TEACHER-LIBRARIAN PARTNERSHIP

1. TEACHER-LIBRARIAN PARTNERSHIP “SIRS Spurs Creative Writing”

2. PRIOR TO THE PROJECT A 10th grade class of poor readers became motivated to read because of interest in two Black-Eyed Susan books they read in class… and a third they read independently.

3. Their Interests Sparked… • Enthusiastic Discussion “Would you want to know if you had inherited a disease?” • Creative Thinking “If you were holding hostages and you didn’t want to hurt anyone, how would you deal with a schizophrenic coming off meds?” • Problem-solving “If you saw someone about to harm an innocent person, what could you do?”

4. Discussion Revealed… BES books were enjoyed because: • Main character’s “real” • Plotline’s “suspenseful” • Readers “could relate to story” • “Real” life issues included • Language “real”

5. Teacher: How does a writer make something “real”? Student: I guess… by doing research?

6. Enter…

7. Anticipated OUTCOMES Students will: • Learn the organizational structure of SIRS including tag list, search history, saved session, dictionary, thesaurus, and advanced search • Gain information to provide accuracy in their original plotline

8. Student Learning Outcomes Students will: • Use before, during, and after reading strategies of self-selected material • Apply reading strategies when comparing, making connections, and drawing conclusions

9. PROJECT DESCRIPTION With a partner, students use SIRS to research and verify information regarding a controversial/captivating topic in order to create an original plotline that speaks of conflict that a young person might face. and which is filled with authentic and accurate facts Lastly, they write a business letter to a local publishing company describing idea.

10. TIMING • Twelve to fourteen days for the activity (after the BES readings) with three of those days in the Computer Lab in the library. • Two days were used to do unrelated activities so the students could “mull” over their story elements as a professional writer might do. • Two days were for oral presentations

11. Some researched topics: Magic Tricks Talismans Teen Alcoholism DUI Drug Addiction Missiles Peer Pressure Four Wheel Racing Brain Cancer Date Rape Iraq/Bagdad Street Racing Compulsive Exercise Disorder

12. Lab 1st Visit • Entry Exercise: Google your topic. Note the number of hits. • Teacher searches one of topics in SIRS • Compare • Share stats from subsequent slide • Student voice conclusions

13. SIRS vs. Google

14. 1st Visit Objective Students will use SIRS to search for information about their topic in order to find 5 facts (10 total with partner) and to create a list of descriptors that could be explored during Visit 2. (Students also record the article from which they found their facts.)

15. 2nd Lab Visit Objective After having taken time in reading class to determine the main character, the setting, and rudimentary elements of the plotline, students will use SIRS descriptors to search for 5 more facts each that could be used in their original story.

16. 3rd Lab Visit Objective Each pair swaps 10 facts with another pair. Each pair will work together using SIRS to find validation for each fact. Students will record the article in which the fact is found. Incentives will be provided to make this a competition.

17. Assessment Students create a poster, book jacket, or other visual of their choice to share with class during an oral presentation that expresses their topic, plotline, title of book, protagonist, important characters, and setting. “Recommendations/Reviews” may be include.

18. Observations • With a partner, all students demonstrated the ability to use SIRS to find information of their choice; verifying the facts of another pair proved more problematic. • Behavior problems were noticeably reduced. • Students entered the classroom asking if they could work on their “novel”.