The Digital Libraries go to School (DLgtS) project helps K12 educators create learning activities with NSDL resources to teach science and math in their classrooms. Now eight months into the three-year project, DLgtS project staff at Utah State University, UCAR and SUNY Cortland have begun a series of workshops with in-service and pre-service teachers in Utah and New York, which introduce participants to NSDL with a just-in-time tutorial and then provide instruction on assembling NSDL resources into learning activities using the Instructional Architect (IA) tool. Often participants don't know that NSDL is a digital library; however, they are enthusiastic about having one place where they can find quality science and math "online stuff." The teacher-created learning activities are being used by peers who have not attended the workshops, and in one instance, a workshop participant has been designated to regularly create learning activities for colleagues using NSDL and the IA tool. As the project continues, a Review Committee will develop a rubric to review teacher-created learning activities that will be contributed to NSDL as a special collection. Additionally, a communication network will be established to support interactions between in-service teachers who are using online learning activities in their classes and to support mentoring relationships between in-service and pre-service teachers.

To extend the impact of the DLgtS activities, Project Tomorrow, a non-profit organization, has received supplemental funding from NSF and is partnering with Utah State University and UCAR to implement Project TestDrive: NSDL. During the 2006-2007 school year, Project Tomorrow will recruit teachers and students from 150-200 schools nationwide to "testdrive" NSDL online resources, and provide feedback through surveys and focus groups on factors that contribute to high-impact, pedagogically sound STEM resource creation and use.

The Digital Libraries go to School and Project TestDrive: NSDL activities support the outreach goals of NSDL while also providing critical data, through rigorous evaluations, about the uptake and use of online STEM education resources in classrooms. Further, by receiving funding from NSF's Teacher Professional Continuum program, these projects demonstrate that the infrastructure, resources and community around NSDL can support the goals of a wide range of NSF programs.

Related Link: http://dlconnect.usu.edu/

The NSDL community is speaking of something interesting?and you are invited to share those educational discussions with your communities.

Blog discussions range from scientists who are sharing research tips that tie data collected by Citizen Scientists from all over the country to teaching and learning in ?Bringing the Field to the Classroom?Birds?, to in-depth science, technology, engineering, and mathematics information about current news for teachers to use in sharing changes in news stories with their students at the ?NSDL News Topic Center: Current Science Information?, to an online discussions and observations about the promises and pitfalls of using new media for scholarship, ?Meeting web kids on their own turf.? Publish NSDL blog content on your website using NSDL RSS.
Related Link: http://expertvoices.nsdl.org/feed/blogs/

Emphasizing the importance of, "Let(ting) teachers know what you are and how you can facilitate their research to improve STEM teaching," the National Science Teachers Association highlighted current NSDL efforts to do just that in a November 4, 2006 article. From the NSDL/NSTA Web Seminar Series, designed to reach out to teachers offering topics such as birds, bones, and plate tectonics, to the Teacher Professional Continuum (TPC) project "Digital Libraries Go to School," aimed at improving K-12 STEM instruction, NSDL outreach activities help teachers find shortcuts to locating what they are looking for at no cost, while showing them how to adapt resources to their classrooms. Dean Krafft, the principal investigator for the NSDL Project at Cornell was quoted in the article: ?I believe we have the tools, the momentum, and the community to make NSDL a new, vibrant, and transformational digital library, and a critical resource for everyone who teaches, uses, or learns about science, technology, engineering, and mathematics."
Related Link: http://nsta.org/main/news/stories/nsta_story.php?news_story_ID=52842

There was an increase in traffic to NSDL.org, both over September 2006, and October 2006. October's figures were boosted by the NSDL Annual Meeting held Oct. 18-20, 2006 to bring visits, the preferred NSDL webmetric, to NSDL.org to 668,433 for the year ending October 31. This represents a 30% annual rate of growth increase in visits to NSDL.org. For more information please contact Mick Khoo, Evaluator, Core Integration Team, 303 497-2604, or .
Related Link: http://eval.comm.nsdl.org/

The Community Services Committee will host ToolTime on Wednesday November 8th (tomorrow) at 2:30 pm EDT /11:30 PDT for a brainstorming session on the NSDL 2.0 platform. Dean Krafft will begin by presenting a short (15-20 minutes) overview of NSDL 2.0. Callers will then be invited to discuss ideas for how to use the system to meet community needs, including suggestions for services that would have high impact.

Related Link: http://commserv.comm.nsdl.org/

"Online learning is opening access and opportunity for all students by providing high-quality courses and highly qualified teachers over the internet--regardless of their neighborhood or geography," said NACOL President Susan Patrick. Patrick is the former director of the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Educational Technology, where in 2005 she was instrumental in publishing the current National Educational Technology Plan. Download Keeping Pace with K-12 Online Learning: A Review of State-level Policy and Practice from NACOL's web site http://www.nacol.org/.
Related Link: http://www.nacol.org/

Marcia Mardis has published an article in Knowledge Quest, Journal of the American Association of School Librarians that includes links to select K-12 NSDL projects.
Related Link: http://www.ala.org/ala/aasl/aaslpubsandjournals/kqweb/kqarchives/volume35/KQW35_1Mardis.pdf

You are invited to participate in the International Technology, Education and Development Conference in Valencia (Spain) on March, 7th, 8th and 9th, 2007.

The general objective of the conference is the promotion of international collaboration in the field of technology, engineering and science education and to provide an International Forum for researchers, engineers, professors, educational scientists and technologists in the areas of Education, Science and Technology. It will be an excellent opportunity to present, demonstrate and discuss research,development, applications, and the latest innovations and results in the field of Higher Education and Industry.

You are encouraged to submit presentation abstracts and participate to share your achievements in the fields of education and international collaboration. The deadline for submitting abstracts is December 1st, 2006.
Related Link: http://www.iated.org/inted2007/?section=3

"Online learning is opening access and opportunity for all students by providing high-quality courses and highly qualified teachers over the internet--regardless of their neighborhood or geography," said NACOL President Susan Patrick. Patrick is the former director of the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Educational Technology, where in 2005 she was instrumental in publishing the current National Educational Technology Plan. Download Keeping Pace with K-12 Online Learning: A Review of State-level Policy and Practice from NACOL's web site http://www.nacol.org/.
Related Link: http://www.nacol.org/

This site contains Darwin's complete publications and many of his handwritten manuscripts. There are over 50,000 searchable text pages and 40,000 images. There is also the largest Darwin bibliography and the largest manuscript catalogue ever published. More than 150 ancillary texts are included, ranging from reference works to reviews, obituaries, descriptions of the Beagle specimens and related works for understanding Darwin's context. Free audio mp3 versions of his works are also available.
Related Link: http://darwin-online.org.uk/