Whenever I see the ELM homepage, I'm reminded how much I'd love to see our SPPS Reliable Online Resources webpage do the same thing. A pathways system to websites and databases would make searching so much easier for students and staff. I envision an SPPS Pathways homepage for secondary that would include cute icons for topics like Ancient Greece, Mythology, Inventions, Biographies, Civil War, World History, World Religions, Hmong-Related, Spanish-Related, etc., that would lead searchers to individual pages loaded with easy-to-follow links to databases and great websites, all reliable information. Joyce Valenza, Queen of high school librarians, does a good job with her pathfinders webpage. I can only imagine how slick it would be for us to point kids to one easy-to-use webpage for virtually all of their online searching needs. This would eliminate the need to create individual webpages for teachers' projects like I do now. Of course, it would take money to hire someone to do this and sustain it, so I don't see it as a viable option in the near future. However, once schools begin to realize the importance of easy-to-use reliable sites, and once the info lit standards are in place for awhile across the curriculum, it just may happen. I'll be on my lawnchair in Florida by then...No, not Florida -- too humid. Maybe Napa Valley near a gorgeous vineyard...
On another topic, using the MnLINK Gateway is a great way to obtain books my book club is reading if my own library system doesn't have them.
On yet another topic, I'm smiling as I write this because I've reached a milestone: the first 17 things are finished. I know this because I was keeping track on my iGoogle Homepage's To-Do List, which was actually one of my things...life is just so ironic sometimes.
Happy New Year!
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