Foreign Languages

FSI Language Courses offers free foreign language courses with many different languages to choose from.  The courses consist of downloadable student texts, workbooks, instructor’s manual and sound clips.  The courses are far from flashy (looking like 1950’s military manuals or something) but if you need to learn a language you can’t beat the price.
Check them [...]

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I learned about GoogleLab’s ‘Living Stories’ collaboration project with the New York Times and the Washington Post via ResearchBuzz.  I see great potential in this application.  Is this the new RSS Reader?  The new Wikipedia?   To understand ‘Living Stories’ watch the brief video on the page.
Currently, the following TIMELY stories are included:

Health Care Reform

Afghanistan War

Global [...]

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‘AASL is promoting two resource lists, each honoring Internet web sites that enhance learning and curriculum development. Developed by an AASL task force, the sites are all free and user friendly.
The Top 25 Web sites for Teaching and Learning focuses on websites that foster the qualities of innovation, creativity, active participation and collaboratin.            [...]

Continue Reading Best Websites for Teaching and Learning from American Association of School Librarians (AASL)

Strategy+Business magazine (www.Strategy-Business.com) had an excellent article in their 54th issue, Spring 2009.  The article was entitled, “The Library Rebooted“.  Here is a brief quote:
“Their world has changed–a lot.  The library’s underlying promise hasn’t changed; the library is still a way for us to break beyond the immediate boundaries of our world, to…But the environment [...]

Continue Reading “The Library Rebooted” - a comprehensive article on the state of libraries

Ironically one of the best passages about the value of libraries I’ve ever read came from an article about library cutbacks and closings in Pennsylvania:
“In Franklin’s and Carnegie’s times, the library offered access to encyclopedias and books. It gave everyone a chance to educate himself during a time when access to education, especially higher education, [...]

Continue Reading Library Cutbacks in Pennsylvania and Lower Income Citizens

Fallon, NV’s Lahontan Valley News reports in “Libraries thrive in poor economies” that
“People’s wallets are getting lighter and are going out less unless it is to their local library.  As the economy continues to slide, local libraries are experiencing a sudden influx in clientele using their free services.”
Read on…http://www.lahontanvalleynews.com

Continue Reading “Libraries thrive in poor economies”

The Bend (Oregon) Bulletin reported in “Books fly off shelves as library use soars: Phenomenon may be a chapter in story of nation’s economy”:
“People are flocking to Deschutes County libraries, and officials say the slumping economy may be bringing them business. From July through November, patrons checked out about 10 percent more books and other [...]

Continue Reading Public Library Funding in this Economy? It’s a ‘no brainer’!

Daneeta Loretta Jackson wrote Six reasons to love the downtown public library for Examiner.com:
“Being homeless and jobless in America’s third world can be a real drag. Finding a place that can help you feel normal and provide much needed resources is important to keeping up morale. The New Orleans Public Library downtown branch is one [...]

Continue Reading Reasons to love downtown public libraries