Thing #11

I felt that LibraryThing is a good resource, especially for students that are given summer reading lists (i.e. pretty much every student in high school language arts classes!). They can use this resource to list all the books they have read, or need to read. With the ability to interact with other LibraryThing users and get different viewpoints on books, and generate discussions with poeple outside their classroom, they can broaden their horizons. I think a good lesson for kids is to reinforce that one book can elicit many different feelings and viewpoints, and that things they like might not necessarily be a favorite of others. In other words, this can help reinforce/promote the acceptance of ideas and beliefs not necessarily our own.

For my teaching situation, in a personal finance class students could be assigned certain books to read, and look them on on libaryThing and get opinions on the book from at least 5 other non-class users (i.e. can't use their neighbors in class!).