3 Things for the NVHS LMC: Leftover Candy Edition (#8)

 Interesting Articles

The New Parental Obsession is from The Wall Street Journal and is about parents checking their kid's grades online. (Password page for Off Campus Access). A look at how teens spend time in their day and the differences between girls and boys is from the Pew Research Center. A study from Brigham Young University says that overall time spent on social media alone does not lead to anxiety and depression in teens. In other words, it's complicated.

Figuring Out Fake News

Bad News is an online game that simulates a fake news campaign. The player tries to get as many followers as possible. Research has shown that the game helps players to "inoculate" against fake news.

We are 204: We Set the Dark on Fire

Medio is a country sharply divided by economic inequality and patriarchal traditions. At the  Medio School for Girls, students are trained to become the wives of rich and powerful men. Each of these men have two wives. One runs his household and the other bears and raises his children. Two girls join the household of one of the most powerful households in the country. The girls will become spies for the resistance movement that is working to take down the rich and powerful. And they will find forbidden love.

3 Things from the NVHS LMC #7

VidReader: Create Search Transcripts of YouTube Videos

Put a URL for a YouTube video into VidReader and it will generate a searchable transcript on the fly for you. There are a number of sample videos you can try to see how it works. Click on any words in the transcript and the video will jump to that segment. You can then share the video with the transcript using a link or a number or a number of other sharing services.

Interesting Articles

On the Cult of Pedagogy blog and podcast, Jennifer Gonzalez interviews the host of the We Teach Languages podcast about how teaching world languages has evolved.  While looking for some resources for teaching about fake news, I stumbled across this 2016 NPR story about how to look out for fake news stories. It is a nice summary of a few useful techniques.. The University of Southern California Ed department has a new service called The Answer Lab, where scholars take questions and answer them with a summary of related research and a recommendation for best practice. The first two briefs are up on their website now.

Lincoln Award:  Dear Martin by Nick Stone

Justyce McAllister is an honors student, a senior headed to an Ivy League school, and only one of a few African American students in his classes. He is also a scholarship student trying to escape a rough neighborhood, He learns about the teachings of Martin Luther King from his favorite teacher and he keeps a journal where he writes letters to Dr. King to help make sense of his life. Then, his best friend is shot by an off duty cop while the two friends are out driving and Justyce’s world is turned upside down. Audio Sample of the Book

3 Things from the NVHS LMC #6 -- Google Edition

Google Search Tricks

Are you a Google Search Operator (nod to 80’s era Sade..anyone??) Commonsense Media shows students (and you) how to use a few common search operators to target and refine your web search. When you search for college information in Google, the knowledge panel, also known as the big box on the right side of the first results page, will now have some basic information about admissions, cost, etc. Looking for a podcast about soap carving or competitive dog grooming (we don’t judge) Type in the topic and the word podcast and Google will return a few episodes from podcasts as suggestions. You can even play them in the web browser.

Google Extensions for Your Sanity

If you aren’t familiar with extensions, the short of it is that they are little tools you add to the top right corner of your Chrome web browser that give it superpowers (disclaimer: not really). Here are a few that might help get you through a stressful day. Having too many tabs open in Chrome can be distracting. OneTab allows you to reduce the clutter. Just click the icon and all the tabs get reduced to one and you get a list of links to reopen any of the tabs. Sometimes you need to take a social media or YouTube break, but when it becomes a problem, use StayFocused to block or limit time you spend on certain websites. We’re talking about you, cute kitten videos.

Google Slides’ Side Hustle: Digital Notebooks

Google Slides isn’t only for presentations. Since it gives you the ability to add videos, links, customize the design, resize the slide to your own custom proportions, among other things, it also makes a great digital notebook. The Ditch That Textbook blog has directions and ideas for creating your own digital notebooks in your class.

3 Things from the NVHS LMC #5

Too Busy for Time for Time Management

Everyone in the education world knows how valuable time is in their work and life. A new study confirms that people who value time over money are happier (but of course money is great too.) Of course, our students need to know how to maximize their time as well. Lisa Johnson from the Tech Chef blog has a post with resources she used to teach students about time management.

Thanks for the Books, Volume Reading Committee 

The district's Volume Reading Committee has a done something awesome. They have given all of the district LMC's a one time gift of money to purchase books to help add a bunch of new books for our collections. We will be soliciting your feedback in the near future about materials that might support your independent reading assignments.

Lincoln Award: Nyxia

A group of teenagers with troubled pasts have been selected for a mission to a faraway planet where they will help mine an amazing mineral called Nyxia. On the way there, their numbers will dwindle as they face a series of competitions to determine who will be part of the final crew. If they make it all the way, they will receive lifelong financial security for them and their families. But the competition can be deadly and the corporation sponsoring the trip has some secrets they want to keep hidden at any cost.

3 Things from the NVHS LMC #4 - Happy Birthday to Dr. Fuhrer Edition

Back to the Basics 

From Edutopia, Fundamentals of Classroom Management is a list of resources aimed at new teachers, but it looks like they have some useful information for any teacher. Also from Edutopia, an article from a few years ago suggests a simple strategy for asking better questions to students. Finally, Jennifer Gonzalez from the Cult of Pedagogy podcast recently did an episode / blog post about what to do you when you want some answers, but you get nothing but crickets in response. 

Google Drive Learns New Tricks

Google Slides and Docs have a few tricks up their virtual sleeves. Say you want to hide a slide during a presentation because you want to temporarily hide an answer. When in presentation mode, press the B key for a black screen, W for a blank white one. You can also set up automatic timings on a Slides presentation and have it loop in  kiosk mode. It might be helpful for student festival or rotation directions during group work. Just click the gear icon at the bottom of the screen when in presentation mode. In Docs, go into the Tools menu and click Word Count. You can display a live word count as you type. Great for typing up announcements or other places where you have a word or character limit.

We are 204: With the Fire on High

Emoni Santiago's life course seems pretty set in stone. She is a high school senior with a toddler to raise and she has to help her grandmother pay the bills. Emoni is such an instinctively good cook that her cooking skills seem like magic, but she thinks her own dream of being a chef will never happen. That is until her school starts a new culinary arts class. Taking the class is one thing, but she will never be able to afford the culinary two week trip to Spain to work in a real professional kitchen. And getting to know the cute new boy that keeps trying to get her attention is definitely off limits. But maybe this is her real chance for a better future for both her and her daughter. Here is the book trailer on YouTube.

3 Things from the NVHS LMC #3

Oops! I Forgot to Bring and / or Charge My Chromebook

Just a quick reminder that we have a limited number of Chromebooks for students whose device is being repaired. For that reason, and because of a directive from the CEC, we do nott lend out Chromebooks to kids who forget their device at home. For students who forget to charge their Chromebooks, we have a few chargers on hand for kids to checkout and use in the LMC Unfortunately, because of high demand (and forgetful adolescents), we don’t allow them to leave the room. We do have 12 desktop computers in the LMC. When we distribute the devices or talk to parents, we suggest students develop a habit of putting their bookbag and Chromebook in the same spot every night and make sure to plug it in. A recent NY Times article discussed how to help teenagers remember to bring their stuff to school. Worth a read.

Interesting Articles: Swipe Left or Right on Tech?

There is a scientific debate on teens, screens, and mental health. Mindshift has a nice summary. A new research study says that if you want to take a mental break, then put down the cellphone. Researchers have found a way to tell if students are really just Christmas-treeing a test on a computer. Want to know how many books you could get through in a year if you just quit checking your social media account? Omni Calculator can give you an idea.

Gale PowerSearch: Topic Finder

Are you looking for more information on a current topic? Would you like your students to bring in articles to support your curriculum? Try searching all of our Gale Databases with Power Search . The topic finder also helps you narrow down a search by clicking on other terms related to your search

3 Things from the NVHS LMC #1

Update Those Chromebooks (Please Pass It On)

One of the best things students can do to improve the security of their Chromebook and fix possible problems is to update the operating system. It isn’t hard to do and it takes about 2 minutes (or less). Here is a useful slide that Lance created a while back. Please share it with your students and encourage them to update whenever their computer tells them have a new update.

New LMC Databases from Cengage Gale

We have added Cengage Gale’s U.S. History in Context and World History in Context to our lineup of LMC databases. We have several other databases from the same company, so if you know how to use one of them,  you will figure out the other ones really quickly. Plus, there is a special interface called Gale PowerSearch that allows you to search most of them all at once. All of our Gale databases are integrated with Google, so you can send material to Google Drive or Google Classroom.

New Reading Lists: Lincoln Award & We are 204

Every year, we like to promote the Lincoln Award Nominees list. The list is put together by a committee of high school librarians and high school students from across the state. Last year, we also worked with the other high school LMC Directors to create the first We are 204 list, a districtwide list that promotes titles that reflect the district’s diversity. Both lists have great books for high school students. We will be introducing a title a week, but here are both lists in case you are curious: Lincoln Award / We are 204.