Author Archives
I am the librarian at Detroit Country Day Lower School in Bloomfield Hills, MI. I have worked as a librarian for the past nine years. I was a classroom teacher for four years prior to that. I have worked in charter, public, and private schools. My favorite thing about being a librarian is the opportunities I have to work both with students and teachers. I love the co-teaching opportunities and connections I have been able to make! I have served on AASL committees as a member and chair. I was most recently a member of ALA's Ready to Code (RtC) Task Force.
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5 Parts of the ALA Annual Conference
Recently, I had the opportunity to attend the ALA Annual Conference in Washington, D.C., for the first time. This was made possible by receiving a professional development stipend from the Library of Michigan. As I reflected on my experience I… Read More ›
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Summarizing with Dash: A Collaborative Project in First Grade
Recently, a first-grade teacher wanted to have her students use coding to create a summary. Her goal was to have students share a story and include how the main character developed as well as how the setting changed. She sought… Read More ›
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5 Things I Love about Author Visits
Each year I am responsible for scheduling the author visit for my school. Preparing for these visits can be a lot of work. There are many factors to consider such as finding the right fit for your audience, budgeting, book… Read More ›
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Tour de France Project: Collaboration in Library, P.E., and French
As school librarians, we know that collaboration is an important component of running a successful library program. Once partnerships have been created, collaboration with homeroom teachers can occur regularly. Their curriculum and the library curriculum align easily especially in subjects… Read More ›
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On a Mission: Students with Exceptional Abilities Coding Music
Libraries Ready to Code (RtC) is an initiative of ALA that is sponsored by Google. This initiative focuses on the role of school and public libraries in providing opportunities for youth to develop computational thinking skills through coding activities and… Read More ›
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The Ready to Code (RtC) Collection
There are 450,000+ open computing jobs across the United States, but only 35% of high schools teach computer programming (code.org, 2019). The American Library Association (ALA) wanted to understand and support libraries with information and resources related to computer science…. Read More ›
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Early Literacy Skills and More Using Bear Books
The preschool program at my school focuses on using the students’ interests and the world around them to guide classroom themes. Being from Michigan, we see very distinct seasonal changes. What animals do during each season is often observed by… Read More ›
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5 Ways to Spread Book Love
This year one of my professional goals was to reflect on how I was promoting a positive reading culture at my school and develop ways to improve it. Improvement implies there is something wrong with what is currently being done…. Read More ›
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The Glass Half Full: Focusing on the Positive
Recently, I was able to attend my state library conference, the MAME Conference, for the first time. While there we heard from speakers like Colby Sharp, John Shu, and author Jewels Rhodes Parker. Needless to say, it was two days… Read More ›
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Code to Move: Mixing Coding with Brain Breaks
To Start: Recently, I had the opportunity to attend the CS Fundamentals Introduction Workshop sponsored by Code.org. This workshop explored why computer science should be taught to all students. The presenter was Vinos Kassab (@kassabv). She shared how students’ computational… Read More ›