October 22, 2008

LISMA’S General Membership Meeting was attended by a small, but enthusiastic group of School Media Specialists from elementary, middle and high school libraries.  Our featured speaker, Craig Sciglimpaglia, gave a most informative presentation on the use of Gale/Cengage products which included the NOVEL products, databases and Virtual Reference books that are free to all libraries through New York State. 

Some of the new features Craig highlighted included the ability to bookmark articles for later use.  In addition to accessing them at your library, you can also email the bookmark to your online address and retrieve it for use at home.  When you click on the link in your message, you are asked to sign in, and then you are brought directly to the article.  What a time saver!

Another great feature is the ability to translate articles with a simple click into eight languages, including Spanish, French, Italian, German, Japanese and others— a great feature for ESL/ELL students, as well as those learning foreign languages.  Craig also explained that an audio component will be coming soon. 

While many of us use the more expensive databases offered by Gale/Cengage, if you are not getting the FREE ones, you are missing out on a valuable resource.  You can register for NOVEL at http://novelnewyork.org/register.php