by: Jennifer Aston
If you read this blog, you might be aware that I am currently taking my Teacher-Librarian Part 2 AQ (Additional Qualification) through Queen’s University. Some of the tasks that we are doing involve reading articles and synthesizing information in different ways. It may not come as a surprise that I have been using Canva for a lot of these things. I thought I would just post a few to share out. Copyright Matters:.. Read More
This week in my Teacher-Librarian course through Queens, the focus was on Foundational Documents – Leading Learning, Together for Learning, different Teacher-Librarian publications and Copyright Matters. It involved using these documents to self-evaluate, which has been really helpful. I think I have actually identified what my Annual Learning Plan focus will be for next year based on a few different tools. One task involved summarizing an article for others. I chose one called.. Read More
This week, I started a Teacher-Librarian Part 2 course through Queen’s University. I was concerned that taking the course would mean the end of my already sporadic blog. But here I am writing! The first week of this course has been really inspiring. The tasks and discussions are fun, engaging, and I am enjoying reading and replying in different discussions related to being a Teacher-Librarian with people who are in the role (this.. Read More
Multilingualism is generally understood to mean knowledge of more languages than a native language. It is a language term that moves from monolingualism (knowing one language) beyond bilingualism (knowing two languages) into the realm of knowing many, or multiple, languages. This year, our school is taking part in an “Inclusive Libraries” project. During our first meeting, my principal, a colleague and I had an actual full day in-person PD with a wonderful breakfast and.. Read More
My blog has been badly neglected in the past few months and today I am firing it up to post a couple of blog posts (by request). Let’s start with why. Why did I start making these calendars in the first place? Initially, I started making them to respond to a need in my own school community. I had some evidence that some of the youngest students at my school were not being.. Read More
One thing that has been on my “to do” list this summer is to create a Website for our Library Learning Commons. I am blogging about it today so that I can figure out why it may or may not be worthwhile and talk it through. So for the LLC website I have been thinking about the following questions: Question 1: Why a Website and not Google Classroom or some other platform? First,.. Read More
Next year, I will be a 0.7 Teacher-Librarian and a 0.3 classroom teacher. I am going to hold back on saying which grade I am teaching right now until the fall, when school returns. This past year my 0.3 consisted of some small group reading instruction with Grade 1 students and teaching Drama, Dance & Music in grades 1, 2 and in a 3/4 class. I enjoyed it a lot, but these art.. Read More
For nearly two and half years, my family has been really cautious and Covid-free. That is, until recently. We have been using N95 masks, we were all vaccinated as much as we could be. We were vigilant. However, in June, like many, we started letting down our guards as restrictions everywhere in Ontario eased. Did I go to a couple of stores without a mask? Did we start wearing 3 layer blue masks.. Read More
This week, I have had both of these things on my mind. They might be two separate blogs, but I will see if I can make sense of it here. A few weeks ago, I sent out a message to staff – is there a class interested in partnering to hold a student election? I had ordered materials from CIVIX last fall for the Federal election and never had the opportunity to use.. Read More
For the past few weeks, I have been following the story of “The Great Bear“, a book by Cree author, David A. Robertson, that was being challenged at the Durham District School Board. My friend and colleague Daniel Tooker has been reading this book out loud with his Grade 5/6 class. Last year, they read the first book in the series “The Barren Grounds” (which admittedly, I just started). He and I followed.. Read More