Musings of a Millennial Librarian

Universal Design for Learning               Universal Design for Learning boils down to creating curriculum that supports and challenges ALL students.   We must realize that students learn in a variety of ways and should be given choices when it comes time to show that they comprehend the material.   As educators we need to design flexible curriculum that benefits ALL learners, such as kinesthetic, audio, and visual.   UDL can seem like a daunting task but it is what’s truly best for students!   Which of these guidelines am I already using?             I currently use guideline 8.3, “foster collaboration and community.”   I’m a big fan of cooperative learning and it’s become a big part of my teaching practice.   My students are always sitting in groups of four which makes it easy to incorporate partner and group work into lessons. ...

Podcasts             Recently I’ve become a huge fan of podcasts!  I first started listening to them when Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey from The Office started their show The Office Ladies.  I absolutely love it and from there I’ve branched off to listening to other podcasts that are aligned with my interests.  Podcasts have become the perfect thing for long car rides and I can’t get enough of them these days!             There are several options when it comes to creating your own podcast.  I chose to take a closer look at Podbean, Anchor, and SoundCloud.  Each one has their own pros and cons and I’d love to share my opinion with ya’ll!   Podbean Podbean is the podcast hosting service that I’ve used for past assignments.  It is definitely great for beginners and those just starting to dip their toes into podcasts.  It’s been great for i...

Cartoons & Comics             I really enjoyed trying out various digital technology apps to create comics.   They each have their own pros and cons and I’d love to share my opinion with ya’ll.   Hope ya’ll enjoy these library jokes! Pixton             This was by far my favorite!   I was able to create a free, educator account that I can share later on with my students.   It was easy to get accustomed to the features and was fun to use!   Pixton has more features to offer with their free version compared to the others I tried out and was more user friendly.   The characters are customizable; you can change their outfits, facial expressions, hair color, and hair style.   The feature I really enjoyed was focus, I was able to change the position of characters within the template and I had fun trying out the various choices.   Ove...

Videos & QR Codes in the Library YouTube                YouTube is a fantastic tool to promote the library!   It’s a great way to provide information in fun, unique ways.   YouTube is very user friendly and allows you to share videos in variety of formats.   Here recently I’ve uploaded videos, screencasts, and a book trailer created on Animoto.   I look forward to creating more content for my YouTube channel in the months to come, especially with virtual learning!                I checked out a few channels that were library focused and want to share what I found! The NHS Library    Most Helpful for Students:    This video is beneficial to students because it introduces them to the basics of conducting research on the database, EBSCO Host.   All too often students simply copy and paste inf...