While I’m really interested in all sorts of technology possibilities, as a person responsible for a huge library facility and resource centre I passionately believe that the first and most important ‘augmented reality’ option for children and youth are found in books, magazine, graphic novels and more.
Good books. Good literature. Good augmented reality!! Through books you can experience so many possibilities, so many passions and emotions, so much history, exciting mystery, and more.
This week has been a big one for us on the ‘augmented reality’ front!
As our visiting speaker Paul MacDonald from The Children’s Bookshop said to our Year 7 students: “A good book should leave you slightly exhausted at the end. You live several lives while reading it”.
Paul challenged the boys for an hour with many exciting ideas, and reasons to get into ‘what’s hot’! He even got into quiz mode to capture every single boy – the prize? A Cherub beanie! You’ve never seen such a sea of hands desperate to answer a question about books and authors! Heaps of boys charged over to the library after getting out of the dining room at lunch time – and queued to grab or reserve the books that Paul had been enticing them with.
Patrick Ness
We also had a fabulous visit from Patrick Ness, who spoke to Year 9. Talk about mischievous but exciting! He also sat down for a literary lunch discussion with our Extension English students. Patrick was just fantastic at pitching the literacy message to active adolescents.
Oh, and don’t forget the magic of buying your own signed copy of an author’s book!
For me – the first and best form of augmented reality – guaranteed to impact on every aspect of a students learning future – is reading and more reading. More important than any other technology tool in the whole world!
judyoconnell.com 
Love Steampunk novels! Scott Westerfeld is a fantastic Author and Paul Macdonald really knows his stuff! He is always an entertaining & enthusiastic speaker and knows how to “sell’ his books to kids. Lucky audience…
P.S.
Could I ask how you came by the nifty poster – did YOU create it? May I use it? Are there any more genre type posters – especially for boys?
Nice to hear from you Marion. That ‘poster’ is just one of Paul’s powerpoint slides – you can make heaps of cool ‘posters’ like that for yourself 🙂 We like to display slideshows of cool stuff like that on our big overhead screen!
Leviathan is excellent. Westerfield managed to capture cyberpunk, steampunk and good old Flashman type high adventure. I wonder if it could be used to augment History class. I am also a big fan of LightningBug.com.au right now — and recently used it in Montana (the only place that let’s me practice) – getting people to tell kids they can create, and show them that they are going to be good at it … I’m a convert to reading – thanks to you … and audio books too … I love reading the field guides at the same time … to see if I’m spotting what I should be.
“reading and more reading” summarises my learning priorities perfectly.
As with any learning, reading becomes more powerful when guided and fueled by passion.