Friday, June 27, 2008

Big Huge Labs Revisitied

I went back to the Big Huge Labs site and played around a bit. My best effort was a Warholizer picture of my Grandmother. I have saved it to my Flickr photos. I m sure Grandmother would have loved it. I have not added it to my blog and I m not sure I will. I really love working with Flickr and Big Huge Labs. I will continue useing these tools for a long time. Thanks for introducing them to me.

Thursday, June 26, 2008

EBSCO

The EBSCO representative stopped in the Library today. She was visiting all the branches at GRRL to let us know that EBSCO is getting an update. I had a nice talk with her, about some of the changes that will be coming up in July 2008. The new user interface is very nice, it looks modern and user friendly. I checked out some of the changes online at : http://www.ebscohost.com/ . EBSCOhost 2.0 is almost here, the future has arrived!

Tuesday, June 24, 2008

TOAS #4 Revisited

I m taking some advice from the Common Craft video "Online Photo Sharing In Plain English", and putting my family photos online as a back up. I really like this idea, this is coming from a person that has had her computer crash and has lost a lot of photos. I will not be making them public, at least not all of them. If you scroll down to #4 I have a picture of my Great Grandfather Rasmus you can view.


Tragedy and Violence In Little Falls Today

We don't think of violence in my little town, that is something that only happens in big cities. Today an armed man, walked into the Morrison County Court House and held the county Commissioners hostage at gun point. The Morrison County Court House had to be evacuated, the police went in, the man was shot and killed. The Library is located 1/2 block from the Court House

One person that came in said to me, what a relief no one else was hurt. I didn't reply to that. I wanted to say, everyone involved was hurt, the emotional trauma can last a life time. This desperate act of violence left no winners today, and has taken away the communities feeling of security. The feeling of security that we in small towns take for granted.

Monday, June 23, 2008

Summer List

Well I have set up a new Ta Da list for myself, that should cover the rest of the summer. I find I enjoy being able to cross off items on my list as done. I will be going back over the 23 things on a stick listings and try to complete the challenges. That should be helpful to keep me current on things, it's a great reminder that learning never ends.

George Carlin - May 12, 1937 - June 22, 2008
Bye George thanks for the laughs.

Sunday, June 22, 2008

Bolg Searching

Today I did some blog searching, wow is that fun. I m adding a My Favorite Blogs to this blog, and will post blogs that I find of interest. Some of them will be Library related and some not.
I hope you will take some time and check them out.

Today is Sunday, a busy day for a minister and also my family day. This being the case my blogs will be short on Sundays. The weather is perfect and the family and I are heading out to the lake for a picnic. How lucky we are to live in Minnesota on such a day. I hope you will all have a chance to be out and enjoy it.

Saturday, June 21, 2008

23 TOAS

I did it! I have enjoyed working on 23 things on a stick. It has been a wonderful experience. I have learned so much, and done things such as blogging that without taking this course I would never have done. I have been introduced to some wonderful tools, such as RSS, Flickr, and the list just goes on. I look forward to using them at our Library, and at home.

Library 2.0 is not coming, it's arrived. We need to work together and discover how Libraries can use this new technology to benefit our patrons. I hope you continue the program and if you have a second 23 things on a stick, sign me up.

This course was a real eye opener for me. There were parts that were a real challenge, and some that were pure joy. I feel I have grown both in knowledge and in confidence.

22 TOAS

I can't believe I am at the end of 23 things on a stick.

I plan on continuing my blogging, I find I quit like it now. There are many tools I have learned about that I want to explore more and become proficient at. Keeping up with technology is a challenge, I like challenges. Being a member of WebJunction and Ning's 23 things on a stick group should be helpful to keep me on course.

They say to break a bad habit you need to stop doing it for 21 days, well then the reverse must also be true. I have developed a new habit of working on 23 things on a stick everyday. I hope to continue to do that, and will continue to set aside a few minutes a day to continue growing with Library 2.0.

Friday, June 20, 2008

21 TOAS

I have become a member of Ning. I have to say this Social Network appeals much more to me then Facebook or MySpace. I find I am not overly impressed with the Social Networks and see little difference with them and chat rooms that I have seen. They are a little more controlled I guess because of interest groups, but not much. I find the 23 things on a stick group more appealing because we have a common goal. Well that and the fact that Librarians are just a great group of people to hang around with.

I tried to sign up for Gather but it was not working correctly or something, I kept getting the registration form coming back up to do over. I didn't get a conformation of my registration so, I will have to try this one at another time. You can use some of the features without being a member. Features I liked were, the articles and the group Minnesota Readers.

I signed up for WebJunction. It has a lot of information for Libraries, that I look forward to spending time exploring. One thing I just need to say, the home page is BLAND, for a community of Techies. I like the idea of having a spot for courses you can take listed on the site.

Thursday, June 19, 2008

19 TOAS

I liked pod casts, I can see it being very useful, for listening to interviews, educational lectures or radio broadcasts. I m a fan of NPR but only catch bits an pieces of the programs while I m driving. Pod casts are a way for me to listen to the entire program. The amount of things out there is mind boggling.


I listened to several pod casts some were good, some were boring. I listened to Tom's Podcast from On the road with Minitex. I also listened to" New study: Brain can't handle driving while talking on a cell phone", from March 2008.

I tried out all the directories, well all but Podcast.net which I couldn't get to load on my computer. I found I prefer Podcast.com, to me it seems the easiest to use, it has two nice features, a subject listing that shows on the entry page and a easy to find and use search box.

20 TOAS

I have signed up for an account with Facebook. It seems very easy to work with and I can see the value of having a place to post questions to other Librarians etc. I can see the appeal for adolescents, who want to be a part of a group.

I have joined two groups on Facebook, one is 23 things on a stick, the other is Library 2.0 Interest Group. I like the idea of having a support group you can contact with questions or to share comments with. Of course you can just leave a message on 23 things on a stick's blog lol.

I left a message on the wall in each group, the process is very simple. I was a little surprised to have my full name and other personal info posted for others to read. I can see security issues with that.

I m glad to have had the experience of using Facebook, I think as librarians we need to know what interests our adolescent patrons and have at least a basic knowledge of how things like Facebook work.

Wednesday, June 18, 2008

Library of the Future

I found this video interesting for Libraries.

18 TOAS

Well I have to say I enjoyed this thing more then I thought I would. I used the key word "orchestra" and found a lot of videos. The Final Countdown cello and orchestra is my favorite.
I really enjoyed it and put it on my blog . I set up my blog for one click video sharing and added the video. It was a very easy process. The video I choose is not a Library 2.0 but I will add one a bit later. This one is so cool I just had to share it with you.

When I began this thing I was thinking of You Tube only as a place where people put silly videos online. I have learned since exploring You Tube there are a lot of interesting and educational things on it as well as the silly entertaining ones. I spent two hours just watching videos!

Thank you for opening my eyes.

Final Countdown cello and orchestra

I love this, hope you do too.

17 TOAS

I have experience using some of the ELM Databases/references. We use OCLC almost everyday. ProQuest is the one our patrons use most from ELM searching for articles. I have not used the alert feature before so I set up an alert. It was an easy process and took very little time. This is a nice feature and I can see it being very useful to patrons, example ones following the latest news on the up coming elections.

I had not used my EBSCO account to set up a web page before. I did some exploring of this tool, and spent about an hour playing around with the page composer. It is not the worse one I have worked with but it seemed to be slow. I really am pressed to come up with a good use for it, other then giving people the experience of setting up a web page.

We have had several patrons interested in ebooks on NetLibrary. I suspect that number will increase as time passes.

ELM has a lot to offer students doing research. I guess my concern is, most students doing a research paper are only allowed one or two sources from the Internet. SO, are news articles from Pro Quest considered Internet or news. LOL

ELM is a wonderful source of information for the public. WAY TO GO MINNESOTA!

Tuesday, June 17, 2008

16 TOAS

The University of Minnesota Assignment Calculator and the RPC are wonderful tools. This is something I will be pointing out to students that are working on research papers. It's a great tool for helping the student manage their time on a research project. I would like to see a link to the sites put on the teen page as well as the main library page.

I will be using the Minnesota Assignment Calculator for some of my religious study classes.

15 TOAS

Second Life is almost the same as the old Active Worlds site. I was a member there for a few years, long ago lol. Virtual settings are great fun, and I can see the appeal to teens. I m happy to see they are using it for more then just entertainment now, love the idea of the library in a virtual world. I love the creativity that you can express on sites like Second Life.

Virtual worlds like Active Worlds, and Second Life are great fun. It gives you a chance to express yourself in things you can create. What a wonderful art form! I m all for kids of all ages learning to use technology in a creative way. It's a bit expensive for kids that really want to be involved with it though. They charge for the membership (without which you can't build a house). There is a charge for virtual land, (does this bother anyone else). I was happy to see the Library was free =D. I know the company that produces the site needs to have income to cover their expenses

I will be very interested in seeing where they go with the concept of virtual classrooms. Very cool idea! Let's hope they keep them free.

Does Second life have a place in the library? I think it is worth a web link on the teen page, as long as you can use it free as a guest. Call me old fashion but Libraries should be free and things we link to, or give a library endorsement should also be free to everyone.

This blog is coming from a WOW (World of Warcraft) fanatic!

The graphics are what sell me on MMOPRGs. There is no comparison with the graphics from Second Life and World of Warcraft. The social aspects are similar, you meet alot of people in either setting. For me personally I would rather be in a virtual setting in a game then on a chat.
Second Life is basicly a virtual chat room. Second Life does let you be creative and actually create your environment, that I really like. You are probibly wondering but what can you learn on a game like WOW, you learn to work with other people together as a group to reach a goal.
The environment for Second Life is aimed at the teenage person, while WOW is for any age. My Guild in Wow has memebers from age 12 to 79, in fact we have several families that play together.

Would I recommend Wow for the library? NO.

Monday, June 16, 2008

14 TOAS

I enjoyed exploring Library Thing, I signed up for an account which was very easy to do. I have added some of my books to my blog, this was also very easy to do.

It's fun seeing how the books you read rate with other people. It's also nice to find other people with the same reading interests, it's great for finding new books to enjoy. Some of my books have no ratings lol, guess I am the only one reading them.

I can see this being useful to patrons for recommendations, for good books to read. We have a special shelf where we display "staff picks", this is very popular with the patrons at our library.

Saturday, June 14, 2008

13 TOAS

The start page I chose was Google, my reasons were I already have a Google account and I liked the artist themes. I think I will be making it my new home page because it has all the features I want right at my finger tips. It's also very easy to work with.

Ta-da list I can see myself using for my personal to do lists.


My favorite tool was Backpack, it has so many good features. The calendar is perfect for Library use for setting up schedules for library activities, and staffing schedules. I really like that you can use different colors for each person on the calendar, much easier to work with. The comment page is great for sending messages to the staff.

My stickies is one I would recommend everyone check out. WOW, this tool is great for my research work. It allows you to put a post it on web pages when you run across something important on the page. You also can leave a note so you know what you had found on the page of interest. This tool will save me a lot of time.

I liked the PDF converter, its easy to use, however I would not use it much.

Zamzar, very easy to use, and you have a large selection of files you can convert to. I would recommend this one.

12 TOAS

I have signed up with Digg for an account. Sign up is easy, using Digg is easy and fun. I have an odd love of weird news stories and think this is great. It will save me doing a lot of online searching for my favorite news lol. I was happy and surprised to note there is a category just for weird news lol. I submitted a news article from BBC News, only to discover someone else had also submitted the same article.

In the Library I can see using these tools to keep up on all the latest Library related news. Also all the latest top news stories from around the world. At home this will be a time saver for me looking up odd news items and archeology articles.

I think these tools are a productivity enhancer simply because it saves so much time.

I have read articles that I have found posted on Digg because I have them listed by my interests. It's a cool tool.

I also liked Newsvine and plan on getting an account with them also.

Friday, June 13, 2008

11 TOAS

I had fun with this TOAS. The tagging was very easy to use and helpful for people that are just skimming over blogs. It makes is a snap to find exactly what subject you are looking for on the blogs. I plan on tagging the rest of my entries on this blog later.

I spent alot of time exploring on the Minn 23 account in Del.icio.us. There are some really interesting sites to explore. Del.icio.us is easy to use, the tags are great to help you navagate all the information that is on the site.

One of the best features I think of Del.icio.us is that you can veiw your bookmarks from any computer, how wonderful is that. When you are at a library doing research you can bookmark articles and sites you want to use for your research, so when you get home there they are right at your finger tips. What a wonderful tool for students!

I can see this tool being a big asset to libraries.

Tuesday, June 10, 2008

10 TOAS

Wiki's, Wiki's, Wiki's, where do you start.

I Thought the "Common Craft video on Wikis" was great, short and to the point. Very easy to get the basic idea of what a wiki is.

I was having so much fun exploring the wikis that I lost track of the time and it's now midnight. I will be a bit tired at work tomorrow but also better informed.

SJCPL Wiki: I thought St Joseph County Libraries Subject Guide was awesome. What a wonderful use of a Wiki. It is a great way to get rid of the "old rolodex" of frequently requested information we hide behind the desk. (I can hear you laughing!)

Book Lovers Wiki: I found this a nice idea also for reading clubs to use a wiki. I am going to pass this idea along to our Teen Reading Club. I think they would love a spot to review the books they read for other teens.

Library Success: I was sad to see the site had a vandalism problem. What a wonderful use again for a wiki, sharing ideas with other libraries around the world.

The Albany County Public Library Staff wiki: It's a fine idea. Not sure it would be useful with our library, simply because we have our procedures manual online and a daily news spot to keep us informed on what is happening in our 32 branches. I did find it interesting to look at though.

The Library Blogger's Wiki: This was one of my favorites, and took up a lot of my time lol. It was fun seeing how many libraries are blogging and to be able to see what they are blogging about.

The most interesting thing about the Wiki concept to me was that you can interact with the site.
You can post comments and thoughts, or add some information to the site, wow.

I can understand why the faculty at many schools would ban "Wikipedia" as a research source. How trust worthy is a site that can be added to and changed by anyone?

I went in to the 23 things on a stick wiki, (try saying that fast 3 times) and added a note or two for fun. It was very easy to do, and reading the comments was great.

9 TOAS part 2

Thank you team for the invitation to collaborate and edit the Declaration of Independence. I am sure our Founding Fathers would have loved using Zoho Writer, I know I did.

I have shared this information on how to use the Zoho Writer with my co workers and we are all looking forward to trying it out at work.

Sunday, June 8, 2008

9 TOAS

Oh how I wish I would have known about this a few weeks ago. Our library, along with 3 others and the youth initiative for the county made up a listing of all the youth activities for the summer. We spent days sending information back and forth to get the listing ready. Online collaboration tools would have made it so much easier.

Google Docs seems to be the easier of the two to use, but has less features. Zoho Writer has more features such as photos. I liked them both. The project I would be working on would detemine which of these tools I would use.

The Founding Fathers would have been in heaven, with tools like these. Our Nations Independence would have been much earlier.

Saturday, June 7, 2008

8 TOAS part 2

WOW it worked, I have my slide show on my blog. I found the hardest part for me was uploading the photos. My connection, as I have said, is very slow, uploading each picture took over an hour. Once the photos were in my album it was a snap! I selected the peel format from Picture Trail. The instructions on picture trail were very easy to follow. I would recommend Picture Trail very highly.

8 TOAS

I will be making two posts on my Blog about this thing. I find the sharing of thoughts, ideas, plans photos, videos etc. a wonderful tool. I can see many uses for this; I am working on uploading photos at the moment on Picture Trail. I am finding it slow because as I have said before I live on "the dark side of the Moon", and my connections is killing me here. Some of these tools are so much fun, I can see myself coming back to this "thing" many many times. It will be great for library programs, and program promotions. Well, I am going to do some more uploading and hopefully will have a presentation on my blog soon. Keep smiling everyone!

Sunday, June 1, 2008

7 TOAS part 2

Our Library has been using e-mail for a long time it is great for getting messages to other staff fast. We have 32 branches that are spread out over 3 counties, so anything that improves communications is a big plus. Some would think, why not just call, well sometimes the person you need to contact is not working the same hours as you are. E-mail makes is so easy to leave a message, and everyone checks their messages at least once a day. We love it.

OPAL is wonderful, what a great idea! It is a wonderful tool for training. I really like the fact that it is interactive, so you can ask questions. I also like the fact that most of the programs are free to anyone.

Webinars are also a great tool for libraries. You can get training online, from instructors anywhere in the country.

The only problem that I see for using either of these tools is for people with slow or dial up connections. If you live on the "Dark Side Of The Moon" like I do, and have dial up connecting is a problem. Wouldn't it be great if the state of Minnesota could work on making sure all areas of the state are wired for internet use. Maybe someday =D