AI in the School Library

1/9/2023

AI in the School Library: Scarier Than "Google It"?

As school librarians, it's important for us to stay up-to-date on the latest developments in technology, including the use of artificial intelligence (AI) as a tool that everyone is jumping to play with and experience.. AI is quickly becoming a part of our daily lives, (I’m looking at you Alexa users!) and it's important for school librarians to understand how it can be used to improve the library experience for students.

If you haven’t been hearing about the “chat” AI tools then its time to get up to speed.

My dad (a part-time retired HS teacher who teaches two senior electives) watched aghast, at a recent family dinner, as the AI app Genie wrote a detailed and coherent essay about a documentary he has his students watch and write about for class. It included specific references to the documentary tone, images and other elements that support the argument that it is subjective. Like many teachers, his response was one of disbelief and then concern about how he will ensure his students are creating authentic work. Rightfully so.

My sister (a small business owner) lauds the use of AI as a game changer for her work and cannot rave about it enough. And, as an aid to her business, says it is the best productivity too she has ever has used. The AI tool has saved her tons of time, just in the few weeks she has been using it. Specifically it has helped her reach out to local business who are related to her work, write social media posts, and connect with podcasters who may want her as a guest.

For many teachers, especially in secondary, this is a scary tool because it makes it so easy for kids to pass off work that is not their own. However I believe that is where we, as librarians have a chance to get ahead of what is coming and help teachers and students use AI tools in a meaningful and appropriate way.

The reality is that most of us have already interacted with some form of AI, an Alexa, automated programs, tech support/chats, etc.

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Avoid Bad Presentations!

1/17/2022

5 PowerPoint Projects That Aren't Presentations

Short on time? Pin me for later.

It can be so easy to fall into the rut of just having your students create PowerPoint presentations because, let's face it, we do it all the time, so it must be easy. But, it's not easy and often the end results are just plain BAD! Because really, who can suffer through another slide show where every other slide transitions with a folding origami crane...not cool PPT designers, not cool. So, if you want to use PowerPoint, but you don’t want to sit through bad presentations, here are five project ideas that are NOT presentations.

There are lots of ways you can use PowerPoint, but when you are in a hurry or have to come up with a product idea quickly, here are five things you can do, using your students' skills with PowerPoint, without actually having to listen to presentations. While you could have them present using these ideas, it will definitely be better than listening to 25 students read directly from the screen!

The Best Free Citation Generator for Students

11/21/2019

The Best Free Citation Generator for Students

Are you struggling to get your students to cite their sources? Do you need a quick and easy, not to mention, FREE citation generator for your classes? Do you want to end the whining and complaining about requiring your students to include an MLA or APA citation as a part of their research? Never fear teachers and librarians, after almost a decade and a half of teaching MLA citations to my students, I have found what I consider to be the best free citation generator for students!

I did not believe that there was an easier citation tool than easybib. It was my go to citation generator in college, graduate school, as an ILA teacher and as a librarian...and it failed me this school year.

The ads were distracting to my middle school students, the pop-up videos were a hindrance to the work we had to accomplish in a 50 minute class period; and I could see the mounting frustration in my students' faces as they ran into roadblock after roadblock trying to use what I kept telling them was the best option out there. But, boy was I wrong!

Don’t have time to read the details? Pin this blog post for later!

Quick and Easy MLA and APA Citations

It is not a myth my friends. The new tool I found really is all that and a bag of chips! It has truly changed my students outlook on having to complete a works cited page or bibliography.

I and my students are officially hooked on a free citation tool called mybib.com. This is a FREE, no advertising sidebar, pop-up absent, MLA and APA citation generator for students.

You don’t need an account to reap the benefits of all the things you pay for with other programs. For example: APA is free, in-text citations are free, annotations are free, among other things.
You can easily set up an account with an email address and a password. This allows you to work on multiple bibliographies at the same time.
They have an authority/reliability measure. This walks students through the process of going back to look for additional information.
They have a quick and easy pop-up box to catch all the little nit-picky rules about citations, like when to capitalize parts of a title.
Switching between formats is as simple as the click of a button.
The interface is simple and clean.
You can select manual entry if you want your students to learn the basics before using the “auto” cite feature.
Even if you use “auto” cite, you are still shown the manual cite page to check your work.
You can add in an annotation, which is then auto added to the final works cited page.
It easily formats the document and then allows for downloading or copying and pasting into a Word document, as well as other programs like Google Drive, Dropbox, etc.

If you want to read more about how my students are taking notes for research, or just need a place for students to apply their use of mybib.com, check out this posting about Teaching Research in the Middle School Classroom.

Disclaimer: I am in no way sponsored by this resource, nor am I paid in anyway to promote it. These thoughts and opinions are completely my own.

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