Interviews & Author Skyping

Every week is kind of like a circus in the Media Center. We have all kinds of crazy things going on and it is almost always a wide-variety of activities. This week was no different. Tuesday I did book checkout and maker space free build with a Reading class that doesn't usually come to the Media Center. Wednesday I was off campus for a testing training. Thursday I was back at it with my Art students working on their Langston Hughes projects and Friday I had my GAPP kiddos back with me doing an "I Love My Library" activity (more to come on that later).

There were a lot of BIG things this week:

• The ABC Awards Gala for Brevard County Teacher of the Year
• A News Interview for the #swms20bookchallenge 
• Project Lit Skype session with Nic Stone 

I'm not going to talk much about the Gala. It was a wonderful evening but doesn't really have anything to do with what happens in the Media Center. I will say that I got to walk down a red carpet, do a red carpet interview (if you'd like to watch it, it is the second video on the linked page and about 18 minutes into the video), and I got to meet a lot of awesome educators. The interview part was one of my favorite parts of the evening (other than having my mom, my husband, and my bestie there with me) because I got to speak about the importance of my profession and what I do everyday and how AMAZING our students are. 

Thursday I had the honor of having Greg Pallone join us for an interview. He did a story on our school-wide 20 Book Challenge and our participation in the Follett Challenge. He spoke with some of our kids who were featured in our video. He got some information from me and then worked hard to get the story in the 5:00 News and on their website. I'm so thankful that he came and invested some of his time to help our students out. 

Friday we had our monthly Project Lit Book Club meeting but this month's was a special one. We focused on Dear Martin by Nic Stone and Ghost Boys by Jewell Parker Rhodes. Our students got out of class for an extended period of time and we got to Skype Nic. It was sponsored by two of our incredible community members. We had a former NFL player join us, a fierce attorney, a high school senior, and one of our City Councilmen join us. Our students asked really great questions and our community members also had the chance to ask Nic some questions. I highly recommend doing this for your students!

I've written several times about the power of author visits. I have seen the impact of them. Sometimes budgets are strained...ok, who are we kidding? Budgets are ALWAYS strained but this is a great option that is significantly less expensive and still brings your students a great experience. 

A few tips about Skyping with an author for the first time:

• schedule your time and date with your author and then plan to have students in and everything else set up and ready to go before that. Our students came to me 15 minutes ahead of time.
• Make sure the students are prepped for the event. My students knew the event was happening, had read the book, and had been given some background information on the author. 
• Expect tech hiccups but Skype with someone else to test it all out and make sure you have all the equipment you need. 
• Make sure you have your admin stop by so they can see how awesome it is!

Nic is incredible. She's an incredible author and she loves students. If you are looking for an author to Skype with, she's definitely a great choice!  

If I can leave you with one piece of advice it would be to promote your program like it's your job because it is. People don't know that great things are happening unless you tell them about it. Be your own advocate! 

FAME: I'm Gonna Learn Forever

I've been a little absent from the blog.

Thanksgiving week we only had school for two days. The kiddos that came to me disguised turkeys as their favorite book characters. They did a really incredible job and I love that they can be inventive and creative while tying it to literacy.

That same week I submitted two proposals for next year's AASL conference and I also submitted an article for our FAME Quarterly issue.

This week I had 7th grade classes doing maker space activities and I scored about 300 students's 20 Book Challenge submissions.

Wednesday through Friday I was at my state Media Specialist annual conference. It is my favorite thing I go to all year. I love being around so many other energetic Media Specialists to learn from them and grow.

Wednesday I did an 8 hour Makey Makey training and it was awesome! I learned how to complete a circuit, how to play a piano using a drawing and my Makey Makey kit, I drew a book review in four parts and used Scratch to code voice into it, and worked on an awesome group project. I also made several new friends and got to hang with one of my fellow Brevard County Media Specialists.

Right after my training we did Speed Dating with an Author which is one of my favorite parts of the conference. You sit at a table and an author comes by every two minutes to tell you a little bit of the back story of why they wrote their book(s) and to allow you to ask questions. These are always some pretty big name authors so it's always a thrill.

Wednesday evening I had the privilege of going  to  dinner with the other SSYRA committee members and some of the authors. It was so incredible! I sat and spoke with Peter Brown, author of The Wild Robot, and so many others.

Thursday I had breakfast with two of my favorite people and then got to watch a powerful Keynote by Elizabeth Acevedo, author of Poet X. I got some books signed by Elizabeth and Neal Shusterman, and then I got to present on diverse books with one of my fellow Media Specialists, Ana Woodbrey. We talked about the importance of diverse books, how to find them, how to promote them, and why all of this even matters.

I attended a session about the #readwoke movement and then I got to present another session on curating resources through Collections by Destiny with our amazing Follett rep and my fantastic District Media Resource person.  I also went to an SSYRA session, an SSYRA book meeting, and had a quick stop by a special leadership event for up-and-coming FAME leaders.

After that some of my Brevard peeps and I went and had dinner at Disney Springs and laughed and laughed so hard. We did the Christmas tree trail and made it back in time to watch Late Night Library Games.

Friday morning I had breakfast with someone I admire so much, Jennifer Underhill, and she taught me all the things I need to know for the upcoming year, and we had the pleasure of being joined by the hilarious James Ponti. I chatted with some people in the vendor hall, went to Jenn and James's awesome session on author visits, back to the vendor hall, and then lunch and our closing session with none other than Jennifer Lagarde, Library Girl herself. She armed us with how to fight the zombie librarians and be awesome for our kids and staff.

I always leave this conference full of great ideas and so inspired to go back and do great things to boost student learning and engagement.

It's been a pretty great week!