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21st C Literacy Ave Advocate! Will you join me?

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Hometown:: Altoona, Iowa

Your school and country: Southeast Polk Community Schools, USA

Your Role in Flat Classroom: advisor

About Me:: I have been a K-12 teacher librarian in the Southeast Polk Community Schools for fourteen years, with the past six years in the high school. The job is rewarding and challenging. I work with 1700 students of all abilities and interests.

Being a teacher in the high school is rewarding as I watch students grow over four years. They blossom from being questioning freshmen into being mature seniors, ready to graduate and move on to adulthood. In the library, interested teens excel in student leadership skills related to library management and technology! I often urge them to pursue a career in library services and half jokingly tell them I'm reserving their spot to take my position, six to eight years or so down the road, after their college training!

My job is challenging as literacy skills demand greater and greater knowledge of new technologies, emerging daily. Watching the rapid growth of the Internet since the introduction of WWW around 1995 has been fascinating. Each year offers new opportunities for global use and value to our world.

In the classroom, I enjoy the potential and challenge of using Web 2.0 tools personally and with students! I try to keep an even balance of promoting reading and books and encouraging students and staff to experiment with blogs, wikis and podcasting!

It is with great joy that I am participating in the Flat Classroom Project 2008 as an international judge! I am learning right along with the teachers and students! I enjoy teaching learners how to effectively travel down Literacy Avenue in the WWW! Hop on board. Keyword search Flat Classroom Project 2008 and enjoy the reading, thinking, and problem solving!

Carol VanHook
School Media Specialist

librariesrock -- flickr
vanhookc -- twitter, plurk, tumblr

Website:: http://booktalk.pbwiki.com/

Blog:: http://vanhookc.blogspot.com

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At 3:47am on December 17, 2008, Barbara Peskin said…: Hi,
I enjoyed judging with all of you. I'm not sure where to find our collective results. Could you share the URL with me?
Thanks,
Barbara

At 6:51am on December 10, 2008, Steve Madsen said…: Okay, I've had a look at our combined scores and adjusted mine somewhat. I am happy with our results and we can put in our votes / numbers through the survey. We can leave it to the Mega Judge to differentiate if need be. If the third judge completes the survey, that will undoubtedly change the rankings, scores. Thanks for all your efforts. Good luck with the icy roads!

At 6:14am on December 10, 2008, Steve Madsen said…: Oops. I lied to you. 2.A.4 Catherine W has updated her video, not Catherine C. You have reviewed it, I haven't. The outsourced section is outstanding. I'll have to go change my marks. Sorry to confuse you (I am good at causing confusion). Steve

At 6:04am on December 10, 2008, Steve Madsen said…: Hi Carol: You did the correct thing by not looking at my scores & comments. I don't think it makes much difference if things are tight, however, we had probably agree on the top video. I anticipate a couple of ties and I have no difficulty with that. I haven't heard anything from the third judge.

Don't be surprised if we don't have to re-look at one or two videos again because some are being uploaded again due to various technical reasons. 2.B.3 Kathryn C is one such example. Her outsourced video arrived to her the same day it was due so we can give her some flexibility according to Julie L. I'll let you know if we have to have a second look. Steve

At 4:28am on December 10, 2008, Michael J. said…: Hi, thank you for commenting my video, I appreciate all the comments I can get, I want a lot of people to see my video and the comments help! I didnt think about putting examples of people who have became famous over the internet thats a good idea!

At 10:02pm on December 6, 2008, Steve Madsen said…: Carol, it is good to hear that you are so committed and busy. In Australia, the school year is coming to a close as we prepare for our summer holidays that will go through January.

When I review a video, I make notes in Notepad. I then synthesise them to make comments about the video on the Ning and to enter into the google document. I use the rubric when trying to assign marks.

I am not saying you have to do it this way, it just is the mad way that I do it.

I have not made successful contact with Barbara Peskin who is the other Judge.

Steve

At 2:22am on December 6, 2008, Steve Madsen said…: I have sent you an invitation to access my spreadsheet at docs.google.com. Have a play. I know some students may be uploading videos at the time of this writing due to technical problems. The Master Video List page will be locked by Vicki or Julie shortly after midnight on Dec. 5th. I haven't heard anything from the other judges in our group. Steve

At 8:15pm on December 5, 2008, Steve Madsen said…: I have set up a simple spreadsheet in docs.google.com that we might be able to use. I think I will need your email address to send you an invitation. My email address is: smad2585@optusnet.com.au