A Thanksgiving Gift

I know, I know. It's not even Thanksgiving and someone's giving away Christmas gifts already. Believe me, I feel for Thanksgiving - with Christmas decor available in stores before Halloween, Turkey Day has no room to be valued as its own special holiday.

Oh well.

I'm too excited to share this gift, and I can't wait for December, so here is a little something for which we can be thankful - see? It's a Thanksgiving Gift.

The New York Public Library has a very, very, very nice digital archive, complete with an amazing collection of vintage posters. The latest collection (shared via Twitter earlier this month) can be found here: http://digitalcollections.nypl.org/collections/turn-of-the-century-posters#/?tab=navigation

Do take a look, and feel free to download! And let's be thankful there are people out there who keep trash until it's treasure.

15 Copyright Rules Every Student (and Teacher) Should Know...

Melissa Venable over at the Online Colleges blog, posted a nicely accessible list of copyright rules everybody (students AND teachers) should know.

Click on the image above to go to the full post.

Take a careful look at #5 - You can sample from DVDs, even circumventing copyright protection as this is one of the less well known fair use exemptions granted by the Librarian of Congress in 2010. Note that currently many take the wording in the Librarian of Congress' exception to mean that circumventing copyright applies only to university faculty and film and media students, but there has been discussion about extending this fair use safe harbor to K-12.

• This is a list intended for an audience of adult online learners. Please don't tell students that they can "rip DVDs with abandon..." 

You may also want to take a close look at #8 - If your project becomes commercial, you no longer have protection as a student and at #9 - If your project reaches a wider audience, you’re not protected either as these aspects of copyright and fair use that may come into play in some forms of presentations of learning or when students' online blogs or videos are published to the web.

We maintain an Image and Sound Resources page to help you and your students access copyright-friendly images, copyright-friendly sound files, and tools to make using them a bit easier. The page is linked both the Middle School and High School portals under the tab labeled Helpful Things.

Your Public Library has an App!

As we prepare ourselves for Christmas break, I'd like to share a little gift with you: the Hawaii State Public Library System has an app! It's been out for a few months, but I'm not sure if everyone knows about it (and everyone who's anyone needs to know!)

In your app store, search for HSPLS. The app is called "Hawaii Mobile", and it's by ChiliFresh.com (see? I'm citing my sources).

With this app, you can do so many things! Login with your library card number and pin, and you can see your account (books on hold, fines, etc.), renew books you currently have checked out, and use the app itself as a library card. You can also search for books in the HSPLS catalog, scope out upcoming library events, and generally have an amazing time being so smart because YOU HAVE THE LIBRARY APP!

Enjoy, and have a very wonderful Christmas.

Site Evaluation

What is a Filter Bubble and Could This be Why Your Aunty Shares Crazy Stuff on Facebook...?

As a librarian, I love Google.

Google is amazing.

I find and learn amazing stuff via Google...

Have you ever wondered, though, in a Google ubiquitous world, how it is that your Aunties and old high school classmates can end up sharing such bizarre, crazy stuff on Facebook?

It actually probably has a lot to do with the personalization of search. Did you know there is no such thing as a "standard" Google search? Beginning back in about 2009, Google began using your personal search history and approximately 57 other "click indicators" to personalize the results lists you see when you run a search. That means that when you search for "Egypt" from your house in Manoa, you probably see a very different set of results than your Aunty Lulu sees when she searches for "Egypt" from her house in rural Maine.

The web is a big place. The idea that we aren't all seeing the same parts of the web even when we search for the same terms on the same tools is the main concept behind what Eli Pariser has termed a "filter bubble."

It's not just Google either. Facebook, Instagram, Yahoo, Bing... Social media and much of search has become personalized through the use of software algorithms.

Though Eli Pariser presented this Ted Talk back in 2011, the ideas and caveats behind algorithmic filter bubbles are more relevant than ever.



Next post: How we begin to help students venture beyond their filter bubbles...

Information Literacy Playbook: Taking Research Notes, Add Method to the Madness...

When it comes to taking research notes there is a lot more to think about than one might realize. While there is no one right way to take notes, note taking that supports good scholarship have some common characteristics.

Whatever the method, good research notes:

• Allow the researcher to connect a specific fact or quote to a specific source
• Allow the researcher to manipulate his/her content to support analysis and organization

Research notes we are seeing at Mid-Pacific fall into two main forms: note cards and document-style notes.

Note Cards:

Some students love note cards. They are easily manipulated and for a student with the ability to keep track of numerous loose pieces of paper, the paper note card is a wonderful option.

Document-Style Notes:

Note cards don't work for some students for a variety of reasons. Many students find document-style notes more agreeable. Document-style notes mean fewer pieces of paper to lose.

Notes on things we have learned since the publication of these two videos:

• Have students create an Easysbib project at THE BEGINNING of the research process. They will use the author/title information in the note taking process.
• Require students to use parenthetical citation with the author's last name or title information next to each item, skip spaces between each fact/quote, and ONLY WRITE ON ONE SIDE OF THE PAPER. 
• Should you need to physically manipulate facts/quotes in the analysis/organizational step of the research process these guidelines will allow students to cut their note pages up into strips and glue/tape like facts together.
• Use of the parenthetical citation format with (Name pg#) also reinforces the format for in-text citation in the final paper.

Here's document-style note taking work flow presented another way.

Online note cards or note taking?

Because of the nature of the iPad in it's current form, most students find online note taking quite challenging. The inability to have windows open side-by-side means the researchers must navigate from tab-to-tab. It's hard. Given the technological constraints at this time, most students find it more efficient to use their iPad as their reading screen while they take notes on paper or on note cards.

Info Literacy Coaching Playbook: Use Wikipedia, Just Don't Cut Your Arm Off...

Knives can be dangerous, but we use knives because they're incredibly useful tools. Giving a sharp knife to a pre-K child is probably less than wise, but the benefits of knife use by those trained in the safe use of knives so outweigh the potential harms that parents all over the planet hand sharp bladed objects to children. Because parents care, most don't hand over a cleaver and scream, "CHOP AWAY, CHILD! CHOP AWAY!" Moms and dads take deep breaths, and go about the sometimes terrifying task of teaching their children to fillet, dice, and pare.

Used well, Wikipedia, is truly one of the transformative information tools of our time. Students, though, need to be taught how to use Wikipedia in ways that won't leave them heading home at the end of a school day with missing cognitive limbs. This fantastic Cooperative Library Instruction Project tutorial: Using Wikipedia for Academic Research explains it all extremely well!