Week 9 #23

Well, I have finally reached #23 and must say that I have thoroughly enjoyed the experience. This was my first attempt at an online program and maintaining a blog and although I was a little hesitant about using a blog and writing down my thoughts, I have managed to make it through.I was surprised at the amount of material that was presented and learned about the many programs that are available. One of my favorites was Library Thing and being able to show some of my favorite books on my blog. I also liked working with the Image genereators and adding my image to the blog.I tried to include and embed the work into my blog and found that in most cases, it wasn't too hard. Although I won't be able to use everything that was included, I now can understand how exciting technology has become and can only imagine what the future might hold. I would most definitely take part in another online activity. This experience was challenging adn extremely rewarding. Thank You for providing it.

Week 9 #22

I am so amazed at everything that is available to us today. The number of ebooks that are in the public domain and those that are available to purchase is mind boggling. I know that many of our upper elementary students are now listening to audiobooks and are able to enjoy the stories that their classmates are able to read. I still enjoy holding that very large book and reading aloud to my students or devouring that wonderful best seller. I guess you could say that I am my showing my age.

Week 9 # 21

Podcasting looks like lots of fun. I do think that I like ITunes the best as far as the variety of podcasts that are available. I found a site called Bookwinks which has audio and video podcasts of book reviews. I also enjoyed listening to Willow Web, a theme podcast done by elementary classes. I am thinking of trying some poetry podcasts with one of my third grade classes.

Week 9 #20

YouTube is certainly full of wonderful videos. My department recently gave a Web 2.0 workshop and we used several videos from YouTube about Wikis, blogs and del.ico.us. These were very well received by the staff. It is lots of fun to see what is available. I found this Sesame Street Video about the library and I am going to try to Embed it into my blog. I just checked and it works!!!!!

Week8 #19

Library Thing is a very interesting place. I can choose the books that I have enjoyed and recommend them to others. Most of the books that I chose are very popular mainly because they included Harry Potter and some of James Patterson's books. There are many discussions going about Harry Potter and the Spiderwick ChroniclesI used the Library Thing Widget in a previous post and I will try to do that again.

Week 8 #18

Who knew that there were so online tools available!!

This is my first time using ZOHO and it probably will not be my last.

I love the ease with which pictures can be added and colors can be changed.

I am sure that students will love this. I only hope that I can access this at school.

Week 7 #16

I am very intrigued by Wikis. I like the idea of being able to add to and edit a page as it is needed. One very good school library use would be a list of internet links for specific curriculum topics that could be added to as new sites were located. This would be a way of making sure that all of the links were current and working. I also liked the idea of having book reviews on the Wiki. The ability of students to see their work on the internet in a quick and easy fashion might prompt them to participate. There is the possibility that something inappropiate could be placed on the site but notification would help to avoid most of this problem.

Week 6 #15

Libraries have certainly changed and will continue to do so in the future. Their purpose will still be to help users find information but the ways in which they do this will be totally different. Libraries and librarians will need to adapt and change to fulfill the needs and wants of their patrons. Technology will play such an important part in the services offered and the ways in which librarians work with their staff and their users. Perhaps the most important point of all of the articles is the ability of the librarian to listen to the users, to try to learn as much as they can about advancing technologies and their impact on services and to be able to adapt and change as these technologies change.

Week 6 #13,#14

I have taken a look at Del.icio.us and know that it will be a wonderful tool to use in the library. Any of those great sites that can be found to support the curriculum and specific classsroom projects, can be saved here and accessed on any computer. My account has been set up and I have created some folders to hold my bookmarks. Of course, one of the folders is called Library Things. On to Thing 14.
Technorati was very interesting and also very confusing. I think I could have used an entire course on this one tool. Searching for blogs about School Library Learning 2.0 brought up some of the MSLA blogs as well as the CSLA blogs. Tags in these blogs sent me to additional writings about Web 2.0 and gave me different places to go. It really seemed overwhelming in some ways and I would need to spend much more time exploring. Tagging is a creative way of assigning words to the information that is located in a blog. Since everyone can compose their own tags, it isn't as consistent as if there was a list to choose from and the information had to fit into a certain category. It was an experience to look at the tags that were used and notice which ones were used more often than others just by noticing their size.

Week 5 #11 continued

I am now a member of the Teacher-Librarian Ning. I have looked at several postings and am not sure how much I would use this. I am amazed at the amount of networking tools that are available for free on the Internet. I have already learned so much taking part in this course.
Travel IQ was lots of fun even though I was way off when trying to locate some of the countries and cities.
#12 I have looked at Rollyo and am still trying to figure this one out. I think I will need to return to this and try again.

Week 5 #11

Library Thing is listed as one of the Web 2.0 Award Winners. I set up my account and started to choose books to put on my shelves for now, I chose all of the Harry Potter books. After I made my list, I was able to see the accounts of others who have chosen the same books. This will allow me to connect with others who have the same interests. I looked at some of the pages that have been created but I'm not sure how involved I will become in Library Thing. It certainly is an interesting site and a good way to find additonal books to read. My blog is beginning to look a little crowded!!

Week 5 #10

I was able to delete my image and will try to upload it again to a different location. So it's back to the image generators to construct the image.



My image has arrived and it was actually very easy to post.

week 5 #10

I looked at the image generators and created one of my own. I was able to upload my image but was unable to change the location and the title. It was great fun looking at all of the templates and cartoons and I am sure that the students would be much more creative than I was in creating their images.

Week 4 things 8 and 9

I set up Google Reader and added RSS feeds to my list. So far I have 2 folders - Library Things and Book Reviews and also a couple of feeds that don't seem to fit into either of those categories. I have been able to check them and read the updates. I am still working on making the feeds public. Collecting all of this information in one place will save time when looking for the most recent information that is added to a particular site.

Library LearningWinter2.0Week 3

Library LearningWinter2.0,
originally uploaded by k.harrity.

This week I explored Flick'r. I created an account and uploaded 4 photos of my library. Hopefully, I am going to post one of them on my blog. I think that Flick'r is a very interesting tool that teachers would like. I am not sure that all of the filtering software that we have in our schools will allow teachers to use it.

Blogging

I managed to set up my blog and also create and upload my avatar. It is a very conservative looking avatar but at least she is standing in front of Buckingham Palace. So far I have been able to use the technology and learn something at the same time. I hope that I will be able to continue to work through this course.