Alice in InfoLand

Hmmmm… a current Job Description for a K-12 School Librarian, as imaged by *http://www.wordle.net*
Do you agree or disagree with the proportions? Why?
What isn’t there that should be included?

[school+librarian]
[school+library]

aka How to cook a  20 lb. bird in 2 and a half hours
 Although this recipe sounds unlikely, trust me.  I’ve been using it for over 20 years, with success EVERY time.   The turkey comes out perfectly done — both white meat and dark meat juicy and tender — with plenty of flavorful juices/broth for making gravy and stuffing.
Ingredients:
15-20 lb. UNSTUFFED, COMPLETELY THAWED turkey
2 cups (16 oz) water or broth
Optional:     1 raw onion or 1 raw apple
assorted herbs and spices
Large, heavy-duty roasting pan (if using disposable foil pan, put it on a cookie sheet or baking pan for stability)
Aluminum foil
Directions:
PREHEAT oven to 450 degrees.
Put UNSTUFFED, COMPLETELY THAWED turkey into deep roasting pan.
        note:     if turkey is 20-25 lbs., just add 15 minutes to last hour.
                     if turkey is 10-15 lbs., subtract 15 minutes from last hour.
Optional: put 1 raw onion or apple into the bird’s cavity: it adds flavor, and reminds you to make sure that you already removed the turkey innards!
Pour 16 oz. water or broth into bottom of pan.
Cover turkey with aluminum foil (Tented, not sealed).
Put turkey into hot oven, set timer for 90 minutes, and walk away.
(Do NOT keep opening oven to look; that bird isn’t going anywhere.)
When timer rings, after 90 minutes, take foil tent off turkey.
Lower heat to 400 degrees, set timer for one hour, and walk away.
(Get stuffing ready ***, prepare other side dishes, set table, etc.)
When timer rings again, take turkey out of oven and remove from pan to rest on cutting board (gathering juices/thoughts) for 15-20 minutes before carving.
Use turkey juices in pan to make gravy.
 
*** I prepare stuffing in separate pan.
When turkey is done cooking, I use some of the turkey “juice” to moisten the gravy, then cook the stuffing in the oven while the turkey is resting and then being carved.
The stuffing is perfectly cooked by the time the turkey is carved and ready for serving.
 
 Enjoy!
 

I’m heading south tomorron morning to the ALA conference in Washington DC, for four action-packed days of learning, laughter with friends, and l o o o o o o t s of lengthy exhibit aisles, hotel lobbies and convention center corridors filled with more-than-you-could-ever-imagine ideas and possibilities for library-land. I’ve got my schedule of programs (more than one in each time-slot) to go to, vendors to see, and an extra bag for swag to send home.
Then on Monday I head even further south to the NECC conference in Atlanta, for two more days of learning and looking at new tools and toys in the ed-tech world. There will definitely be overlaps — in fact, I’m somehow on a panel at NECC (!!), talking about the 21st Century School Information Center, along with (much wiser) panelists David Warlick, Will Richardson, Larry Johnson, Joyce Valenza, Doug Johnson, Lisa Perez, and Brian Kenney.
(Unlike Doug Johnson, though, I’ve gotten NO paperspam from NECC exhibitors. I guess they don’t know me… yet.)

If you’re at either conference and run into me (literally OR figuratively), please say hello!

I haven’t posted here in a while because I’ve been dealing with my 93-yo mother’s increasing frailty.  She’s been living in an apartment in a  “lifecare community” for the past few years, but in March we realized that she could no longer live independently.  Her mind was ‘dis-integrating’ (her own apt word) more rapidly, causing not just memory loss, but confusion and even occasional danger to herself.  After much to-do and travail, she’s now in what’s called “residential health care” in the same community, where she is much safer and well-supervised.

In the process, however, we had to pack up her apartment and dispose of whatever wouldn’t fit in the new room.  Here are some lessons I learned from that experience, and plan to apply to my own home:

1. Do not save/stockpile grocery bags and/or plastic containers. They multiply when you are not looking.
2. Label ALL photos, with names, dates, and locations.
3. Weed your closets every year. If you haven’t worn it in a year, get rid of it.
4. Three sets of sheets for each bed is plenty: one in use, one in the laundry, one in the closet.
5. Sample sizes of shampoo, etc., are meant to be used, not hoarded.
6. If it’s broken, get it fixed or throw it out. It won’t self-heal with time.
7. Do not expect charitable organizations to be charitable to you.

 A word to the wise (and weary): stop stockpiling!  You’ll probably never use all that stuff, and it only means more for your kids to have to throw out later on.

Andy Carvin is initiating a Stop Cyberbullying Day this Friday, March 30, 2007, on his PBS Blog in reaction to the terrorization/bullying that has been done to Kathy Sierra. Kathy’s Creating Passionate Users blog explores and explains “how the brain works and how to exploit it for better learning and memory… and how to recognize when someone else (including one of us) is applying brain-based techniques to get you to do something.” Her posts are frequently praised and quoted across a wide variety of industries and interests: marketing, technology, education, libraryland, etc.

In school-library-land we know how important it is to alert students, parents, teachers, and administrators to the realities of the Read/Write Web. We advocate for social responsibility and fight against censorship. We want — nay, need — our future citizens to know how to conduct themselves appropriately and ethically at all times, whether face to face or online.

Bullying and social cruelty is hateful behavior, no matter what the format or the age of the instigators. As educators, it is imperative that we do whatever we can to make sure that it does not happen to anyone, child OR adult.

http://cyberbully.org and Nancy Willard’s Center for Safe and Responsible Internet Use provide excellent resources for you to use and share with your students and colleagues, while Vicki Davis suggests several ways for educators to take action on her Cool Cat Teacher Blog.

What will YOU do to prevent cyberbullying in your community?

(cross-posted on LM_Net, and on the AASL blog)
cyberbullying, AndyCarvin KathySierra socialresponsibility cyber-ethics internet_safety

Over at School Libraryland, Justin has distilled what he’s learned in his first year as a school librarian into excellent advice for those now looking for their first job. 

For even more suggestions and guidance for newbies, check out GraceAnne DeCandido’s Ten Graces for New Librarians, and my own Y’s Guide to Starting a New School/Library/Job.

Interesting to see how we all stress the same survival strategies:

• Develop a support system
• Keep learning
• Don’t try to conquer the world
  
• Remember to have a life

So to all the new graduates out there — welcome to the wonderful world of school librarianship, where life is never dull!

Technorati Tags: edubiblioblogosphere, school libraries

Linda Ellerbee’s FIVE RULES FOR SURVIVING CHANGE:

1. Do it your way, because you are just as likely to be right as anyone else.
2. The best things in life aren’t things.
3. It is every citizen’s duty to keep her or his mouth open.
4. If you don’t want to get old, don’t mellow.
5. A good time to laugh is any time you can. 

“Finish every day and be done with it. You have done what you could. Some blunders and absurdities no doubt crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day; begin it well and serenely and with too high a spirit to be cumbered with your old nonsense. This day is all that is good and fair. It is too dear, with its hopes and invitations, to waste a moment on the yesterdays” - Ralph Waldo Emerson

and

“We should all be concerned about the future because we will all have to spend the rest of our lives there” - Charles F. Kettering

found at Paper Notes in a Digital World

IOW: Focus on what’s next, not on what was, if you want to get anywhere.

aka words of advice from mothers, usually learned the hard way:

1. Don’t SHOULD on yourself, and don’t let anyone else should on you, either.
2. Superwoman is a cartoon character, not a real person.
3. Never threaten anything you aren’t fully prepared to carry out.
4. If there’s a bathroom available, use it.

What do you use as cognitive comfort-food when you need a mental/emotional break from reality ?

What puts you into a totally different frame of mind, if only for a brief respite?

Here are some of my favorite comfort-enablers:

Books:

• Dorothy Dunnett’s Lymond Chronicles
• Anne McCaffrey’s Pern series

Movies:

• any of the old MGM movie musicals — preferably with  Fred Astaire or Gene Kelly

 TV (on DVD, obviously, for instant access):

• Seasons 1-4 of The West Wing 

• FWIW, my daughter depends on episodes from Little House on the Prairie.  I think she’s got the full set of all 9 years on DVD, now!
  

 
What are some of your choices?

A little late for this year’s Banned Books Week, but still worth sharing (with thanks to the reminder from LibraryBitch):

Many books have been challenged banned over the years, largely due to complaints stemming from both parents and advocacy groups, often for rather obscure reasoning. Yet despite the challenges, these books are still published and available, and do get read.

The question is, how many of these have you read?    Feel free to copy the list into your blog, highlighting in bold the banned books you have already had the good fortune to read:

• Scary Stories (Series) by Alvin Schwartz
• Daddy’’s Roommate by Michael Willhoite
• I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
• The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier
• The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
• Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
• Harry Potter (Series) by J.K. Rowling (any or all)
• Forever by Judy Blume
• Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson
• Alice (Series) by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor (any or all)
• Heather Has Two Mommies by Leslea Newman
• My Brother Sam is Dead by James Lincoln Collier and Christopher Collier
• The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
• The Giver by Lois Lowry
• It’’s Perfectly Normal by Robie Harris
• Goosebumps (Series) by R.L. Stine
• A Day No Pigs Would Die by Robert Newton Peck
• The Color Purple by Alice Walker
• Sex by Madonna
• Earth’s Children (Series) by Jean M. Auel (any or all)
• The Great Gilly Hopkins by Katherine Paterson
• A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’’Engle
• Go Ask Alice by Anonymous
• Fallen Angels by Walter Dean Myers
• In the Night Kitchen by Maurice Sendak
• The Stupids (Series) by Harry Allard (any or all)
• The Witches by Roald Dahl
• The New Joy of Gay Sex by Charles Silverstein
• Anastasia Krupnik (Series) by Lois Lowry (any or all)
• The Goats by Brock Cole
• Kaffir Boy by Mark Mathabane
• Blubber by Judy Blume
• Killing Mr. Griffin by Lois Duncan
• Halloween ABC by Eve Merriam
• We All Fall Down by Robert Cormier
• Final Exit by Derek Humphry
• The Handmaid’’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
• Julie of the Wolves by Jean Craighead George
• The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
• What’’s Happening to my Body? Book for Girls: A Growing-Up Guide for Parents & Daughters by Lynda Madaras
• To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
• Beloved by Toni Morrison
• The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton
• The Pigman by Paul Zindel
• Bumps in the Night by Harry Allard
• Deenie by Judy Blume
• Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
• Annie on my Mind by Nancy Garden
• The Boy Who Lost His Face by Louis Sachar
• Cross Your Fingers, Spit in Your Hat by Alvin Schwartz
• A Light in the Attic by Shel Silverstein
• Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
• Sleeping Beauty Trilogy by A.N. Roquelaure (Anne Rice) (any or all)
• Asking About Sex and Growing Up by Joanna Cole
• Cujo by Stephen King
• James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl
• The Anarchist Cookbook by William Powell
• Boys and Sex by Wardell Pomeroy
• Ordinary People by Judith Guest
• American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis
• What’’s Happening to my Body? Book for Boys: A Growing-Up Guide for Parents & Sons by Lynda Madaras
• Are You There, God? It’’s Me, Margaret by Judy Blume
• Crazy Lady by Jane Conly
• Athletic Shorts by Chris Crutcher
• Fade by Robert Cormier
• Guess What? by Mem Fox
• The House of Spirits by Isabel Allende
• The Face on the Milk Carton by Caroline Cooney
• Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut
• Lord of the Flies by William Golding
• Native Son by Richard Wright
• Women on Top: How Real Life Has Changed Women’’s Fantasies by Nancy Friday
• Curses, Hexes and Spells by Daniel Cohen
• Jack by A.M. Homes
• Bless Me, Ultima by Rudolfo A. Anaya
• Where Did I Come From? by Peter Mayle
• Carrie by Stephen King
• Tiger Eyes by Judy Blume
• On My Honor by Marion Dane Bauer
• Arizona Kid by Ron Koertge
• Family Secrets by Norma Klein
• Mommy Laid An Egg by Babette Cole
• The Dead Zone by Stephen King
• The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
• Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison
• Always Running by Luis Rodriguez
• Private Parts by Howard Stern
• Where’s Waldo? by Martin Hanford
• Summer of My German Soldier by Bette Greene
• Little Black Sambo by Helen Bannerman
• Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett
• Running Loose by Chris Crutcher
• Sex Education by Jenny Davis
• The Drowning of Stephen Jones by Bette Greene
• Girls and Sex by Wardell Pomeroy
• How to Eat Fried Worms by Thomas Rockwell
• View from the Cherry Tree by Willo Davis Roberts
• The Headless Cupid by Zilpha Keatley Snyder
• The Terrorist by Caroline Cooney
• Jump Ship to Freedom by James Lincoln Collier and Christopher Collier

Hmmm… I guess being a Youth Services Specialist (in both school and public libraries) for all these years has certainly broadened my viewpoints!  

Newark Public Library has put together
In the Wake of Katrina, which includes resources on:

• How to Help,
• News Sources,
• Disaster Resources, and
• Official Sites of Affected States

Especially for librarians, teachers, and all school / community
agencies:

• Helping Children After a Disaster, from the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry

• Helping Teens & Kids Cope, from YALSA (from Pop Goes the Library)
  

• Family Readiness Kit: Preparing to Handle Disasters, from the American Academy of Pediatrics

LII.org’s Hurricane Katrina Page has links to a wide variety of relevant sources, including a site devoted to the impact of Katrina on libraries.

Rochelle at Tinfoil & Raccoon has an excellent list of library-related links, and also notes that the Red Cross can best use donations of money (rather than goods) at this time.

Please send funds only to RECOGNIZED/ESTABLISHED organizations, such as

• the Red Cross,
• the Salvation Army, and
• America’s Second Harvest—The Nation’s Food Bank Network.

Unfortunately, bogus/scam sites are already popping up and phishing for money.

The Louisiana Library Association Disaster Relief Fund is now accepting monetary donations (checks only) to assist school, public, and academic library restoration efforts in southeastern Louisiana.
Please make checks payable to the LLA-Disaster Relief and mail them to:
        LLA
        421 South 4th St
        Eunice, LA 70535

 

international blogging for disaster relief day 

 

Definitely worth reading, and re-reading, and even printing out to have available as needed:

We hold hands. We open eyes. We walk through doors with people through the information we provide. We boldly go where no one
has gone before, through teaching people to read, showing them new
possiblities, giving them options. One piece of information has the
power to change someone’s life, and we get to do it every day. Every
day!

from Feel-Good Librarian’s essay on why we do this: On the good ship Librarian



and don’t forget Why you should fall to your knees and worship a librarian, from Librarian Avengers!



It’s Independence Day, and you have the right to read anything you
want, anywhere and anywhen you choose, without answering to anyone
about it, you hear?

The Life Eclectic, a night out with Eric Chase Anderson — an article in the Sunday Styles section of the May 15 New York Times — begins as follows:

“We’re not suggesting that Eric Chase Anderson is a tad, well, quirky, but consider this: He plastic-wraps his books. With
library covers. That he specially orders. From Wisconsin.”

Well, I may not know (or even care) who Eric Chase Anderson is, but I’ll bet that those ‘library covers’ came from Highsmith, Inc.  and they’re damn fine covers, too.  There’s an art to getting them
to fit just right.  Do you think Mr. Anderson uses a bone folder to get extra sharp creases, the way we were taught in Collection Management 101, or does he just hope for the best?



Besides, what’s so quirky about wanting to preserve the paper covers
wrapping those hardcover books?   Dust jackets are marketing
masterpieces — designed to entice you into exploring the contents of
those books.  Keeping them neat and clean (and unstained) seems
perfectly reasonable to me.  In fact, I have my own stash of 1-mil
Acid-free E-Z Fit Pre-cut Jacket Covers in various sizes, and I’m not
ashamed to use them!!

More life-hacks for staying sane when at professional gatherings:
1.  Always put your hotel key in exactly the same place, so you can find it quickly.  I put it on top of the TV when in the hotel room, and in my left pocket or badge-holder while out of the room.
2.  Bring a luggage tag for your conference tote-bag.  When there’s a gaggle of identical goody-bags parked along a wall at a reception, you want to be able to find yours quickly and easily.
3.  At large meal functions,
    a) If you need to gather a group together, pick a specific location e.g.: “in the ballroom, facing the dais, we’ll be at 3pm” for everyone to go to.
    b) At your table, try to sit facing the dais and with your back to the wall, so that you don’t have to turn around to see/hear the speaker.