Susan Woods's List: for Ed Tech

• I realize that most people would think I am unqualified to sit on such a  committee because I am not a doctor, I have never worked in an emergency room,  and I have never treated a single patient. So what? Today I have listened to  people who are not teachers, have never worked in a classroom, and have never  taught a single student tell me how to teach."

• The history of the card  catalog begins in Paris during the time of the French Revolution and ends in  Dublin, Ohio in the 1970s. The purpose of the card in bibliographic cataloging has not changed during  the years as much as the format of the card. The most intriguing cards were  those that were handwritten by trained librarians. Handwritten cards were replaced first by  typewritten cards, then purchased cards, then online catalogs. Today there are few libraries that still use card  catalogs and many young library users that  do not know what a card catalog was or what it looked like.

     

  Contents [hide]
• The original purpose of the card as a cataloging tool was to aid in material  retrieval by the user, to make access points available from the descriptions on  the card, to determine the title, author and subject of the work, and to establish authority control.
• In a 1935 publication the card catalog is defined as “A catalogue, in any  desired order, made on cards of uniform size and quality, and stored on their  edges in drawers, each card being restricted to a single entry.” (Sharp 1935, 301)

  • In our text it credits Dewey with standardizing the size of the card.
• The concept and creation of the first cards used for catalogs occurred in France  around 1789. “The Constituent Assembly confiscated books and manuscripts and  were brought to literary depots at several locations in Paris. The staff at each  depot was to record on cards the basic particulars about each item held. These  cards were then bound up in bundles and sent to the Paris Bureau de  Bibliographie.” (Jackson 1974, 275) Because of wartime shortages, confiscated  playing cards were used to record the information. Playing cards were larger and  instead of having a pattern or a picture, were blank on the back. “The title page was to be transcribed  on the card and the author’s surname underlined for the filing word. If there  was no author, a keyword in the title  was to be underlined. A collation  was added that was to include number of volumes, size, a statement of illustration, the material of  which the book was made, the kind of type, any missing pages, and a description of the binding if it was outstanding in any way. (This  elaborate collation was partly for the purpose of identifying valuable books  that the government might offer for sale in order to increase government  revenue.) After the cards were filled in and put in order by underlined filing  word, they were to be strung together by running a needle and thread through the  lower left hand corners to keep them in order.”

2 more annotations...

• Library media teachers play an essential role in professional learning  communities by ensuring that students and staff are efficient and effective  users of ideas and information. They collaborate with teachers, administrators  and staff to prepare students for future success, not only through their  teaching activities but through advocacy and provision of resources that ensure  equity of access for all students. Is that not the heart of public education?