2014 Networking Summit Sessions

Session 1: 9:45 – 10:45am

1. Ways to Minimize the Summer Slide by Maximizing Summer Reading – Suzanne Rusnak (Interest Level: Elementary)
   Attendees will share their ideas about ways to encourage students to remain engaged in active reading throughout the summer. Three primary possibilities will be discussed — use of public library programs, school library programs, and eBooks.
2. What’s New at LEARN NC! – Lesley Richardson and Kimberly Hirsh (Interest Level: Elementary, Middle, High)
   We know you are busy and need resources at your fingertips. That’s why at LEARN NC we are working hard to provide you with the high quality, standards aligned, instructional resources you need for all grade levels. Come hear about all LEARN NC has to offer!
3. The Common Core and Choosing Texts & Books – Christina Brayton and Emily Shue (Interest Level: Middle)
   This session will outline the changes in text-based learning and support within the school and media center. We will talk about how to choose books which offer richer text complexity, higher reader engagement, and socially complicated situations. We will talk about how to support teachers in the Common Core and Essential Standards (CCES) with library texts and subscription resources.
4. School Library Media Coordinator Evaluation Instrument – Kathy Parker (Interest Level: Elementary, Middle, High)
   NC has a new evaluation instrument for school library media coordinators. This session will focus on that instrument. In this session, school library media coordinators will review the steps of the evaluation process and share strategies from their practice that meet rubric descriptors.
5. Project Enable – Jill Whitson, Jami Jones, Lou Sua and Antoinetta Wooley (Interest Level: Elementary, Middle, High)
   Interactive discussion/presentation that will raise awareness of students with disabilities and ways librarians, regular, and special education teachers can collaborate to meet these special needs in the library.
6. School/Public Library Cooperation in the New Normal – Tom Terrell and Elaine Yontz (Interest Level: Elementary, Middle, High)
   We are involved in a project to track the effects of Common Core and One-to-One on the synergy between school and public libraries. We want your input on your students’ use of public libraries after school hours and on weekends, particularly if they don’t own their own computers or have web access at home. We also want to know how Common Core has affected resource needs and collection development in your school libraries and how you see your local public libraries supporting those changes. We’ll invite your comments on our strategies for gathering data on these questions statewide.
7. Lifehacks for Librarians – Sharon O’Neill (Interest Level: Elementary, Middle, High)
   life·hack (līfˌhak) – noun, informal 1. a strategy or technique adopted in order to manage one’s time and daily activities in a more efficient way. Time management is a precious skill, one that I never learned as a child. I have, however, learned how to utilize tools like Google Drive, Social Media and even Pinterest and TeachersPayTeachers in conjunction with my phone/iPad/tablet/laptop to maximize my efficiency and increase my effectiveness when communicating with my staff.
8. Mending torn pages (Using adhesive, Filmoplast R and acid free tape) – Gloria Bradshaw (Interest Level: Elementary, Middle, High)
   Participants of this session will learn to mend torn pages (Using adhesive, Filmoplast R and acid free tape), tighten loose hinges (text block is loose from case), and tip in a disconnected page.
9. The Evolving Role of School Library Media Coordinators; Sparking Initiatives – Cathy DuPre and Kevin Washburn (Interest Level: Elementary, Middle, High)
   Come join us as we discuss and explore intentional practice, new research as well as international and national educational trends! How are you embracing change and the impact of digital literacies, maker spaces, as well as physical and virtual collections? How is your learning environment changing to support learners? Please bring ideas to share as we reflect on the evolving learning landscape and needs of personalizing learning.
10. Our Story: Celebrating African American History – Jackie Ruffin-Pittman (Interest Level: Middle, High)
    Our Story is the story of the Middle Passage and the story of Annie Johnson a former slave on the Magnolia Plantation in Scotland Neck, North Carolina. The story of the Middle Passage and Annie Johnson can be shared with grades 4-12. Jackie Ruffin-Pittman reenacts the life of her great grandmother, Annie Johnson. She will share activities for The Middle Passage and Pre-Civil War History for teachers.

Session 2: 11:00am – 12:00pm

1. Flipping the Media Center – Laura Warmke and Carol Gehringer (Interest Level: Elementary, Middle, High)
   Media Specialists are increasingly looking to “flip” their libraries, making instruction and help available outside of classroom or library time. In this session, two Media Specialists, Carol Gehringer (elementary) and Laura Warmke (middle and high school), will share how they flip the media centers at their school. Their strategies include recording tutorials and lessons for students to watch at home and running a flipped, game-based technology professional development for teachers. Carol and Laura will also facilitate a discussion about these topics to allow attendees to share what has worked (and what has not) at their schools. They hope everyone walks away excited and with new ideas to implement!
2. App-tizers for the Media Center – Gail Holmes, Siedah Holmes, and LaShonda Brown (Interest Level: Elementary, Middle, High)
   Use apps to build literacy skills for creating a common vocabulary, generate common understandings and promote instructional methodology across disciplines and grade levels. Join me for a look at five  key apps for building literacy in the classroom and media center. Best served on the iPad but not required.
3. STEM the Tide with Free Government Resources – Judy Walker (Interest Level: Middle, High)
   Finding quality, inexpensive science resources to support your school science, math and technology curriculum can be challenging. However, there are a host of resources (print, online, apps, etc.) available free from various government agencies such as NASA, NOAA, DOE, NIH, etc. The discussion will start with NASA resources and expand to a wide variety of materials provided by other government agencies. We will also discuss how they can be used in both the content classroom and the media center to support the common core and science/math essential standards.
4. Managing Interpersonal Conflict with Coworkers – Gail Munde (Interest Level: Elementary, Middle, High)
   Some say coworkers can “make or break” the workplace. That is, supportive and cohesive coworkers have a unique potential to provide work-related and social support to one another that improves productivity and decision-making, and adds richness to the work experience. On the other hand, coworkers can also antagonize one another to the point of creating an uncomfortable, exclusive, or hostile workplace. As school organizations are overstressed by decreasing resources, increasing class sizes, relentless external criticism, and the constant demand to do more with less, the potential for coworker conflict increases.  Are there ways to avoid and/or defuse interpersonal and intergroup conflict at work? Are there ways to motivate others to acknowledge and develop supportive and cohesive relationships among coworkers? How can we motivate others to collaborate for the benefit of the school, its students and one another? Examining these and other related questions outside the immediate work environment may be useful in developing new perspectives on conflict, imagining new and more effective behaviors for dealing with conflict, and even help to repair the damage caused by conflict.
5. Making the Most Out of a Fixed Schedule – Teresa Wetherell (Interest Level: Elementary)
   In this bring, brag and share session, we will explore exciting and creative ways to offer the most instruction and services to students while implementing the Common Core State Standards (CCSS). Topics will include pairing a daily dose of nonfiction with fiction, bringing science and social studies into media lessons, utilizing and text pairing the North Carolina Children’s Book Award Nominations with other titles as well as round table discussions of offering media lessons and centers (stations) for student’s benefit.
6. Analyzing Primary Sources from the Library of Congress as a Springboard to Developing Research Questions – Cheryl Lederle, Rebecca Newland, and Katie Richardson (Interest Level: Middle)
   This session will provide librarians with a starting point for using primary sources from the Library of Congress in their own instruction as well as when collaborating with teachers. The session will focus on using primary sources to generate research questions and evaluate sources. Library media coordinators are uniquely placed to lead schools in 21st century teaching and learning, and primary sources open opportunities for collaborating with teachers to meet skill and content standards. Because primary sources are often incomplete, a natural part of primary source analysis is asking questions. Participants will engage in a model primary source analysis activity, discuss ways to incorporate primary source analysis into their own instructional settings, and learn how to find classroom-ready materials, aligned to standards, from the Library of Congress.
7. Twitterize Your Classroom – Allison Reid (Interest Level: High)
   The facilitator will show participants how to use Twitter both as a means for connecting and collaboration with their students as well as a means to create a back channel during classroom discussions and group activities. Attendees will come away with useful tools for engaging students both in and out of the classroom, as well as providing them with cheat sheets, and all the lingo like hashtags, follows, mentions and retweeting. The facilitator will show how to add both photos and weblinks to tweets and how to display the Twitter feed in word cloud programs. Discussion will include different ways to leverage the power of Twitter culture in the classroom and on alternative ways to provide the same experience in schools where Twitter is not allowed.  Participants are encouraged to sign-up for a Twitter account prior to attending the session.
8. Let’s Make a Deal! Win-Win Grant Seeking for Library Media Professionals – Michele Oros (Interest Level: Elementary, Middle, High)
   Although grants for media center materials and programming have grown scarce, opportunities remain to collaborate with school and community partners to enhance resources and services. This session will explore the basics of grant writing, with a focus on strategies that promote collaboration and advance the goals of all project partners.
9. Stories From Around the World – Patch Clark (Interest Level: Elementary, Middle)
   ECU Storybook Theatre will present an interactive session sharing exciting stories gathered from around the world including tales from Russia, Japan, Beijing, Peru, Iraq and the United States. Come join us for a fun, informative and magical journey around the world!
10. Celebrate Diversity! Multicultural Literature and the Common Core – Nancy May (Interest Level: Elementary, Middle, High)
    Discover great multicultural books and resources for students at all levels and share your own favorites with the rest of us!

Session 3: 1:15 – 2:15pm

1. Using the NC Young Adult Book Awards Across the Curriculum – Robin Jordan (Interest Level: Middle, High)
   Participants will work together to formulate ideas for using the NC Young Adult Book Award books in Middle and High School classrooms across the curriculum. Examples will be given but the bulk of the session should be for participants to brainstorm ideas and create pseudo lesson plans (that can be completed and shared with others).
2. AASL Best Websites for Teaching and Learning – Joanna Gerakios (Interest Level: Elementary, Middle, High)
   Each year the American Association of School Librarians puts out a list of Best Websites for Teaching and Learning. The 2013 list emphasizes sites that foster the qualities of innovation, creativity, active participation, and collaboration. Designed to encourage communities of learners that explore and discover, all of the sites are free, web-based, and user friendly. In this session, the sites will be introduced and we will discuss ways in which the sites can be used in your library setting. Come ready to explore some new sites, and if you’ve already been using some of them, come as well and share your ideas and experiences. Everything has been organized in a Livebinder for future reference.
3. K-12 Science Resources from the National Library of Medicine – Jeff Coghill and Elaine Yontz (Interest Level: Elementary, Middle, High)
   The National Library of Medicine collects and makes available a treasure trove of free resources in all areas of biomedicine and health care. This session will acquaint attendees with resources of particular value for K-12 science teaching. Resources discussed include History of Medicine Images, Profiles in Science, MedlinePlus, ToxTown, Household Products Database, Haz-Map, TRI: Toxics Release Inventory, and ChemIDplus.
4. Documenting Digital Collaboration – Joan Vey, Allison Reid, and Monica Gropp (Interest Level: Elementary, Middle, High)
   Learn how to create a digital package which includes on-line tool guides, media and teacher lesson plans and collaboration forms. Lesson plan examples include Aurasma and Thinglink. Forms and examples will be shared to use and improve. Bring your most successful ideas on how you support instructional learning in your school.
5. YIKES! I Lost My Assistant! NOW What Do I DO? – Kellie Williams and Connie Conner (Interest Level: Elementary)
   Two Elementary Librarians will share how we survive and thrive without a Media Assistant. Innovative ideas will be discussed such as using creative ways to engage your students in maintaining order in your Media Center while still teaching essential 21st-century skills. We will share how we formed our own Professional Learning Community (PLC) to collaborate across the school district, use social media to solicit and promote our libraries, use Google Docs, Google Hangouts, and Jing to share lesson plans, create calendars and contribute other essential elements that help maintain and improve our library settings. We will also discuss how we collaborate with teachers in our schools using creative and fun ideas to keep them coming back for more! We are looking for your success stories as well. Together we will create a collaborative, living tool for the group to continue this great idea bank, thus creating a statewide PLC.
6. Symbaloo: Using Online Tools to Help Organize Digital Resources and Increase Traffic in your Virtual Library – Sedley Abercrombie (Interest Level: Elementary, Middle, High)
   Attendees will see how using www.symbalooedu.com is a highly effective tool in the organization of digital resources. After a 15-20 minute presentation, attendees will create their own symbaloos, share with others and learn how to embed into websites.
7. Meeting the Needs of Urban Non-Readers – Kathryn Tharrington (Interest Level: Middle, High)
   After working in an urban, predominantly African American middle school for five years, I have learned that to make non-readers readers, you must find out what they like. We will examine titles and authors that students can relate to and enjoy reading.
8. How Usable is Your School Library Website? Best Practices and Conversations about Student Needs and Website Design – Rebecca Morris, Anthony Chow, and Samantha Lam (Interest Level: Elementary, Middle, High)
   Virtual access is an essential part of today’s school library, allowing students to connect to library resources and tools from anywhere, at any time. How does your school library website expand and strengthen the reach of your school library to promote students’ academic success?
   At this roundtable discussion, learn about research on the nation’s school library website usability (n=300), school librarian perceptions (n=85), and share your observations, questions, and ideas about school library websites. The facilitators will guide participants in viewing their school library websites with an eye for cognitive and affective components of design, and share research findings on “how usable” school library websites are for students. Together, we will consider questions like these: What are the goals of your school library website? Who is it “for,” and how do these users interact with the site? How does the design of your website meet student needs? Does your website efficiently and effectively provide essential information about your library’s core services? We will discuss best practices for school library website design, and consider how to work with school leaders and your technology department to build a website that works for your students and your school library.
9. Stories From Around the World – Patch Clark (Interest Level: Elementary, Middle)
   ECU Storybook Theatre will present an interactive session sharing exciting stories gathered from around the world including tales from Russia, Japan, Beijing, Peru, Iraq and the United States. Come join us for a fun, informative and magical journey around the world!
10. Pulling in Reluctant Readers; Focus on Middle and High School Boys – Kristy Sartain (Interest Level: Middle, High)
    This session will take a look at authors, titles, and series that have proven successful in getting middle and high school boys to read. Non-fiction, fiction, and manga will be covered. Bring your suggestions and stories about what has worked for you and we will create a comprehensive list to be sent to all participants.

Session 4: 2:30 – 3:30pm

• Shifting Gears: Exploring the Evolving Leadership Roles of School Librarians as Defined by the Rubric for Evaluating North Carolina’s School Library Media Coordinators.Panelists include Joann Absi (President, North Carolina School Library Media Association), Frances Bradburn (Program Director, North Carolina New School), Carla Brooks (School Media Coordinator of the Year, North Carolina School Library Media Association), Lionel Kato (Principal, North Pitt High School), Kathy Parker (School Library Media Consultant, North Carolina Department of Public Instruction), and Carolina “Cal” Shepard (State Librarian, State Library of North Carolina) – Moderator, Alesia Stevenson Interest Level: (Elementary, Middle, High)

  A new North Carolina evaluation instrument for school library media coordinators was implemented Fall 2013. Many public school professionals feel the demonstration of Standard 1, “School library media coordinators demonstrate leadership,” is the most challenging of the five. Our diverse panel of experts will share their knowledge and viewpoints by discussing strategies for effectively meeting this standard. You are encouraged to submit questions for the panel prior to the summit. Please send them to Alan Bailey (baileya@ecu.edu) with “Panel Discussion Question” in the subject line.