Category: Uncategorized

Posted in Award Winning Books, Freedom to read, New Non-fiction, Scholastic Book Fair, Uncategorized

Midway Scholastic Book Fair, 2023

Posted on by lisafairbanksrossi

Best sellers, new titles and soooo many fuzzy journals!

I’ve been planning and tinkering with print and video promotional materials every day for the big reveal of the gorgeous layout Scholastic is famous for providing. The staff helped with planning the teacher/student previews and PTO volunteers showed up on Friday to help move and organize the library space and help display the goods which was so generous and amazing.

“Mom! I HAVE to have this right now. No, THIS one, oh it’s so cuuuute”

~ Every child present while their parents helped set up the book fair.

The most fun part of the “pre-show” was the student involvement! A group of Shark Council members got a first look and helped prioritize which books to feature (based on their enthusiasm) and just generally promote coming to the fair this week.

Monday November 6 will be a student preview/Wish List creation day (there will be cash registers for kids at lunch recess who come financially prepared on Monday) Afterschool will begin the first public sale slot.

Tuesday November 7 we will be open 8am-9am, lunch recess and afterschool from 3:20-4.

Wednesday, our schoolwide Grandparent’s Day will be the biggest day for shopping, starting at 8am. This will allow grandarents to shop beforehand, as the breakfast doesn’t begin until 8:30am. The shopping will continue until 9:40 am (as it is late start day) and we will stay open until 6pm that night.

Thursday is the last day, opening 8a-9a and 3:20-4pm. Students with an ewallet will help the flow of traffic tremendously. We hope you come, shop and enjoy!

Setting up an eWallet: https://bookfairs.scholastic.com/content/fairs/videos/intro-to-ewallet-fair-files.html

Posted in Uncategorized

Library Grand Opening/Book Fair

Posted on by lisafairbanksrossi

It has been a whirlwind of shelving, adjusting, hosting and participating in grand openings, open houses, and this week, the first Book Fair in our new building! This Fall’s theme is Enchanted Forest, which lends itself naturally to reading as it focuses on fantastical imagination. Our super-volunteers, Midway parents Mary Peterson and Angela Wolverton spent multiple hours on sparkly and adorable, gnome and toadstool-themed decor. PTO members and fellow super mom and super volunteers Kelsey Soukup and Karissa Naslund created a huge antique book (yes those are authentic tea-stained pages!) for the photo booth backdrop.) The students really want to keep the paper tree and benches out, but I suppose we have to eventually set up my classroom again….

 

Posted in Uncategorized

BOOK FAIR IS COMING THIS WEEK!!!

Posted on by lisafairbanksrossi

To get excited about the books available at the upcoming Colbert Book Fair, (starting this Monday, November 23, and continuing after Thanksgiving Break, thanks to the advocacy of PTO president Tami Dillon and the generosity of Scholastic, to give our families more time to shop..the five days without power put all things like this on hold! So now that we (hopefully?)  all have power, Please take time to watch these wonderful book trailers presented by the authors and illustrators themselves!

http://www.scholastic.com/bookfairs/books/book-trailers

Also, please watch this beautiful little film that talks about the vital opportunities for reading and development that are made available by book fairs, Feel good about purchase you make, and the contribution they are to your children’s lifelong relationship with reading.

https://www.facebook.com/ScholasticBookFairs/videos/10152888378215522/?video_source=pages_finch_trailer
There will also be a chance to donate books to Colbert families who may not be able to spare as much extra funding.. in keeping with this fair’s theme “MONSTERS” you’ll be able to place the gifted books into the mouth of a “book eating monster”

betha
Ok well this is how Bertha the book eater looked on my daughter’s head. She will look different attached to whichever mechanism her body will be. 🙂

 

Posted in Digital Citizenship, Netiquette, Uncategorized

Digital Citizenship: if you wouldn’t say/do it in person, don’t say/do it online either!

Posted on by lisafairbanksrossi

Next week is Digital Citizenship Week, and we’ll be learning the foundations of manners on the internet, as well as thinking carefully before posting, how to keep yourself from making a career-limiting move 15 years before you will be trying to make a career, and protecting yourself from being cyber-bullied or victimized by people with no netiquette!

Digital citizenship can be defined as the norms of appropriate, responsible behavior with regard to technology use. And just as librarians lead our students on the shortest, richest path of wisdom through books, naturally we also impart our best practices for efficient information gathering online! It’s a big task, and I, for one, am grateful to be imparted with the privilege of leading children through such an exciting and innovative journey!

Posted in Uncategorized

Storybird

Posted on by lisafairbanksrossi

Loved using “Storybird” today at Colbert Elementary. To get Storybird from any computer, ipad, kindle, Nook, etc (it doesn’t work that well on a hand-held device) you may either go directly to http://www.storybird.com, but I recommend you go to Colbert or Midway (or which ever Mead elementary school you attend) library website > databases > Informational Tech tools > Presentation tools > Storybird. Create an account by using your school-issued username and then use that same username and add @mead354.org (or any other email address you would like ) and your school-issued password.

Click “CREATE: and go wherever the art leads you. The “create poem” allows you to drag and drop phrases into poems,

and the picture book pages allow you to write stories that match with which ever painting strikes you.

Screen Shot 2015-10-14 at 3.35.23 PM

Here’s what I threw together, then decided I would make a book  of out takes from famous fairy tales. Will I finish? Probably not! Creativity is an in-the-moment thing, right?!

I always recommend that beginning, aspiring, not-quite-inspired-yet- or blocked writers start with the ridiculous, just as I did.

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Maker Spaces

Posted on by lisafairbanksrossi

MAKER SPACES are the next generation of library. There are already some of these set up at the Spokane Public Library, and I could be talked into creating these spaces here. Perhaps the 3-D printer is something we could work up to…

See this video for a quick introduction about their purpose and possibility. Expect more in 2016-2017!

SOOO Cool, right?!maker-space-master

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Learning Curve

Posted on by lisafairbanksrossi

It’s true, my darling students at both Midway and Colbert Elementary schools in Mead have had to roll with the learning curve that is inherent in technology. Or, okay, me and technology? As I work with my fellow library media technology teachers to streamline our Ipads, Chromebooks and iMacs to a unified Google platform, there are frozen pages, slow servers, and more than a tiny amount of “winging it” when technology fails to do what is expected to do!

So thank you to all the students for their patience, and for being willing to enjoy my witty banter as I work to fill their minds with new strategies for using technology safely, as well as my enthusiastic selling of current and classic stories I believe will best enhance a meaningful relationship with reading. Thank you to those families who dropped by the Open House at Midway to hear about all the resources available on the district library website. I am attaching a link to an article that explains well the role of libraries and librarians in the emerging digital realm of classroom learning. (click below)

“Mediamorphosis“