AASL Activities

Friday, October 26, 2007
Today’s activities started at 6:45 a.m. with a breakfast in the Silver Legacy Hotel sponsored by H.W. Wilson publishing company. The breakfast was beautifully presented and delicious, despite the hour. Wilson executives introduced new products via PowerPoint. After the presentation, I connected with Ray Barber who had extended the invitation, to tell him of the need for an identified urban fiction collection. That collection would consist of easy-to-read paperbacks of interest to young adults that do not glorify drugs, sex or violence. Ray introduced me to the company president, who said that they would look into finding an expert who knows the literature, and they would create a subset search heading to make the titles searchable.
Arriving at The Reno-Sparks Convention Center, my co-presenter Bob Karl registered. He checked out the room in which we would be presenting, we reviewed our presentation strategy, went to the Exhibit Hall, and then parted company.
I went to a concurrent session entitled Authentic Uses of Technology: Web 2.0 Tools in the School Media Center. The presentation covered integration into student projects and across technologies of Flickr, sharing digital photographs; del.icio.us, sharing electronic bookmarks; blogs and wikis. Bob had a great time in the Exhibit Hall, speaking to vendors and collecting goodies (including a whole collection of comic books!).
Lunch at the hotel was again beautifully served and delicious. The ride back to the convention center in the shuttle was enlivened by a talkative bus driver. They know the territory, and have interesting stories to tell about the locale.
I attended another concurrent session in the afternoon, accumulating more ACT 48 hours. This session was presented by a PA librarian, Celeste DiCarlo Nalwasky, Ph.D., on Designing Lessons So All Students Succeed. She was animated and funny, and presented some simple yet effective lessons.
Dinner was at the Japanese restaurant at Harrah’s. The cook’s performance was breathtaking (no, the knife never slipped), the food fresh and expertly prepared.
I pedaled so much in the exercise room this evening that I hope I am still able to stand through my presentation tomorrow!