Partnering With Your Public Library

If you are a media coordinator in North Carolina, I strongly recommend that you reach out to your local public library.  There may be options available for your students that don't require parents to get them to and from the physical space in order to utilize their resources. 

This school year we are partnering with Perquimans County Public Library through the Pettigrew Regional Library.  They are providing our students with library cards that enable them to check out ebooks and audiobooks through the NC Kids Digital Library.  

We are a 1:1 Chromebook school.  Students can check out, read or listen to books on their devices.  They can turn the books in on their own or have them automatically returned once their loan period is up.  Parents and students don't have to worry about late fees or missing books.  Students have thousands of additional titles available to them.  The public library has an increase in circulation.  It's a win-win all the way around.  

There are specific guidelines that both the public library and our school library had to follow to make it happen.  I'm not sure if these procedures are specific to our library or are general guidelines for everyone.  It is best to check with the public library in your area for exact details.  

If this is not yet available in your area encourage the librarian to reach out to the state to see how they can make this a reality.

As of this post, I've shown about a third of our students how to log in and check out their first book.  I've been overcome by their excitement.  My avid readers love the variety of newer titles.  My boys are excited to be able to find current books on some of their favorite sports heroes.  Some students have even been visibly disappointed when they realized the book they wanted to read was unavailable.  My favorite reaction was from students who found a series they loved when they were younger and they vowed to reread them all.  

If you give a kid a book...

A Year in the Life of a Media Coordinator

Each year educators (and pretty much every working person everywhere) must prove they are worth their salt.  We are observed and evaluated multiple times.  We hope that our amazingness shines through in those few brief moments that our administrators and bosses choose to come in.  The reality is that we are so much more than a few fleeting moments.  It's what we do day in and day out that makes us amazing, but no matter how well we plan a few observations here and there can't capture all of it.  So, how do we make sure who we are and what we do shines through?  

We have to tell our own story.

Last year I kept a running spreadsheet with detailed information regarding the makerspace activities I did with teachers and classes.  I listed the teacher, number of students, a description of the activity, dates and more.  I took pictures of everything and pulled everything together in a folder to share.   I plan to keep that going this year, but I want to add another piece.  This blog.

I don't claim to be a writer, but I plan to use this as a tool to document my year.  As I go along, I'll include the standards from the NC Media Coordinator Evaluation Rubric that tie into each activity and group them by tags.  It will be one more addition to the portfolio I'll use during evaluations and my summative.  Hopefully this will provide other media coordinators with ideas for activities you can use in your own portfolio. 

I'd love to get your feedback and ideas on how to expand the things I include.  Please comment as often as you like.  We are all in this together.  Together we can build media programs that will be go beyond our wildest dreams!

Time to enjoy the ride!