Zotero

**What is Zotero?**
Zotero is a Firefox pulg-in students can use to collect, analyze, discuss, synthesize, and create information. It began as a citation manager but has blossomed into a wonderful teaching tool that can help you model and assess the reading strategies students need in the 21st Century.

What can Zotero do?


Collect-resources from anywhere on the web. Organize documents in personal and shared libraries. Cite sources in hundreds of ways. Sync between a students school computer and their own computer. Collaborate with groups and share ntoes and have online discussions.

Zotero ScreenCast Videos
The website Zotero.org has many wonderful screencast tutorials available: [|Getting Started] [|Annotate] [|Taking Notes] [|Zotero and Microsoft Word] [|Zotero Groups]

Zotero in the Classroom
1. Design- Decide on the goals of the discussion. For example, will students be responding to literature or building comprehension skills? Finally, how will you measure these goals?
 * ** Steps to Integrating Zotero Groups ** ||

2. Organize- Organize the forum and the posts to meet the goals. If needed design collaborative groups of students.

3. Model- Demonstrate to students hoe to not only use the technology, but also the quality of a good post.

4. Facilitate- Allow for the threads to evolve based on student choice, but redirect forums that will not build upon the goals of the unit. Remember, you should not be the dominant voice. Make sure students get actively involved in conversations.

5. Assess- Allow for opportunities for meaningful assessment. Students should learn from the measurement tools.

6.Archive- Threaded discussions create a record of a student’s growth and teachers can store and access this data very easily. ||

1. **Reciprocal Teaching**- Have students post specific summaries, predictions, questions, and clarifications to threads that other students facilitate.
 * Five Possible Uses of Zotero Groups in the Language Arts Classroom ||

2. **Case Studies**- This model works well in content areas. Place students in collaborative groups and have them post responses to article with two opposing views.

3. **Response to Literature**- Post open ended questions to literature and have students respond and then discuss each others’ responses.

4. **Book Club-** Allow students to choose the titles of text they read. Design forum groups based on genres students choose. Students can then discuss what they read outside of the classroom.

5. **Author’s Corner-** Provide students a space to post original essays, short stories, or poems. Students can read and respond to the work of their peers. ||