PLUS

 Hey there Pioneers!! It was so nice to see so many of you last week with your pictures from Spirit Week. In the Media Center, we miss seeing your faces and we miss YOU!  I hope that you all are adjusting well to this new way of learning but I'll be so glad whenever we are back to normal. During this weird, difficult time, one of the best things for students to do is to just keep reading!  I am trying very hard to provide resources to help both parents and students find ways to get books to read.  TumbleBooks provides books, Destiny Discover provides access to our Lightbox and other eBooks, but one of my FAVORITE resources is PLUS.

I was going to talk about more of our World Book Web resources today, but I learned something exciting last week and wanted to share it with you.  Last week in a meeting with ALL the media specialists in Polk County, they told us that Overdrive is working properly and that they have increased the number of books you can have checked out from 3 to 10! Yes, 10! That is very exciting news, but some of you have no idea what I'm talking about so, here we go!

But first, let me explain some things.  Not only do I love our school media center, but I am a huge supporter of public libraries. I had a library card as soon as I was old enough and at the Auburndale Public Library, where I live, they know me by name!  There is no way that I can afford to buy all the books that I want to read, and public libraries fill in that gap for me.  I want our students to know and understand what public libraries can do, but there is no Polk County public library close enough for our students to us.  When I learned about PLUS, I was so excited that I shared it before it even worked properly.   You may be wondering exactly what PLUS is and why I am so excited about it.

PLUS stands for Polk Libraries United for Students. It is a partnership between the Polk County Library Cooperative and Media Services of the Polk County Public Schools. All students enrolled in a Polk County school have a PLUS library card (it’s not a real card, but it works!) The simple explanation is this:  PLUS gives every PCPS student access to ALL of the books at ALL of the public libraries in Polk County. This gives them access to so many more books than one school library alone can give them. 

Right now, one of the most useful things is Overdrive.  Overdrive is a free app, available from most any app store, that allows students to read digital books. We LOVE digital books, because they never get lost, they are never overdue and right now, we don’t have to go anywhere to get them or return them. Attached to this below are the steps to use Overdrive.  

To access PLUS, you can start at the Polk County Public School’s web page. Then go to Students, Online Resources. The icon looks like this: 

(Or you can look right over there on the left side of this page under "Links We Love."

For access, students need a library card number and a PIN.  It’s the SAME NUMBER (which is easy!)

For all students, their library card number is a 10 digit number:  5300 and then their student ID number.  (We call it their library number, they sometimes call it their lunch number.  It’s all the same.  Oh and by the way, that number will never change the whole time they attend school in Polk County. It’s never too soon to memorize it!  Even kindergartners and first graders can memorize it.  In the media center and the cafeteria we do not use the 5300, just the last 6 digits.)

It’s something like 5300123456 but most of our students have a 6,7 or 8 as their first number, but everyone starts with 5300.    Again the PIN number is exactly the same number.

I have a really good friend who is the media specialist at Sleepy Hill Elementary School. She made this video to show her students how to use PLUS. 

Also, another media specialist in Polk County made this video for PARENTS to learn about PLUS.

https://youtu.be/sVhMv0v276s

(I didn't make either of those so you will not hear me talking on there!) 

During “normal” times, our students can use Books By Mail, which mails books to a student’s home, absolutely free of charge. The only charge is mailing the actual book back.  Again, during “normal” school times, we have a large black box in our school media center with the PLUS logo on it, and if students bring the books to me, I return the books for them.

Our students can also, during normal times use the Bookmobile and the Book Vending Machine at Outpost 27, the Polk County Tourist Information Center, located across from Posner Park.  There is also a book return box outside that building where books can be returned.  I will be giving you more information about the Bookmobile and Outpost 27 when things return to normal. 

World Book Web (Part 1)

One of the resources that the School District provides for us is World Book Web.  When I was younger, World Book was encyclopedias.  We don’t use encyclopedia much anymore, but there are a LOT of fun things at World Book Web.

First, how to get to World Book Web.  Start at the Polk County Public Schools page, then go to Students and then Online Resources.  If you scroll down to Reference and Research, the first thing icon is World Book Web. 

If it ever asks for a username or password, it’s readmore with no spaces and no capitals. 

Once it opens, there are so many choices. There are so many things here that are fun and interesting. There are so many that it will take more than one post here to talk about all of them.   Today, we’re going to learn about Early Learning and The Activity Center.

First is Early Learning.  This is useful for our smallest students.  It is broken down into four different sections.  

Let’s start with Videos.  The items are in categories, from Creepy Crawlies to My Body to Dinosaurs to Wild Animals.  There are tiny short videos that define words and show an example of the item.  It’s great for building vocabulary. 

Under Games, there are four different kinds of games.  There are Tracing Games, to help students learn to write and spell words.  There are Matching Games, in many categories to help students notice details. The pictures are a little different, as the animals or creatures may be in different positions.  There may be a bird flying and a bird sitting on a branch, but it’s the same bird.  There are Concentration Games where student flip over two cards and try to make matches.  There are 20 different categories.  Last, there are True and False Games. Students are given a fact and they must guess if it’s true or false.  After they guess, there is a small explanation. 

In the Stories section, World Book uses the same categories used in Videos, but there are small little stories.  The stories can be read aloud to students, or by clicking the speaker icon, students read the book themselves.    

Under Activities, student can color online. They can also draw their own picture and download it.  There are also many, many categories of pictures to color. It’s great for those fine motor skills.   The paintbrush lets students choose the color, the stamp puts selected pictures in the drawing and the camera downloads the finished picture. 

The Activity Center is one of my favorite parts of World Book Web.  The Activity Center is FULL of fun, fun things to do.  In this time when we are all staying home, there are some things here that will  help pass the time. 

This database is very searchable.  It can be searched by age, so no one tries something too hard.  It can be searched by Activity type:  Beads. Construction, Paper, Science, Sculpture, even making wreaths! 

We can search by how long the activity will take or the cost of the materials that are necessary to complete the activity.  One of my favorite activities is the Paper Lantern.  It’s simple, takes only paper, scissors, some tape and a ruler, and is beautiful.

There are 9 different activities for paper airplanes.  Here’s one set of directions.  https://www.worldbookonline.com/activitycorner/project?id=cr1410084

Here is a science lesson that involves dropping things in the bathtub!

https://www.worldbookonline.com/activitycorner/project?id=cr4813058

There are just so, so many things to do here. Give it a try, I think you’ll like it!!!

Lightbox Books

Our media center has a set of Lightbox Books. Lightbox Books are great because they have extra stuff that can be accessed from the book.  Our books are multi-user which means all students could read them at the same time.   The really nice thing right now is – they can be accessed from HOME.  Yes, you can’t come to the Media Center to check them out right now, but you can read them from home, along with the videos and puzzles and neat stuff that is included in them.  

Here’s how you find them:     

o   Go to Follett Destiny. The icon looks like a tree full of books!      

You can find it several ways:

§  It’s under “Links We Love” on the left but not the tree, just click on Destiny.   

§  It’s in ClassLink.  

§  From the Polk County Public Schools webpage under Students, then Online Resources. 

o   Click on Citrus Ridge: A Civics Academy.  (Right side, Under K-8 Schools)

o   Click on Log In (Top Right Corner in the blue box)

o   Log in. Your username is your 6-digit Student ID.  (There is no 5300 in front.)   It’s your library number and your lunch number.   Your password is “readmore” with no capitals and no spaces. 

o   Destiny Discover should open right up. At the top, you will see our Lightbox books!

o   There are books for every level so keep hunting until you find one you like.  When you find one you like, click on the book and then click “OPEN.” 

o   Once the book opens, click on “Open Lightbox.”’

o   Make sure you look at all the extras and the tools at the bottom on the page.

o   Enjoy!

o   Most of the books also have an AR test!  

TumbleBooks!

We LOVE TumbleBooks – and kids will too!  TumbleBooks provides many, many books to read. There are all kinds of books, story books, read-alouds, graphic novels and even chapter books.  Many of the books have puzzles, games and even a quiz.  You can search by Title, Author, Reading Level, or how long it will take to read it.  You can even look for Math books to read! 

You can access TumbleBooks by the link on the left side of this page, under “Links We Love.”  You can also go to Polk County Public Schools, Students, Online Resources and scroll down until you see this:

 

If you access TumbleBooks through the PCPS page, you should not need a password. We figured out that if students access TumbleBooks through ClassLink, they may need a username or password.  I can’t give it to you here, but your teacher knows what it is and if students think really hard, they can probably figure it out. It’s NOT their regular username or password.  It’s something special for online resources.  (Here’s a clue:  If you want to become a better reader, you need to _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _.  No spaces and no capitals!)

Welcome

Hey there!!  We are all on a brand-new journey called Distance Learning!  It's not been easy so far for any of us, but we are managing.  This blog was created to share information about our Book Fair, but we are changing it to provide resources and information for you. 

In these uncertain times, we want to provide all the resources possible for our teachers, our parents and our students.   In order to connect you with the things we've found, we will be using this blog to post links for you.  Bookmark it and check back often.  We want to help you all as much as we can.

On the left side, you should see two things: Links We Love and For Fun. 

Links We Love is the most common links you will need for school.  There will also be links to the great things I share with you on here. (TumbleBooks is next!) 

Under that is "For Fun."  These are links that are absolutely, positively for fun. Books and authors and reading are fun, and these are the best, most fun things I can find about books.  Lunch Doodles with Mo Willems is great. We love Mo Willems and his books at Citrus Ridge.  Elephant and Piggie are some of our favorites! 

Dav Pilkey is the author/illustrator of Dog Man and Captain Underpants. These are some of the most frequently checked out books from our media center. 

Storyline Online has books read aloud by famous people.  One of my favorites is "A Bad Case of Stripes" written and illustrated by David Shannon but read by Sean Astin.  I also love "Library Lion."  I'm sure you can find one that you love too! 

It will take all of us, but we can get through this together.