Thing #8 -- Communication Sharing

This one doesn't seem to have practical applications for my life. I'll move on.

Thing #7 -- Web 2.0 Communication Tools

I'm going past this one, on to #8. We do NOT allow students to do the following:
*Use free email
*Instant Message
*text message
*chat
I see so many library uses for these tools. In fact, our CITS students have these ways to contact the librarian at UMD--from home, of course.

Thing #6 -- Online Image Generators

What timing! A teacher came in with her class to create trading cards of the Presidents, and I had just learned about Big Huge Labs trading cards. What serendipity. And another cool thing to add to my list of tools on the library web site.

Thing # 5 - More Fun with Flickr

See Thing #4--the filter won't allow anything Flickr. I talked with the tech director, and I do fully understand the need for stemming the tide of pornography. I wonder what our attitude will be in ten years, though. Will this type of site still be blocked?

Thing 3.5 -- RSS Again

I found that School Center (through which we create web pages) supports RSS Feed. I have a web page that links from the library page that serves six RSS Feeds. Now if I could just get the teachers to look at it!

Thing #4 - Flickr

This is getting discouraging. All of the new, exciting tools that I'm learning about are blocked by our filter, so students can't access them. I posted a link to the Library of Congress American Memory images on the library web page, but on the students' accounts the site comes up blocked. Good grief!

Thing #3 -- RSS Feeds

OhMyGosh!! How did I live without RSS Feeds before? With RSS Feeds, the Internet is managable. I'd gotten to the point that I didn't surf much because it took so much time. Now, the highlights from my favorite sites are delivered. No searching them out--they are just THERE! I use gmail, so adding the reader was a piece of cake.

The tutorial video was very good. I posted a link to it on my school web page under the "How-To" link. I plan to email the teachers to let them know that it's there, so that they might start using RSS as well. It would be so helpful to deliver content to teachers in their subject areas.

I've been slow to do my 23 things because work has been so busy. Finding this little gem among the things makes me realize that I REALLY need to make the time to complete them.

Thing #2 -- Library 2.0

I have no doubt that Library 2.0 is coming, but no one really knows what that means. My high school library has changed dramatically in the 13 years I've been here, but 13 years ago we couldn't have foreseen the ways in which we would change. Thirteen years from now, will there be databases? Will there be books? Will we still have high school libraries? No one knows. Project these questions out to 23 years in the future, and they become all the more relevant.

A great hindrance in adopting Library 2.0 is the rules that we don't create, but have to enforce. Students are not allowed to access blogs. Or Flickr, or MySpace, or most of the other tools that are talked about in conjunction with Lib 2.0. Be it CIPA or district philosophy, we do not serve students with the tools that they prefer. What will change this? When will it change? Why learn technology that I cannot serve to my students?

Thing #1 -- Blogs and Avatar

Wow--thing #1 will eat up as much time as I'm willing to give it. Just dressing my avatar took forever. Perhaps it's the librarian's nature to futz with the details. However, I did learn about how a blog is created (fairly easy) and how to make an avatar (quite fun).
Now on to thing #2.

Finding the name was the hardest part

Who knew it would be so hard to come up with a blogger name?

Two weeks later, I've finally come up with the Profound Greyhound.
Let the fun begin!