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Sussex High School Media Specialist, Jennifer Edwards, started a Book Club last year with the support of Anita Harris, Instructional Technology Specialist. They used Blogger.com to create the blog for the book club. Some obstacles that they dealt with were related to the filter, but they got it launched by spring. You may have caught a presentation by Jennifer at VEMA in the Fall.
This year’s group is just getting things off the ground beginning with the purpose and goals of the Book Club. Jennifer has added all the books the club will be reading on the blog and will be having her students start to blog soon. Here is some info on her Book Club:
Purpose: To read Young Adult books, discuss with peers and integrate technology into library instruction.
Goals:
1. Increase Interest in Reading (school-wide)
2. Improve SOL Scores
3. Encourage students to examine books in a different format
4. Improve communication skills
5. Increase use of technology
6. Serve as a model for other organizations in regards to technology
7. Increase the size of the media center collection
Meetings: meet at lunchtime, twice a month; allow students to discuss the books that they are reading and guide discussion as necessary using information sheets and bookmarks with ratings for books; share suggestions and thoughts with other students; checkout new books; discuss blog and have students add comments to questions posed by LMS
Students can access the blog from home and all comments have to go through the LMS for approval before being posted.
At the end of the year, the students completed a multimedia project choosing to use either PowerPoint, PhotoStory, Moviemaker, Inspiration, Publisher or any techy tool they like to “campaign” for their favorite book. It had to include certain criteria such as plot, setting, themes, characters, etc. Check out a PowerPoint created by Ashley Dawson and Amber Woodard for their final project. . |