Check out The Plantation Letters, a small collection of digitized documents coming from the much larger Cameron Family Papers held at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.
In association with the site is a ning, with is accesible by invitation only. One needs to go to the contact page at The Plantation Letters site and find the email addresses for the creators in order to ask for an invite. I've sent in a request and will let you know if there are any problems.

ALSO, they say......."We need VOLUNTEERS! We have more letters about slaves, women, and children on antebellum plantations than we can transcribe. If any teachers or other readers would be interested in helping to transcribe and get more letters online, please contact us. Transcribing assistance would make a great service learning or class project for students with contributors gratefully recognized on this page."    

Image: Nick Sherman/Flickr                                                                Katie

This is the title of a study published in 2006 by the MacArthur Foundation. I thought one paragraph would be of interest to library staff and of use for advocacy purposes. They say,
"Beyond core literacy, students need research skills. Among other things, they need to know how to access books and articles through a library; to take notes on and integrate secondary sources; to grasp what kinds of information are being conveyed by various systems of representation; to distinguish between fact and fiction, fact and opinion; to construct arguments and marshal evidence. If anything,these traditional skills assume even greater importance as students venture beyond collections that have been screened by librarians and into the more open space of the web.  Some of these skills have traditionally been taught by librarians who in the modern era, are reconceptualizing their role less as curators of bounded collection and more as information facilitators who can help users find what they need, online or off, and can cultivate good strategies for searching material."
The entire 'occasional' paper can be found at the MacArthur Foundation website under Digital Media and Learning.  I recommend you look it over.                          Katie

First of all if you ever get a chance to hear Brandon Mull speak, jump on it. He's engaging and you will have a much better appreciation for his work after hearing his life story.  He says he writes now to satisfy his 36 year old self as well as his "10 year old inner child." It sounds like he has been creating elaborate fantasy stories in his head for as long as he can remember and we're just lucky he is able to translate them all so well onto paper.
The first of his next series, The Beyonders,  is due out March 15th. He says they are written for a slightly older audience (Amazon shows ages 9-12; Titlewave gr. 5-8). The first one is an impressive 464 pages. Mull spoke about the Harry Potter phenomenon and being thrilled to see that there was acceptance and a market for books which appealed to both young people and adults and how nice it was to know the right story could hold a young reader's attention even if it was several hundred pages. Middle schools especially and even high schools with fans of the Fablehaven series may want to give these a try.                                                          Katie

Check out the trailer for the new picture book by Michael hall called "My Heart Is Like a Zoo"

Time for a little change of pace. This is just a wonderful "feel good" sort of a story , from the New York Times, delightfully written. I hope it will put a smile on your face and warm fuzzy feeling in your heart.

 And what good library doesn't have a number of great chicken stories you could combine with this??

Image from ClassroomClipArt.com

This "School Library Journal" article gives a nice mini biography and tribute to the author of the Redwall series. Students and adults alike will find some fascinating information.                                                                                  kt

Just learned about this teacher created site for elementary age children called KidsKonnect. I sent the author the address of the ADF&G Wildlife Notebook page to add to her already large Alaska page. Take a look and see if you might want to add it to your library pages and/or list in a newsletter.        Katie

Christian Science Monitor as published a list which looks worth investigating for you high school folk.  See more detailed information here-

The Reapers Are the Angels by Alden Bell
The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake: A Novel by Aimee Bender
The House of Tomorrow by Peter Bognanni
Room by Emma Donoghue
The Vanishing of Katharina Linden by Helen Grant 
The Radleys by Matt Haig
The Lock Artist by Steve Hamilton
Girl in Translation by Jean Kwok
Breaking Night: A Memoir of Forgiveness, Survival and My Journey from Homeless to Harvard by Liz Murray
The Boy Who Couldn't Sleep and Never Had to by DC Pierson

Here's a neat little site called Lizard  Point which has a large collection of clickable map quizzes, some online math practice and an interactive program for practicing money counting. It is kind of a quirky collection, with a link on it to Etsy so one can purchase hand made jewelry as well. I assume the creator is multitalented but the student resources looked very useful so students would just have to be coached to ignore the jewelry they way they ignore ads. If you don't want to use it in school share it with parents.