Thursday - Discus, Google, & Legend

This was a busy day for me at Dorman.  During 1st block, Cathy and I went to Mrs. Adkins' STEM Humanities class for a library orientation (Cathy) and DISCUS/Research presentation (me).  I incorporated many of the ideas Cathy had discussed with me the week before and was grateful for the PowerPoint slides she shared with me.  The focus of the presentation was to introduce the students to the database resources available through the Dorman Media Center as well as Discus.  While I recommended not defaulting to Google automatically, I would like to develop a presentation related to using Google effectively.  Google is a great search engine when you know how to use it efficiently and I want to make sure students can do this. Next presentation idea! :0

To start off I had four students hold up signs (Google, Discus, Library, or Ask a Friend) and stand in a different corner of the room .  Then I asked the rest of the class to go stand next to the sign that best represented their own initial search strategy when conducting research.  Cathy blogged about the class visit and here are the collaged group shots she took of the class in action:

Before Presentation



Notice that Google and Discus changed in size in the After shot (except the one student who switched from Discus to Google - I must not have convinced him!).

After Presentation

During 2nd Block, Melanie and I went to Mrs. Shepard's class to present a Dystopian Fiction book talk.  This class had a slightly different selection of titles than Tuesday's class so I created a new Prezi with trailers and book descriptions.  Melanie came to my rescue when a question was raised about the Marie Lu's book, Legend.   While I did read (and loved!) Legend this summer, I had not prepared a book talk about it and drew a blank.  Melanie serves on the SCASL South Carolina Book Awards committee and reads everything.  She was able to provide the students with a brief plot description and, most importantly, spark their interest in the book.  I hope to become as well versed as Melanie is in young adult fiction, but will have to do a LOT of reading to catch up!

The remainder of the day was filled with readers advisory, students signing up for the BYOB Lunchtime Book Club, completing a resource list for Mrs. Campbell's SAT class, and ideas for future collaboration projects.  Once again, I left Dorman with my head buzzing with ideas and projects and excitement in knowing that this internship is preparing for my future position as a School Library Media Specialist.