Thursday, July 24, 2008

Week 8, Thing 19.1: Digital Pipeline

I've used Digital Pipeline with my staff and students and really try to push its resources. The Pipeline tends to be th forgotten resource, and when reminded we say "Oh yeah, why didn't we use this?" I don't think we use this valuable tool as much as we should, which is a shame! But each year I my goal is to work at getting more on board and I've found that if the students use it, the teachers somehow catch the idea and begin to open up to using the tool. Another great way for me to showcase the Digital Pipeline is to physically get into the computer lab with a class as they research their project. It's wonderful to have two adults circulating to assist students. Of course having the right tools helps tremendously. I found more success this last year, probably because we have a new computer lab and through the TTL grant my team purchased some laptops, which I use in the library for lessons, which allows access to the resources. Another challenge is for teachers to have "get-to-know time" with the Digital Pipeline and databases.
I was able to find a few of my favorite journals and love the option to save items to a folder. I plan to offer and inservice to teachers on the newly updated Ebscohost sometime in the first quarter.

1 comment:

Katie said...

The folder aspect of the Digital Pipeline is a great addition as well as the training videos, tho the voices don't seem to go with the avatars.