Allen Country Public Library Asks Three Questions

Shared by Michael Stephens on Tame the Web blog:

Google and the World Brain

from the YouTube trailer description:

"The story of the most ambitious project ever conceived on the Internet. In 2002 Google began to scan millions of books in an effort to create a giant global library, containing every book in existence. They had an even greater purpose - to create a higher form of intelligence, something that HG Wells had predicted in his 1937 essay "World Brain". But over half the books Google scanned were in copyright, and authors across the world launched a campaign to stop Google, which climaxed in a New York courtroom in 2011. A film about the dreams, dilemmas and dangers of the Internet."

Learn more about this film!

It is an official selection in the 2013 Sundance Film Festival screening in Salt Lake City, Utah on January 18.

Wish I could be there.  A must see!

Capture to Cloud

This seems to be a very handy tool, not only for research, but also for collaboration.

Offers a basic free version with pay options for premium usage. Includes:

• Build workspaces
• Drag and drop desktop files
• Add live webpages
• Public and private sharing
• Live activity stream
• Mobile apps
• Google and Dropbox integration

Why use it? Collaborative team work which includes media, webpages, and documents can be discussed in real time with a project team on any device - desktops, tablets, laptops, and mobile phones.  

While the CaptureToCloud app runs on the iPhone, it’s much easier to use on an iPad.

You have to be willing to sign in with a Google Account and then  Capture to Cloud requests permission to:

• Manage your contacts
• Manage your calendars
• View basic information about your account
• View and manage any of your documents and files in Google Drive
• View your email address
• Perform these operations when I'm not using the application

I used a school Google account to register because it tracks everything you do which is quite unsettling.  But it seems that Google tracks everything you do no matter what.  Hopefully I won't be targeted for more ads. The interface reminds me somewhat of Evernote, but it seems to have much more social functionality.  I also enjoy the "slideshow" view of all the items which are saved.

The help feature is robust and the first thing I will experiment with is organizing content into collections.

Flipped Classroom Resource and Research Tool Shared at our Morning Exchange Today

Today we discussed the ideas of Salman Khan for a "One World Schoolhouse"

• see: Khan Academy  
• At least 30% of our students are using this  
• Either in class or on their own

View the Khan Academy TED Talk:


Pick up a copy of The One World Schoolhouse by - Salman Khan  at the New Trier Library 

Call Number: 371.334 K45

New Sharing tool which has mobile applications to any device:  Pocket

Pocket (Formerly Read It Later)

getpocket.com/

When you find something you want to view later, put it in Pocket.

With our Gale In-Context Databases we have sharing functionality to share articles to Pocket.

iPad App: Explain Everything

My students are currently writing annotated bibliographies and so I decided to experiment with Explain Everything and make a short tutorial on why we need to write annotations for our sources:

Two Recent Reports from Pew Research

It's been a while since I contributed to the blog, but these two reports are definitely worth sharing:

Nov. 1, 2012:  How Teens do Research in the DigitalWorld

and

Oct. 23, 2012: Younger Americans’ Reading and Library Habits

Major Findings:

From the Overview on Teen Research:    “The teachers who instruct the most advanced American secondary school students render mixed verdicts about students’ research habits and the impact of technology on their studies. Some 77% of advanced placement (AP) and National Writing Project (NWP) teachers surveyed say that the internet and digital search tools have had a “mostly positive” impact on their students’ research work. But 87% say these technologies are creating an “easily distracted generation with short attention spans” and 64% say today’s digital technologies “do more to distract students than to help them academically.”   ….   According to this survey of teachers, conducted by the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project in collaboration with the College Board and the National Writing Project, the internet has opened up a vast world of information for today’s students, yet students’ digital literacy skills have yet to catch up.”

From the Summary of Findings on Reading and Library Habits:  “More than eight in ten Americans between the ages of 16 and 29 read a book in the past year, and six in ten used their local public library. At the youngest end of the spectrum, high schoolers in their late teens (ages 16-17) and college-aged young adults (ages 18-24) are especially likely to have read a book or used the library in the past 12 months. And although their library usage patterns may often be influenced by the requirements of school assignments, their interest in the possibilities of mobile technology may also point the way toward opportunities of further engagement with libraries later in life.”

Combined the two reports contain over 150 pages of charts, graphs and findings so they will take a while to get through, but should be worth reading and discussing, especially in light of our own observations at New Trier.

Michael Wesch on Knowledgable vs Knowledge-able

Wesch explains that it is NOT enough just to have the skill set of finding information. It is all about inspiring curiosity and embracing questioning which is the "hallmark of a lifelong learner".