Last month, the ALSC Children and Technology Committee hosted our monthly Twitter Chat on “Incorporating New Technologies/New Media into Your Service” and we came up with the following questions for participants:
Tag: Media Mentorship
Teach Me Something Fun: Media Mentorship and Online Learning
“Libraries are about access, and we need to step up to provide ALL TYPES OF ACCESS.” –Amy Koester, ALSC Blog, Our Future Includes EBooks #alamw13, January 24, 2013 Online learning is a topic that deserves more focus. Normally, in my conversations about electronic resources, the attention is mainly on ebooks or databases. Libraries, as informal and self directed centers of learning, have been concentrating more on online learning, and it is obvious we need to remember children in this movement as well. Yet when I did a quick and informal survey of library websites, I see much work and time has been spent by libraries on evaluating and recommending online learning sites, and some libraries have even created their own. Through media mentorship, we can draw both our young patrons and their caregivers to the many online learning products, free and paid for, that we subscribe to, find, evaluate, and…
New Media Focus: Keeping Up on Streaming Video
In my last post for the ALSC blog, I wrote about downloadable and streaming audiobooks. With our strengthening focus on media mentorship in ALSC, streaming video is another new media format that needs our attention for promotion and incorporation into our regular programs and services.
Media Mentorship and Libraries: More Resources
There’s been a lot of discussion about media mentorship, especially with the popularity of Pokémon GO. How can libraries help families and children learn how to make smart and safe media decisions?
Pokemon Go, Libraries, and Media Mentorship
Pokemon Go popularity is not showing any signs of slowing down anytime soon. According to a report from USA Today the game has topped 15 million downloads and the average person is spending around 33 minutes per day in the app. With the game continuing it’s pop culture run and with libraries as many Pokestops or Gyms, this is a perfect time to embrace media mentorship in the library and incorporate it into our Pokemon Go programs.
Apps, Storytime, and Media Mentorship
The Summer Reading Program is in full swing here in Mount Prospect, Illinois, and with that comes patron questions about books, movies, programs, and more. In the past year, there have also been more questions about selecting appropriate and interesting apps for children. After discussing the need to address media mentorship in a more direct approach than what we were currently doing, it was decided this summer to start giving patrons a take home at the end of storytime that includes a “Digital Lit Tip.” Our summer storytimes are open to the public and can have children of various ages. Very young children must have a parent with them. In order to make these tips accessible to all patrons, even those who don’t have access to devices at home, we selected apps that were already reviewed and featured on our iPads in the department. We also plan to post the…
Encouraging young listeners with downloadable and streaming audiobooks
Downloadable and streaming audiobooks have been on my mind again. Recently, some articles came out about the benefits of audiobooks for literacy; a revelation that probably surprised few of us in children’s and school library services. We did not create the Odyssey awards for nothing. ALA Editions published a wonderful book about it by Sharon Grover and Lizette D. Hannegan “back” in 2012. Last year, Rachel Wood from Arlington Public Library wrote an ALSC Blog post that stands as a primer for building an e-audio collection. But it always feels like a topic needs to come around a few times before the greater profession and the greater public latches on. Perhaps it is not always content that is the way to hook a reluctant reader but format too. Dan Cohen from the DPLA wrote an article for The Atlantic talking about the powerful role that smartphones play in the lives…
Let’s Share: Best Practices in Media Mentorship
Do you consider yourself a media mentor? The ALSC Children and Technology Committee would like to hear about your best practices as a media mentor with new media, preschool age patrons, elementary age patrons, and during summer reading. Please contribute to our Google Form. The committee will collect these best practices to share with our colleagues through articles, blog posts, twitterchats, and other continuing education opportunities. As well, consider encouraging colleagues, at work or across the country, to share their successes, stories, and ideas. The committee is interested in practices from all sorts of libraries: rural, urban, suburban; small, large, medium; public libraries, school libraries, special libraries; stand alone libraries, consortia, and library systems. To learn more about what ALSC is doing with media mentorship, check out the Media Mentorship in Libraries Serving Youth page and the accompanying white paper. Michael Santangelo is the Electronic Resources Coordinator at BookOps, the shared technical…