Lawrence+Road+Wikis


 * LRMS Library—A 21st Century Media Center**



By: Paula Trapani-Wiener As you may know, Lawrence Road Middle School Library has been online for over a decade. This information-rich library website has been used as a springboard for library and research projects and has been considered an invaluable resource to both staff and students since its inception. But now…I am very proud to say that our website has launched into the 21st century!
 * LRMS Library Media Specialist**

I (reluctantly, at first) began migrating the original, “old-fashioned” website to the world of Web 2.0. And, it is now officially transformed into a wiki—a new, collaborative, and interactive website! Like the former library site, students, parents, and teachers can find information about the library and its varied resources. But now, they can view this information in a new way—with video clips, audio clips, and slide shows. They can even “join” the website in order to more easily communicate with me and with each other in the new “discussion” area.

I have recently “unveiled” this new and improved website to my students, and I was met with an enthusiasm that was somewhat surprising. I suspect that this excitement was due, at least in part, to the fact that the arrangement of our new library site is so similar to sites like blogs, Youtube, and Facebook that teens have been using for some time.

I recently conducted a lesson introducing two genres of fiction—realistic and historical fiction. This is not a new lesson; I have been book-talking novels in these genres for years. What was different about this lesson, though, is that it did not involve the use of PowerPoint or a display of actual books. Instead, all components of this lesson are completely online, posted to the library wiki. I showed the students how to access the wiki and then showed them the “Book Lists” link posted here. Together, we viewed and talked about the definition and characteristics of each genre. They saw the link to a brochure of sample titles that they can download and/or print. They also viewed a slide show of some of our newest novels in these genres (complete with summaries). And finally, they saw that they could access any portion of this lesson online anytime for free by going to our NEW wiki: http://lrmslibrary.wikispaces.com/Book+Links.

I concluded this lesson by challenging my students not only to choose a book to read over the vacation, but also to contribute to an online book discussion by filling out a very brief book review survey linked to our library wiki (http://lrmslibrary.wikispaces.com/Book+Reviews). I am thrilled to report that nearly every student (even some of the most reluctant of readers) left the library with not one but two or three books from the genres we discussed during our library wiki-based lesson!