Last Blog Post!

Looking back on webinars -- they were all quite interesting and informative. I did reference my group's webinar in last week's post, even though we weren't required to write one. I figured it would be easier for me to write about it the day we did it, instead of a week later when the experience wasn't so fresh in my mind. When it comes to the webinars I attended (4 of them), I really like the diversity in topics that were covered. It seemed to me, for all the webinars that I attended, that the presenters were all quite well prepared.

Back in my sophomore English class in undergrad the final paper's topic had to be what we wanted to be our final career...Kinda like 500, blech. Anyway, that English paper that I wrote was about Library 2.0 and the Young Adult patrons in a public library. It was interesting for my professor to read considering I was at a strictly business school. But she was cool with it because her husband had just graduated from Library school. :) She even had him read it to make sure I had all my bases covered. I went searching around for that paper when I started the readings for this week to see how I could change it to be more aligned with the new technologies that have emerged in libraries since 2007...unfortunately, I couldn't find it. I know I have a hard copy around somewhere in storage, but that's 150 miles away.

I feel that if I were to rewrite that paper now, all three of the readings for this week would be cited numerous times. I appreciated how the Fontichiaro (and the Blowers and Reed)  article(s) point out that librarians -- and teachers -- should keep up-to-date with new 2.0 tools and technologies and then share their knowledge and skills with other librarians and teachers. This is going to become crucial as my classmates and I head out into the professional workplace in -- hopefully -- the next couple of years. We're also going to have to share our skills and knowledge with others in our workplace, and above all, with patrons. The Semedini article was similar to the others seeing as how it dealt with different technologies and how to deal with problems that cropped up using 2.0 technology. Overall, I really liked the readings for this week, because they talk about issues that will be very relevant for my future career.

Presenting a Webinar

Today, #TeamHAAK presented our webinar about catering to LEP patrons in libraries. Thanks to the Elluminate crash course we went through during class, we were able to get through our webinar without too many problems...until we were waiting for it to save. :P Yes we all exited out of it, and waited anxiously for the next five minutes to pass so we could get the link to the archived webinar. However, after about 10 minutes, it still hadn't shown up, and we were all getting a little more than slightly stressed out. We went back in to the room to see if we could retrieve the recording, and did all kinds of stuff to try and fix it. There was still someone else in the room when we went back in, so we figured we could try and all exit out again and wait for an agonizing 5 minutes for it to hopefully save. AND THAT WORKED! Thankfully. We were all quite relieved to say the least -- and we all realized what Kristin actually meant when she said that we HAD to exit out...otherwise it wouldn't save. We closed the program under the impression that just we had to close out of the program, not everyone else in the webinar. I feel like this was actually clarified in class -- given the amount of times Kristin repeated it, but for some weird reason, it just never clicked in any of our brains...But everything is all saved. Yay!  And the correct link is now posted in the wiki. :)

As a group, we are EXTREMELY glad that we got together the night before to do a cold run-through. the Pre-Meeting allowed us to work through the numerous technical we had concerning the Powerpoint presentation, and do a trial run of the presentation pointed out where some additional information/slides were needed. We were also able to get a rough estimate of how long it would take us to present, and we were all able to become more comfortable with what would be happening when we presented the webinar live.

While the actual presenting of the webinar did have some issues, such as quite a bit of lagging when we went on the web tour, and some audio issues, I feel that overall, the webinar went pretty well. We had some good chat going on in there, and the results of the polls were interesting. Overall, I feel that the webinar experience was a great way to put new information out there. And it was good experience for what we may be facing in our future careers.

My reaction to the webinars I have/will be attending will most likely be the content of next week's blog post. :P

P.S. I actually just finally noticed how incredibly annoying it is to read tiny white text...just in case you were wondering why the design suddenly changed...

#Twitter

What can I say? Twitter is slightly annoying but also a slight necessity? Hmmm, yup, I think that's how I feel about the site. Kinda annoyed, but kinda intrigued. I suppose it was a good idea to have the class get a Twitter account as an assignment, otherwise I most certainly would have refrained from it all together.

I have discovered that I feel Twitter is more of a time-sucker than Facebook. I really don't understand the point of just seeing other peoples statuses that are under 140 characters. I know a lot of people love twitter because of the job-posting possibilities, and all that other fun jazz. I actually did link my Twitter account to my Facebook account, so that my Twitter statuses would go to Facebook automatically. And some of the features of Twitter, such as the retweeting was fun. I did seem to get caught up in some conversations -- with Ayla. :P

I can see how Twitter is invaluable in the library world, because everyone involved can stay up-to-date (by the second) with everything that is happening in the industry. Book recommendations can reach countless people in a matter of minutes. News travels so fast over Twitter, that it's mind boggling. Maybe in a few years, I will come to like Twitter, but for now, I just really don't have too much of an interest in the site. I feel like Facebook is more useful to keep in touch with the people in my network. I do realize that Twitter is a good way to meeting people outside your own personal network, with comes in handy when it comes to the job-postings. So, that is the positive side I see in Twitter. And of course, #TeamHAAK!

#filethisloc

Week 10 Webinars & Effective teaching

I found the readings this week to be quite interesting, and I'm sure that Mallorie loved the fact that VANDERBILT was mentioned...ok, yeah, that's besides the point. Anyway, the readings this week have proved that the position of a librarian is not just the typical "behind the desk" stereotype that the public generally makes. Working as a librarian, and as an instructor is much more than that.

The Montgomery article was chuck full of statistics, that even though they seemed boring, proved a point. More and more students in today's society are using the internet and social networking sites to gain information and interact. This is why librarians have learned to adapt, and have found it necessary to reach out to patrons through library websites, chat functions, emails, and texts. And this is why webinars have become a tool very valued in the library. This article used statistics to prove that virtual library resources are becoming more important or just printed, on-site materials. Because more students and patrons are using electronic means of accessing materials, libraries, and librarians have had to adapt.

The M-cubed article was great -- specifically because the music librarian wrote part of it. Just kidding...but seriously, come on...nothing is cooler than a music librarian. Nothing, absolutely nothing. except maybe eating from the peanut butter & jelly combined jar with croutons. and Blogger is telling me that croutons is spelled wrong...I liked how both types of embedded librarianship were touched on in the article. The music librarian being more of the "traditional" embedded librarian with the business librarian being the virtual embedded librarian.

As for the classroom activities of one-shot workshops...I like snacks. :) The workshops were fun. There was a lot of variety in topics, and I learned a lot from each one, with good discussions all around. And I actually joined Twitter because of Heidi & Abby's workshop. Weird, I know. I joined Twitter before I was actually required to for class. Let's just say I don't really like Twitter, but @2servingsofcute is already blowing up my Twitter feed. #filethisloc. Long live #TeamHAAK.

Reflection - Book Club

The book club was great! I probably ate around 9 cookies...could life get any better? I submit that it could not! Ok, but anyway, I really did enjoy the book club. All of the stories were interesting and the group had a lot of discussion going on. I found that the spirited discussion helped me to better understand the themes and issues presented in each of the stories, and because there were different viewpoints in some areas, there was also some great debating.

When it came to leading my group with Ayla...I think that we both had stuff that we saw in the story that we wanted to share, that in some ways, it was more like we were participating that leading. Not that participating in the discussion was wrong, but we probably could have done a better job of leading it. In the end, it was a fun experience, and I got snacks. :)

I really enjoyed class last week, because the webinar was great. It was nice to see how we are supposed to have our webinars work, and to have Bobbi Newman talk about the HCOD issue was really awesome. It was nice to hear how she feels about the whole debate, and how it will effect librarians and libraries in general.

Ethics & Workshops

The code of ethics pages for the ALA and the Medical Library Association where both short, sweet, and to the point. I think it's a good idea to read the code of ethics as in intro for the ethics lecture/discussion. And both of these pages were a good base for the Lenker article about ethics in the library workplace. Reading through this article was very helpful for me. All of my past library experience has been in a tiny tiny seminary library. Well, seminaries are associated with churches...so all the patrons I worked with were studying to become ministers...and this may seem stereotypical towards ministers...but ethical issues rarely came up in my workplace.  So to read through this article and see some of the issues of ethical questionability (that's not a word, but you get my point)  that could potentially arise, it was slightly scary to me. I don't know if I would be able to handle it. Not saying I'm not ethical, because I am, at least in my opinion, but some situations could get dicey.

The Mosley article was also an interesting read. I find that I can get more out of a class lecture when I have some relevant readings under my belt before hand. I appreciate that the assigned readings really do relate to class. Anyway, the Mosley article about workshops gave a lot of good ideas about how to design an effective and interesting workshop that will benefit those who take part in it. This makes me look forward to the one-shot-workshops we're going to be doing soon.

Should be fun.

Book Club - Clubs

I found that all of the stories were quite interesting, and seemed to be spread out over target ages.

Cinnamon by Neil Gaiman.

Ok, I'm not going to lie, but I didn't quite get the point of this story. Maybe it's because I read it sometime last week at about 2 in the morning, and just didn't get it. I did get that the aunt was killed by the tiger, and the tiger got Cinnamon to talk... But why did she go off into the jungle with the tiger. I mean, she was a princess -- stay in the palace! So much more comfortable than the jungle. So, yeah, that's what I got out of that story.

The Lady or the Tiger? by Frank Stockton

Very interesting. I really really enjoyed this story. The king's way of judging people to be innocent or guilty seemed to be a simple if not quite just way of solving the "problem." But really, someone could be guilty and still open the door to the lady, and he would get married, and everybody would forget about the crime that was committed...How realistic is that? Ummmm, not very. On the other hand, even if the person on trial was innocent, and he opened the door to the tiger and subsequently died, that's not quite realistic either.

The point of the story...the princess's actions of showing the lover which door to choose when she knew what was behind each door. And then not telling the reader what door she chose...that's some smart writing. It was a great story overall, and I really enjoyed it.

The Goose Girl by the Brothers Grimm

I have always loved stories by the Brothers Grimm, and this story is no exception. I thought that this story was a great children's story. Some of the other original Brothers Grimm story are not so appropriate for children, but The Goose Girl is are fun story that can teach lessons to children of all ages. I thought the real princess was quite selfless...but then again I thought that she could have stood up for herself just a little bit! And then the maid in waiting...more like a witch (replace the first letter of that word with a different letter at your leisure). But the real princess didn't complain, and she won out in the end.

The Last Question by Isaac Asimov

I thought this story was also very good, and what made it even better was that it was written in 1956. That Isaac Asimov could see the future! :P The story brought up a lot of interesting themes that could relate to today's times. The use of energy, the advancement of computers, and people's reliance on computers...All issues of today. I thought it was an interesting story, and way ahead of its time...even if we're not ever going to be moving to different planets and galaxies.

Week 6 -- Socratic Seminars

Yay for Book Club!!!!!!!! Well, ok, I will admit that I don't read as often as a good librarian should, but I do at times have interest in reading. Personally, I think this weeks readings were my favorite of the semester so far. Back when I was a lovable high school student, I really did love to read, and would read a ton. I was always the one who participated in class discussion in Lit class. Granted, the discussion I participated in did not always have something to do with the topic at hand, but I was still talking! But seriously, I loved lit class.

When my 10th grade lit class discussed the readings that we had, we always discussed them as the entire class. I had never actually heard of the Socratic Seminar. I wish we had approached our readings like that instead of as a whole class, it probably would have been much easier for me to get more out of the readings. Not saying that I didn't get anything out of the readings through our way of analyzing and discussing, just saying that the Socratic Seminar may have been a more interesting way of going about it.

The Tredway article gave a lot of good information and techniques about how to lead and run a Socratic Seminar. It talked about the different seminars conducted at different schools, and how students benefited from those seminars. It also give a quick overview of how the teacher is the facilitator of the seminars and how the teacher is to help the students actively learn through the seminar. It was a useful and to the point article.

I found the Metzger article to be a more in depth piece on Socratic Seminars. She described the experience of her freshmen class in more detail and talked about how her class developed over the length of the course. She started out simple, and as she saw that the students were able to take on more difficult pieces, she progressed and challenged them more. What I really appreciated about Metzger's approach to the seminars was that, even though she was the leader of the seminars, she didn't make it obvious. She participated in the seminars, often sitting in the outer circle, but she didn't try to correct students if they were wrong. She gave the students the opportunity of working out the wrong interpretations and their issues themselves, with little nudges in the right direction when needed. By giving the students the opportunity of realizing when they come to the wrong conclusions, and the opportunity to fix them, Metzger is helping the students actively learn, which was pointed out as a necessity in both her article and in the Tredway piece.


The Hoffert piece strays away from the traditional classroom/high school setting and looks more directly at actual book clubs. Because book clubs are "all the rage" right about now, this is a good article to read to get an idea of how book clubs have changed and how they can be effective. Hoffert addresses the fact that book clubs are no longer just books. Poetry, movies, and plays are also discussed, not just books. I find this to be refreshing and opens up the discussion of themes and ideas to many more possibilities. Each different medium as its own unique way of portraying a theme or plot. Those involved in the book club may find it easier to discuss a theme from, say, a movie, than from a book. I think that book clubs will continue to be popular, because they are a way for friends -- or strangers to get together and share their passion for stories, and or course, have some good (hopefully) food at the same time.

Class: I enjoyed last weeks class because we got a chance to look more closely at McGonigal's talk, and discuss the different aspects of the lecture that she gave. To be honest, it was little hard for me to catch on at first, but with the help of the others in my group, I became more comfortable with the discussion as the class went on. I'm very excited for class in the next couple of weeks, with our own little book clubs forming. It'll be fun to see how everything works, and it will be interesting to see what kinds of things we will be reading and discussing.

Maybe we should all bring snacks to our little book clubs!!!! Pass around a snack sign up sheet in class...yup, good plan.

Week 5 -- Transfer, Meaning, & Acquisition

The two readings for this week, Chapter 3 from out textbook, How People Learn, and the Put Education First article related very well together. It was very easy for me to relate to the Wiggins & McTighe article -- from the student's point of view. When I was in high school, sometimes I felt that the only reason I was there was to memorize facts, and be able to repeat those facts on command, i.e. tests. Because I was just expected to know certain required things for the tests, as soon as the test would over, I would just kind of forget about all the material that I had "learned." according to How People Learn, in order to have success transfer of information, a degree of mastery of the original subject is required. In high school, it is very hard to keep high school students interested in a certain subject long enough for them to acquire "mastery" of the subject area being studied.

Because it has become apparent over the years, that it is difficult to engage students in the necessary transfer, meaning, and acquisition of new concepts and information, Wiggins & McTighe have developed 12 steps to help with transfer, meaning, and acquisition. Teachers have to do more than just tell students about the things they are learning. For the students to truly learn, the information has to be applied and analyzed by the students. When students are able to apply what they are learning, it is more likely that they will be able to retain the information even after the assessment/test. In order for a student to fully benefit and learn what is being taught, (s)he must be able to correctly understand the subject, be able to acquire new information and build upon prior knowledge, and be able to transfer what is learned to real-life situations, to help with further learning.

Similar to last week, I felt that the concepts in this week's readings were aimed more at teacher than librarian, but the more I think about, the more I realize that a librarian -- any librarian, not just a SLM librarian -- is a teacher. Sure, we may not be in the formal classroom setting, but we can also look at a library being a huge classroom with no subject area boundaries. As librarians, we are still in situations that require us to teach in a way. We don't have the required time each week when we must teach a certain subject, we are in a library to teach patrons at anytime. We don't just help patrons find what they need, or just help with their research. Hopefully, we get the change to teach them how to correctly perform research, and how to use -- yes, I know I just used the word use -- what they learn. So, yes, teachers are the only ones responsible for helping students, librarians are also, our students just don't have a specific age range, and we're not in a classroom.

As for class reflections from this week...I wasn't there, and I'm sorry I wasn't, but it was probably better for everyone that way.

Week 4 -- Learning Environments

The readings from our textbook this week tied in nicely with the Sadler piece. The book talked about the various different types of learning environments with the community: learner-centered, knowledge-centered, and assessment centered. The Sadler article focused mainly on the assessments and how teachers are to work with students to maximize their ability to perform well at various assessment tools. 


I realize that this class is a required course for SLM folks, but I feel that these readings were focusing mainly on the instructional value of the various environments -- as in teacher & student, not really librarian & patron. Don't get me wrong, I did find the readings this week to be interesting, and I'm sure as librarians we will be able to benefit from these readings, I just feel that they were looking more at the teacher perspective. 


In the chapter, I thought that the figure 6.1 was very helpful in demonstrating how the different learning environments are all intertwined within the overall learning community. Venn diagrams have always been very helpful for me when I'm trying to understand something. When teaching, we much keep in mind that a curriculum that looks at all learning environments together is more beneficial than have just a learner-centered environment, or just a knowledge-centered, or just an assessment-centered. To be fully beneficial to the student, we must incorporate all aspects, taking into consideration, the learner, the knowledge level, and the quality of the assessments. 


From class on 31st: I enjoyed looking over and watching a couple of the screencasts, although it became apparent to me, that I didn't include all of the required aspects of the assigned screencast. I glad I got a chance to see some of the well-done screencasts, so if I ever feel the desire to create a screencast in the future, I will have some good techniques in mind. I also liked the group work where we came up with definitions. It's helpful for me to be able to work with other classmates, because then I am able to learn other people views, and be able to put what we learn in class into practice.

Social Interactions and Communication with the Online Generation

Since last week we looked at how students are learning via online courses and screencasts, this week I decided to look at how librarians --specifically school librarians -- are communicating with student patrons. One of the articles I looked at was 'What's my email address anyway, miss?': communicating with the Facebook generation by Nicola McNee, published The School Librarian, volume 58, issue 2 (2010). This article would have fit in well with last week's readings about online learning. McNee, as a school librarian has come to realize that today's generation is most comfortable with navigating the world wide web, and using the internet as the source for endless information and answers to the greatest mysteries.

She has found that it has become a challenge to communicate with students via email, as the students rarely take the time to check their inboxes, instead relying on facebook messages, and instant messages or text messages. She decided to utilize iGoogle to keep information up-to-date and keep the students in the loop as to what was going on in the library. She set out to show students that they could successfully integrate social media with learning.

I feel that this is a very important aspect of the library environment today that we all, as future and present librarians, should be aware of. We have remember to come up with ways of learning and teaching that will be interesting to those we are trying to teach and inform. We can't expect kids today to learn in the same way we learned when we were younger students. I feel like I said a similar thing in my post last week, and here I am saying it again. This just proves that it is a very important issue for me, we must be able to take into account the changes to research and learning that are happening around us. We then have to utilize those changes into a productive way of teaching the present and future generations.

Week 2 -- Online Learning

I found this week's readings about online learning, tutorials, screencasts and screenshots to be quite interesting and informative. I feel that this kids of this generation are just constantly connected to a computer, taking in technology at an amazing rate. My five year old nephew knows how to work computers, iPads, and tvs better than I do! Sometimes when I get "confused" and ask for his help, he just looks at me and says, "Kim! don't you know anything? I mean, it's not THAT hard to figure out!" It's quite cute to watch.

Because this generation has grown up in the computer and internet environment, it would be reasonable to assume that they may be comfortable in the online learning setting. In the readings this week, I found that I enjoyed the Johnston article the most. The reason for this is because I took a number of online classes at my undergrad. During the course of these classes, I because quite comfortable with the online module that was used, Blackboard. I will say that Blackboard is much easier to navigate than the c-tools site, but maybe that's because I used it for three years, and I've only been using c-tools for a semester. Perhaps I will get used to the clunkiness of c-tools soon.

Anyway...in this article Johnson explains how surveys and studies were done to find out how well the students were able to learn and retain information through Blackboard, and how they felt about navigating the module. According to the findings, many of the students felt that the flexibility of the online learning environment worked well with their daily routines and was beneficial. There were some students who did feel that some face-to-face instruction was more helpful than just the online, and so there was a sort of blending course put in place, where some of the course work was done in person, and some was done via Blackboard.

Each student has different was of learning and best retaining the information presented to him/her. As instructors/librarians we must be able to account for each students learning curve and be able to adjust. In today's learning environment, online learning is more prevalent, and will most likely continue to become more and more important. As this trend continues, we must be able to keep up, and stay attuned to the changes so that we may best help students and patrons.

Reflections and Hopes

Ever since I was 17, I knew that I would someday attend the University of Michigan's School of Information to become an ALA certified librarian. I have always loved to read, and during my junior year in high school, I started volunteering at a small academic library. The president of the seminary had donated his own personal library to the school. He had created his own handwritten cataloging system, and the part-time librarian was looking for some volunteer help to convert the cataloging system to the Library of Congress system. What started out as volunteering turned into paying job, and sparked my desire to work as a librarian for my occupation.

Because I have experience working in an academic library, it would be presumed that I will continue working in an academic library when I am finished at the School of Information. However, I do have an interest in working with preservation and conservation, and interests in Youth and Young Adult librarianship. As a child, I loved to read, devouring series after series of books. I read the Boxcar Children, Nancy Drew, Hardy Boys, Babysitter's Club, The Saddle Club, and hundreds of other books. I parents would have to pry me away from my fourth book of the day to force me to get some fresh air. I want to be able to encourage children to explore the world of literature, to love the classics, and get lost in the fantasies that are hidden within book covers.

While reading through the competencies of Youth librarians, there was one in particular that struck me: "Instructs children in the use of library tools & resources, empowering them to choose materials & resources on their own." I feel that this is very important to stress to children from early on in their lives. By letting children choose their own materials to read, we can let them learn of their own interests. True, we may point them in a direction that we believe would interest them, but in the end, the choice is up to the patron, no matter his/her age.

As I stated above, another interest of mine is preservation and working with special/rare collections. The academic library where I work has a special collection or works published in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. I have had a lot of experience working with these books, and working to preserve them to be enjoyed and used for research by people around the world. The longer these materials can be preserved, digitally and in print, the longer patrons can benefit from the information they hold.

Our textbook How People Learn seems as though it will be a very helpful resource during the course of this class. Every individual person has a different way of learning new things. In chapter one, it is said that teachers/professors cannot just give an informational lecture and expect the student to remember what was said. The student will retain the information better if it can be experienced hands on, or associated with something that is already known. When learning new things, preconceived and prior knowledge must be kept in mind. A learner has a better chance of remembering something if it can be built on or associated with an already known fact. Also, when prior knowledge may not be correct, and teacher must know what knowledge the student possesses in order to best correct that way of thinking.

I believe that this textbook will be quite useful to me personally to understand how I myself am able to learn to information and how others learn. The more I know about how the human being learns, the more effective I can be in my future career. I look forward to working through the course this semester, and taking what I learn to help others learn also.