Childhood Memories

I love Big Huge Labs, which is an image generator attached to Flickr.  You can do loads of fun things with the different applications.  Lots of things there lend themselves to library displays, but our Library team used the Mosaic Maker to create another competition for Book Week last year.

Our idea was to think of different objects which would be found throughout the book.  We came up with 12 objects for each book.  Since Heidi is one of my favourite books, examples of things in Heidi might include: goats, grandfather, a stool, a bed in a hayloft, wooden bowls, a picture of two of the Alps, and the meadows, perhaps an old fashioned wheelchair. 

Once the objects have been decided, I found pictures of them, and created a set in my Flickr account.  It’s then a very simple matter to put the URL for the Heidi set into the Mosaic Maker generator, and the tool puts the photos together in a mosaic.  These can then be printed out and laminated for display or other use.

Last year we had created around 10 of these mosaics.  We explained the task to the students and then allowed them to try to guess which mosaic belonged with each book.  We left clues around the Library, such as the book on display.  Some students found it a bit too hard and so we had another list of the titles, which we had jumbled.  The students needed to unjumble the title, then decide which book went with the mosaic.  They could use the OPAC to help them with this.

This could be a great “buddy” activity for Book Week.  Have your older students create these for picture books which the little ones would be familiar with.  The littlies then have to try to guess the titles.

Another in this category, but this time for the younger end of the older readers, is Miss McAllister’s Ghost, by Elizabeth Fensham. I loved this book which tells the story of the relationship between an old lady and three younger children. Miss McAllister has cut herself off from the world and still lives as she did before the war. The children discover her secrets when one of them mistakes the old lady for a ghost.

Kill The Possum, by James Moloney, is a really powerful look at a family in crisis, and at the mercy of bullying ex-husband. When the police cannot do anything, a teenaged boy gets involved.  Great book for the more mature older readers.  I heard James Moloney talking about this book, around last year’s Book Week, and he made mention that he was absolutely delighted with the cover of it, so make sure you have a good look.

Last year, the Library team I worked with decided that we would incorporate some of the Web 2.0 tools we had learned about in our own PD, into our book week program.  One of the, very simple, activities which our boys enjoyed were Wordles. 

Wordles could be created for books by using the blurb of the book, a review, or even a small passage taken from the book.  The text is simply copied and pasted into the text box at Wordle, press the Go button and magically your word cloud appears.  You can then play around with the font, colours and layout, to create a Wordle that you like.

Although you can’t save your Wordle as a .jpg, you can take a screen shot of it and create a .jpg that way.  Ours were printed off, then laminated.  The boys had to carefully analyse the Wordle for clues as to which book it might have been.  They would make terrific displays around your library during Book Week too. 

I wrote about Wordles in a post last year.  Clicking on the Wordles category will take you that post.  There are a couple of links there to some extra teaching ideas for Wordles.

I recently created Wordles for two books shortlisted in the Older Readers Category of the CBC Book of the Year Awards.

I recently attended an inservice on reading in the digital age. One of the first activities required us to bring the first book we connected with.  What a difficult task.  How could I choose only one?  And the task required a “connection” with the book, rather than a “favourite” book.

I ended up going with Sara and Hoppity which I’ve had since I was quite young.  It was given to me as a birthday present and one of the only childhood books I still have.  I then had to consider what it was that connected with me.  Its illustrations are very childlike and perhaps that appealed.  I loved the stories…they were a mix of comic format and longer narratives, but all about Sara, a little girl who lived in a toy hospital with her parents.  She has a little toy puppet, Hoppity, who “talks” to her, and dances about, when he is wound up.  With Hoppity’s urging, Sara is constantly doing naughty things, even though her intentions are using quite well meaning!  The whole scenario is fun and their adventures really sparked my imagination.  You can find out more about the Sara and Hoppity books at http://homepages.tesco.net/~space.patrol/SaraHoppity/SaraIsSix.htm

Other books which nearly made it to the inservice with me were: When We Were Very Young (poems by A.A. Milne) and Heidi (Johanna Spyri).  I loved the poetry of Milne, which is full of rhythm, rhyme and such fun language.  I remember being given this book as a present because I was part of a group who were reciting and acting out “The King’s Breakfast”.  It was such fun. 

I’m not really sure why Heidi resonated so much with me.  I loved her lifestyle in the Swiss Alps and perhaps it was the mountains that I enjoyed reading about.  It’s such a beautiful story too.  I had another book based in Switzerland that I loved too, called The Little Swiss Miss, so perhaps it was Switzerland that I really enjoyed!

Talking in a group about our reading, and why certain books connected with each of us was great.  It enabled us to share our book with others, and learn about other books that colleagues felt had connected with them.  Hearing reasons for a book connecting with the reader was equally as stimulating: some loved the illustrations in a book, others loved the geography of where the book was set, and for others, the book was connected with a safe and happy time in their life, and looking at the book always brought back those childhood memories. Hearing others talking about books opens up many new reading possibilities for ourselves and it was a very worthwhile way to start the session on reading.

Just recently I have been reflecting on how I go about my research and pondering on what actually motivates me to start researching. 

A couple of months ago I stumbled across an old autograph album from 1951.  Looking through it I saw several names that I recognised from Australian theatre.  If you’d read the rest of my blog you’d know that I’m a passionate theatre fan, and love anything to do with it, including theatre history.

Needless to say I bought the album (for an extremely modest sum) and brought it home to look at more closely.  Many of the autographs were signed with the person’s name, with “Mother Goose Panto” or “Theatre Royal” underneath.  Well there was my reason for researching right there!  I had to know more! 

I had several problems which needed answers.  Firstly I needed to be able to decipher some of the autographs which were very difficult to read.  I wanted to know more about the Theatre Royal, a theatre unfamiliar to me, and I wanted to know more about the production.

Being a researcher is a bit like being a detective I think.  You gather all the clues you can find and then bring it all together to solve your puzzle.

I started by verifying that there was indeed, a Theatre Royal in Adelaide during the 1950s.  I had a clue about Adelaide in one of the autograph entries, and the original owner of the album had thoughtfully written a verse at the front, signed her name and listed her address! 

An internet search led me to the History of Theatre database, and then through another link it was on to Ausstage. It was here that I managed to find the production I was after…Gay Fiesta / Mother Goose at Theatre Royal, Adelaide.  The opening date was 26th December, 1951.

One of the autographs is Toni Lamond, whose Australian career I know very well.  I remember seeing her as Nancy in Oliver! at Her Majesty’s Theatre, when I was very young.  I later saw her in Gypsy.  More recently it has been her son, Tony Sheldon, who has impressed me on stage.  His role in Priscilla Queen of the Desert was superb, and I believe that his knowledge of Australian Theatre history is just huge.

An internet search of Toni Lamond led me to several interviews where she mentions her very early career, including her time of working on the Mother Goose pantomime.  Apparently the cast of the evening show, Gay Fiesta, also performed in the Mother Goose panto each afternoon.  How hectic their schedules must have been! This sort of schedule certainly wouldn’t happen today.

I am still in the throes of working out the other autographs, but I have searched the newspapers of 1951 and found the advertisement for the show, and a number of small articles.  The State Library of South Australia has managed to find a review of the show in one of their newspapers, one which I haven’t been able to access here in Melbourne.  I’ve been in touch with the Adelaide University, who hold the theatre program to these shows in their theatre collection.  I have managed to find Toni Lamond’s autobiography, and this has led to more information about the show and its performers.  Further searching has led me to an interview with Ms Lamond, which the National Library of Australia has in their Oral History collection.

I feel that I am well on the way in my research, and I will continue to see what more I can discover.  I also need to work out how I am going to put all of this information together. 

The internet has been a very important part of my research.  It has allowed me to network with librarians in Adelaide and Canberra libraries.  Each one has added to my research, and I am grateful that they have been so giving of their time and expertise.  The internet has given me access to several interviews with Toni Lamond, each one adding snippets of information.  Databases have allowed me to discover cast lists and small biographies of many of the cast members, and Picture Australia has led me to many pictures of the Adelaide’s Theatre Royal.

Our students need to have similar learning experiences.  They need to be enthused about what it is they are learning about, and they need to feel the same excitement that I have, when they find more pieces of their own puzzle.  They need to be encouraged to seek other’s expertise to help them gather their information, and networking via the internet can be extremely motivating.

How lucky we are these days to have such networking tools these days!

I am amazed that a whole year has passed since I began my Web 2.0 learning in earnest. I had been introduced to it prior to May 2008, and in fact had dabbled with several different interactive applications, but completing ”23 things” made me play and investigate far more than I probably would have if left to my own devices.  Sadly I have let my blog lapse, for various reasons.  Perhaps I could call it a hiatus over summer. 

With the 12 month anniversary looming tomorrow, I thought it might be interesting to look back over some of the applications which I still use regularly.  There’s probably far more than I will mention but here are a few.  Blogs are read frequently, of both professional and personal interest.  There are some brilliant educational blogs out there, and many, many related to Teacher Librarianship, including our own SLAV Bright Ideas blog, which I love reading.  Teacher Librarians, on the whole, are very giving with their information and sharing happens often as a matter of course.  And what better way to share your thoughts, than to write blogs. The many book blogs out there have helped me when I’ve been reviewing books, or preparing for book talks too.

I read other blogs relating to my personal interests. There are some excellent ones sharing reviews and information on theatre from all around the world, but especially Broadway. There’s a couple of very good blogs relating to gymnastics, and another helping those of us who love to “op shop” around Melbourne.  Bloglines helps me to keep up to date with all of the latest happenings on each of these blogs. 

There are many online storage places which have been helpful.  Google Documents stores some of my “I’d hate to ever lose them” files and has been useful when we, as a Library Team, were working on the book week program together.  Slideshare also stores one of my Powerpoint documents. 

Delicious is much better at keeping track of my “must keep” websites than my backing up of them is! It’s a great way of finding related websites too.  Same thing applies to Library Thing.  My account is also helpful when I’m preparing for booktalks. Came across a very thought provoking review of a non fiction book once, on the Underground Railroad, that was added only because the reviewer was concerned that it was more fiction than fact.  Through her review she was able to direct readers to more substantial information on the subject.

Podcasts have become an everyday part of my life and I love them. I don’t get a lot of time to listen to the radio these days, but podcasts keep me in touch with many of my favourite programs. Overseas podcasts about all manner of things have really quenched my thirst for all sorts of information. My only problem now is that I have heaps lined up to listen to! 

I will probably revisit some of my past posts to see what else I still use.  In recent months I have become a convert to Facebook and have just begun taking baby steps on Twitter.  All good fun, but needing lots of time to explore. What did we ever do without the Internet? It is absolutely amazing how many people my ventures on the internet have brought me into contact with in the past 13 years: many people overseas who I now consider as great friends because we have had an interest in common; and other people who have contributed to my professional life through their interaction and interest in Web 2.0. It’s a satisfying medium that’s for sure.

Originally uploaded by winsongreen

Looking back over my blog I realised that I had neglected to add an example of an image of a mosaic which I created for Book Week this year. This one is based on the book by Robert Newton called The Black Dog Gang. It’s an historical novel with the action based around the Sydney Rocks area. A couple of the images are snippets from the book’s cover, and many of the images are from an online exhibition called Around the Rugged Rocks.

Finally a report that says what we teachers and librarians have known for some time!  Childnet International has found that there are educational benefits for those children who use social networks, such as My Space and Facebook.  The report says that not only do children develop more literacy skills, they also learn about copyright, protecting themselves and their work, and how to avoid antisocial behaviour such as cyberbullying along the way.

Interactive Web 2.0 applications can connect kids to others from all around the world with similar interests. Whilst it’s fantastic for all kids, imagine what it would be like for that lone student in your school who might have an interest that seems to be shared by nobody in their peer group. Somewhere in the world there will be a network where he will finally feel that he belongs. If there isn’t then he can create such an environment, and I have no doubt that someone will be in touch.

I began my online experience over 10 years ago with a website about The Waltons television show. I created it as a project for my Teacher Librarian course.  All these years later my site is still going strong. Over the years it has brought me into contact with hundreds of people from all over the world as well as many people involved with the show, including its creator, Earl Hamner. I count many of these people as close friends now. I remember what a thrill it was to be contacted by people who shared my interest. The internet has become much more interactive since then and students will find online forums and spaces just as rewarding as I did all those years ago, perhaps even more so now. I’m sure the thrill is still the same. 

You can read the full report here.