wikispace for educators

We have had some discussion in class about the difference between a wiki and a blog. I mentioned that I have a classroom wikispace. (I do have access to my wiki through my school's server.) Since we are expert bloggers (*wink*) you might want to set up a wiki for your classroom or library.

I sat mine up in September 2008. I didn't use it as much as I intend and hope to do more with it this coming school year. I will post some ideas for usage in a future post.

For my wiki I utilize wikispaces.com. They offer free wikis for K-12 teachers. They allow teachers to choose a wikispace that is private and can only be accessed by members of your wiki. It is very easy to set up your wiki account and wikispaces.com offers tutorials to assist you with all aspects of personalizing and using your wiki.

Here is the link to the website if you are interested in learning more about wikis:

http://www.wikispaces.com/site/for/teachers


Happy Reading!
M.

Booktalker's Guide

I don't know about your students', but mine love it when I do booktalks for them! And, I love doing booktalks! It is a great way to motivate them to read books they otherwise may have never picked up. So, I have set up a website with links to my favorite booktalking sites. I hope you will find them as useful as I do---they are great for getting ideas, motivation, or "borrowing" (giving credit, of course) when you don't have time to write your own booktalk.

http://www.google.com/coop/cse?cx=002309573849625436696:1mr9vmquwim

Happy Reading!

M.

Teen Reads

Hi all!
If you are a librarian or language arts teacher for grades 7 – 12 you will want to check out the website Teenreads.com. It is a great blog associated with The Book Report Network. On Teenreads.com, you can will find information and features about favorite teen authors, books, series and characters. It is defiantly worth checking out!

Above I mentioned The Book Report Network. If you are unfamiliar with TBRN, it is a group of websites founded in 1996 that share book reviews, compelling features, author profiles and interviews, excerpts of the hottest new releases, literary games and contests, and more with readers every week. You will find it at http://www.tbrnetwork.com/content/index.asp.

Happy Reading!

M.

Remembering Reference Books

Sometimes students have a hard time remembering the purpose of each type of reference book.
A "trick" that might be helpful to them is this:

Dictionary---Defines
Thesaraus---The same
Encyclopedia---Explains
Atlas---Where it's At
Almanac---All the facts

Unfortunately, I don't remember where or from whom I got this so that I can give credit where it's due. : (

Happy Reading,

Michelle