on a web browser, or you can download the free app (Destiny Discover) to your phone or tablet. Want the details on how to do this? Check out the QuickStart Guide I created for you by going to this link: goo.gl/xgpCXt                                                       Happy listening!

There are several new non-fiction books making an appearance in the library this month. While some are here simply to grab the attention of our readers who enjoy non-fiction text, others have been acquired to be useful for you, our hardworking teachers! If any of the books below look interesting to you, please stop by the library to check them out--literally or figuratively! Some titles that may be of interest: 12 Great Tips on Writing... This series includes books that provide tips for writing: true stories, scripts, speeches, fiction, blogs, poetry, persuasion, and informative writing. The books also have an online component that features live updates to the books. These titles are concise, making it easy to read a small portion of the book to students while taking up minimal class time. 12 Spooky and Scary... If you're looking for something to get the creative juices flowing during this Halloween season, you could check out any of these titles, which include...

Today is September 30th...congrats, everyone! We've made it through the first month (well, if you don't count those first few days when we were still on break) of the school year! I'm so excited to be your full-time library media specialist this year. This means that I have more time for you and our students, and I want to make sure that our media center staff is providing the support that you need. This blog is separate from our Scranton Reads blog, because it is just for our teachers. I'll post about once a month to let you know about our library resources and activities, so that you can take full advantage of everything our library media center has to offer. Ready? Here we go! One of your resources here in the library is...me! Ha! Didn't see that one coming, did you? For those of you who may not know, school library media specialists are librarians as well as certified teachers. We specialize in connecting people with quality information, and then addressing ...