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Practicum Experience -#1 Jan 16-23, 2023



This first week of practicum began in what was quite a busy week. Our school district initiated a new campaign to engage educators, students, and their families. It seeks to encourage all stake holders to be fully committed to their education. It was a logistical feat given the necessary adjustments to our schedule.  Additionally, our Culture and Events team worked diligently to plan events for the upcoming President’s Day and Black History month. I spent some time working on my social media presence via Twitter. Follow me: @TeachersTalkTec. Given all the activity of the week, I was extremely grateful for the support and training provided by our Media specialist, Ms. Erwin. Admittedly, as an older student, I was a bit apprehensive about technology. Ms. Erwin makes it appear easy.

This week, while working with Ms. Erwin, I was trained the Destiny Library Management system. Destiny is the software platform used to monitor all access to media in our school. From Destiny, the user can view the dashboard, its catalog, and users. The user can generate reports and complete other administrative functions.  Next, I was trained on the “My On” function available in Renaissance. Accessing “My On”, the user can view the number of students per grade level with books checked out, the number of books finished, and the time spent reading each book. Pictured below are the Reports view and My On-dashboard view, respectively.





I realized that I never actually paused to consider the number of the responsibilities that our Media specialist manages so well. In part, she manages by being organized. For Technology concerns, all staff enter requests at the school level in Microsoft Teams’ Technology chat. This allows her to track and monitor requests. She creates and provides the link to our daily announcements, she contributes to our weekly "Smore" newsletter that keeps staff informed of upcoming events, tasks, initiatives, news, celebrations and more. 

Because there was not always a circulation person, two kiosks were set to provide students and staff with an easy method by which they can check books in and out. One such Kiosk is pictured below:


Next week, students will compete in a Technology competition at one of our local high schools. I am excited to participate. Stay tuned as I continue to share my experiences during practicum. 
 
 















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