Thing # 19 (Week 8) LibraryThing

I've used LibraryThing for both a personal book collection and for the summer reading program at my school. You can see on my blog where I added my father's railroad books - I created the list to share this interest with other train enthusiasts out there. I noticed that many people are using LibraryThing for online book clubs, so when our English department got together this year to select the summer reading books, I sent them a link to a YA lit club so that they could read some reviews of current literature.
This past fall, I catalogued last year's summer books and posted them on my library web site so that students would make comments, but so far no activity. This year, I'll make sure that they know about it beforehand. I'll also be able to use the recommendations for further reading feature for those students who want to read similar titles.
The LibraryThing for Libraries project that would integrate the features of LibraryThing with an existing OPAC really seems like a great leap forward. I noticed that it's mostly public libraries that are using this, but I think that it would be great for schools as well. Not only could students search by keyword and subject headings, but also by more familiar sounding tags. And they could also add their own reviews as well as reading others.

Thing # 18 (Week 8) Online productivity tools

This is a picture of my daughter Jennie (last one on the right) with her Irish Step-Dancing team that recently competed in the All-Ireland competition. They came in second! First place went to an Irish team.

Part one...I'm writing this blog post in ZoHo Writer and I'm very impressed with it, especially with the emoticons! (Why can't I see them in Blogger? I tried importing them as pictures, but I couldn't insert them here.) It's nice to be able to write and publish within the same program. They also have several other applications like a spreadsheet program, etc. I'll try out Google Docs to see how they compare. On a related note, I'm using the OpenOffice suite on my new computer since it didn't come with Microsoft Office and I'd recommend it to everyone. My daughter Jennie, the step-dancer, is a free-lance pharmaceutical writer and she uses it for all her work. Why buy an expensive program when you can use an open source alternative that has all the features you need, plus the ability to save in any format? The only thing OpenOffice lacks is the web-based access, which would be a very desirable addition.

As a writer, my daughter has occasion to collaborate with her clients, so maybe she'd also like to use a web-based product like ZoHo or Google Docs. And I can definitely see how teachers could use the collaborative feature with student reports as well as for creative writing assignments.

Part two...Well, I just gave Google Docs a quick tour, trying to add and edit the subject as above, but it failed my test! I couldn't just upload the photo, but had to insert it as an image. However, when I did so, the upload failed - maybe the file size was too large. Also, I couldn't find any place where I could add any comments in balloons or any emoticons. Now, I'm not the type to elaborate my writing with all that stuff, but it was appropriate for the text of my blog. So, maybe Google Docs is a tad more serious than ZoHo? I didn't try out any of the other applications, so I can't comment on them.

Thing #17 (Week 7) Sandbox play

I just posted a message to the calcurriculum wiki and I tried adding a YakPack where you can talk to one another. Not sure if it will work! Not only can you collaborate on screen but talk to one another as well.
In my previous blog post, I explained how I'm planning to use a wiki to guide students through their Virtual High School classes next year.

Thing #16 (Week 7) Wikis

Wikis aren't all that new to me since I took a course last summer about them. I had high hopes that I could create a wiki as an alternative to our school's webpages, which I wasn't allowed to edit on my own :( I haven't updated the wiki that I started, but after reading more about them for this exercise, I'd like to try again. This coming September, I'll be a coordinator for Virtual High School and I'd like to be able to communicate with my students through one of these new technologies. I'm wondering if wikis are the best format to use. I'm leaning in that direction because even if the students are taking different subjects, the online learning will be a new experience for all of them. I know that they will be taking an orientation to Blackboard, but I'm sure that they'll have more issues that I can help them with. And with a wiki they can also help each other through the course.
Reading about all the different ways that other schools and libraries have used wikis makes me a little embarrassed that I haven't updated mine. I was really impressed with the Westwood school wiki, from the sample school wiki link - very organized and well thought out class presentation. And of course I'm always blown away by Joyce Valenza's high school website http://mciu.org/~spjvweb . I noticed that she's created wikis for most of the new links. I'm inspired!

Thing #15 (Week 6) Web 2.0/ The Future of Libraries/ Library 2.0

This exercize has really come at the right point in the course for me. All the investigating that I've been doing into new technologies has me overwhelmed with the possibilities for the future of our profession. And I'm wondering what this will mean for the future of school libraries. At my school, I already see that students use the internet as their primary information source. Try as I might to convince them that they should start their searches with the catalog, they invariably gravitate to the easiest method for them - usually Google or Wikipedia. I've tried educating the teachers, but it all seems to fall on deaf ears.
I enjoy a healthy book budget, but I wonder if all that money is just being wasted on books that students never read.
I read all the articles from OCLC and was most impressed with "Away from the icebergs" by Rick Anderson. He advocates against building comprehensive print collections, when patrons can access the information online anyway. This makes so much sense to me, but the alternative (i.e. more digital content) would be a tough sell in my school. Our students are now so used to using Google and Wikipedia, they probably won't use what I buy no matter how superior it may be.
To find out what others are saying about changes that might affect school libraries, I also read the article "School Library 2.0" from the Wikipedia references. The author believes that in order to survive, the library needs to extend it's services beyond the boundaries of the school. As a staff member at the Genesee Valley BOCES in western New York, he's planning "two educational centers to support career and technical and alternative education programs. It is exciting to imagine what a library that serves culinary arts and automotive technology programs could be. We are looking to create something akin to an information commons, which will feature a print and audio fiction collection and primarily digital reference and nonfiction resources."
Since I work at a technical high school, I'll put some serious thought into redesigning the existing library collection to suit the needs of our students.

Thing #14 (Week 6) Explore Technorati

After respectfully declining to "claim" my blog on Technorati, I tried doing a keyword search for "School Library Learning 2.0" - 28 results in both Blog posts and tags and only 18 in the Blog Directory. I actually found my blog, but alas, "no fans" for me. I selected the "New Books" from the popular blogs link - I like it much better than I thought I would, and there are links to Amazon for their reviews.
Tagging and the future of information retrieval - sounds like the title of an article...tags are a great concept, uncontrolled cataloguing, but easier to use than traditional subject headings - more like keywords.

Thing # 13 (Week 6) Del.icio.us

I must say that delicious is quite overwhelming - or maybe it's just that I'm so busy this week that I've been finding it difficult to keep up with everything. I registered for an account and added it to my toolbar. I've managed to add a few of my bookmarks to it, but time will tell if it becomes a habit or just one more thing to think about (and spell). Sorry for the whining! Can't wait for vacation...
I read how some libraries have utilized delicious to reach out to the public, but I doubt that it will be useful for academic research. Just because something is popular doesn't make it authoritative.

Thing # 12 (Week 5) Roll your own search tool with Rollyo

While I enjoyed viewing other searchrolls, I found it difficult to immediately come up with a list of reliable websites to create my own. I finally created a couple based on sites I usually check on a frequent basis - subjects are "Book Reviews" and "Italian Genealogy". I'm almost embarrassed to say that I made them public since I'm not sure that anyone else would find them useful! Oh well, I'm just learning. I wanted to add a search box to my blog, but couldn't figure out how to (even though I read the instructions several times.)
I think Rollyo would be useful for teachers who wanted their students to search only pre-selected websites, and add that information to their homework pages.

Thing # 11 (Week 5) Explore Web 2.0 award-winning applications and Ning

Again, I'm finding that I'm having way too much fun and spending way too much time on these explorations! I finally decided to comment on this one http://www.etsy.com/.

The lovely item for sale above is a handmade Arrr Matey Truffle Magnet - only $ 8.00 plus shipping! This was from their "Geekery" category, but they have a wide variety of craft areas represented from jewelry to woodworking. All the items for sale on etsy are completely handmade - what a great idea for crafters who need a salesroom without the overhead. It only costs $.20 to list each item plus a commission of 3.5% if sold, plus any fees associated with PayPal.

I was surprised to see that their idea of handmade also includes books, vintage items such as sewing and knitting patterns and a few antiques. I can see how school organizations could use this site for fundraising purposes, as long as they could keep up with the orders.

Ning is great! - I used it last summer for a course on Wikis through Simmons College so I already had an account. Again, I got totally immersed with all of the Nings that are out there to join. I selected the Dead Fred Genealogy Photo Archive http://deadfredgenealogy.ning.com/ because I've uncovered a few mysterious photos of unknown family members. I was intrigued with the concept of posting pictures of these people in the hopes that someone out there could identify them. Talk about a needle in a haystack - I guess I like to believe in impossible things - like the Giants winning the Superbowl. Wait! That was real!!! Okay, I digress...

On to playing with the Travel IQ - I surprised myself at how far I got, but bummed out when I was so far off the target for a few of them. With practice I'm sure I'll do better. What a great site for practicing geography skills.

Thing # 10 (Week 5) Online image generators

After playing around a bit I finally chose the Warholizer. Since my hobby is genealogy, the image I chose to upload is of my grandmother Maria Sposato, who was born in Carpanzano, Italy. I plan to use this generator with library pictures for my website.

I also spent a lot of time investigating the other image generators. My initial opinion is that most of them are rather silly, but I can see the usefulness for occasional classroom use. However, this won't happen for a long time at my school because many of these newer technologies, especially those that manipulate images, have been blocked.