Mary Harrison – Just another School of Information Community site (2024)

My goal with my research community was about more than searching and learning about research communities, it was about gaining a new skill to better understand my students and being a better teacher for them. Learning how they gathered and used information was important to me as I was not teaching them in person nor was I ever able to meet them in person this year. Everything was virtual. But while my research was limited age wise, what I did find supported much of what I already knew, as discussed in Blog #4, that students do not know how to use technology beyond games, that parents and older adults are…

Technology is a huge resource for young children to access information. Kids often go to parents, trusted adults, siblings, or friends for information. But today, the internet is become a more widely acceptable place to seek information with kids even asking Alexa, Google, and Siri devices for information and homework help. As my INFO 200 Blog #3: Information-seeking behavior and information needs of chosen community, discusses, kids will find information where and when they want it and sometimes, even if they were not seeking it to begin with. However, there are kid friendly resources out there that, as long as kids know where to find them or have links to…

Biblioburro from the media files this week is actually a story in our literature books for our second graders from McGraw-Hill. We did not read it this year because we did not get the curriculum until March and our themes were Endangered Animals, Plants, and Outdoor Adventures-although I almost added it for Outdoor Adventures and am considering just putting it in our virtual classroom as a read aloud for the week anyway. So, when it popped up in the files, I got excited. In one of the articles from my Literature Matrix, it discussed how libraries responded to the pandemic. It showed the Trike-a-delic Rider of Evergreen Park Public Library…

Libraries and information centers are a big deal for my learning community of Early Childhood students. Learning to read and going to the library to pick out your own book is a rite of passage. It is one of the first things you get to do to have independence from an adult, a gateway to find the information to the things you want to know without having to ask someone else, and you get to make your own decision about what you want to read. Harnessing this empowerment and putting it to use in other fields and academic inquiry could go a long way in inspiring students that they can…

I selected a study called, Tablet Use in Primary Education. It was done in 2015-2016, submitted in 2017, and published in 2019 by Maria-Carmen Ricoy and Cristina Sanchez-Martinez. The study looked at how students used tables in school. The studied via data collection and discussion groups the information collection and tablet use of 76 6–11-year-olds in first, third, and fifth grades. The school of focus is in Northeastern Spain and was implementing a plan to include tablets in classrooms during the 2015-2016 school year. Discussion groups were conducted in which 45 students participated, 27 girls and 18 boys. Nine discussion groups took place (three in each of the observed classes)…

Palfrey, J. and Gasser, U. (2016). Born Digital: How children grow up in a digital age. (2nd.ed.). Basic Books. The book is the 2nd edition published in 2016, but I initially was not aware it was the second edition. In my first Masters coursework we were not allowed to use research more than 10 years old. So, when I found out much of the book was published in 2008, I became concerned. It is 2021, it has been 13 years and many new apps and technological advances since the first edition was released have come about. The book sought to describe how the first generation of children who were born…

Information Seeking Behaviors of Early Childhood Students Students today have access to a lot of information at their fingertips and many without parental/adult supervision. I vividly remember my students playing games on coolmath.com. A website approved by the district for use of the students. It was free and on a very rudimentary website given the year. It was old. But, still worked. However, because it was “free” for students, it had a lot of ads on the pages. One ad one day happened to be of a girl, dressed in lingerie, having her photo taken. One student immediately scrolled up and alerted me. I banned Cool Math and of course…

I have been going back and forth on what information community I wanted to search. I could do something on pageants and pageant contestants. I could do something on sports fans. I thought about movie fans as my family and I watch a lot of movies and they often ask questions that, while they are discussing the answer and interrupting the movie, I Google the answer in a matter of seconds and tell them, so they will stop talking. Unfortunately, while a lot exists out there to help with such matters and even Pinterest Fan Fiction posts and memes that keep certain movie universes alive, I was not finding much…

Hello Classmates, My name is Mary Harrison. I live in Southern California. I received my Bachelors in Secondary Education English from Arizona State and a Masters in Adult and Higher Education with a concentration in Intercollegiate Athletics Administration from the University of Oklahoma. Currently, I work for a homeschool charter school assisting K-12th graders on their homeschool journey, plan for and instruct our 2nd Grade Experiential Learning Program, and handle some curriculum ordering as well for the school. I first started looking into MLIS programs back in 2010. I looked into UCLA but they required a few prerequisites that were unattainable with the impacted Community Colleges in the area at…

I’m Mary Harrison. I majored in Secondary Education English at Arizona State University. I added my Cross-Cultural Language and Academic Development Certificate from Brandman University and Multiple-Subject Credential at CSU San Bernardino. Later, I received a Masters in Adult and Higher Education Intercollegiate Athletic Administration at the University of Oklahoma. I am now pursuing the Teacher Librarian Credential and MLIS at SJSU. Last semester I took INFO 220 and INFO 250 through Open Classes. In INFO 220 we had to read and make a database for 35 books. You can find mine here if you’re interested or need some help with the format. I have taught in Arizona, California, and…