Teen Tech Week 2017

I always schedule a week's worth of activities for YALSA's Teen Tech Week (TTW). This year TTW was scheduled at the same time as the Louisiana Library Association annual conference. That meant I had to move TTW to the next week. I had work to do to prepare for conference, so I did not have time to plan TTW. Of course, that is no excuse, but I felt slammed. I like to have the students help me plan, but the school schedule seemed to be changing daily, and I did not see my book groups every week like usual. Then I returned from conference exhausted, and I ended up with the flu and missed two days of work. I finally was able to find three days in a row in March when I could offer activities in the library at lunch. 

Day 1:
We always have a day of movies for TTW. Since it falls after the Academy Awards, we usually schedule a showing of the animated shorts that were nominated for an Oscar. This year, it was much more difficult to find the movies except Piper. I did find some Pixar shorts that I thought the students would like. They were all a hit. 





Day 2:
I saw a post on Facebook about this company called Stick Together that makes giant posters for students to sticker by numbers. It is the same concept as the paint by numbers kits from years ago, but there is no mess of paint. The students use stickers. It was addicting, and the students completed the piece in about a week.




Day 3:
A couple of months ago members of National Honor Society and I took the Marshmallow Challenge to 4th graders at a nearby elementary school. I thought this activity would be ideal for TTW. Since I was running this activity at three different lunches, I had each team use their own iPad for their 18 minutes of work. That way the teams did not have to start at the same time. I bought individual prizes and had winning teams for middle school, 8th grade, and high school. Those are our three different lunches. The kids had such a blast that many returned the next week to see if they could improve the height of their free standing structure. 





Comments

  1. Adventures with the Millam'sApril 20, 2017 at 3:01 PM

    Stick Together! That is so cool- thanks for sharing.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. ElizabethApril 22, 2017 at 7:24 PM

      The kids really loved it from the 6th graders to the high schoolers.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Happy Holidays from BRiMS and Bookmarked

I run two book groups at Patrick Taylor. My high school book group, Bookmarked , was created in the fall of 2007 which was my second year as librarian at the school. The students really wanted a library club, but the square footage of the library was so small that I could not imagine how any students could do any actual library work. Instead I created a book discussion group. Not only did we meet to talk books, but I tapped these students to help me with fundraisers and special programming like Teen Read Week. Helping me with these special activities seemed to appease the members. I waited until February of 2009 to institute a book discussion group for my middle school students called BRiMS, or Books Rule in Middle School . Both of the groups meet during lunch, and this year, the school added a third lunch. Now BRiMS is made up of only 6th and 7th graders. Bookmarked has 8th-12th grade students. This has actually worked well because in 2014 and 2015, Bookmarked lost a lot of members w
Read more

Banned Book Week: Students Make Comments Pro & Con Censorship

Image
This blog post is being designed as a lesson for the English I students at PFTSTA. The teachers and I have collaborated on an activity to celebrate Banned Book Week (BBW). Many times in the past during BBW, I have invited the 8th graders into the library to discuss the banning and challenging of books in schools and libraries. I usually show some videos and share books owned by our library that have been banned or challenged somewhere in the US. This activity always spurs great discussion among the students and teachers. This year we wanted the students to create a written response to the presentation. We thought there was a real world connection if we had the students post their opinion online as a comment to someone writing about censorship in schools. The teachers and I want the students to learn how to compose a well thought out comment that is supported by evidence and concrete details. How more real world could it be than having the students comment directly on their librar
Read more

Students Weigh in on Banned Books and the Freedom to Read

Image
Every year, for Banned Book Week, I prepare a lesson for our 8th graders. It was always teacher directed with discussion until last year . The English I teachers and I created a lesson for the students that included research and writing. I pulled the materials that I wanted them to read, and the students would write a very short essay declaring their belief in the need for teens to be able to exercise their freedom to read what they want to or the need for certain books to be taken off the shelves of the library or pulled from the English curriculum.  Above is the slide presentation that I have made for the students. Included in the slides are several videos that I thought would get the students thinking. There are slides with links to specific articles that we want the students to read and use for the concrete evidence to support their stance. A rubric is included at the end so the students know exactly what is expected. The teachers and I want the writing to have a rea
Read more