Curation/Strategic Investment in Digital Resources

#FutureReadyLibs #BlogChallenge Week 2

Digital resources have been interesting for me in an elementary library.  We have about 150 eBooks, not many but they are not being checked out.  I'll do a lesson on eBooks and have students practice logging in so I know who can and cannot get logged in.  I show teachers and share their log ins. I have a surge of eBook check outs.

And then... nothing.  I need to reevaluated how I circulate eBooks.

Of course eBooks are just a small portion of the pie in digital resources.  In Texas we have TexQuest, "a reliable online resources for Texas public schools provided with support from the Texas Legislature."  I'm just now becoming comfortable using TexQuest and sharing it with my teachers and students.

I've pulled information from TexQuest for three different teachers.  So far I haven't gotten much buy in. I'm talking up the databases and trying to push myself on teachers collaborate with two teachers who are about to start research projects.  I've offered to do a lesson in the library or to go to their classroom and work with students in their environment.  So far I haven't gotten very far but I'm working on it!  I'm not good at taking "no" for an answer so I'm not really worried here.

Again a small piece of the digital pie.

With the open licensed educational resources (OER) becoming a big thing I feel I need to add this to my list of things to learn more about and share with teachers and students.  OER gives us access to a ton of awesome teaching, learning and research resources and content.  With the information highway changing so fast it hard for books and textbooks to keep up.  OER we can help us stay current.

OER is something I need to research more so I can lead my district and help them plan for digital resources.  I also need to include it in my collection development plan.  Just another hat on my teacher-librarian head!