Library Media Diva

So today got off to a slow start. I was optimistic about the keynote address when I was handed a CPS audience response device upon entering ballroom 500 at the Indianapolis Convention Center. While the presenter droned on about the history of information science, I sat staring at my clicker thinking this is how the 8th graders feel in history class, except they don’t have a button to push. I found myself distracted and pondering how an effective use of this technology might be used at my middle school. I think it could be a great assessment tool and I will definitely be looking into integrating this new technology into our school curriculum. The conference today really had slim pickins for library media specialists. I was disappointed in the offerings today, but I am hopeful tomorrow will be a better day. I am looking forward to the AIME luncheon.

With one of the most popular teen books making its way on the big screen, you should definitely check-out this critique of the trailer.

http://www.cracked.com/video_16776_5-reasons-youll-hate-movie-twilight.html

The City of Ember will be released in theaters on October 10th, 2008. I spent the summer looking forward to seeing the film adaptation of one of my favorite books (next to Harry Potter of course…..which I will now have to wait until the summer to see). After viewing the trailer, I am a bit disappointed. I hope for the sake of the film that the movie is much better put together than the trailer. I do like Saoirse Ronan, cast as Lina, and Harry Treadaway, as Doon. Those characters are close to what I had imagined as I was reading the book. Check back for a full review of the film sometime in October.

Here is the first installment in my podcast series on this year’s Young Hoosier Book Award nominees. Enjoy!

Jumping the Scratch by Sarah Weeks

Movie Poster Courtesy of Clevver

Drats….I have to wait practically another year to see the next installment of the Harry Potter Films! Half-Blood Prince was set to be released this November, but now it will not be released until July of 2009. I am sure Warner Brothers is delaying the release because they are short of a few summer blockbusters. Man next summer’s movies are really going to stink because of the writers’ strike. Read more about this on the Wired Blog. Although I am disappointed, I am not sure I am ready to join the Facebook group that is claiming the delay has ruined their lives.

Oh how the first weeks of school are so exhausting. It is so rough getting back into the swing of things…nothing seems to be in sync yet. The students in my broadcasting class are so excited, I am becoming more worn out just trying to keep up with their level of enthusiasm. They are definitely teaching me a thing or two.

In the next week I will post more reviews of Young Hoosier Books, as well as my first podcast. How exciting! Look for those….as for right now, I am going to bed.

I came across an article today about ex-google workers launching a rival search engine, so of course I had to go check it out myself. Cuil.com purportedly has 3 times more websites indexed than Google; that could mean a lot more junk info to weed through. My first thought after reading the CNN article was good luck outdoing Google, especially with such a lame name. After visiting Cuil, I learned that Cuil is an Irish word meaning knowledge. How appropriate….maybe it isn’t as cheesy as I originally thought. It seems the philosophy of Google analyzing users rather than web content rubbed these ex-google workers the wrong way. Cuil’s philosophy:

We believe that analyzing the Web rather than our users is a more useful approach, so we don’t collect data about you and your habits, lest we are tempted to peek.

I was very impressed with the format for the search results. It is very graphic, great for visual learners. The column format is much easier to read than the average search engine. This could be a really great search engine to teach students why it is important to use specific keywords when searching for information. For example, when you type in the search term, Saturn, Cuil will help you refine your search terms and gives you the option to look at results for Sega Saturn, Saturn Car, Saturn Planet & more. I’ve got my eye on this search engine; it has potential and just may be Cuil after all.

See other reviews:

http://www.informationweek.com/

http://www.hostscope.com/templature/not-so-cuil-after-all/

http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/07/28/technology/28cool.php

http://broadstuff.com/archives/1100-An-initial-review-of-Cuil.html

http://blog.searchenginewatch.com/blog/080728-075255

http://searchengineland.com/080728-000100.php

http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/07/28/068211&from=rss

Curious about how Houdini made an elephant vanish? Want to know how he walked through a brick wall? How did he manage to make all those great escapes? Unfortunately the author of this biography is a magician himself, so he has taken a vow not to reveal any of Houdini’s magic tricks. However, Sid Fleischman, who is accustomed to writing fiction, does an excellent job of captivating the reader. Fleischman tries his best to keep the story honest, but I think he had a hard time telling the truth about Houdini, when Houdini himself was rarely honest about himself and his capabilities.

While I was impressed with all the things that Houdini could vanish or escape from, I really wanted to know how he preformed all of those illusions. Hopefully this will lead the reader to investigate further in other works. The format for Escape was very nice. There wasn’t too much text to a page and it was broken up by photos, some that had never been printed before, playbills and other ephemera surrounding the Great Houdini.

Once upon a time there was a wonderful author named Gail Carson Levine, that could construct whimsical fairytales. This particular tome is no exception and I could hardly put it down once I started reading. The main character of this story, Aza, desperately wants to be beautiful. She is so homely looking that her parents abandoned her at an inn. The innkeepers take Aza in and she is grateful to the family that raised her as their own, but everyday while working at the Inn she tries to hide her hideous face. How embarrassing would it be to have people commenting that you must have Ogre ancestors? Aza learns an important lesson about how beauty within is more important than outward appearance. In the end her warm heart wins the love of a prince and she finds out just how special she really is.

This fairytale is jam packed with lore; poisoned apples, an evil queen possessed by a magic mirror, centaurs and more. While there isn’t much boy appeal (there are no dragon fights), there is mention of an ogre or a gnome here and there. Girls are going to love this book!

Definitely not as good as her 2008 award winner, So B. It, this has similar themes surrounding the main character. The young boy in this story has an Aunt that suffers from memory loss. In So B. It, the young female character has a mother struggling with memory loss, but it is more severe and has many other complications.

I cried several times at the end of So B. It, because I was really attached to the characters. I didn’t feel the same about this book, although Weeks deals really nicely with the issues surrounding sexual abuse. Unfortunately, I think that there are many young people out there that may relate well to the struggles of this main character.