Nothin but a Ning!

I literally had no idea what I wanted to discuss this week for my blog. Last week, I attempted to request the email delivery of two articles that were never emailed to me. One of the articles focused on Black Librarianship, and as an African American woman, I was very interested to read it. Since that idea fell through, I decided to just Google Black Librarians. I ended up finding a Ning that was pretty cool. The name of the Ning is Black Librarian Nation and it has been created to give African American Librarians a place to network, and share their experiences in the field.

Ning is one example of a growing number of sites that allow you to create a social network for a specific audience around practically any interest, group, or activity (Rosenfield, 2008). Ning has great potential value as an educational tool, especially for professional development and building professional connections (Rosenfield, 2008).

For my Library Administration & Management course we we’re required to join a Ning. While I appreciate my professor introducing us to Nings, I wish she would have required us to use it more. Once I set the page up, I never went back to add friends or really make the most of it and as a result I no longer remember my username or password! I am not blaming my professor, as my lack of motivation/interest for the Ning is the direct result of my forgetting the login info.

The Outcome: I signed up for Black Librarian Nation and was impressed that I wasn’t accepted right away. I had to wait until I was approved by the creator of the Ning itself which was surprising. When I think back on it, my professor had to add/ or invite us to her Ning before we could join it. Now that I am an official member of the Black Librarian Nation Ning, my initial excitement has decreased. I became a member Monday evening, today is Wednesday and I haven’t been to the BLN Ning since then. Does this mean that the Ning is bad, NO; I just have a very short attention span in regards to networking sites.

Reference

Rosenfield, E. (2008). Expanding your professional network with nings. Teacher Librarian, 35 (3), 1-2.

Lights! Camera! Action!

VIDEO HAS BEEN REMOVED!!!

Hurray! Hurray! Boys and Girls I am pleased to announce that my spring course, LIS 6510, has come to an end!!! Now my summer can begin and I don’t have to worry about classes until September. One of the last assignments we were given was about Intellectual Freedom and the best ways to go about teaching it to children. This was found to be a little challenging because the class was geared towards pre-school through third grade students. However, my professor was lenient in her requirements of the assignment saying that we could market it to third through fifth grade students. One night, I found myself literally tossing and turning thinking about all the work that I had to complete before this class was over! I got up at around 3 or 4 in the morning and began working on what I considered to be an “Educational Video.”

The video was targeted for young children to teach them about Intellectual Freedom. I learned from this class, that young children are very fond of talking animals. Hence, I decided to make a cat, with a comical past, the messenger of my video. I named him, Louie the Talking Cat, and attempted to give him a New York accent which sometimes sounded like a Boston one instead! When I presented this assignment, it was very well received by both my professor and classmates who were quite impressed with the idea! My professor, Anne Williamson, told me that my idea was very clever and that I should see about getting it published!! Talk about a compliment! I was very humbled by that, but enough talking. Here’s my “Educational Video,” starring Louie the Talking Cat.

Upset Parent

Over a month ago, someone posted to the listserv an article from the Orlando Sentinel. The article was discussing a woman who checked out four popular fiction books in 2008 and refused to return them to her public library. The popular fiction books that Tina Harden checked out were Gossip Girl and It Girl books. Apparently, the mom checked them out and later found them to be inappropriate for her daughter and young girls everywhere! The mom had accrued a balance of $85.00, due to late fees at the Seminole County Public Library in Orlando Florida.

In an attempt to bargain with the library, Harden requested that the books be kept out of the hands of minors (Jackson, 2010). She wanted to see warnings about certain content as well as age restrictions on borrowing (Jackson, 2010). When the library said it would reshelve the books in the adult-section but wouldn’t restrict them further, Harden decided to keep the books (Jackson, 2010).

Naturally, this story garnered a lot of attention from the media and caused many parents to speak out. They argued that if Tina Harden didn’t want her daughter to have access to certain books that was her choice. They continued adding that Harden didn’t have the authority to decide what their children read as well as the fact that the books were public property. One man even donated some replacement books to the library, and others promised to send in checks or books to replace what Harden refused to return.

Well, I guess Tina Harden had a change of heart because shortly after this story broke she returned the books. Her reason: “There was a certain amount of good that could come from me holding the books to make a statement, and I felt like that was achieved.” “I feel like I had done my part to help focus attention on this (Jackson, 2010).” Yippee, suddenly Tina Harden has become the voice behind what's an appropriate young adult collection at a public library?!

What most irritates me about this entire ordeal, besides the fact that this parent refused to return library books for two years, is her refusal to also pay her library fines. She said that she hopes the library will waive the fines (Jackson, 2010). Harden continues adding, “It’s not that I lost the books or I didn’t feel like turning them in (Jackson, 2010).” Seminole County Library Services Manager Jane Peterson said that the library system could not forgive the fines (Jackson, 2010).

Final Thoughts: After refusing to return books back to a public library for two years, the parent has a change of heart and decides to return them. Interestingly enough, her crusade to bring attention to the Gossip Girl series and other books that closely resemble similar themes came to a halt once she felt her point had been made. It’s not a big deal that she disapproved of the books because she clearly has the right to decide what her children will or will not read. Instead, she kept public property thus prohibiting others from using what didn’t lawfully belong to her. Now that she’s finished advocating for age appropriate young adult literature in public libraries, she believes that her library fines should be waived...give me a break! I would recommend that this parent take some time to familiarize herself with a little thing called Intellectual Freedom. Perhaps this will give her some insight as to her rights as a parent and as a patron using the Public Library.

References

Jackson, R. (2010, May 7). Gossip girl-inspired books returned to public library. Orlando Sentinel. Retrieved from http://blogs.orlandosentinel.com/features_momsatwork/?p=5356

Storytelling Experience

Every now and again, some life events have a way of just taking your breath away. For some that could be a good or bad thing, but for me it’s definitely a good thing! Around mid-February, I met a woman named Lillian McGhee who worked at Priest Elementary. Mrs. McGhee taught a reading program to students who scored lowly on the MEEP. Upon getting to know one another, she asked me if I would be interested in coming and reading to her students. I agreed and a few weeks later in March, there I stood reading The Lorax to her seven third grade bilingual students.

The children seemed to really enjoy the story and a visual board that I created. Mrs. McGhee suggested that something be created to help the bilingual students have a “visual idea” of what a word/object was in case they didn’t understand it in English. This technique of creating a visual board worked a couple of times and then I decided to switch things up.

Next, I had a research proposal to write for my Research in Libraries class. Since I was volunteering at Priest, it was decided to write my proposal on engaging bilingual students through storytelling and comprehension exercises. The third grade students at Priest were the focus of this proposal. As the weeks continued, I began to explore other ways of teaching the students vocabulary.

Lillian McGhee suggested to me to use Ed Helper, which is a very helpful educational website for teachers and students. Due to log-in issues, I didn’t use Ed Helper but I was able to re-create material on that website through Microsoft Word. Through Word, I put vocabulary words in multiple tables and put clip art images next to each of those words. Images were placed next to the vocabulary to give the children a better understanding of what the words meant.

Well, it has all come to an end as today marked my last day going to read to the students at Priest Elementary. Next week is their last week of school and Mrs. McGhee is leaving and re-locating to Pennsylvania. Words can never express the satisfaction I got from going there and reading to those students. When they saw me today, they immediately started waving and smiling, saying “that’s Ms. Jasmine,” and “Hi Ms. Jasmine.” Shortly thereafter, they presented me with letters and cards that they made to say thank you. In one letter, a student thanked me for coming to read, because I taught them how to read and he said that he would never forget me…I fell apart as I read their letters. It was so touching to see that in coming there to read to them I had in some way impacted their very young lives…I will never forget any of those students and I will never forget their appreciation of my reading. Personally, volunteering at Priest was such a blessing, but as a library student it has been an inspiring hands-on experience that will impact me as a future Children’s Librarian.