Spooktacular Updates

What a week! I know many of you were disappointed that there wasn't a post last week. But don't worry because I'm back and at nearly 95%! Here are your updates:

Halloween buttons and Writing contest
I think I've gotten to nearly every class this month to make Halloween buttons. First grade was holding out on me, but we'll take care of them on Monday! Don't worry, I just purchased another 1000 buttons. So we're good for awhile. You may have seen some student writing displayed in the library. These are submissions for the "Harris Burdick" writing contest for grades 3-5. Winners get a free book from Amazon! We'll do something similar for K-2 next month. 

3D printing bonanza
I got our new 3D printer fired up and working overtime to make some cool samples. This machine is available for anyone to use. We can make nearly anything using some design software. Letters, numbers, words, shapes, etc. A small print does take around 30-45 minutes, so it's not a good setup for each kid in a class printing something. But if you are interested, let me know so we can work something out. In the meantime, stop by to see some of our creations. 

DBRL Connections
There are several programs that are free from Daniel Boone Libraries that we can take advantage of. If you are interested in either or both, let me know.

• Library card drive - DBRL will come out to help sign up students for library cards. Cards are mailed to their homes
• Library field trips - these are free and open to any grade level. 

MACH Menu

A little later than advertised, but check out the link below for a list of really cool equipment we have available to use. How might we use these, you ask? Lots of ways! I have met with kindergarten to come up with a monthly plan for maker activities. I'd be happy to meet with you as well. There's always a way to integrate new ideas into your existing curriculum or we could do stand alone projects. I'm also weighing a few larger challenges to launch in the coming weeks. Here's the list of really great stuff we have to use.

Pineapple drought?

Although I know a lot of cool stuff is happening in your classrooms, it seems that most of you are too shy to add it to the board. Well, enough of that! It's the easiest way for teachers to learn from what you are doing. I will be pulling a pineapple card on Tuesday next week and the teacher who gets pulled will get a book from Amazon!

Hope you have a great weekend!

Finding Joy

I apologize in advance for this Dr. Phil moment...

I had a media specialist meeting (no, they don't call them library teacher guy meetings yet) on Tuesday. My coordinator mentioned that people seem more stressed than usual this early in the year. She pointed us to an article about finding moments of joy in your day. So I've been thinking of that point this week and have found it's not hard at all to find joyous moments throughout the day. There are so many awesome kids here, but it's hard not to let moments of stress and frustration dominate the "how was your day" answer. Here are some of my moments from this week. 

Kindergarten bookmarks

4th Grade Halloween buttons

He was so proud to write his name!

3rd Grade Halloween buttons

Reading club with Mrs. Kunkel's class

3rd Grade Halloween button

On your checkout day....
Please, please, please send your books down in the morning to be checked in. This serves two purposes for us. First, it makes checkout time much less hectic. Second, it ensures we get all the books checked in so we can cut down on the "Oh, I gave that to you earlier" debate that's so much fun to have. Students may bring books to renew at their checkout time, but only for renewal. Thank you!

MACH Integration Ideas
By next Friday, I will have created and shared a list of activities and materials that we have available to use with students. I'd love to talk with your teams about how to get things rolling with your class. Here's a look at some of the new equipment we have available to us. I recently purchased another 3D printer, 3Doodler pens, LEGO WeDo Robotics kits (for primary, yea!), Little Bits circuits, and two Little Bits R2D2 sets. 

Another call for books!
Boy, you'd think if you asked a bunch of teachers what books they would like purchased you'd get over run with responses. All I heard were crickets last week. So I'll try again. Email me titles that are popular with your students, ones you want to use for instruction, or sets of chapter books for book groups. I have my next list about ready to submit and my voucher money won't last forever! 

New Books!
Ray just arrived with boxes of books! Looking forward to digging through the boxes and sharing them with you and the students.

Have a great weekend!

Flowchart and Button Madness

Happy October! What a fun time of year. The classes seemed to enjoy The Widow's Broom in the library this week and we have more good ones to follow. The Halloween books are flying off the shelves! 

Book Requests
Send me any titles that you would like to see in the library. I always have a shopping list up on my computer to add requests from students. I'll probably submit this month's order in a couple of weeks. Now's not the time to be shy because I have money to spend! 

Bookroom Reminder
As more of you are accessing bookroom resources, I wanted to remind you about that process. Feel free to take any set from either room 343 (old) or 312 (new). Items in 312 with a green dot are in circulation so bring them to the media center for checkout. If you take a set from 343, please take all the copies and put them in a plastic bag (on the black cart). When finished, bring the bags to me in the media center so I can enter them into Destiny for circulation. Here's another copy of the wonderful flowchart if you happened to leave your last one on your fridge. 

Green Screen
The MACH now features a green screen (wall really) that can be used for student projects. We have access to an app that can be scoped to teacher or student devices. I'd be happy to assist with ideas on how you can use it or with the implementation. It's something that can be done Kindergarten through Fifth grade. Check out my cheezy example below:

Button Craze!
You may have seen some buttons floating around the school this week. I purchased a button maker to create awesome buttons for all kinds of things. We're using it as swag for 4th and 5th graders who read Mark Twain Award nominee books. I've been passing out "Hello, I'm Awesome" and "Hall Superstar" buttons to students I catch being great. I'd like to extend the button-making fun to your classrooms. Let's schedule a time to make their own creations! The button maker travels on the Purple Cart of Fun, so we can have students draw their own button and we can stamp them out in your room. I have templates made up so it's easy for students to create their designs. Contact me to schedule a time! 

Library Assistant Program
We launched our newest program this week. We have 70 (no, that's not a mistake) students in the program from 4th and 5th grade. Class captains create a schedule and we have 6 students come in each day from 3:00 to 3:15 to help straighten and shelve books. Maybe you've notice how empty our carts have been? All them! They've done a great job especially after news got out about a shelving test at the end of the month. 

Have a great weekend!