Weekly Reader

If I Had College-Age Children, I Would Give Them This Advice for the Final Weeks of School: Don't Cheat
"I imagine this conversation would occur sometime during Thanksgiving, perhaps as we were washing up the endless number of dinner dishes and de-greasing the kitchen.  No, no: let’s put it in a neutral location, as Tenured Radical and the returning college student are having a final cup of coffee at the airport while waiting out a flight delay." -- Claire Potter, Tenured Radical, 12/7/11

The Adaptation of Hugo Cabret
"In Brian Selznick’s Caldecott Medal–winning novel, The Invention of Hugo Cabret, protagonist Hugo muses, “Machines never have any extra parts. They have the exact number and type of parts they need. So I figure if the entire world is a big machine, I have to be here for some reason. And that means you have to be here for some reason, too.” Director Martin Scorsese’s film treatment, Hugo, evinces this philosophy from its opening sequence, in which a complicated clockwork system is  turns into an equally bright and busy time-lapse shot of nighttime Paris." --Katie Bircher, Out of the Box (The Horn Book), 12/8/11

The All in One Fear and Public Speaking: 15 Resources
"It's one of the most common fears, they tell us. So why are we so nervous about our public speaking fears? Use these tips from the blog, along with examples from some fellow fearful speakers, to think about your public speaking fears and overcome them:" -- Denise Graveline, The Eloquent Woman, 12/7/11

10 Ways to Change the Minds of Tech-Reluctant Staff
"We often hear about tech-savvy educators and administrators who have an array of best practices and whose love for technology is evident. But as anyone who’s ever been part of a school or district knows, not all teachers and administrators are as comfortable or familiar with technology. In a recent “Question of the Week,” we asked our tech-savvy readers: “How do you get tech-reluctant teachers and administrators to use technology effectively?” Here are our readers’ top answers (edited for brevity)." -- Meris Stansbury, ESchool News (original post), 21st Century Fluency Project (reposted), 12/3/11

SLJ's Top Ten 2011: Technology
"You know what? There’s too much stuff. That might not be what you’d expect, coming from a technology editor. But looking back over the past year, I found myself wading through tons of gadgets, tools, and miscellaneous merch to get to the real goods, and by that I mean the substantive ideas that we wrote, talked, blogged, and tweeted about in 2011." -- Kathy Ishizuka, School Library Journal, 12/2/11

UNBSJ Students Protest for Study Space
"Students at the University of New Brunswick in Saint John held a protest at the campus Tuesday about a lack of quiet study space. Samantha Tinker, one of the rally organizers, said exams are slated to start next week, but the new $25 million Hans W. Klohn Commons is more like a computer lab and café than a library, with students clustered around tables chatting and working in groups. It also comes up short on basics, such as desk space, and even books, she said." --- CBC News, 11/30/11