Category Archives: Web 2.0

#9 Library related blogs

I have to apologize for my non-linear blogging techniques but hey, I’m a Web 2.0 kind of person.

Finally – my post on blogs in my RSS feeds. I put this off because I didn’t have anything earth-shattering to say. Still don’t. It’s pretty self-explanatory: you save library-related blogs into Bloglines (or other) and group them into folders, as I’ve mentioned in my earlier post. What I want to do is share one of the blogs with you – apologies for those who already read this blog. It’s Ripple effects (and it’s also in my blogroll) by Tony Ryan who used to be involved in all sorts of teaching in Brisbane and is now a consultant. I’ve come across some interesting things in Tony’s blog. One of these is a video which demonstrates the power of wikis in classroom learning and in a very simple, visual way. Here it is.

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/-dnL00TdmLY" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

Another video which really cracked me up I found in his del.icio.us list. It’s called Introducing the book. I don’t know about you, but I’m a technophobe. My first reaction to new technology is the primitive ‘run’ and ‘scream’. I can so relate to this video. I hope it will make you laugh.

[kml_flashembed movie="http://youtube.com/v/xFAWR6hzZek" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

#11. Let’s face it …


new-2

Originally uploaded by tania.sheko

A little background … My older son was one of the last to ‘be allowed’ to use MSN, Facebook and MySpace. What am I saying? He was one of the last to ‘be allowed’ a gameboy, Nintendo, to watch The Simpsons, South Park, etc. Reflecting back on my reluctance to condone MSN, Facebook and MySpace, I have to admit amongst many other reasons, a distinct nervousness about this new way of socialising. True to every generation, I was afraid of change, and I wasn’t in control of this socialnetworking – I didn’t understand it at all. When you don’t understand something, you’re likely to be suspicious of it. Could even be paranoid about it.

Some time this year – I don’t remember why – I decided to ‘get’ Facebook. That weekend I don’t think I even came up for air. I was hooked. In a short time, I’d ‘found’ people I’d lost touch with and minutes later was communicating with them – my god-daughter in Sacramento, friends from Sydney we’d lost touch with – we had lived in Sydney for 13 years. Posted photo albums revealed young people we had known well as young children. I was able to see friends’ trips all over the world. I saw albums of weddings, christenings and other events.

The different levels of communication have proved interesting. When suddenly finding someone I knew but hadn’t seen for ages, and unsure of whether they wanted to reconnect, I was able to ‘poke’ them, leaving it up to them whether they wanted to communicate or not. Brief responses indicated a more distant willingness, whereas some responses were overwhelmingly positive and took the form of private emails. Writing on people’s walls is public with the knowledge of others being able to read everything. Very twitter-like is the initial few words that everyone adds which lets you know what they are doing or thinking or feeling in the last day or so. Sounds trite but sometimes I’m happy to be informed of things on the run – eg. if someone has passed an exam, got a new job, is sick, etc. You’re not expected to respond. It also means that you don’t have to email everyone separately with those little things.

Lastly, I have to admit, it’s addictive. If you’re the kind of person who has to check emails throughout the day (yes, it’s a little sad), then watch out – Facebook is worse because all your ‘friends’ are up there together and there’s so much going on at once.

Yes, I have changed my attitude to my sons’ participation with Facebook. I think it’s a good lesson, and one that can be translated to our experience as teachers/teacherlibrarians. If you don’t ‘do’ something, you won’t really know what it’s about. You’re more likely to be negative, suspicious, critical. But if you don’t keep up, not only could you alienate young people, you could miss out on a lot.

PS. Yes I do have a life. I also live in the real world.
I’d love to hear about others’ thoughts.

10 habits of bloggers that win


Blogger Warning

Originally uploaded by LuChOeDu

I thought I’d share with you some tips for a good blog which are posted on the Cool Cat Teacher blog: Ten habits of bloggers that win

Which of these do you think are most important?

By the way, I’d love to hear from all of you out there – do you find blogging addictive/frustrating/waste of time/superficial/informative/social/all of the above? I’m looking forward to hearing from you…

Finland, Finland, Finland (the country where I’d quite like to be)


Inari lake, Finland

Originally uploaded by enricod

I found an interesting blog connected to a Library 2.0 Symposium in Finland based in the Abo Akademi. If you can trust my limited Swedish, it’s a Swedish university in Finland. I found the statements about Web 2.0 in libraries interesting so I’ve included a paragraph:

‘The main goal of this project is to deepen the understanding of the interactive information source called Web 2.0 focusing on knowledge, experience, collaboration, and creation of new contents. The role of the information professionals and the libraries (Library 2.0) in this new dimension of the information chain is crucial. We need to put libraries in a stronger position allowing them to respond more quickly and flexibly to user needs, and to new challenges and development. Through this project we aim to develop the skills needed to manage the new information platform and foresee the development of needed competencies in the information society. The new techniques demand computer, social, and network competencies and may result in new kind of digital divide as well as creating new forms of information overload. We need to shift our understanding of the information society. It is not only a question of shaping order in information chaos but understanding how individuals shape their own personalized information spheres’.

I think this sums it up!

#7 Librarything


My Book – Bound Edge

Originally uploaded by kate e. did

I’ve been ‘cataloguing’ my books on Librarything for a while now. It appeals to my sense of order and love of storing data neatly. If I’m looking for book information for a talk, instead of looking through masses of separate word documents in folders saved all over the place, there it all is in one spot. Each book is instantly recognisable by the book cover – you can choose the exact cover you have in your library – and at a glance you can peruse for genre or keyword by looking at the tags. Bibliographic information is there. Two things I particularly like is that you can find out what others think about the book (social data – click on the icon of two peope under ‘shared’ on the right) and put in your own synopsis or review. Usually I choose one or more reviews from journals or blogs or whatever, and copy them in. Not sure if that’s a problem with copyright, but it’s just so that I’ve got everything at hand when I need to talk about a book. The comments by others is a good alternative to the more formal reviews of journals. Down to earth. It’s a place where you’re allowed to say you couldn’t stand the book.