Thing 23: Congratulations

Yay for being done with this!!!!  It actually wasn't that hard and I did learn a lot of new things.

My favorite thing that I found wasn't anything new, but a reminder of how much great stuff there is on YouTube.  I think doing this has shown me that there are so many things out there that I still don't know about and that I need to be paying attention to new trends in technology.  I was surprised that there were some things that I saw that I immediately knew I would never use.  Some things seemed unnecessary or difficult for elementary students or just a reboot of something better.  My suggestion for the future is to constantly be checking links to make sure that there aren't any dead or outdated links in the wiki.  I probably would not participate in a future class because I am READY TO BE DONE WITH SCHOOL!!!  My one word for this is:  EXPLORE

Thing 22: Your Turn

I have used Edmodo in the past and find it very simple to set up and use.  The students like it because it resembles Facebook and I like it because I can easily monitor what is going on.

I have set up groups for my classes and can add assignments, quizzes, etc. to each group account.  Edmodo also allows you to schedule posts so that you can do several assignments at once and have it post when needed.

Here is a tutorial video in case you don't know about it:

Thing 21: Online Image Generators

I love ImageChef.  It was very easy to use and had lots of different options.  What I really love are memes!!!!  I have seen teachers use these to introduce class rules and I am definitely going to look into this for the upcoming school year.

Here are some I made today:

This is my current first world problem :)

I also made one in Comic Strip Generator, but did not find it as easy to use:

Thing 20: Recess

I chose to look up more videos on YouTube and TeacherTube.  I think that videos are such an easy way to introduce or reinforce something.  The good thing is that 99% of the time, someone else has already made the exact video you are looking for!

This is a video about elementary library routines:

This is a video about how an elementary school uses their iPads for research:

Thing 19: Mashups

I couldn't have guessed what a mashup was before reading this assignment.  It is not anything that I have ever seen or heard about in the past.

I looked at the librarian trading cards and I guess I don't understand the purpose?  Is it just to make one?  I have done trading cards with students in the past.  We have created them for book characters using ReadWriteThink.org because it is very simple for students of all ages to use.

I did like the tool that allowed you to link photos with maps.  I know that Google Earth allows that
and it makes it very easy for me to show my students a map of Washington, D.C. and then immediately show them user photos from the area we are looking at.

I think that Flickr is good for a library as far as research because of the Creative Commons section of photos.  This would make it easy in incorporate images into projects and not have to worry about copyright issues.

Thing 18: Shelfari and Goodreads

I have been using Goodreads for a little over a year.  I learned about it from fellow classmates during a college class.  It is very easy to use and update with books you want to read, are reading, and have finished reading.

I am not as dedicated to updating the books I have read.  I more often use it to find new books from recommendations from friends or by looking at various lists.

I do not allow my account to post on Facebook, but I will see updates from friends and get new ideas from books that way also.


My Goodreads

Thing 17: Ning

I had no idea Ning even existed until today.  I think for people that really understand setting up websites and such that it is a great thing.  Me?  Not so much.  I did like the Teacher Librarian Ning and spent some time looking through it.  I personally think there are too many social networking sites out there.  Most bloggers also have Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram accounts that I follow and I can't think of any more information they could possibly get to me.

Thing 16: Video Sharing

It is ridiculously easy to add videos to Blogger.  Being able to just search for the one you want through Blogger and add is great!  YouTube is one of those things that is so easily misused that teachers often don't use it for classroom purposes.  Because of all the "bad" stuff on YouTube it is often blocked in school districts.  I am lucky that my district does not block YouTube so I actually use it often in my lessons.  When teachers start looking for educational related things and not cat vidoes, they will find a plethora of ideas.

I found this cute video about library rules:

This library has several videos where the students are teaching about the library.  This is video #1 where they introduce the three main sections of the library:

Thing 15: Podcasts and Vidcasts

I have only used Photostory once when creating a slideshow for a funeral.  It was the best way to incorporate photos with specific songs.  It was very easy to learn and I had pretty much forgotten about it until this assignment.  I definitely think this would be pretty easy to use with any grade level for simple projects.

I created a Photostory about some of my favorite library decorating ideas that I hope to incorporate this year.

Thing 14: More Online Application and Tools

I have previously used Prezi for a couple of college presentations but have not had the chance to use it in my teaching or to have my students use it.  I am not sure that I realistically see myself using it with younger elementary students because sometimes I do not feel that it is entirely easy to understand.  But I can see it being used with upper elementary students as an alternative to a traditional Power Point.

Here is my Prezi:

Collaborative Teaching

Thing 13: Online Application and Tools

I have recently started using Google as a way to create and save documents.  I had previously wanted to use Dropbox but my school district has it as a blocked website and encourages us to use Google.  At first I was peeved, but once I explored all the things that Google has to offer I was actually very impressed.

It is very simple to create documents, spreadsheets, and presentations using Google.  All of my documents and logs for my practicum are saved in my Google Drive account.  This makes it so much easier for me to access them no matter where I am working.  Flash drives have always been my go-to but I worry that if I ever broke or lost it then I would be up a creek!  With Google, all of my stuff is saved "in the sky" and I feel much more confident about its longevity.

I have also used Google to create questionnaires.  I will be sending one out to the teachers at my new school as a way for me to find out their opinions about the library in the past and what they want to see from the library in the future.

Oops!

Thought that Thing 11 had posted but it didn't so that's why they are out of order!

Thing 11: Play in the Sandbox

I found that adding my information to the wiki was much easier than I even expected.  I was able to quickly go in and type in my answers with no issues.  I think that this is a great thing because if you have a page with a discussion question and wanted students to edit and add their ideas then this is a simple thing to do and you are able to view the changes that are made.  I do wonder if students would be tempted to delete other people's additions?  Is the teacher / moderator able to view the wiki and see this if it happens?

Thing 12: Microblogging

I have been using Twitter for a few years, but not on a professional level.  I mostly use it to follow some of my favorite random bloggers and anything sports related.  I have recently began following a few libraries as a result of various classes.  I do not know of any librarians in my district that use Twitter but plan on having a Twitter account for my school library.  I will actually be moving most of my education related accounts to a school account just to keep my professional and personal tweets separate.  Some of the people I follow on Twitter include:

@librarian_tiff
@shannonmmiller
@100scopenotes
@abbylibrarian

My personal one is @missrayburn but I mostly retweet funny sports stories so don't expect much library stuff!

Thing 10: School Wikis

I have very limited experience with wikis.  Two of my classes in college have used them and I have found them very easy to use once you play around on them some.  I have found them simple to use as far as uploading documents and posting discussions.  I have also seen them easy to manipulate when the professor needed to make changes to assignments.

I looked at the examples listed and saw some wikis where the only thing they were used for was uploading pictures.  If that is the purpose of their wiki then they are doing great!  However, I feel that the wikis I looked at where the students uploaded assignments and projects seemed to be more beneficial to the teacher.

I think that even in an elementary school library a wiki would be a great thing to set up when doing research or collaborative projects.  It is a centralized location for the librarian and students to manage their materials and will allow the teacher and the librarian to make changes and adjustments as necessary.

Thing 9: Useful Library Blogs

Again, the tool that actually gave me results was the Google blog search tool.  However it didn't return a huge amount of information, but then again I didn't spend a large amount of time looking as I already have a collection of library blogs that I follow.  Technorati was not user friendly at all and didn't seem to have things that were of interest to me.  Syndic8 had a main page that had a LOT of information on it and was difficult to navigate.  But most of the links that I chose were duds and the website doesn't seem to really be there anymore.

Doing a simple search for "library blogs" on Pinterest and narrowing it to boards with that title will get a large number of boards that are full of library blogs.  I find that these types of searches produce better results because the people using Pinterest are my kind of people and are searching for and using the same types of things I am.  Honestly I think that Pinterest is the new "Google" for many people and should not just be used to pin recipes for Oreo cheesecake :)

Thing 8: RSS Feeds

I tried out the Google blog search tool and it did pull up a couple of blogs but also a whole lot of randomness that wasn't helpful.  The other links didn't really seem to work so I didn't get anything from them.

I use blogs daily.  I very rarely find these blogs from internet searches.  Most of my blogs are found through other blogs that I read.  Good blogs are often referenced by their peers and that attracts my attention.  The "newest" way that I find blogs is through Pinterest.  Simply following a pin that I like often takes me to a blog that I didn't previously know about.

I definitely love using Feedly to organize my blogs.  I have no desire to visit a blog's actual page unless there is a specific need.  It is so much easier to see all the new blog posts in one location.  I get very annoyed by blogs that are truncated (meaning you have to visit their blog to see the post).  I will usually stop following that blog unless they regularly post amazing stuff!

Thing 7: Blog Searching

I did a search in Technorati but it was about as helpful as asking my dog for information.  I know this site has changed a lot since its inception and I'm not sure how relevant it is anymore for the general internet searcher.  Google blog search gave me some results but I actually got more results by just doing a regular Google search.  I also got a lot of results on Ask.com (in fact they were exactly the same as the Google results).

While doing this project I did more "tag" searching than ever before.  And I'm not necessarily won over.  I'm sure that if you had a specific project or research paper that you were doing tagging is essential.  But for me, the elementary librarian, Pinterest gives me everything I need.  Seriously.  It is probably the most amazing search tool that I have used in many years.  When you learn how to search it correctly and understand the difference between searching for pins versus searching for boards, you will find a wealth of information.

Thing 6: Tagging

So I played around on Del.icio.us and wasn't really overwhelmed by it.  I searched for various library terms and such and a lot of the links I found were no longer valid, which is always frustrating.  I'm sure that if you are someone who tends to bookmark a lot of sites then this is good for you.  I am not that person.  If what I want isn't a blog (which would then go into Feedly where I would bookmark it there) then I use Pinterest to save it for future reference.

I can see this more as something that would be used by students doing research.  However, I don't see it as something I would use in elementary.  Our research is much more limited to what our students are capable of and something like this would be extremely confusing and crazy to teach to them!  But for secondary students, this is a way to get them away from Google as their main search tool for research.  They could easily set up accounts and save the results of their searches for future reference.

Thing 5: Social Networking

I chose to follow the Walnut Grove Elementary School Library on Facebook.  My reasons for following this library were not due to amazing things happening at this library (but I'm sure there are).  It's because Walnut Grove is prevalent in the Little House book series and I am a huge fan!  Now I agree that this Walnut Grove is not the same one (this one is in Alabama) but the name sounds wonderful to me.

I believe a Facebook page is great for a school library.  It would be an easy way to share what is going on in the library with the community.  I also believe that it doesn't have to be a competition to see who can post the most amazing activities...the things being done in the library on a weekly basis are great things that need to be conveyed to parents and community members.

However there are potential problems with using Facebook.  One is that not all students are allowed to have photos published online and that information would need to be closely monitored by the librarian in order to maintain privacy rights.  Another issue is that the librarian would need to keep the page updated.  There is nothing worse than going to an outdated Facebook page where the last update was six months ago.  Of course, it's going to create more work for the librarian, but advocating for your library to the general public is going to require some effort.  But that effort should produce results that only benefit your library.

Thing 4: RSS and Newsreaders

I have been using blogs in my personal life for several years now.  I used Google Reader for years and was devastated when they chose to discontinue that service.  The blogs that I followed posted about the new choices as everyone was in the same boat.  While most of the bloggers switched over to Bloglovin, I made the switch to Feedly and could not be happier.

Feedly makes it very easy for me to sort my blogs into various categories and offers suggestions when I subscribe to a new blog.  I also love how simple it is to remove a subscription from my phone.  Google Reader was not user friendly and would force me to go to a desktop version to delete that subscription.

The one thing that I am not an expert at is adding content from the blog.  I've noticed that many blogs will have a way to add it via Bloglovin but not Feedly.  I normally will just go into my Feedly account and add the url manually.

Thing 3: More Photo Sharing

I created an album in Yogile for those of us doing our library internship.  It is aptly titled "Library Internship".  This is a way for us to document all the things we are doing during our period of time as free labor!

The album is accessible at www.yogile.com/libraryinternship
Photos can also be added by emailing to:  libraryinternship@yogile.com

I am actually very impressed with the fact that photos can be added by anyone you choose simply by emailing them to the email address.  I didn't believe it so I created a separate album and proved to myself that it actually worked!