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My blog, “Finding My Way: Confessions of a Life-long Learner” has moved from Wordpress to Edublogs. Since Edublogs is powered by Wordpress, this is not a very dramatic move (though there are a few differences between the services). The main reason I moved is because Edublogs is — you guessed it — focused for educators. So, the help section is particularly helpful for teachers and the forums contained teaching-related threads which I think could be very helpful.
Plus, the blog provided by Edublogs (theEdublogger) is great!
Before looking into Delicious more thoroughly a while ago, I didn’t think it was anything I could use. Now I kick myself whenever I accidently use “favorites” instead of delicious — inevitably I want to access that saved website elsewhere, but I can’t remember enough about it to find it . . . and I would have it instantly if only I had saved it to delicious.
While I haven’t started to use the networking capabilities, I see their potential. How many times do you email links to coworkers? Steps could be eliminated by establishing a network and common tags. Steps are also eliminated by just sharing a bookmark (i.e. since I just blogged about wikis, check out my bookmarks: http://del.icio.us/kareneidem/Wikis
One of the bloggers I subscribe to has started using the “Daily Blog Postings” function — I can quickly scan what this “expert-in-the-field” thought was important enough to bookmark, and it can lead to some good, new information.
I think this was one of the more interesting “Things” for me when I started learning about it I had such a misconception about its purpose. To quote a couple of songs from the 60’s and 70’s — “I can see clearly now” and “I’m a believer.”
(Again, apologies to MILI participants . . .)
“Wiki Wiki” = Quick. And that has been my experience with wikis — they are quick to set up and use. I remember someone asking, “Sooo, it’s basically just a website, right?” and I’d say yes — a basic website that anyone with access can edit. Again, I think this goes back to the book “Wisdom of Crowds” — there are a lot of people out there with a lot of good thoughts and information on a multitude of topics. Isn’t it a good idea to have places for them to share their information? And then isn’t it a good idea that other people can either verify or change that information?
We’ve talked about multiple uses for these at MILI — handbooks, curriculum organizers, student project organizers, book reviews, school websites . . . the options are nearly endless. I really like the examples that are given throughout pbwiki.
Here are wikis I’ve made or helped to make:
http://milicopyrightwiki.pbwiki.com/ (password: mili)
http://kareneidemslibrarymediacenterhandbook.pbwiki.com/ (when I showed this to an MLIS class, the instructor said that she had a paradigm shift seeing a handbook online instead of as paper in a binder. Currently, I would be the only one to edit this, but if I were to have one at a job, and leave that job, my replacement would have everything at his or her fingertips and be able to change it easily.)
(My apologies to any MILI participants who know this already, but I want to share some of what we’ve done concerning collaboration with the 23ThingsOnAStick participants.)
I would describe GoogleDocs as the most “life-changing” tool for me . . . and I think I could venture to say for the school librarians we work with in the Metronet Information Literacy Initiative. Since I use a lot of different computers, I’ve always has headaches with losing my flash drive . . . or having it not being compatible with the computer I’m using . . . or emailing myself documents when I don’t have a flash drive and will be working on a different computer later . . . or saving something on a hard drive thinking I’d be back at that computer, but end up working somewhere else . . . on and on. And this happens to a lot of school students, too, as school librarians can attest when they are trying to help students print something right before their class. In fact, I’ll share a post from a school librarian who is thinking about beginning a school-wide initiative for all students to use GoogleDocs.
Anyway, now with GoogleDocs, I have everything with me all the time everywhere. I love it. And that is not even taking into account the collaboration capabilities, which are amazing. Some of my favorite things are that docs can be published as web pages, that you can compare changes between different revisions, and that multiple people can collaborate on one page at once — in the slide show and spreadsheet applications, it can be 50 people at once! (I think it is only 10 for the regular docs.)
So, in short, this has made my life a lot easier. I think that if I were in a more traditional work setting, I’d try to ask myself before most emails, “Could this be accomplished more efficiently with GoogleDocs?”
I had started a post about this based on the readings provided, but I’m scratching that to just write from my heart :) What is Web 2.0? It is an empty shell until users add content. I am amazed over and over again at how participatory this new age of technology is. I distinctly remember saying to myself in college “I am never going to have a job that involves technology” because I knew I didn’t have the mind or heart to be a “techie.” Yet here I am, heavily involved in technology and — for the most part — enjoying it. I thank the “techies” who are able to build the types of technology which allow me — a lowly “non-techie” — to participate.
In many ways, web 2.0 is like democracy . . . it can get messy, but for the most part it can allow the will of the people to happen. (Perhaps Google is the equivalent of the Supreme Court and we have to ensure there are checks and balances to ensure my statement above is correct?). I think a lot about the book “The Wisdom of Crowds” (which has its detractors) because it kind of blew away my concept of “expert” and showed me that ”more” can be “smarter.” That’s the potential I see for this web 2.0 world . . . that it has the potential to make society smarter, more collaborative, and more free.
As for “Library 2.0″ I liked the following statement from Sarah Houghton, quoted by Michael Stevens, requoted by John Blyberg, and posted by 23ThingsOnAStick: “Library 2.0 simply means making your library’s space (virtual and physical) more interactive, collaborative, and driven by community needs. Examples of where to start include blogs, gaming nights for teens, and collaborative photo sites. The basic drive is to get people back into the library by making the library relevant to what they want and need in their daily lives…to make the library a destination and not an afterthought.”
While some may argue that libraries have always been “2.0″ish, I say that there can never be too much effort made toward helping libraries be “interactive, collaborative, and driven by community needs.” And if it takes a new, trendy term to keep that concept at the forefront, I’m all for it.
I love my Google Reader . . . it is a great way to keep up with what is going on ‘out there’ in addition to keeping up with what is going on with MILI. Since I didn’t need to set up an RSS aggregator for Thing 3, I decided to do a couple other things. First, I went through my list of subscriptions and deleted feeds I don’t really like. (It’s a pretty good clue that you don’t like a blog if, after reading it for a while, you start clicking ‘Mark All as Read’ even though you haven’t read any of the posts :))
Then I decided to look through my “starred” posts to see which blogs I star the most so that I could recommend the blogs which have been most useful for me. However, this appeared to be an overwhelming task since I have starred hundreds of posts and there is no way to put them in order by blogger. THEN I discovered the “Trends” option in Google Reader . . . Lo and behold, the Reader keeps track of my Top 10, Top 20, and Top 40 blogs according to how many times I’ve starred the blogs’ posts! Yea! So, according to my Trends (and excluding MILI blogs), my most-starred blogs are
Larry Ferlazzo’s Website of the Day for Teaching ELL . . .
Now that I think about it, this isn’t a truly accurate depiction of my recommendations because I often do not star the valuable postings . . . Rather, I often go out to the sites a blogger recommends and then add them to my “favorites” for future exploration. Therefore, based on my own subjective preferences rather than the objective Trends, I also recommend:
Doug Johsons “Blue Skunk Blog”
Joyce Valenza “NeverEndingSearch”
Then, I added these seven blogs to the blogroll on my blog. Of course, my preferences will probably change as I discover new blogs, so from now on, I’ll just update the blogroll.
(FYI: I hope this won’t be too repetitive for MILI participants who might be reading my blog . . . if so, I’ll always use the heading “On a Stick” for these posts, and you can just delete them.)
I just signed up for 23 Things On a Stick. According to the blog, 23TOAS ”was developed by the seven multitype multicounty library systems as part of the staff development the multitypes offer in their regions . . . This program is open to all staff in any Minnesota library—public, academic, school, or special—as well as members of their Governing Boards, their Friends groups, or Advisory Groups.” Surprise, Ann Walker Smalley is the wizard behind the curtain . . . . I mean, the blogger behind the blog 
Even though we are teaching/learning a lot of these things in MILI, there is always more to learn! I tried (unsuccessfully) to get into a St. Kate’s class this semester called “Library 2.0,” so I decided that participating in 23TOAS would be a good alternative.
Since I already have a blog (Thing 1), I did one of the “challenges” by adding a couple widgets to my blog — a counter (350 views!) and a “recent comments” section.
The prelude of posts to come . . . .
I had been trying to figure out how to make my blog become the main place I “store” all of the information I acquire as I am “Finding My Way” in the information world, library world, and world in general. One major source of information I wanted to make available to myself (and others, if interested) was my classwork. I’ve done a lot of work for these MLIS classes that are making me a librarian, and much of it could be useful to me in the future. But computers come and go, so I didn’t want to save everything on my hard drive. Zip drives and other storage units are great, but they are prone to loss and destruction. Plus, I didn’t know of an easy way to make these formats available on my blog without copy/pasting the content into a post.
Lo and behold, along comes Zoho Viewer. As its tagline says, “Get rid of attachments. Just upload your document, grab the URL, and share it with your friends or post it in blogs / forums. No sign up required.” So, in a way it is like Google Documents, because you can allow others to edit your documents — yet another Web 2.0 tool encouraging and allowing easy collaboration. OR you can just let others view your document, which is what I’m doing on my blog.
Since I already use it, I tried Google docs, too, after I realized Zoho is similar. But I like Zoho better for this purpose because it has a “Bulk” upload option which is easier — less clicking. Plus I like the final view better in Zoho. Also, Zoho might be a good option for collaborating with people online who do not (for whatever reason) want to set up a Google Account.
Animoto is a “cool tool” I’ve been fooling around with . . . it’s been fun. Basically you upload some photos from your hard drive or a photo-sharing site (I use Picasa), and then you can choose music from their collection or yours, and then it creates a video which you can keep or remix. It only takes a couple of minutes! When you are on the page with your photos, note the options for deleting or highlighting selected photos. Keep in mind that you have to have between 10-15 pics . . . For example, I made a separate ‘album’ of my Eiffel pics rather than uploading all our Europe photos which would have taken forever. Then you can email the finished product or upload it to your blog — the “Help” section walks you through any questions you might have. Best of all, these 30-second videos are free! They seem to have uploaded kind of funny . . . . they are a little too big for their frame and fuzzy. Maybe I’ll figure that out in the future but for now — Enjoy!
Hutch (the dog) Video
Eiffel Tower Video
The VW Van Video
I decided to use Google Reader for my aggregator. (I like to say “aggregator” because it sounds like agitator and alligator.) Bloglines looks cool, but it wasn’t as intuitive for me as GR; plus, I use Google, GDocs, Gmail, etc. and I want to use Picasa and more.
I’ve added a bunch of feeds . . . I think I’ll have to remove some after I see which I really like. I put a link to GR on my blog so that I can get to it that way, too.
While doing this, I discovered a cool tool called Pagekeeper.org. It is a bookmarking site for teachers and students. It is not RSS, just a “favorites” site that you can organize in a way you can’t organize your desktop or browser favorites. It is easy to use, you can access it from any computer (instead of saying “Erg, I can’t remember the site, but it is saved on my Favorite’s), and others can view your page if they know your username (no password required for anyone who is not going to edit the page). So, take a look at it — my username is simply “Karen” . . . you can look at other people’s pages by searching for a particular subject or grade level. I really love it!
Well, here is Thing 2! Just in case you don’t click into my “About,” I’ll reprint the purpose of my site here:
******I like to hike. When hiking, I enjoy coming upon cairns — piles of rock which help me find my way. They are interesting creations, the products of several people who are helping to lead the way.
I am becoming a librarian. While becoming a librarian, I enjoy coming upon “library cairns” — words of wisdom which help me find my way in the library world. They are interesting creations, the products of several people who are helping to lead the way.
This blog is a collection of the “cairns” I am discovering as I am FINDING MY WAY in the library world — ideas, articles, blogs, discussions, tools, and more — as well as a few of my own comments ( or “confessions”). Mainly, I want to create a repository of all the great information out there about the future of libraries so that I will have markers to follow as I am finding my way as a librarian.
Of course, I hope that others who are interested in going in the same direction might find the information in this blog helpful. And just as real cairns are created by more than one person, I hope that others will add their “rocks” in the form of comments, suggestions, links, and more. My thanks to you in advance.
And, just in case you didn’t notice, “cairn” sounds like “Karen” :) *******
Michael Stephens (http://www.tametheweb.com/) presented at the MN Library 2.0Summit hosted by the Health Science Libraries of Minnesota and the Minnesota Chapter of SLA. Here is a bibliography similar to the one he gave us; I’ve asked for an electronic version of the longer one and will post it if possible. Here are some of my notes:
- The heart of Library 2.0 is user-centered change. L.2.0 uses some social tools, has open & transparent conversations, involves the users in service & planning, recognizes & responds to trends, has presence with users online, learns & innovates, adopts a 2.0 philosophy, and creates a culture of trust.
- Library rules can be as simple as “Respect Yourself, Respect Others, Respect the Space”
- DON’T BAN THE TECHNOLOGY, BAN THE BEHAVIOR.
- Send lap-top librarians out to the cafeteria (or wherever users are at)
- With so many trends, here is how you recognize a “good trend” — solves a known problem, users are asking for it, others know how to use it, it looks like fun. Don’t die or not move forward because of “risk aversion.” Libraries need to throw out the “culture of perfect” or “culture of deferral” and just try it. Like gamers, we need to try it, make a mistake, learn from it, and go back to do it again.
- Trends driving the global economy: “wisdom of crowds”, unlimited video, personalization, being “green”, instant buying, all-access economy. Promote these ideas in your library.
Blogs: talk about what is new, programs and materials, new resources, conference reports. Blogs are a way to easily deliver content to users, promote e-journal access and resources, and create conversations.
Podcasting: http://audacity.sourceforge.net/ and http://www.garageband.com/podcast. Great example of use at http://www.kankakee.lib.il.us/.
RSS: Really Simple Syndication, aggregators. Google Reader, Net Vibes, Bloglines, Blogbridge
Wikis: PBWiki offers a “Presenter Pack” with T-shirts and gold memberships for free!
IM: http://wwwl.meebo.com/ lets you access IM anywhere for free.
Flickr: Capture events, buildings, speakers, etc. Make the library “human.” Create a useful profile page for your library. Tell stories. Show new books with a note tag linked to the catalog. Show the “Day in the Life” of a book.
Social Networking: When/if you use it: meet the mission and convey the mission.
Second Life: Teen Second Life featured in School Library Journal “Meet the New You”
