Alberta Online Reference Centre

The Alberta Online Reference Centre is a great site! The best thing is that it has been put together by the province and all schools have access to it so there is no need for districts or T-Ls to recreate things.

I really liked:

• the detailed search I could conduct for resources (subject, grade, language, etc.)
• all the great databases all students and teachers can access from this one point (no need for individual districts or schools to buy)
• the Tools4Teachers (T4T) section – lessons on whole units of study; again searchable by grade and subject; I found a whole selection of Grade 4 science lessons that seem to cover the entire curriculum! Includes student and teacher information.
• My Workspace – an area to save and create; I am wondering if this is available for students as well as teachers?
• The listing of new resources and popular resources
• Teachers from outside Alberta can request access to the resources and access everything except the licensed resources

Thanks for allowing us access to this site, wouldn't it be great if the BC government would create something similar?

I just read the post that Anne made about the Alberta ORC and the fact that it may have cost school based T-Ls their jobs.  Wow - is this really the case?  That is very short sighted if it is the case.  Definitely the T-Ls are needed to help students and teachers navigate the site and the databases.  I honestly never thought of this - I thought it was just a really great reference collection that would be part of the school library.  I must say that this is a very frustrating part of this job - having to constantly justify WHY the position is actually needed.  Why is it that people can not see the importance of the T-L?