Welcome to the 20 2.0 Program. This site was created to support technology learning at the Daviess County Public Library, Kentucky. We hope you enjoy learning with each other and have a good experience.
The availability and use of online productivity web-based applications (think word processing and spreadsheets) has exploded over the past two years and for good reasons!
These powerful applications provide users with the ability to create and share documents over the internet without the need of installed desktop applications. Some experts speculate that this emerging trend may mean the death to Microsoft Office and other software-based productivity tools, while others think web-based applications have their place, but not in the office. But no matter which side of the office suite platform you side with, on this both sides seem to agree; web-based apps have their place.
One large benefit to web-based applications it that they eliminate the need to worry about different software versions or file types as you email documents or move from PC to PC. Another bonus is that they easy accommodate collaboration by allowing multiple users to edit the same file (with versioning) and provide users the ability to easily save and convert documents as multiple file types (including HTML and pdf). And, you can even use many of these tools, such as Zoho Writer and Google Docs* (formerly known as Writely) to author and publish posts to your blog. It’s this type of integration with other web 2.0 tools that also makes web-based apps so appealing.
A wiki is a collaborative website and authoring tool that allows users to easily add, remove and edit content. Wikipedia, the online open-community encyclopedia, is the largest and perhaps the most well known of these knowledge sharing tools. With the benefits that wikis provide the use and popularity of these tools is exploding.
Some of the benefits that make wikis so attractive are:
Anyone (registered or unregistered, if unrestricted) can add, edit or delete content.
Tracking tools within wikis allow you to easily keep up on what been changed and by whom.
Earlier versions of a page can be viewed and reinstated when needed.
And users do not need to know HTML in order to apply styles to text or add and edit content. In most cases simple syntax structure is used.
Among their applications are pathfinder or subject guide wikis, book review wikis, ALA conference wikis and even library best practices wikis.
This week is all about pictures. This can be addicting. And because of that I have created a Flickr account. Explore the photos I have uploaded, add tags and descriptions, explore what you love. but BEWARE this can consume your time quickly. DON'T LET THIS PROJECT CONSUME YOU!
First watch the Common Craft video "Online Photosharing in Plain English." Click arrow to start the video.
There are lots of places to store photos online. Walgreen's, Walmart, Picassa (associated with your gmail account), and Flickr.
Investigate the photo sharing and image generators this week.
Explore Flickr and learn about this popular image hosting site.
1. Take a good look around Flickr and find an interesting image that you want to blog about. You can explore Flickr photos, search the tags, view various groups, and more without a Flickr account.
2. Use any keyword(s) (baseball, cats, library cats, library signs, Minnesota library, whatever…) to find photos with those tags.When you find an interesting image or group, comment on your experience finding images, using Flickr, and anything else related to the exercise. Upload the image to your blog (be sure to credit the photographer). Don't forget to include a link to the image in the post.
In this Thing, you are asked to take a good look at Flickr and discover what this site has to offer. Find out how tags work, what groups are, and all the neat things that people and other libraries (a list here, too) are creating thanks to Flickr. The Library of Congress has a Flickr account--with more than 3,000 photos that you are invited to tag.
I have started an account for you to view and play with. This will save you time. There are photos of my kids and animals, mostly building pictures. Are you feeling adventurous? Upload your favorite building photo from the Staff Doc Grand Opening folder.
Username: harringtondcpl
Password: threekids2
Flickr Color Pickr - lets you find public photos in Flickr that match a specific color
splashr lets you present your Flickr photos in different view.
Most of us don’t have the time or the artistic talent to create specialized graphics or logos for projects. Enter the Online Image Generator! These handy-dandy tools let you create many types of images – framed pictures, slide shows, comic-style captions, trading cards, calendars, and much more.
Why use this tool? Create trading cards of authors, scientists, historical figures, or even concepts you’re trying to teach or promote. Media specialists can support teachers by helping students create images around astronomy, algebraic equations, historical figures (“I’ll trade you two Ben Franklins for an Eleanor Roosevelt!”). Students and staff can create trading cards of themselves to help them get to know each other. Other possibilities include creating a calendar with an image related to what you’re promoting that month, or a mosaic with multiple images related to your books, videos, or other resources.
Use the images generators in summer reading programs, book clubs, training, and more. Librarians at Carleton College are using trading cards as a way to reach their students.
The possibilities are endless! As is the time you can spend playing around with these sites—beware! Don't spend too much time on this. We are learning.
1. Go to Big Huge Labs. 2. Choose Trading Card from drop down list. 3. Create a trading card and save it to your computer. 4. Use the photos from the Grand Opening 5. Upload the your trading card and images to your blog to share with others.
Be sure and blog about your favorite thing you did this week. Let me know if you will use one of the sites again to store photos. Remember to Smile you never know when you are on camera.
This week is all about social networking sites for books. You knew we would get there. We are a library. Did you really think I would leave out the books? We love to talk about what we have read, what we are reading, and what we plan on reading. It is time to take that discussion online.
And, I know I hear a groan coming, you will blog about 2 different things.
5. Blog about your shelf and the site you explored. Try to link to your shelf from your blog.
Don't forget someone will be in Reference next Wednesday for a questions and answer session and to help you.
Blog Suggestions How do you think a library would use a social site for books? Which site did you explore? Did you have popular books? Did you write a review?
WOW! We are 1/3 of the way through the program. I am beat. I have read more blogs in the last 3 weeks than I have ever read. Keep them coming. I am learning so much. Today, I spent the afternoon preparing for the next exercises. I hope you find them fun.
We have several newcomers to the program and I am estatic. The staff is going to make this such a success. I know this is really different for most of you. I applaud your willingness to take the challenge. Some of you are out discovering have already discovered some of things we will be investigating and sharing them. This is wonderful.
Keep up the hard work. I look forward to reading your blogs in the coming weeks.
It is a virtual place to gather and discuss books. There are even applications that will let you place your bookshelf on your blog. You can also find Shelfari other popular social networking sites- Facebook, and Myspace.
I have been hearing lots of feedback on the program. Some good. Some bad. I wanted to show you what each age group is doing online. Think about yourself and where you fall. Maybe you aren't the majority. That is OK. This visual said a lot to me and I wanted to share it.
Spectators are rampant. And as people age they are more inactive users. I got this visual from Business Week, July 11, 2007
Have you seen this small funny tags on websites? Do you know what it means? If you are not sure of the answer to either of those questions, don’t worry you’re still in the majority, but this is changing rapidly. This is a sign for RSS. In the information world, RSS is not only revolutionalizing the way news, media and content creators share information, but it also is swiftly changing the way everyday users are consuming information.
RSS stands for “Really Simple Syndication” and is a file format for delivering regularly updated information over the web.Just think about the websites and news information sources you visit every day. It takes time to visit those sites and scour the ad-filled and image-heavy pages for just the text you want to read, doesn’t it? Now imagine if you could visit all those information sources and web pages in just one place and all at the same time … without being bombarded with advertising… without having to search for new information on the page you’d already seen or read before… and without having to consume a lot of time visiting each site individually. Would that be valuable to you? Well, it’s available now through a newsreader and RSS.
This week’s discovery exercises focus on learning about RSS news feeds and setting up a Bloglines or GoogleReader account (a free online newsreader) for yourself to bring your feeds together.
Using Bloglines Tutorial (how to keep up with dozens of blogs everyday) – This online tutorial walks you through how to setup a Bloglines account and add newsfeeds. Follow Steps 1 to 3 to set up your Bloglines account. Steps 4 – 9 are optional and cover how to subscribe to different types of feeds (podcasts, Flickr albums, etc)
Don't forget to tap the knowledge of your co-workers. Working through the discovery process to gether can be fun.
Discovery Exercise: 1. Follow the discovery resources above to learn more about RSS and newsreaders. 2. Create a free online Bloglines or Google Reader account for yourself and subscribe to at least 3 newsfeeds to your reader. See Using Bloglines Tutorial steps 1-3 for instructions.
Newsfeeds: Subscribe to several of your co-workers' feeds. This is as easy as typing the blog URL into the subscribe field in Bloglines. Try it, it's easy! Then try adding a other types of news feeds that you will enjoy personally.
I am so glad to have lots of people helping me learn with this project. And boy there is a lot to learn.
What I have learned:
Attended a 23Things Summit
You can work faster than I can
I had to skip a week so I can catch up
We need a work together time.
So I am working on catching up. And I am checking my calendar to see if we can gather at the computers on the first floor to work together. Bear with me, I am learning too.
Thanks to everyone for participating. This has turned into a great experience for me and I hope for you also.
Now that you’ve done some exploring around this website and understand how this program will work, it’s time to setup your very own personal blog to begin recording your thoughts, discoveries and exercises in.
For this program, I recommend that you use Blogger*, a popular free online blog hosting service that is extremely easy to use.Creating a blog using Blogger takes just three steps: 1. Create an account
2. Name your blog
3. Select your template.
Once you’ve created your blog here are two important things to know:
To add posts: The maintenance interface that you will use to add posts, edit or change the step-up your blog is accessed online at http://www.blogger.com/ Be sure to write down your login and password. To view your blog: Your blog address is http://(xxxx).blogspot.com, (xxxx)=the unique identifier you entered in Step 2. Be sure to also write down your blog address. If you run into problems or would like more information about blogs and using Blogger here are some discovery resources you can use: Freevlog’s Quicktime Tutorial: Setup a Free Blogger Blog
Discovery Exercise: Setup a blog for yourself through Blogger. Add a test post or two. Note: Use one of your test posts to create an entry about the habits among the 7 and 1/2 lifelong learning habits that is easiest and hardest for you & why. Have fun!!!!
IMPORTANT NOTE: How you choose to identify yourself on your blog is your choice. You can blog under a screen name, anonymously, or as yourself. However, in order to qualify for the staff incentive will need to register on DCPL Wiki. You may use a screen name. But remember, your blog is registered at the DCPLSandbox wiki.
* Use of Blogger is only a recommendation. If there is another blog hosting site that you are more comfortable with, please feel free to use it.
Register your blog on DCPL Sandbox wiki on the page Library Staff Goes 2.0.
