Blog Post #3 Technology Leadership (Tech Tip Sharing)

 Are you looking for a new and exciting way to review class content? Check out Quizlet Live! Quizlet is most famous for its digital flashcard format. Now Quizlet is available in a fun gaming format that students will love. This game encourages collaboration and content review. You can find a flashcard set on Quizlet that aligns with the content you want to review or create your own set of flashcards. Students will join the game with a code. Then you will assign students to a group. Groups will be given a mascot so it’s easy to follow. Once the game begins students can track their team's progress. The goal is to get 12 consecutive answers before the other team. For an added challenge, have students write some of the questions and upload them to your flashcard set. 

If you want to know more about this exciting game from Quizlet, check out this blog post from Ditch That Textbook. Ditch That Textbook is an excellent education technology blog from the mind of Matt Miller. He’s a teacher and a technology enthusiast. 

Come back next week for more Tech Tips!

Citations

How to start a Quizlet Live game in 60 seconds + tips and tricks. (2019, April 10). Ditch That Textbook. https://ditchthattextbook.com/how-to-start-a-quizlet-live-game-in-60-seconds-tips-and-tricks/

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The Intersection of information Literacy, Technology, and Media

After digesting all of the materials this week, I feel like I have a better understanding of information literacy, technology, and the digital/media intersection. Within the last 10-15 years we have seen an explosion in “fake news” and misinformation. I’ve seen firsthand from my own family and friends how misinformation spreads. According to Clay Johnson, author of The Information Diet, misinformation is false or inaccurate information but disinformation is deliberate or intentionally false or inaccurate information. Both are pervasive in our society and both are leading people astray. There was a time when the internet was a reliable place for information. For that reason, people tend to believe what they read on the internet without consciously fact-checking or evaluating the information they find online. So…what does this mean for school librarians and those in the field of information science?

It means we have to take an active role in teaching students and our patrons how to be conscious consumers of information. To do so, we must first be aware of our information consumption. Are we evaluating what we read online? Are we consciously consuming information? Are we engaging in discourse with others to promote information literacy? Are we utilizing resources that have reliable information and we teach others to use these resources? 

If you take a look at the Framework for Information Literacy in Higher Education, you will see that there are lots of commonalities between this framework and the 21st Century Framework for K-12 students. Additionally, there are similarities between the higher education framework and the AASL standards. For example, both frameworks and the AASL standards promote collaboration, content/information production, inquiry, and information evaluation. These examples are just a few ways these frames are similar. If we teach students to be digital and information literate now, then they will become conscious consumers of information later. 

Citations

The Liturgists Podcast. (2013). The Liturgists Podcast - Fake News & Media Literacy. Google Podcasts. https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9hbmNob3IuZm0vcy81NmVhMWU3OC9wb2RjYXN0L3Jzcw/episode/aHR0cDovL3BvZGNhc3QudGhlbGl0dXJnaXN0cy5jb20vZS9tZWRpYS1saXRlcmFjeS0xNDg4ODkyNDg1Lw?sa=X&ved=0CAUQkfYCahcKEwjg-dDOnN7yAhUAAAAAHQAAAAAQEg&hl=en

Information Literacy for Higher Education Framework. (2016). http://ala.org/acrl/files/issues/infolit/framework.pdf

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A Crosswalk of AASL & ISTE Standards

 The AASL standards provide a framework for student learning, school librarians, and school libraries. These standards are organized into six shared foundations: Inquire, Include, Collaborate, Curate, Explore, and Engage. Within each shared foundation are four domains: Think, Create, Share, and Grow. The ISTE standards outline competencies for learning, teaching, and leading in the digital age. These standards can be used as a guide to help educators use technology for student learning. While the AASL standards focus on information literacy and the ISTE standards focus on digital literacy, they are similar in many ways. Both provide standards for collaboration, digital citizenship, and creative creation. For example, the AASL standards III.B.1 and III.B.2 are very similar to the ISTE standards 1c, 6a, and 7b for students (see graphic below). Both sets of standards require students to use various tools to connect to and communicate with other learners.

In the article, Now Serving…an Appealing Menu of Digital Literacy Tools and Resources, Mary Lou Caron O’Connor outlines how she incorporates digital literacy tools into her library lessons. This article presents an excellent example of how the AASL and ISTE standards can be used in the school library. O’Connor creates “menus” with various digital tools. During her library lessons, students select which tools or resources they used for the activity. In one example, the students had to research their favorite book and the author and then use digital creation tools to share their information with the class. For this lesson, they demonstrated their research skills using databases such as EBSCO and PebbleGo. The students created presentations using digital tools and collaborated with each other when sharing and providing feedback to one another. When AASL and ISTE standards are used together it can create dynamic library lessons that lead to digital and information literate students.

Citations:

Caron O’Connor, M. L. (2019). now serving AN APPEALING MENU OF DIGITAL LITERACY TOOLS & RESOURCES. Knowledge Quest, 47(5), 16–21.

American Association of School Librarians. (2018). National School Library Standards crosswalk with ISTE Standards for Students and Educators. Retrieved from American Association of School Librarians: https://standards.aasl.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/180828-aasl-standards-crosswalk-iste.pdf