Techie Tip

If you are a SMART or Promethean user, then this techie tip is for you. One of the beautiful attributes of the interactive whiteboard technology is that all of your hard work (notes, annotations, etc.) is saved and can be used again without redoing. Now it is easier than ever for both SMART and Promethean users to save notes and annotations drawn over any application.
Use the transparent background feature of SMART Notebook or Activinspire to make annotations that you can save and go back to when the need arises. I recently saw this transparent feature used by a math teacher to annotate over his graphing calculator software. He was able to draw notes, functions, graphs, geometric figures, and more on top of the software, which made it that much more dynamic. When he was ready for a clean slate, he simply clicked the next page icon to get a new transparent page, all the while being able to click the previous page icon to go back and reference earlier annotations as needed. This proved to be a much more efficient and effective way to annotate.
Imagine the possibilities of this feature in the media center. When teaching lessons, the media specialist, or students, can personalize applications by adding relevant notes and annotations. These additions can be saved and used again from class to class, and year to year. What else can you envision? What interactive whiteboard tips can you share?

Emily Hodge
Instructional Technology Specialist
University of Georgia Educational Technology Center

Professional Resources in GALILEO

Summertime and the livin’ is…HOT! We hope all of you are enjoying your summer vacation, but if the heat’s too much and you’re ready to start thinking about school again…OK, well, maybe not. But, when you do need to turn your thoughts back to school again, GALILEO offers support for your media center.

We’ve mentioned teacher resources and library staff resources in the GALILEO Planet News before, but we wanted to point out professional resources in GALILEO that include information for media specialists particularly.

Professional Development Collection from EBSCO includes articles and educational reports for professional educators, including many resources for media specialists. From book reviews of children’s and young adult literature to evaluation of a library media program and from instructional design to technology integration in the classroom, there are articles on a wide variety of topics. Search for school libraries, school librarians, educational technology, technology integration, or library media to get an idea of what you can find in this database.

ERIC (@EBSCOhost) and ERIC (@eric.ed.gov) provide access to the education literature in the Education Resources Information Center (ERIC). ERIC not only includes journal articles, but also lesson plans, technology plans, books, reports, and much more. Try searching for library services, library materials, electronic libraries, library use studies, technology integration, multimedia, or educational technology to see the types of resources you can find. Remember to check both versions of ERIC when you’re searching because the full text may appear in one but not the other.

Use Magazines A-Z to find magazines and professional publications in GALILEO for media specialists, such as the following:

• Book Links
• Computers in Libraries
• Curriculum Review
• Information Today
• Knowledge Quest
• Library Media Connection
• Multimedia & Internet@Schools
• Online
• School Library Journal
• School Library Media Activities Monthly
• School Library Monthly
• Teacher Librarian

Remember that you can use journal alerts to keep up with a favorite publication or search alerts to keep up with a topics of interest.

As always, the GALILEO Training page provides a list of upcoming sessions. Several sessions designed to help media specialists get the most out of GALILEO have recently been scheduled.

If you have questions or comments or need to report problems, please Contact Us.

Courtney McGough
GALILEO Support Services
Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia

Dropbox: No More Hassle Updating Files On Multiple Computers!

(Advocacy note: On Wednesday, I had the wonderful opportunity to examine the applications for the Georgia Exemplary Media Center awards. I was, yet again, amazed at the outstanding programs that are in place throughout Georgia. I would like to encourage media specialists across the state to submit an application for this award next year. With such excellent leadership and powerful activities taking place in our centers, everyone from teachers to administrators to public officials can clearly see the strong impact good programs have on student achievement through these applications and awards. I urge you to make application, and share all your great work with the world!)

Dropbox (https://dropbox.com): While networking with the all of the good media folks at the DOE reading session Wednesday, I learned of a really cool tool that can clearly make your life more organized. It is called Dropbox, and it is a way to share all of your files from computer to computer so that any change you make to a file is automatically updated on all of your computers. Basically, you can access all of your files from any computer without having to make changes to the file from one computer to another. Updates and changes occur at the dropbox, so no constant need for flash drives or emailing documents to yourself so you can access the latest version of a file. With the dropbox downloaded on your computers (or iPad or iPhone), you need not worry about making changes to a file you are creating – it is done automatically for all of your computers. You can also begin to work on a file, leave that file to go to your other computer, then pick back up exactly where you left off through the dropbox.

The good news is that this application is free, providing 2GB of storage (and deleted files and revisions don’t take space). Much more space is available for a fee. And this is a secure storage area where files are encrypted with AES-256 before being stored. If you wish to share files or photos, this is easily done as you simply send a link to the file to whomever you wish to receive the data. This is a simple easy-to-use tool that truly does help to organize files and keep them current on every computer you have, simultaneously! Highly recommended!!

Phyllis R. Snipes,
University of West Georgia

Words to Widgets

What in the world is a widget? That’s what I thought a few months ago, so I decided to find out. Now I think they are going to help students navigate researching with databases.

I’m in the middle of switching all of our database links from words to widgets. Where I used to have the words “History Resource Center: World” linked to that database, now I have a widget – the words, an image, and a search box where a search can be started immediately (see picture). I think students will like starting their search right away, and may be more likely to remember a database if there’s a picture tied to it. I’m in a high school, but I think this could work for any age group.

Gale databases have great widgets. They provide everything for you and let you customize it if you want. You choose what option you want for embedding, such as HTML code for your website (what I use) or a link to paste in Google sites. The image is also a link, so if you didn’t want to use the search box, the database still comes up.

EBSCO also has widgets available. I received great customer support from Ryan Taylor, who was very helpful in helping me create some of the specific widgets I needed.

For the databases that don’t currently have widgets, I’m not savvy enough to create them myself. But that’s ok; there aren’t too many, and all of them have an icon associated with each product. So I used that icon and made a link. Easy, and I think more recognizable to have an image and text than just text alone. We’ll see in August!

If you are even thinking about trying widgets, go to our Social Studies Databases page and see what you think (it’s the only one I have finished). If you like it, it’s a little time-consuming, but I promise it’s not difficult! I’d be happy to share any tips, tricks, and HTML code that I can.

Holly Frilot

Library Media Specialist

Collins Hill High School

Registration Is Open for the GOLD/GALILEO Users Group Conference

Registration for the 2010 GOLD/GALILEO Annual Users Group Conference is now open!  Explore – and sign up – at:

http://www.georgialibraries.org/lib/gold/ggugc2010/

“Collaboration Comes of Age”

Hand in hand with their observance of milestone birthdays for a 15-and-fabulous GALILEO and a truly tenacious 10 for PINES, Georgia librarians can look forward to another coming of age when the GOLD/GALILEO Users Group Conference turns 21 on Friday, August 13.

The number 21 symbolizes maturity, legitimacy and progressive civic involvement making our 21st conference theme a cause for both celebration and respect for all that Georgia libraries have accomplished through creative collaborations. Join us as we honor the importance of resource sharing – and turn all these treasured resources and events into one GOLDen occasion!

Adding to the celestial pathos of this year’s theme is the 400th anniversary of the publication of Galileo Galilei’s “Starry Messenger”, a work that changed our view of the solar system and our place in it. Come rediscover how our continued library partnerships help us face up to hard times and face down an overwhelming number of “sun, moon and stars”-type requests.

Let’s change our stars on Friday the 13th – initiating instead a library zenith of new economic and educational opportunities for the citizens we serve!

UGA Center for Continuing Education Conference Center & Hotel
Athens, Georgia
9:00 AM – 3:30 PM

A newsletter article with more detail about the conference is available at:

http://www.georgialibraries.org/lib/gold/ggugc2010/GG_article.pdf