Thing #23 Final Thoughts

As I have said before, this was a wonderful learning experience. Although I won't use all the tools, I sure will use many of them and share them with others. Some of my favorites were the blog itself. It was almost like writing in your diary when we were kids. I will surely be keeping up with that portion of the things. I enjoyed seeing other web 2.0 tools and the Go2 web 2.0 page was particularily useful. I use my delicious and RSS feeds daily. I'm not too crazy on the wiki's and sharing of info. It's hard enough to decipher good websites and then throw in everyone's opinions on these sites will not be very helpful to me. I enjoyed the social network sites and plan to use Ning.
I would love to see more programs like this in the future...count me in! I enjoyed looking at other blogs and learning from them. I am glad I finally connected with Ruth Solie and will look forward to working with her and other NLLN members in the future. In one sentence this experience gave me the knowledge, awareness and understanding of Library 2.0 Tools,FANTASTIC!

Thing #22 Ways to Stay Current

I will continue with my Library blog, I plan to start an entire new one this summer. I've started to jot down ideas that I will do with the blog and ways for the students to enjoy it. I have found when I get here early in the morning is the best time to work on my blog, I will continue that time frame. I need to take a few days and regroup what I have learned and put into good use the items I thought would be useful for the library. All in all it was a wonderful learning experience. I have been instructed by my Dean to do an inservice for the faculty and staff on what I learned through this and help them get started on their own blog or a "23" thing.

Thing #21 Other Social Networks

I enjoyed looking at the other social networks. Like I said in the previous post, MySpace and Facebook are just too juvenile for me. I can see myself using Ning as my social network. I am probably the only one in Northern MN not to have a computer at home so I wouldn't be using Ning or any other network all that much. I think they are a great tool to connect with different groups and I am not saying I wouldn't use it during the work week. I did join the ASPCA since I am a dog lover. As I was writing this, one of our faculty came in to tell me about her evening on Second Life with her husband last night. They had a great time going on a date and visiting other islands. Thats all wonderful but I don't see myself using the virtual world all that much, I need to stay in reality, that works best for me. The same goes for the social networking, its fine but I would rather talk on the phone with my friends. Again, this has been very enjoyable to learn about but putting it into use is pretty far off the radar.

Thing #20 Facebook and MySpace

I made accounts at both of these. I didn't particularily like either one of them. They are way too teen for me. Too much glitz and glamour. I did have an old friend find me on Facebook which was fun to reconnect. Some of my students signed up to be my friends which I really didn't need to see their pages. As a prospective employer I would never put the things these students put on their pages for all to see. I enjoyed the Ning social network and would use that one before these two. I looked at other libraries using MySpace and found that most were for teen information. I don't plan to use MySpace at all. I'm feeling a little overwhelmed by all we have learned so far. It is hard to keep track of all the passwords, logins, just trying to check in on everything. I will have to pick and choose what I want to keep and use. The blog is still my favorite.

Thing #19 Podcasts

I tried several different podcasting sites and I had more luck with podcast links off of sites like CNN, MPR, NPR. I had trouble loading the podcasts from Podcast.net. I thought Educational Podcast directory was not aesthetically appealing. I like the book review podcasts on NPR and MPR. I would and do use those. I could see using podcasts for the library in the future especially for library news, research techniques, although why reinvent the wheel when so much of that is already out there. I did go out to Gcast but I have yet to download anything from my phone. I've had a cold for a week and my voice is pretty crackly. This "thing" will take more research on my part

Thing #18 YouTube

This was fun to explore but very time consuming. I did use tags to narrow down my searches. Most of the videos to me were very immature and nothing I would want to post on my blog. I did return to one that I did post about cell phone use at school. It's called the Angry Professor and I don't know how staged it is but it does get to the point about cell phones in the classroom. I don't know about anyone else but I have a huge problem in the library with cell phones. Again, we do so much proctoring in our library that I try and keep it as quiet as possible, a cell phone going off is very distracting to people taking tests or just trying to read. No matter how many times I tell them or put signage up, it still remains a problem. I would like to show this video at our orientation but now I think I will just post it in my library blog for all to view!
I can see using different videos in my blog, even creating one myself on library research, orientation to the area, different procedures, the dewey decimal system. It would also cure my small desire to act!

Thing #17 ELM Productivity Tools

This was another interesting thing, as I have not used any of those "tools" in ELM. I can see using the folder and notes options when working with colleagues on a project and sharing information. This is something our faculty can use to share with their students on topics they are researching. I wasn't too crazy on the web page idea, maybe if I had more time but there are so many tools out there that I need to downsize and use the simplest and less time consuming ones. When I get more time to set up some mini classes for faculty I will definately be showing them these tools.

Minnesota Library 2.0 Thing #16

I have looked at putting a link to one of these tools for a long time and never did. It was nice to be able to play around the two of them and look at their different tools. I liked them both but would consider using the RPC. It was a little more user friendly for our students. I showed it to my work study and she thought it would be very useful. I have our English teacher looking at it now so I will get her opinion. The Teacher guides were very helpful. I printed off several of the PDF files about search tips, Boolean basics and evaluating websites. I will use these when I talk to classes about research. I can hardly wait to work on my blog and get it ready for use this summer, there is so much I have learned through this program to use. The email feature is nice to, at my age every reminder helps. It is a great planning tool for students and myself, it just getting them to look at it and use it. I can see our nursing students using the RPC, they are a very organized group.

Thing #15 Online Gaming

I chose to sign up for Second Life since I already have an account there. Two of our Faculty just attended a conference on Second Life and our college is part of the MNSCU island. I will eventually be putting my library out there with the rest of our college. I went to Info Island where a lot of libraries are and was not to impressed with what was there. I would have all my database links there, maybe a reference desk. I could show new materials. I don't know how many students would utilize it if they weren't already signed on. Our college is thinking of a way to create like 50 different avatar accounts for students to use throughout the semester. I will be working closely with our two faculty who got the ball rolling on this. We had 100 plus high school students visiting our college last friday and the three of us got on Second Life and showed them around. It was pretty cool. I am a real novice at it compared to my collegues but learn more everytime I visit. I would like to put some kind of library orientation out on our island also. Just have to figure out all the logistics, hope to get something going this summer.

Thing #14 Online Productivity "LibraryThing"

I enjoy working with LibraryThing. I started to set it up for our book club but then changed to a more generic site. I will definately look into using this at a later date for our book club. I would also have a link to it for our college library site. It's nice to have so many book reviews at your fingertips. I got some great ideas for books to purchase for my library and to read for book club. It is easy to navigate around this site. It was fun to read what others had said about the books I have read recently. Confirmed that I wasn't the only one not liking Cornwalls newest. I already turned my book club onto it, now I will share with my library patrons. FUN!

Thing #13 Online Productivity

This was an interesting "Thing". I tried several of the online calendars. Kiko was not easy to use at all, I did get an account activated with Spongecell which was quite easy to do, I have more accounts and passwords than I care to remember. I set up some tasks in Spongecell which was user friendly. I don't think I would use those online reminders much, post it notes work really well for me! I made an account in Remember the Milk just because I liked the name. I fiddled around with it and added some tasks but again, 3M will still make money from me on Post It notes. I did make myself an IGoogle page and liked working with that. I like the items that conform to my homepage and have their own easy access button on my taskbar. Something I have to log into each time does not save me any time. Its been fun to see what is out there and trying to figure out a way to put it all with in reach or a click will be the desired result.
I have been playing around with my IGoogle page and out of all the productivity tools this one I will use the most. It is very easily accessible and I can add exactly what I will use the most on it.

Thing #12 Social Media, Digg, Mixx

These sites I thouroughly enjoyed. I am a newshound and to see other news items from different sources was great. I liked them all, but I would use Newsvine more than the others in that I liked the way their site was set up. I tried to share several articles and kept getting a security certificate issue. I don't know if that is our college problem or if it was an internet issue. I will try again tomorrow. I especially liked the local news in Newsvine. Gave articles from not only the star/trib but city pages. This was a fun "Thing" to do, one of my favorites. At first I thought it would be a productivity detractor just because there is so much to look at but once I got looking around I think it can be an productivity enhancer. I am definately going to tag some of these site.

Thing # 11 Tagging and Del.icio.us

I enjoyed Del.icio.us. I can see some uses for this for our library. It would be nice to have sites bookmarked that you can access anywhere. I come across some good sites and then try and look later for them and my menapausal mind just can't seem to locate them again. This would work well for sharing of sites. I tried to watch the 8 minute tutorial and it would not open for me. I did find a site http://www.go2web20.net/ that I have shared with some of our faculty. Like one of them said, "its overwhelming, whats out there". This site puts it all in one place for you. I looked at Furl and Pagekeeper but our school uses D2L IMS software for sharing and discussion and it seems to work well for our students and faculty.

Thing #10 Wiki's

I've been looking at all the wiki links and really searching my brain as to why we would use one for our library. I can see uses of project involvement with others, I like the library that showed all their new items by month. I could see us doing that but I could also do that in a blog. Unless I would want feedback about something we were doing, I don't think I would wiki, wiki, wiki!
I did go out to 23 things on a stick wiki and put in a comment in the comment tab.
I've looked at several of the wiki examples. I am still having a hard time thinking of uses for our library. I joined PBWiki and have been playing around with that. I'm beginning to feel a little overwhelmed with all the tools. I am at a stage in my career where I want to downsize my work load, all these tools seem to make more work?? Maybe I haven't used them enough. I have a hard enough time checking emails, much less blogs, wiki's etc. I have enjoyed learning about all the tools, just need to see where it would be practical to use them. Our college uses D2L for alot of our sharing, discussions, course info.

Thing #9 Online Collaboration

I set up an account in both Zohowriter and Google Docs. The first problem I had was that it would not upload a Office 07 doc. I changed it and it uploaded fine. I edited in both and they were both very easy to use. I went to publish in both of them to my blog and it said it did but I can't find it anywhere...will continue with Thing #9.....

Thing #8

I fooled around with Picture Trail, the download was pretty slow, so I uploaded the faster version and I could not find the pictures I had saved. So I started over and it went fairly well although it put doubles in of two pictures. The picture cube is cool, not placed very well on the page. I could see utilizing some of the picture tools. Have some pictures coming later this week of our "Amazing Race" so I'll play around with that.

Thing #7 Communication

Since I am a one-woman show at our library, I have yet to set up a online reference desk. I am very interested in IM and how that could work as a reference desk. Our students have their own student email account but I find that most of them use their own personal email. We tell them constantly to check their student email as that is our preferred mode of communication. Some do, some don't. I just had two students today (as we are into a month of the semester) tell me they didn't know they had an account. I see most of them on facebook, myspace etc. I truly think having a library blog will be the way of communicating with them. Email is going out. I need to get on board with IM as I see them using that more and more. I have yet to test message anyone because I rarely use my cell phone and we don't allow them on in the library as we do so much testing for distance classes.
I did not attend any webinars through Minitex or OPAL but have attended quite a few through MNPALS and enjoy that route rather than driving 200 miles in January. The information I need from the webinars is easily understood and a great way to disseminate the info.

Clara in her Brett favre jersey

DSC00280,
originally uploaded by campbean.

Trying Flickr again to see if I can get it where I want it

Ongoing RSS saga

Well I got CNN top stories to feed but that really isn't exactly what I wanted to accomplish. I will continue to see how I can get my favorites...

RSS Feed

I thought I had the RSS feed uploaded but it wasn't what I selected so I deleted it. I am having one heck of a time getting what I want in my blog. I'm still working on it...

Thing #6 Online Image Generator

This was great fun! I can see using alot of these features on a regular basis.

Thing #5

My creation,
originally uploaded by campbean.

I chose to create a puzzle with Flickr. It was pretty easy, I might be getting the hang of this!

Thing #3

I played around with the RSS feeds and am not satisfied with my outcome. I selected several "favorites" and they were not the feeds that showed up in my blog. I am going to play some more with it, but for now have an RSS feed running just not the one I wanted! :)
I can see where this would be quite useful so I want to get a handle on working with the RSS feeds.

Thing #4

I enjoyed working with Flickr, just don't know how the blog and it connect?? I ended up uploading these photos from my camera not Flickr. I guess I am feeling quite lost at this point. I can see where it would be very useful to use Flickr I am just not understanding how to connect the two? Any suggestions...

"Thing #2"

I am just getting my feet wet on this Library and Web 2.0 jargon. Very interesting comments by Mr. Abrams and the blog by John. I do feel that we need to service our library community by whatever means possible. I want to reach my 20 to 30 year old customers in my library and if learning blogging, wiki's, myspace etc I am more than game to do that. I find it all very interesting and fun trying to think of ways to incorporate these features for my library here at NTC. Some of our program areas are already using Second Life so I hope to work with them on including a virtual library. I remember years ago when the internet was going to be a crucial part of libraries and how some old school librarians were not thrilled to be a part of it. I don't want to feel that way about Library 2.0. I want to embrace the changes and hope that I can reach my younger (and older) audience with these tools.

New "Thing"

I look forward to really hitting the "stick" so to speak next week and continuing the adventure of "23 things". I've taken some time to view other blogs and they have been very helpful. It is especially nice to get to know other librarian types in my region! Hope everyone has a nice weekend and it looks like we are finally on the temperature upswing!

The "Race"

What a great time we had last night at our NTC Foundation's Amazing Race. We had 7 teams of Faculty and Staff play our own version of the game. They had to perform challenges that pertained to everyday staff and faculty functions. From balancing a bank statement, flossing teeth, powerpoint, hanging a cupboard, vacuuming the teams went all out and surprised the heck out of us. They actually ran like crazy down the halls and into rooms to perform their tasks. My personal favorite was putting 20 books in order of the Dewey Decimal system which surprisingly they did very well. We had judges at each station to give them their next clue if they got performed their challenge correctly. We served an international hors deurve buffet afterwards and had lots of prizes and awards. Now its planning for the second leg of the race in April. Oh, and we did raise some money for the Foundation!!

Thing #1

Well I think I did it. I've never set up a blog before and it was very user friendly. I had done an avatar before in my fantasy football league on Yahoo so she was already done! Might have to redress her for the elements. I am looking forward to continuing with Thing #2 and learning all the Web 2.0 tools. I feel like I haven't kept up with all the new technology and my goal is to revamp my library webpage for Northwest Technical College. These "things" will help me accomplish that goal. Oh, and my dean has told me after I am all done with the 23 Things I need to show my co-workers a "thing" or two!

Race Day

Well our NTC Foundation's Amazing Race is today. My co-chair and I are so excited we want to start this morning. The buzz around campus is getting louder and the teams are getting pumped up. Some have ordered their costumes so its going to be fun to see what they have all come up with. I hope to post some pictures from our event for all to see. Sounds like its going to start warming up...I don't know but 20 below this morning felt a little balmy! I must be getting used to it.

Greetings!

My first blog post! It has been a very busy week for me as our learners are back for spring semester. The library is buzzing with ID cards being taken, making new friends, greeting old ones. We do an enormous amount of test proctoring in the library for distance learners so I've had a lot of questions about that. I am also the co-chair for our Faculty/Staff giving campaign for our Foundation. On Thursday afternoon we have our kick-off event which involves our Faculty and Staff playing our own version of the "Amazing Race." Going to be a busy week.