Happy Holidays!

Season's Greetings from Ms. Stack, Ms. Hirsch, and Ms. Zitay. We wish you and your family a safe and joyous holiday break. Have a very Happy New Year! We look forward to seeing you back in the school library on Monday, January 5, 2009! It will be a Day 2. As always, should you need help with anything - homework, research, pleasure reading suggestions - anything at all - just ask! We are here to help.

Tribute to Twilight

Mepham, you sure know how to support a cause! Our third annual Scholastic Book Fair was a wonderful success. Even in these tough economic times, you all came through with very generous donations to "ONE for BOOKS" which allowed us to raise money to buy books for children during this holiday season. The highlight of the event for many of our students was the "Twilight to Tribute" t-shirt raffle. Hundreds of you entered to win, but only two of you did. Congratulations to Alexa DiMaggio and Elana Korn.

Scholastic Book Fair

Our third annual Scholastic Book Fair is right around the corner! It will be here in your school library from Monday, December 1st - Wednesday, December 3rd from 7:30 a.m. - 3:30 p.m. Our family night will be held on that Monday from 7 - 9 p.m. We will continue to have our “ONE for BOOKS” donations, which raises money to purchase books for children’s charities, including Toys for Tots, Kids in Distressed Situations Inc., and National Center for Family Literacy. Books enrich our student’s lives – and we all reap the benefits. Thank you for your continued support.

I've Gone Google!

They say once you've gone Google you never go back. Well, they don't really say it... but I will. The Google Teacher Academy in New York was AMAZING. The best thing that I learned all day was that since all of our students in the Bellmore-Merrick Central High School District have email accounts that are powered by Google, we are now considered a Google Apps School. What does this really mean? It means that we have access to Google Web applications for communication and collaboration within our classrooms. Applications such as Google Docs, Google Sites, Google Calendar, Google Talk, Google Maps, Google Earth, iGoogle, Google Reader, and so, so, so much more!

Photo courtesy of Lisa Thumann

I'm Going Google!

According to their Website, The Google Teacher Academy is "a FREE professional development experience designed to help K-12 educators get the most from innovative technologies." 50 innovative educators were selected to attend the GTA NY based on the merits of their online application - and I was one of them! Each applicant was required to produce an original one minute video. My topic was "Classroom Innovation" and the results are posted here on YouTube.

On November 18th I will be headed to Ninth Avenue in New York City and I will return to W.C. Mepham High School a Google Certified Teacher to report back to you!

We've Flipped!

Is Ms. Stack the next Steven Spielberg? We've been filming some video in the library lately with this little camcorder. This is the Flip Video. It's small enough to fit into your pocket and requires no plugs because it has it's own built-in USB. This little camcorder takes up to 60 minutes of video, has 2GB of internal memory, and takes video in avi format, which is perfect for working with our computers in school.

Stay tuned for our latest movies that will be posted soon!

Election Day