Thing 23: Final Thoughts

Wow! I finished! There were times, I questioned if I could do what was asked, but now I know, I can tackle any one of these Things, and more. I learned so much, and found, I have so much more to learn. I compare this to a favorite author's new book. I read it through quickly, so that I can find out what happens. Then, I read it again to savor the thoughts, ideas and words. That's how I plan to revisit 23 Things. Now that I am done, I will go back and do some of them again--just to make sure I understand the process. I will delve deeper into them, and add them to the list of resources our students have, so they can become more worldly, in an internet sort of way. Until the next time, Gator Reader signing off--

Thing 22 What did I learn?

Mainly I re-confirmed my thoughts that there is sooooo much out there and I am only using the very teeniest tip of the iceberg. 23 Things gave me the opportunity to see more, (and want more). I will continue to keep up my blog, and as a media specialist, I hope to keep up with what's new in the technology world. I briefly explored the Library Web 2.0 blogs, as suggested, so the first part of my plan is to spend some time with each of them. I will go back and review what I have already learned, and incorporate some of them into my library as communication or research tools. I don't know if I will get to 15 minutes/day, but I do plan to do Saturday or Sunday afternoons (instead of watching TV)--Sunday is "watch-hunting or sports day at our house, so this will be easy to remember. I find that revisiting the things that we have done (I like to read what the others say in their blogs after I have finished mine) and then go back to find something they may have found and I have missed. I will keep up with the GoodReads and the 23 things on a stick Ning, just because I found the comments useful and interesting. The best way for me to keep up, is to do this on a weekly basis--I have too many evening activities to do this every day. So I will continue on Sunday afternoons, and refresh my memory as I go.

Thing 21 Beyond My Space

It took me awhile to get through all the links in this "thing", and of course, I wasn't allowed to enter any of these social networks at school. So, here I am, Easter weekend, finishing the 23things. The 23things on a stick Ning was interesting. I uploaded a photo, and added the badge to my blog. I also joined the GoodReads network and invited my son to join me, and he has added a huge amount of books and reviews that I didn't even have time to catch up on. But it was easy to join that group. It appealed to me because of the book reviews. I am always looking for new/old books for my students to read, and this network might just prove to be helpful later on. On to the next Thing! Almost done. Huzzah!

Thing 20 Facebook and My Space

After viewing the Common Craft Show Video and perusing both Face Book and My Space, I formed a different opinion of the Social Networks especially after looking at the libraries that used My Space. I can see where teens and younger people would relate to this type of space. I felt more secure with Face Book, so I joined that site. I will see what happens in the next week. I did ask friends to join, and I also posted a short message on the wall. I do have a friend or two out there that has a Face Book site, and will see what their page looks like. I joined the Librarians and Facebook group and read a few of the posts that I found interesting. I can see why these sites would be appealing. I, too, like to have all my stuff in one bag. It is time to call it a day.

Thing 19 Podcasts

Huzzah! I just added an RSS feed for some Yoga Podcasts on my blog. I just started doing Yoga--and I am loving it. I even recognized some of the terms from the feed and knew what they were talking about. I listened to several podcasts about Harry Potter, and other book related casts. I found the educational directory the easiest, although I thoroughly enjoyed the ones from St. Cloud State (after they finally downloaded). I'm not sure I will try it myself, but I know that I will check on the RSS feeds that I subscribed to on a regular basis and keep up with my yoga, and the other health site I added.

Thing 18 YouTube and others

It is fascinating to find a video about any possible topic (and some impossible ones) and watch it instantly via YouTube or Google Video. I found that on my iGoogle home page, it shows the most recent YouTube videos. After looking at Google Video, I found that they were all labeled YouTube. I disliked the small pictures (yeah, I know I can make them bigger) and I did not like the hesitation between some of the scenes. I thought the library ads were hilarious, especially Conan the Librarian -- I feel like that some days. Sometimes the videos were hazy and that is what happened with the Librarians on Parade, so I did not recognize the person from MN--although, it might have been the one sticking out her tongue at the camera. I chose the Jodi Picoult Video because she is one of my favorite authors and she was visiting a favorite city of mine. I actually got a hug from Jodi Picoult when she did a book signing at Borders in Minneapolis. (Because I came the farthest distance to see her). I do think these short video clips could be useful in a library setting -- in fact, I have used some for Internet Safety training. I have not put them on our website as of yet. I think they could become a distraction for students, and that is why we do not allow YouTube in our school--I found a lot of inappropriate videos that I'm sure students (and maybe staff) would find very fascinating. I am glad for the opportunity to have used this option, and I did sign up for a YouTube account.

Thing 17 Part 2: NetLibrary

I was finally able to figure out how to get into NetLibrary (it was tooooo easy) and found that I really think that I will recommend it to my High School staff. What a great way to get resources for Social Studies, Science and English research papers. Using the search feature and finding parts of books that pertain to a topic, and then being able to view them and see what information pertains to the subject is great. Adding notes for personal use is an added plus feature. I am glad I took the time to use this tool.

Thing 17 Elm Productivity Tools

Where do I start? The Gale/Cengage data bases are being used in my libraries. I haven't taken them one step further to add the RSS feeds before. I sincerely tried to get the feeds to work, but to no avail. I also viewed all the short videos and tried to do the step by step directions. I found lots of information on Youth smoking, but couldn't find one with a feed. I was successful at Page Composer, and even created a webpage with ProQuest (I think I like this one). I wasn't able to access a place to register with NetLibrary, but am still working on that one. I finally got to view the short video today and think I can use that resource. I have used Webinars before, and do check from time to see if something is available for me to use. I do use the ELM resources on a regular basis, both at work and at the public library. I think that I would use the ProQuest article web page maker and share that via email with colleagues in order to collaborate resources. Being able to get to a webpage directly on a certain research topic would definitely save time for both students and teachers. And, I like the idea of peer reviewed articles being used by students. I still want to check out the NetLibrary and plan to do so if I ever figure out what I need to do to get into it.

Thing 16 Assignement Calculator and RPC

Having already accessed the Research Project Calculator, I am somewhat familiar with the process and have already suggested it for use with my students in our district. I have shown teachers how to use it, and the resource page that is available to them. I looked at the Assignment Calculator, typed in a topic, and liked the idea that after a topic was decided, some articles, either periodical or web sites, were indicated that might be useful for that research. I think that I could use the Research Project Calculator to make a slide show for some of my internet safety lessons that I teach to my elementary students. I may try that when it is time to do that project. I believe this is an excellent resource and include a link on my Media Center resource page for students to access it easily.

Thing 15 Libraries and games

Well, I am not an on-line game lover, and definitely not a virtual game player. However, I did try the Pirate games, and it reminded me of the games my son played (and still does) on his Play Station. Talking to the pirates, via the keyboard is not my thing. I did enjoy the booty games and trying to beat the pirates out of their swords, but I can play those kinds of games anytime, if I feel the need. I also checked out the virtual library game/learning tool, Second Life. I am intrigued by the concept of learning at kiosks about art for an entire quarter or semester or a short hour long learning experience about a certain topic. I can see this happening at a public library where games are one of the reasons patrons visit that library. In our school district computer games are not allowed unless supervised by a staff member, and if it takes as long as it took me to download (at least an hour for the pirates stuff) then it would not be time efficient. I think the students would love this type of learning environment, but our servers would be clogged indefinitely.

Thing 14 Library Thing

I LOVE library thing--I plan to add my collection of books to it as I have extra time. It is easy to use, and I think it will be useful for me to connect to books that other librarians have used and read. Mostly I will use it for my personal collection. It will be interesting to see what I actually have and be able to keep track of my collection. I even added my short list of books to the blog. WOW!

Thing 13 Online Productivity tools

I chose to customize an "igoogle" page. I have done My Yahoo before and I just updated that one, but I do like the igoogle page better--many more choices for set ups, and I just plain prefer to have all my stuff in one spot, and google has so much to offer--online calendars, sticky notes, to do lists, itunes and many more that can link to what I already have set up, like Picassa. In fact, I liked it so well, I made it my home page, and added a weight watchers link to it, and let google do the work for me. As for the other productivity tools, they are just too much for me--too much organizing so I can be organized. I do use my Outlook calendar, and that seems to be sufficient for my purposes. I looked at the online calendars and the reminder thingees, but too many places for me to sort out right now. I did look at the other tools in the list and can see why they would be useful--backpack intrigues me--but right now I'll stick to what I have and now that I have igoogle as my homepage, I should be organized forever.

Thing 12--I Digg, I Mixx, I Reddit

There is so much information in each of those sites, and it is constantly updating. I did find a couple of articles that I enjoyed, and went through the process of sharing them by posting as a direct link to my blog. When I went back to view it, of course, my computer wouldn't allow me to see what I added. (It was about geishas) What I thought was interesting, is that you click on "share" and it lets you choose the site you want to share through. As for using them in the library, I think I preferred Newsvine because of the format and the national news updates on a regular basis. I'm not sure it would save me any time, or make me more productive, since I seem to find all sorts of links to distract me.

Thing 11 Delicious Tagging

Tagging photos, articles and information with subjects that make sense to me and my patrons has great potential for research and saving those favorite bookmarks of mine. If I could tag some of the research sites, or inform staff and students how to tag their research articles, this would save them a lot of time, and enable them to have all their articles in one spot. What a great way to build a list of resources. Now that I have those buttons on my explorer site, I plan to use them to organize my favorites.

Thing 10 Wikis

Well, I certainly find Wiki's interesting. Many of them that I viewed made sure that the viewer's messages pertained to the site, and were not personal or abusive. Some of them required an email address in order to edit any of the pages. I did get into the 23things ona stick Wiki and added a title to the front page, and then deleted it when I found the section for the comments. It seems like such a simple concept and seemed easy to access the editing pages. As for Wikipedia, we do not ban it from our library, but do remind students that a lot of the information on the site can be added by any internet user and therefore the information, although interesting, may not be completely accurate and therefore not suitable for research documentation. I am not sure I am ready to start up my own wiki yet, but I do like the idea of the "subject" topics, book lists, book reviews, and the other library sites. We are presently working on celebrating MN 150th birthday in our school, and I viewed the MN wiki and might possibly add to that site myself, or encourage some of my patrons to visit that site and add to it. I am glad for the opportunity to learn more about wikis. I was clueless, now am a little informed.

Thing 9 Collaboration

I found that Zoho Writer was relatively easy to use. I edited the Declaration of Independence, and I think that our Founding Fathers would probably be amazed at what can be done with their masterpiece. I tried to use Google Docs, but it would not allow me access. I did, however, add one of my documents to my personal google account. This would seem to be a useful tool since access to my document is right at my fingertips (if Internet is available). I like the idea of being able to access documents easily, but am a little leary of the entire world being able to utilize or see these documents. For the most part, I am content with my flash drive and the school server to handle my personal documents. If I were a history teacher, it would be useful to access public documents and have editing capabilities for these documents.

Thing 8 Sharing

Now that is really cool! I created a photo slide cube with picture trail. Adding it to the blog took only 2 tries--it is really easy to use. I had forgotten that I had a picture trail account, and it was fitting that my pictures from Armenia are located there--I am doing a presentation on Armenia tomorrow. I also have an efolio account, and have used it before. Efolio is used by our school counselor and other staff members. I haven't used mine lately because I have a TeacherWeb account that allows me to include the library stuff I want on there. I will post the link. I try to keep that updated with the latest library news from our school. Our school's website is also a useful link for sharing information with our patrons. I have also used Shutterfly and Snapfish for sharing photos and making photo books. I made a photo book of my niece's wedding and several calendars--I would recommend either one of those for picture sharing. What is nice about those is that you can use other family member's photos if they belong to that group. I would also recommend Picture Trail, and I, too, didn't have to buy anything. I just clicked through the ads. It was easy to use, easy to understand. I liked the lazybase and think it would come in handy for those lists of titles (books in a series, etc) that students want access to, as well as other personal lists (recipes for Weight Watcher's, for example). The Big Huge Lab is a great site to play around with pictures and create different formats for the pictures I have taken. I tried the Mosaic Maker and the Badge Maker and can see using them in the future for personal projects I have have. Could also be used for school projects--making 'official looking' badges for our Reading Zone readers comes to mind right now. This is way too much fun--but time to move on.

GatorReader

Thing 7 Communication tools

After reading the productivity tips for email, I agree completely and actually do all of those already. I check email about 4 times during the work day. Our school email gets bogged down with riff-raff--you know those jokes that aren't really funny, or the chain emails that are ridiculous and mostly untrue. I do delete most of them, and when I get fed up with them, I refer them to our school website where they can check if what they are sending is really true.

Email, however, is a very useful and efficient tool for providing information quickly to those who need it. We use if for quick messages, meeting information, workshop ideas and emergency information. Being able to communicate with teachers and staff is very important, and email provides an efficient way to communicate to all staff members.

As for IM, I do have a Yahoo Messenger account, which of course, I can't access at school. But I would love to IM with any librarian out there who is willing to chat about 23 things. Send me an email address and I will add you to my contacts on Yahoo Messenger. ( I will see if our techician will allow that site on my computer at school)

I have used Messenger for several years now, because I chatted with my Armenian teaching partner during our Project Harmony year-long project. Connectivity was an issue with her at that time, but when we could get through it was very useful as we planned our lessons for each other's classes. We also did an instant chat with Armenian students--of course this had to be prearranged to make sure all of us were online because of the time difference in our two areas. I also IM with my daughter who was in the Peace Corps, and phone calls were very expensive and IM was free. We still use that from time to time.

I am fascinated by the IM Reference aspect for school libraries. What a great tool that would be if we could get our students out of the nasty sites they like to text message to each other with--that is why we do not allow it in our school district. The language they use is inappropriate and downright filthy at times. (Beats me how they got around the firewall, when I can't get into any blogs or messenger services from my computer)--But a 24/7 reference center WOW!

I don't have the option for text messaging on my cell phone (it's in the car, primarily for emergency use). I have sent messages a couple of times, but I am so slow and so illiterate when it comes to texting, that I prefer to use email or regular phone calls. I have a problem with the shorthand used in texting--basically it is Greek to me. But, I can see the advantage of being able to text to students/patrons who use a cell phone as their primary source of communicating. No doubt this will be a common practice in the future BFNIDTY (but for now I don't text yet).

I have participated in Minitex webinars and I feel they are a valuable tool for communication, especially for those of us in remote areas. They provide a way for us to get new information, or training on new technology via a web conference. I learned all about the Gale resources via Minitex, and this was efficient and economical for me, as I usually have to travel several hours to get to a conference that might last an hour.

Although I am not proficient in using all of these communication tools yet, I do realize their importance for out patrons/students and the impact they will have on their learning and their ability to have access to library resources and tools basically at their fingertips.

Whew! 7 done, 14 to go! My brain is full!

Thing 6

Wow! I made a name badge for my Weight Watchers meeing, a trading card with a favorite pet, a puzzle and checked out the mosaic maker, the motivational poster, the framer and the pocket album. They are all so easy to use to create different ways to present different photos. This would be great in an art class or any class that requires pictures for brochures or posters. I liked the simplicity of it, and can see myself using this in presentations or informational projects with students.

After using Flickr, I think I prefer it to the Google Picasa Web Album--it uploads easily, sharing is simple, and it's fun to play with the "toys" that go along with Flickr.

Thing 5

The "spell it" portion of Flicker was fun to do. I spelled out "I love to read" and added it to my blog. I also tried out the color photo find section. I think that I would use the "spell it" portion for posters and maybe use it to motivate my readers in the library. Since it is I Love to Read month, I may put that group of photos on a poster and use it in the library. I get too carried away with all this stuff, and something that is supposed to take me 15 minutes ends up being an hour or so. Very relaxing and stress relieving so far--have to concentrate on learning something new.

Thing 4 Flickr

After playing with Flickr for the past 3 hours, I decided to use the google photo tool--Picasa web albums. I might be able to access this at school under my google account. The ability to save/sort/organize/share photos in either Flickr or Picasa would be very useful for the pictures we take for our school calendar. Right now, the photos are saved on the server in monthly folders. I can see organizing them in the web sharing, saving them (most likely privately, because of data privacy) and then utilizing them when it is time to put the calendar together. I have used Shutterfly and Snapfish to share photos and make cards and books and to order prints on line (very briefly) I think the magnitude of Flickr or Picasa make them a grea tool for saving the photos, to free up space on personal computers, and to keep them safe is an awesome thought. If the photos I take are of scenery, things, and do not contain personal things such as family, friends and students, I don't have a problem sharing them. However I am concerned about sharing pictures of students with the public because of data privacy, and out of respect for the students themselves.

I did upload 18 pictures to the Picasa site, and guess what--you can view them in my slide show. That was so easy. I can't wait to try some things with the reading program at school. It is so much fun to work with pictures on the web, just to see the many ways that you can display the, organize them and share them. I would like to add my "I Love to Read" pictures to this site as well, and share them with all the other reading lovers.

Thing 3 continued

Had to go back to Google Reader to check up on any new feeds to my account, and also added a couple more. What a great tool, but I also reviewed the process again--cause if I don't use it, I lose it. Since I am a weight watcher, I added some WW blogs to my subscriptions. Next I will make IGoogle my homepage, so I can readily check the latest info.

Thing 3 RSS feeds

I just subscribed to Google Reader and set up the blogs from 23 things, ALA, and ISafe. I already found 2 lesson plans I can use with my 3-5th graders regarding Internet safety training, and several blogs that refer to books for elementary students that will be helpful in collection development. I can connect to 23 things from there, and am still playing with other subscriptions to add to the Google Reader. I could not get into the other RSS account. I am also learning that everything requires email accounts and passwords, so I am writing them down in a notebook (I wish I would have won one of those at MEMO) and I have also started a GMail account. This is very time consuming, and 15 minutes a day, is barely getting into each of these "things", so I feel like I have accomplished something by doing 3 of them this week.

Thing2 Web2.0

I am overwhelmed by Web 2.0, and I must confess, I am one of those "baby-boomers" who is always up to a challenge and needs to learn new things. (Right now, it is thing2). I watched the video and read the articles, and I feel I am already behind on what the post-baby boomers are learning, and what they need to know. But as I am one of the "oldies", I probably won't see much of Web 2.0 in my media center before I retire (That is because, I have to access the components at home, since blogs are blocked on our server.) I find that my mind is full of what is out there and how little I do know about all these "things". But I am learning, and I will continute to finish the 23 things, just so I can be a bit wiser (but maybe not smarter than a 5th grader) when it comes to the virtual tools available to our students. Now, I am going to re-read the articles, and see what I can use with my students.

Meet My Avatar

What an interesting experience--kind of like playing with Barbie dolls, only a bit more technical. My Avatar represents some of the things I enjoy--my cat and Renaissance Fair, where my oldest son married his love in a grand Renaissance wedding. The fair takes place during late summer and, I look forward to visiting Shakopee and Renaissance again this year.

Thing 1 Gator Reader

I just created, and edited my blog space for Gator Reader. I hope that this experience will help me to understand the usefulness of blogs, and employ the space to enhance my Gator Reading program. I also went in to customize the space. I chose the green background because our GMR gator colors include green, and because green is my favorite color. It reminds me of spring, which I am more than ready for.