Here's What You Missed at Edcamp Philly...

That's me sharing w/other campers.

Saturday, May 18 was partly cloudy and cool in Philadelphia, PA, but inside the Wharton School of Business at UPenn it was a sunny and awesome day. The third annual Edcamp got underway at 10 AM with session one and ended close to 4 PM with a smackdown. Having left New Jersey at 6:45 AM with my two colleagues from work, we were ready for a day of learning, sharing and discussing all topics related to technology and education. Each and every session on the schedule had a corresponding Google Doc, where everyone could contribute their ideas, comments and notes. There were two morning sessions and two in the afternoon, followed by everyone meeting in the auditorium for a smackdown, where we shared cool apps and sites with each other. I presented a session on Google Apps and Drive which grew a decent crowd and lots of great questions. There was also a premiere of the first Flocabulary Edcamp Rap.



The Edcamp movement began three years ago and has become known all over the world. Here's a list of the upcoming Edcamps. Maybe I'll see you at the next one.......

Wow! 40 Retro Library Posters!

I am always looking for cool signage for the library media center. Recently I came across some awesome retro posters (*of course I used Photoshop on some them..) after searching on Google images. Thought that  you would enjoy looking at them, or maybe even use them.

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Hundreds of Things to Do With Old Books

When you are in the midst of weeding hundreds of books, the task of what to do with them is always in the back of your mind. Are they torn apart and placed in the recycle bin? Do you donate them to the local public library? Can you have your own book sale to raise a few dollars for the school media center? Well, not all the books you are getting rid of could be considered up-to-date and I'm sure you wouldn't want a student using that information for a paper. So....as opposed to trashing some of them, here's a list of resources which have some great ideas how to reuse those old books.

9 Cool Things to Do With Old Books into Something Cool

10 Creative Ways to Recycle Old Ways

15 Creative DIY Projects Featuring Old Recycled Books

20 Awesome Ways to Reuse Old Books

20 Ways to Decorate with Book Pages

50+ Ways to Repurpose Old Books

80 Awesome Ideas for All Your Old or Unwanted Books

Art From Old Books

Creative Ways to Recycle Old Books



How to Reuse Old Books for Homemade Gifts

New Life For Old Books- wonderful, creative Pinterest board with great ideas

Stylish Projects From Vintage Books- from Better Homes and Gardens



Ways to Reuse an Old Book- from the Huff Post Green

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Are YOU a Comic Sans Criminal?

Although I am a media specialist, I think about design every time I work on a worksheet, form or sign. I am a right-brained woman. Every time I receive an email or see a sign with comic sans as the font, I'm sorry to say that I cringe. Here is a great site which explains the only times you should be using the comic sans font. It is appropriately called Comic San Criminal.

Do You Use Google Chrome Books? If So, Please Give Us Your Feedback...

10 Tech Shortcuts from David Pogue

17 Awesome Google Chrome Extensions

This was a good year at my school. We finally got Google Chrome added on the machines in the library lab, so students would be able to start using Google Drive with their documents. YES. The best part is that students and faculty/staff can add extensions to the browser without any permission. All they need to do is go to the Chrome Store and click what they would like to add. I've tried out many myself and recommend the following:

AdBlock- blocks all ads, including Facebook etc.

Announcify- reads aloud any webpage for you


Awesome Screenshot- allows you to capture the screen image and annotate


EasyBib Tools- provides students with instant citing of a webpage


Evernote Clearly- makes blog posts and articles clean and easy to read



Evernote Web Clipper- allows you to clip a web page or portions of a webpage to your Evernote account

Note Anywhere- add notes to any webpage; they will be there the next time you go to that URL

Quickrr- all in this one extension:

* Translator
* Dictionary
* Calculator
* Tasks To-Do
* Notepad
* Calendar
* World Clock
* Unit Converter
* Currency Converter
* Stopwatch & Timer
* Search Tools

Read and Write for Google Docs- assists students with disabilities, ESL students; provides talking 
dictionary, picture dictionary, vocabulary tool.



RemindMe- set reminders for yourself

Save to Google Drive- "This extension allow you to save web content directly to Google Drive through a browser action or context menu. You can save links to documents, images, and HTML5 audio and video all by right clicking and selecting 'Save to Google Drive'."

Session Buddy- "View and save the state of all open browser tabs in the current or past browser sessions."


Shorten Me- shortens really long URLs


Simple Highlighter- highlights, annotates and translates

Snippy- take snippets of webpages, then upload to Google Drive

Study Stack- FlashCards, Crosswords, Hangman and other activities to make memorization fun.

Task Timer- keep track and stay on task