I have long followed Heather Daly‘s work and you need to know that most of the time I’m simply gobsmacked by what she is able to accomplish. So it was an absolute thrill to listen to her in our small table talk – a 20 minute, small group protocol — that is a legacy piece […]
I would like a secure Google Doc/Form way to communicate mark updates with students. I’m wondering if we can use something like DocAppender on a spreadsheet to mail merge a column to users with a specific email address …
I have a garden and last summer I had a bumper crop of black currants last summer. There are often times at harvest when I have too much to handle and so I’m learning strategies to save that summer taste for use all winter long. I like to approach any sort of abundance with the […]
So as cool as I am, and as much as I am on social media, I don’t want to hotbox with my students in their social media spaces.
I’m the type of person who generally doesn’t like surprises. 2019 has been full of them for me.
Students were empowered to use technology for their learning as they were ready, and it was the librarian’s job to be responsive to this need.
[This article was originally published in December 2019 edition of the Ontario School Library Association’s Teaching Librarian magazine] I am sitting in an auditorium in Buenos Aires, Argentina wearing headphones and a team of translators are converting every Spanish word spoken on stage for my benefit. As exciting as the journey itself has been, to […]
Tim and I bought a recliner yesterday. I had to put aside my ‘interior designer hat’ for the adventure because it came down to user experience more than user interface in the end. The fella struggles to find all things tall enough to be comfortable, often buying things too wide just so that they’re also […]
It’s been a couple short months since my last post about my new adventures in coding with Canada Learning Code. This time I joined a class specifically aimed at teachers to learn HTML and CSS. Whenever I tell friends about my new learning pursuits, I often get the question: Why? How would you ever use […]
I’ve been watching this group Canada Learning Code for awhile and trying to summon the nerve to go to one of their workshops. I worried that I would be completely out of my element and that I’d feel really awkward in a group of people more advanced than I was in the content. I first […]
Originally published in Canadian School Libraries Journal May 21, 2019. When the political world beckons me to pick sides and arm myself, I conscientiously reflect on my purpose and my goals as a teacher-librarian. I also surround myself with like-minded idealists, searching for ways to not only make sense of the turmoil, but also to […]
This week I finished my volunteer stint as co-planner for the Ontario School Library Association, which for a rough estimate, is about 100 hours per year. As one of the best volunteer experiences of my life, I’d like to take you through why it’s such a fine way to give your time back to your […]
Waking up to more cutbacks in #ontEd funding is never fun. So I decided to look at the data. This post is all about the different ways I developed professionally in 2018. There were so many great happenings around the province this year. It never ceases me to amaze me the passion that Ontario educators […]
My love affair with Mindomo continues. Here I am trying to explore the Ontario College of Teachers’ Standards of Practice. I’m focusing here on just one of these standards: Ongoing Professional Learning. https://www.mindomo.com/mindmap/beliefs-and-learning-about-our-own-writing-0586b22d3bd64316b6f45a9e97b86981
School Library Makerspaces: Grades 6-12 by Leslie B Preddy My rating: 3 of 5 stars As a secondary librarian, without planning time, without my own students focused on design/construction/creativity, I’m launching a full-time makerspace this fall that is filled with mostly donated items from the now-extinct home economics and fashion programs at my school. We […]
threadbare beauty 