March Department Meeting

At our meeting today, we discussed:

1. any questions and concerns that have arisen since we began to use Requisition Manager
   Consensus--program working well, allows us to keep track of expenditures.
   Concern expressed about time needed to use program. Expectation this will ease with increased familiarity. Anyone with problems should speak to me.
2. Poetry Cafe (indicate your plan at http://turtlehook.poetrycafe.sgizmo.com/) If you need any inspiration, check out Nikki Giovanni's poem in the March issue of American Libraries (copies distributed): "a Library is: a place to be free/to be in space/ to be in cave times..."
   I would like every library to have a presence. So far, there are wonderful ideas coming forward.
3. Lost books
   We brainstormed about how to handle lost books and lost book monies. Pending discussion with the business office, our procedure for student replacement of lost books will be:
   a. encourage the student to locate and return lost book
   b. ask the student to bring in a new copy of the same book
   c. accept an alternate book--a new paperback for a lost paperback book and new hardcover for a lost hardcover book
   d. The last choice will be payment for the book with cash. Receipts and records of transactions will be kept. All monies will be turned into each building's main office in January and June.
   Follow-up question for business office: Will each school have a bookkeeper? When monies are turned in, is it possible to allocate them for replacement library books?
4. Summer Reading
   Thanks to a donation that allowed us to puchase books from Borders, we're preparing baskets to be raffled in the fall to summer reading participants. The baskets are built around the theme of insects in keeping with the summer reading program theme for students in grades k-2, 3-5, as well as for middle school students. Totals: 5 k-1 baskets, 5 2-3 baskets, 5 4-5 baskets, 4 6 baskets, 8 7-8 baskets
5. New professional books
   Librarians perused and borrowed new books from our professional collection. A complete list can be found at http://workbench.wikispaces.com/Professional+Books.
6. National Geographic books were distributed for each library.
7. TLC collection-- title recommendations
   Please give me recommendations for additions to our TLC collections by April 16.
8. Remaining monies
   Now is the time to close out our accounts. Please spend your remaining monies by the time we break for vacation.
9. National Geographic books were distributed.

As much as possible, I'll include links to articles rather than distribute hard copies.

Articles and websites of note:

"Meet Your New School Library Media Specialist"

"Top Shelf Fiction for Middle School Readers"

"A Cyber Six-Pack for Educators"

"Addressing Adolescent Literacy"

A Gathering of Readers: An online celebration of indigenous chldren's reading and culture.

We have a new subscription to Information Searcher, a new newsletter put together by Pam Berger. If you're interested I have the most recent issue. The lead article is "Web 2.0 Strategies for Searching". There are also articles on world history resources, blogging in English language arts and election links for young people.

Connected Newsletter's February edition has as its main theme digital photography in the classroom.

Distributed: Nikki Giovanni's poem, "Storytelling in the Web 2.0 Era", "A Vision for Classroom Blogging"