Archive
Our Zinio Digital Magazine account is up and running
EasyBib Accounts for all ASIJ Students
To get your EasyBib account, visit our Online Resources/Databases page and scroll down to EasyBib. Follow the link, create your account, and you will be in business!
EasyBib is an intuitive information literacy platform that provides citation, note taking, and research tools that are easy-to-use and educational. EasyBib is not only accurate, fast, and comprehensive, but helps educators teach and students learn how to become effective and organized researchers.
Linda Hayakawa
Coming Soon! The Zinio Digital Magazine Service
Stand by for our new Zinio Subscription. We have discontinued our underused library print magazines and gone with a new digital service. You will be able to read our magazines on your computer, iPad or other device. We chose the magazines based on a poll taken in the high school last year. We should have this up and running in a week or two!
Green Screens, Cameras and Lights
Did you know that the HS library has green screens, cameras and lights you can borrow for your next awesome video project? Just ask Mrs. Yoshii for the equipment and book the IdeaXchange or one of the Collaboration Rooms.
Image: “Green Room, Green Screen” by Jared Tarbel.
Creative Commons License.
9th Grade – Speed Dating with Books and Library Orientations
The 9th grade students have visited the library twice in the past few days. The first time was to get acquainted with some great books, such as our new Sakura Medal titles and books recommended by the library staff. They sat in circles and spent one minute each with five books. Then they discussed the five books with the others in their circle. The second visit was a library orientation. The students worked in teams to discover information about both the physical and virtual library and then presented what they had learned to the rest of the class. Topics covered included the Online Databases, the Citation and Creative Commons Guide, the Destiny Library Catalog, the Sakura Medal Program, the fiction genres in the library, the Tech Help Desk, and rules around borrowing computer chargers, books, Kindles, iPads and other library materials.
Speed Dating with Books
9th Grade Library Orientation
Digital Public Library of America – A New Database!
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Digital Public Library of America The Digital Public Library of America brings together the riches of America’s libraries, archives, and museums, and makes them freely available to the world. It strives to contain the full breadth of human expression, from the written word, to works of art and culture, to records of America’s heritage, to the efforts and data of science. The DPLA aims to expand this crucial realm of openly available materials, and make those riches more easily discovered and more widely usable and used, through its three main elements: 1. A portal that delivers students, teachers, scholars, and the public to incredible resources, wherever they may be. Far more than a search engine, the portal provides innovative ways to search and scan through the united collection of millions of items, including by timeline, map, virtual bookshelf, format, and topic.2. A platform that enables new and transformative uses of our digitized cultural heritage. With an application programming interface (API) and maximally open data, the DPLA can be used by software developers, researchers, and others to create novel environments for learning, tools for discovery, and engaging apps.3. An advocate for a strong public option in the twenty-first century.
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Research, Research, Research!
There is so much going on! The 9th Grade I-Search project is in full swing. The students are asked to begin with “a passion to know something.” They choose a topic of great personal interest. They write down what they know about their topic and then begin to explore. The librarians’ part in this is to introduce the students to the library catalog and all the neat things it can do for them, show them how to generate keywords and search strings, how to navigate databases, how to authenticate their resources to make sure the information they are getting is reliable, and how to “Google” more effectively. They craft their paper under the guidance of their English teachers. Unlike most research papers, this one focuses more on the journey of discovery rather than on the results of their research (although that is part of it). At the end of the process, we go back into the classroom to help the students create their bibliographies and their in-text citations. Students come to us for one on one assistance. We also support the unit by buying new books, both print and digital, when our existing collection does not have the information they need. This is a great way to develop a dynamic, up-to-date collection.
The I-Search topics this year.
At the same time, juniors and seniors in Mrs. Krauth’s Japan Seminar class are exploring issues related to Japan and producing very high level research papers. Each student is expected to have a reference interview with a librarian to help them locate the best print and digital resources for their topic. In this case we are using databases and search engines the students will encounter at college such as Academic Search Premier, JSTOR and Google Scholar.
Some of the J-Sem topics this year.
There is more…. we will post on some of the other research happening at ASIJ in a couple of days!
New Research Tool – the ASIJ LibGuides
We have subscribed to a wonderful platform and content management system for aiding student research. It is called LibGuides and it allows the ASIJ library media specialists to curate information targeted for specific units of study. Teachers can also add information to the guides. So far, we have used our new LibGuides for three classes: AP Environmental Science, Modern World History and Psychology.
Please take a look at our new guides at http://asij.libguides.com/index.php.
Explore the New Questia School Database
Questia School has a slick new interface and many powerful tools. Every ASIJ HS student now has access to 78,000 ebooks, in addition to magazine, journal, newspaper and encyclopedia articles. www.questiaschool.com
Here are some tutorials we’ve created for you. http://youtube.com/watch?v=TobFOwi3ZQc and http://youtube.com/watch?v=3JQXdMlLbDQ
Resources for the Upcoming U.S. Presidential Election
Resources on the upcoming election from Infotopia
http://www.infotopia.info/presidential_election_2012.html
Infotopia is a completely free Google alternative search engine
that includes only websites previously recommended by librarians, teachers,
and educational and library consortia.
ASIJ HS Library/Tech Updates 