Monday, November 08, 2010

My New Second Home - Brighton, CO - Part 1

Today has been another reflective day for me as I get to know my new city, Brighton, CO.  No, I am not living there, but I am working there as Manager of Instructional Technology for Brighton School District 27J.  I am spending about ten hours a day in Brighton and the surrounding communities working to help use instructional technology as a tool in student learning. It is interesting how it feels to try to function in a new city when you don't know where the services you like or need to use are located.

The Brighton location of the Rangeview Anythink Library was one of my stops during my lunch hour.  I'd signed up for a temporary library card online which allowed me to request books and put books on hold.  Today I went by to get my official library card (so that I can access their online subscription databases) and to talk with Todd Cordrey, Anythink Manager, and Melody Costa, Guide, about working with the Brighton 27J school district.  My goal is to work toward registering all students and teachers as library patrons of Anythink.  Then they too can access the online subscription databases for school assignments and research.  Students throughout the district can have free access to safe, qualified resources through Anythinks subscription databases. For the district to purchase these databases would require funds of well over $50,000 annually.

One of my goals in my position is to find ways to most efficiently and effectively utilize the instructional technology tools already available to us.  I look forward to partnering with Lynda Freas, Anythink Adminstrator, to help all Brighton 27J students increase their access to information through Anythink membership and get online at school or at home using these 21st century tools to assist them in their learning. 

If you would like to help with this project scaling throughout the district, please comment on this post!


The databases available through Anythink include: 


Academic Search Premier
Search for scholarly articles from over 8,450 journals, including the social sciences, humanities, education, engineering, applied science, and ethnic studies fields. Full text is available for more than 4,600 journals.
 
ALLDATA
Find detailed car and service information from 1982 to present.
 
Ancestry: Library Edition
Discover more about your family history by searching a wide array of sources, including census reports, birth & death records, and immigration records. Fill in what you already know with newspaper articles, yearbook photos, and much more.
 
Associations Unlimited
Find information on over 475,000 non-profit organizations. Search by subject, location, organization name or acronym.
 
Beacham’s Guide to the Endangered Species of North America
Search extensive data on the habitats and ecosystems of more than 1,200 species identified as endangered or threatened by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife service.
 
Business Source Premier
View company profiles and full-text articles from over 2,150 business publications.
 
Chilton Library
Find step-by-step repair instructions, maintenance schedules, recalls, diagrams and more. Search by specific year, make and model.
 
Consumer Reports
Get ratings and reviews, recommendations and buying advice for thousands of products across several industries.
 
Drugs, Alcohol, and Tobacco: Learning About Addictive Behavior
Approximately 200 articles cover topics ranging from binge drinking to the role of genetics in addictive behavior for researchers in grade six and above.
 
EBSCOhost
Search across multiple EBSCOhost databases simultaneously.
 
Encyclopedia of World Biography
Learn about individuals who have made significant contributions to human culture throughout history and the world.
 
ERIC
Find education literature and information about practice in learning, teaching, educational decision-making and research in this online digital library.
 
FirstSearch
Find library catalog records, journal articles, or ebooks by searching extensive collection of databases, including WorldCat, ArticleFirst, and MEDLINE.
 
Fuente Académica
Access articles in Spanish from scholarly journals published in Latin America, Portugal and Spain, with particular emphasis on the subjects of agriculture, biological sciences, economics and more.
 
Funk & Wagnall's New Encyclopedia
Search over 25,000 encyclopedic entries covering a variety of subjects.  
 
Gale Legal Forms
Find and print up-to-date legal forms and informational booklets online, including forms for power of attorney, divorce and bill of sale.
 
History Reference Center
Thousands of biographies, historical documents, full-text articles, maps, historical video and more are available. 
 
Infobase Ebooks
Over 150 ebooks are now available right from your desktop on a variety of subjects - from health to history. Geared towards readers grades 6-12, users can view, search or print any of the titles.
 
LearningExpress Library
Take comprehensive, interactive online practice exams for academic, civil service, military, and professional licensing and certification exams. Registration is required.
 
MAS Ultra - School Edition
High school students can find articles, photos, maps, flags, biographies and more for their school projects. 
 
MasterFILE Premier
Access thousands of images and full-text articles from over 1,700 periodicals, nearly 500 reference books, and more than 164,400 primary source documents. MasterFILE Premier also includes an image collection of over 502,000 photos, maps and flags.
 
MedicLatina
Find medical research and investigatory journal articles from renowned Latin American and Spanish publishers, including full-text articles in native Spanish.
 
MedlinePlus
Learn information about drugs, latest health news, and find answers to health questions. An illustrated medical encyclopedia and interactive patient tutorials are also available.
 
Middle Search Plus
Middle and junior high school students can find historical essays, biographies, maps, images and more to help with school projects and research.
 
Newspaper Source
Search full-text articles from 25 national and 260 regional U.S. newspapers, including the Denver Post, Greeley Tribune and Pueblo Chieftain, and transcripts from TV and radio news.
 
NoveList
View fiction reviews, award-winner lists, and recommendations. Includes breakdowns by age and genre as well as resources for book discussions and curriculum.
 
NoveList K-8
Fiction guide for young readers includes discussion guides, award-winner lists and recommendations.
 
PubMed
Access thousands of biomedical citations and abstracts from over 5,000 journals published in the United States and 80 other countries.
 
Primary Search
Elementary kids can find articles on every subject for their school projects.
 
ReferenceUSA
Research businesses and individuals for class projects or market research for small businesses. Search for professional biographies, brands and products, or contact information.
 
Regional Business News
Search articles from regional business publications and full-text for more than 50 sources.
 
Science Reference Center
Learn about topics from biology and chemistry to environmental science from this comprehensive research database of science-oriented content, including full-text for over 600 science encyclopedias, reference books, periodicals and more.
 
TopicSearch
Find over 139,800 articles on current events topics like aging, crime, drugs, energy, health, human rights and world affairs, from over 4,800 sources, with 1,650 full-text periodicals.
 
TumbleBooks
Online, animated talking books for kids in English, French and Spanish. Includes puzzles, games and audio books for independent learning.
 
TumbleReadables
Search online collection of read-along titles for elementary, middle school and high school students featuring adjustable online text and complete audio narration.
 
TumbleTalkingBooks
Listen to high-quality audio versions of classics of American and world literature, non-fiction, fiction, and children and teen books. Ideal for readers of all ages and abilities, those learning English as a second language, and people who may be visually or mobility impaired.
 

6 comments:

Mike Jurkiewicz said...

I KNEW I had to be on the right track. Not to steal your thunder or anything, but I have been working on that very goal. The last two years at PVHS, I had a station set up in the registration line where students could fill out the form and apply for an Anythink library card. The first year (09-10) I did it I turned in over 700 aplications. This year I believe I still had over 400 students apply for a public district libary card. I then took the applications to the Anythink main branch, waited for them to contact me that they were ready for pick-up, and then brought them back to school where we (the library staff) distributed them to the students in a certain class period. We also have a link to the Anythink library system on our school and library web sites. The whole process works pretty smoothly. This will most likely be the last year that we subscribe to our own database collection (we only have one). From now on, I will direct all students to the Anytink database collection.

Connie Masson said...

Mike:

Your great work is so good to hear about. I hope others in the district read your comment and follow your lead! And you are not stealing any thunder, you are confirming it is what we need to be doing. I wonder if Anythink can run access reports to see how many of their patrons are logging in from our schools? That is a question I am going to ask Todd.

Thank you so much for sharing your best practice example.

Christy Meredith said...

I'm with Mike. I didn't realize initally that Anythink offered all of that b/c I had never seen it immediately (nor really looked for it) on their website. I had always used the online resources for my own work for my Masters. And when I originally found out I was moving into the library, I got so overwhelmed with phone calls from people asking about renewing our accounts, that I just kept things the same this year as has been done in the past. Tiah told me about Anythink earlier this school year, and I've decided that I will not be using those funds next year for a database, but directing kids to get Anythink library cards. I'll help out with registration, and do what Mike did to get it rolling this next year.

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