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Each year we are very fortunate to be able to send about half of the 48 librarians in our district to the Texas Library Association annual conference. It is always a great time of learning and relationship-building for our group. When the conferees return, that learning and relationship-building continues as we all meet to hear information about some of the sessions they attended.

This has always been one of my favorite staff development sessions that we do each year, but I really look forward to it since we changed the format last year. In the past, the conference attendees made brief presentations on the sessions they attended to the whole group. While the information was interesting, two hours of “sit and get” wasn’t very much in keeping with current educational best practice.

Last year, we changed the format to a mini-conference, where participants can choose six out of twelve presentations that they would like to attend. Yesterday’s meeting consisted of sessions on virtual field trips, the state database program, gaming in the library, Second Life, digital booktalks, and more. Our schedule for the afternoon is posted here.

What I love about this meeting is the creativity that is shown by the presenters. We give them some very minimal guidelines and off they go! Yesterday we saw tic-tac-toe, interactive Powerpoints, games, discussion, a Promethean desktop flipchart, etc. all used as ways to involve the audience and make the presentation interactive. It’s so much fun to see all of the learning and sharing going on!

Thanks to all who presented yesterday. You all did a fantastic job!

The K-12 Online Conference is a conference by educators for educators around the world interested in integrating emerging technologies into classroom practice. A goal of the conference is to help educators make sense of and meet the needs of a continually changing learning landscape.

This free virtual annual professional development event spans the next three weeks. Presentations appear in the form of streamable or downloadable audio or video clips, with each workshop lasting about 20 minutes. Presentations are archived so that you may return to them later or visit sessions from previous conferences. Scheduled live chats allow participants to also connect real time.

Read more about it on Joyce Valenza’s blog then give it a try!

There are a several professional development opportunities coming up this fall! Librarians in the north Texas area may want to take advantage of any or all of the following:

Friday, October 17 – Library Expo

This annual event for school librarians takes place in Plano ISD and is coordinated jointly by Plano’s Learning Media Services department and Richardson ISD’s Library Media Services. This year’s theme is Discover the 21st Century Library and the keynote speaker will be John Canuel, Director of Library

Services for Jeffco Public Schools in Colorado. In addition to the keynote, there are always great breakout sessions presented by local librarians, a vendor exhibit — and, as if that isn’t enough — there is great shopping to be had afterwards at the Willowbend Mall across the street! (wink, wink)

More information is available at the Library Expo web site. The event is free for librarians, but they do ask that you register so they will know how many people to expect. Registration begins online September 15, 2008.

Saturday, October 18 – TLA District 5 Fall Meeting

TLA District 5 will host its annual Fall Meeting October 18, 2008 at El Centro College in downtown Dallas. It looks like there are several programs of interest to school librarians, many of which focus on web 2.0 technologies. Online registration is available at the TLA website.

Saturday, November 1, 2008 – Children’s and Young Adult Book Festival

This annual event is held at Sam Houston State University each year. It is often worth the overnight trip to Huntsville to hear the nationally-known authors that will be speaking and autographing their books. Since it is a smaller venue, librarians actually have a chance to visit with the authors a little more. Featured authors this year are: Kathy Appelt, John Green (Looking for Alaska), Patrick Jones, and David Small. Between author sessions there are workshop programs presented by area librarians. Visit the SHSU web site for more information.

Saturday and Sunday, November 1-2, 2008 – Texas Book Festival

If you’re in the mood for a bigger event with more authors, the Texas Book Festival in Austin will meet those needs. Check out the list of authors expected to attend and get more information here.

Image citation: Playing in the autumn leaves, uploaded on October 20, 2007 by [Northeast Photography] and used under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works license.