NoodleTools will be offline for maintenance on 1/2/2009 between 10 PM and 12 AM CST.

Please note that our telephone support number has changed to (650) 561-4071.

In case you’re interested, NoodleTools has a Facebook page:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/NoodleTools/30367079098

Just an experiment — we’ll see what develops from it. Perhaps if certain aspects of a NoodleTools/research “community” is useful, we can learn from that.

Debbie authored an article titled “Guiding the Gifted to Honest Work” in the most recent issue of the Duke Gifted Letter (Vol. 9 / Issue 1 / Fall 2008).

Students will tell you that plagiarism is everywhere and, perhaps, even irrelevant. To make their case, they point to recent examples of high-profile authors, politicians, musicians and even clergy who have used the work of others without acknowledgment. Although the penalties have sometimes been severe, students assert that these cases prove that intellectual property and copyright are unworkable and outmoded. Read more…

Debbie will be giving a keynote and conducting one session at the Ventura County Office of Education tomorrow, October 3rd. Then its on to Portland on Thursday, October 9th for the OASL/WLMA Conference, where she’ll be doing one of the extended sessions (9 am - 12 pm).

Who Knows What …and How Do I Know it?
Students make judgments about authority in their everyday lives, but don’t necessarily transfer this to evaluating online sources. We’ll look at the relationship between trust, expertise and authority in the real world, the academic world and in the new permeable Web where learners expect to create information and construct knowledge, not just consume it.

Beyond Cut-and-Paste: No More Cat and Mouse, Revisited
You’ve been telling your students not to cut-and-paste, but are you teaching the specific skills they need to avoid plagiarism? Do your students (and do you?) know the difference between paraphrasing and summarizing? Do they know how and when to quote a source directly? Do they recognize common knowledge? Do they understand how to develop their own opinions and voice? Constructivist, student-centered teaching ideas and documentation strategies for your information literacy curriculum.

The user’s guide has been updated to reflect the addition of Chicago/Turabian formatting and some features that have been added over the past few months (see previous blog entries). The corresponding knowledge base articles will be updated over the next week as well.

Also, with the latest statistics now indicating that Google’s Chrome is getting some significant usage, we spent some time testing NoodleBib under that browser. That went very well, and we’re pleased to announce that we will be supporting Google Chrome as a browser option effective immediately.

I’d like to provide a quick update on our plans for supporting the changes introduced in the MLA Style Manual and Guide to Scholarly Publishing (3rd ed.). Based on what we have learned from MLA, we have decided not to make any updates in NoodleBib yet to support the new formatting. MLA has specifically recommended that “undergraduate and high school students should continue to follow guidelines in the sixth edition of the MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers until the seventh edition is released in spring 2009.”

We are pleased to (officially) announce that Chicago/Turabian bibliography-notes formatting will be available in NoodleBib starting September 1st. All subscribing users will automatically have access to the new formatting option, and it will also be available as part of the free NoodleBib Express tool (which allows you to create individual citations).

There are two “bibles” of Chicago style — Turabian’s A Manual for Writers of Research Papers, Theses, and Dissertations (7th ed.) and The Chicago Manual of Style (15th ed.). There are a few differences between the two guides (most significantly, the noticeable lack of coverage of online sources in the Chicago Manual of Style). We decided to stick with Turabian’s Manual for Writers (which is written more with a student in mind) as our “primary” guide for the new feature. In the same way, we use the MLA Handbook as our primary guide for MLA formatting (written for secondary school and college students), rather than the MLA Style Manual (written for graduate students and scholarly authors).

We look forward to working with you all again this school year!

Debbie will be presenting at IASL in Berkeley today (Sunday, Aug. 3) from 1-4 PM.

Seeding the Oyster: Leadership Through Dialogue
Marilyn Kimura and Debbie Abilock, Room 104
You’ll recognize the names of these discussion groups: Socratic seminar, Literary Club, Harkness Table, deliberative dialogue, professional study group. Yet few librarians have used them as advocacy tools to build learning communities in support of literacy and collaboration. We will provide an opportunity for you to experience several types of inquiry discussions using provocative texts, photographs and film clips. As you learn discussion, reflection, and facilitation skills, you will see how nurturing inquiry and intellectual dispositions can seed your leadership in the school community.

Our users know that NoodleTools is unique because we focus on helping teachers and students learn. Not mindless fill-in-the-blanks software, NoodleBib is a powerful and accurate citation and notetaking program where students get the support they need when they need it. Throughout the research process students are learning to investigate analytically, think critically, articulate ideas clearly and document their evidence accurately.

Sharing these goals, Pearson Education recognized that we were the right partner for the next generation of their writing software. We’re delighted to announce that NoodleBib is seamlessly integrated into the new version of Pearson’s MyCompLab, a writing instruction environment. From the MyCompLab composing space, a student can click the “Cite sources” link in the Writer’s Toolkit to open NoodleBib, create a source list and notecards, and then import that work directly back into the MyCompLab editor. Users will find NoodleBib a slick fit with MyCompLab’s intuitive composing space and writing instruction resources.

[ click image for full-size view ]

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About Pearson: Pearson Education is the global leader in educational publishing, providing scientifically research-based print and digital programs to help students learn at their own pace, in their own way. “The new MyCompLab empowers student writers and facilitates writing instruction by uniquely integrating a composing space and ePortfolio with proven resources and tools. In this revolutionary application, students receive feedback within the context of their own writing—encouraging critical thinking and revision while honing their skills based on individual needs. Administrative features developed specifically for writing instruction bring instructors closer to their student writers, make managing assignments and evaluating papers more efficient, and save instructors time.” More…