WOW! What  a semester this has been. I can't believe that we have just a few short weeks before it comes to an end. I have learned so much throughout this experience. My experiences shadowing different Media Specialists has been the most exciting part as I have been able to get hands on experience with the tasks I will face as a Media Specialist. Working with students has also been a great part of this experience; as well as being an instructional partner to other teachers and exploring the roles collaboration plays in the process. Developing this portfolio has been an amazing experience as well. Before starting the program I had absolutely no clue how to develop a blog, let alone an entire website. I feel as though the classes and assignments have helped make me a better teacher. I say this because experiencing technology on this level helps me become more relevant to my students as they are immersed in technology as well. I can't begin to tell you how much fun I've had, and how excited I am about the opportunities that lie ahead!

The county in which I work is rolling out a pilot program to test "Bring your own device" (BYOD) in the classroom. My school has been chosen to participate in the pilot and I am one of the teachers selected to start using BYOD in my own classroom. I am really excited about the prospects of BYOD and am looking forward to developing my first lesson using student technology. I am currently working with the media specialist at my school to develop resources that will help other teachers at my school and the other pilot schools use BYOD in their classrooms to the fullest! Updates to come.

This week Houston County Schools are on Spring Break!! Woo hoo! As the semester winds down I am getting more and more anxious about graduating. I feel that I have so much to do and so little time to get it all done. I am so glad that I have been working on my portfolio as I go along as some of the last tasks I have to complete are very time consuming. I have really enjoyed working in the media centers. I've had the opportunity to shadow really awesome media specialists and look forward to having the opportunity to become a media specialist in the future.

I created a monthly report to submit to Dr. Peavy about the happenings in the Northside High School Media Center during the month of March. It highlights the "App your way to better grades" classes for students, Teen Tech Week, the Meme competition, and the ongoing weeding efforts in the Media Center.

Yesterday I delivered SMART board training to teachers at my school. My API had the confidence in me to deliver the training to teachers throughout the school. I was very nervous as I knew some of the teachers would be upset that they were being pulled out of class to go to the training. I included several jokes and funny pictures throughout the presentation to "break the ice" so to speak. I was surprised that there were only two people throughout the whole day that had anything negative to say. Most of them were genuinely interested in learning about the SMART board Notebook software and how it could help further student understanding. I am really excited about having the opportunity to deliver the training again in the future.

I have been helping the media specialist at my school weed the collection. She is new here and as such wants to make the media center feel more like her own. One way that she is doing this is by systematically weeding every part of the collection. So far she has weeded over 3,000 books and continues every day. The media center has been hosting a book sale as well where the weeded books have the chance to be sold first. Some of the books in the collection go into the trash and there has been some backlash because of that. Some people believe that the books have value, no matter how old or outdated their content may be. My view is that some of the material can cause harm to patrons as it is outdated or may present prejudice or judgmental viewpoints that may cause more harm than good when read. Overall, the weeding is going well and continues to be a highlight of my work 

This week was Teen Tech Week! Teen tech week is a time where students can explore different aspects of technology. Our school decided to hold a Meme contest, taught an App Your Way to Better Grades seminar for students. We also developed a technology display using old technology that teachers brought in. The students were amazed to see the old technology and had many questions for the media center staff. We had a great time playing an old NES system and students learned a great deal about how technology has changed over the years. I also developed a website promoting Teen Tech Week that can be found by clicking the picture below.

As part of my practicum, I leave several days a week during my lunch/planning period and head over to Russell Elementary to help the media specialist out. This week I was able to read to the first grade classes that came in! I read part of Dr. Seuss' Oh The Places You'll Go. I really enjoyed seeing their reaction to the story. Being a high school teacher, you rarely get to see the true innocent child side to the students like you do when they're in first grade. They reacted to the pictures and the story itself. I even enjoyed stopping and having to explain why the book said that they would move mountains. One of the students quickly raised his hand and said "Mountains must be really really heavy." It was great! I can't wait until I get to read to them again, it has been one of the best experiences of my practicum so far.

I spent my time today with Mrs. Irwin processing books. She had a box of books purchased for the library and needed to have them processed. She showed me the basics of Surpass which I had become familiar with in my past experiences with the media center. She showed me how to import MARC records into the database without having to do them by hand. I found out that since she has been a librarian for over 30 years she still does most of the MARC processing by hand as she knows most of the categories. I found the new system to be very accommodating to beginners like myself and found it fairly straightforward in processing the books. I also learned about breaking books in, how to cover the books and other processing such as printing and placing barcodes, etc. I feel comfortable in processing books in the future.

Tonight I participated in the Webinar: The Care and Feeding of Your Blog with Sue Waters through the TL Virtual Cafe. I really enjoyed the experience and found the software easy to use. The greatest asset of this type of presentation is that it is interactive. Sue had many great tips for keeping your blog alive and staying relevant in the increasingly competitive market of blogging. I am going to use the many tips in my blog in the future and look forward to being able to implement some of the "feeding" methods discussed in the webinar.