Final Thoughts

 There hasn't been a single Treasure Mountain that I've been to that hasn't ended in disappointment.  But as Dr Suess has famously said, "don't cry that it's over, be happy that it happened."  We've covered so much territory in less than 24 hours.  Our retreat is ending with a Big Think.  A time to collect our thinking and ask ourselves, So What?  and Now What?  Why do the things we've discussed matter, and what are we going to do with this information?  

We're reflecting on our thinking through the lens of the CSL Leading Learning Standards.  How do the big ideas present themselves in the context of the standards?  How might the standards need to be finessed to reflect the current thinking?  What's missing?  Ultimately, how can we as school librarians be yet better?

It is this kind of thinking and the drive to serve our communities better that drives us as teacher librarians and makes me keep coming back to Treasure Mountain Research Retreats.  Thanks to Anita, Carol, Joseph, David, and every single person that I've had the pleasure of talking to.  You have made me a better teacher librarian and a better person.  Until next time!

Request for Reconsideration

 What do you do when someone comes to you asking that a book we removed from the collection? 

This is the question that Sheri Kinney and Dianne Oberg addressed in the after lunch speakers session. Luckily for Sheri, she had expert teacher librarians in the greater community willing to guide her through the process. Her advice to us all was to make sure that your policies are not just in your head, but on paper. It’s very important for other TLs and for the Canadian book community to be able to access other experiences. See their paper for links to the database where you can search banned book cases. 

Project Management through Trello

 

UGH!!!!  Alanna and Tim King need about six hours more to address my interest in what they have to say regarding using Trello as a tool for student inquiry and projects.  Tim's touching story about how students have more than thrived through the agency given to them when given the scaffolding of a project management system and community to enact their own projects kicked off this discussion.  As a person who works with students in just this way, but have never found an effective method for managing these types of projects, I am super excited to continue this discussion and check out their paper and new interview with David Loertscher.  I wish I could say more now, but know that I will have much more to say once this exploration gets going.