Innovative Users Group

Surprising the information you stumble upon when reading newsletters such as the latest innovative News for December 2007. this one has reference to our own Lisa B.

IUG "Flickrs" On
The Innovative Users Group (IUG) has started a Flickr photo pool. It's a cool way to check out what other member libraries are doing around the world. Recently added to the pool is an image (left) of attendees at the 2007 IUG Annual Conference in San Jose, California, as captured by Lisa Billingham of Edith Cowan University (Australia). The new Flickr pool is run independently of Innovative by the IUG. Please contact IUG through Flickr for posting guidelines. You can find an IUG in your corner of the world on the IUG website.

Elle

The edublog awards

The edublog awards for 2007 are now up for voting. In the Best library/librarians blog category we have WAs own Katherine Greenhill's blog Librarians Matter as one ofthe nominations.

Check it out at this site and lodge your vote http://edublogawards.com/2007/best-library-librarian-blog-2007/

Elle

23 things mark 2 draws to a close

Congratulations to all those who have completed the second round of the 23 things learning 2.0 program. It has been a very stimulating time reading your blogs and learning about the different ways we might use these web2.0 technologies.

I look forward to seeing how we might develop ECU Library in library 2.0

ALIA Top End Symposium papers now available

Hi All

The Symposium papers are now available from the ALIA website http://alia.org.au/groups/topend/programme.html

Some of the notable papers inlcude:

e-volving libraries: our clients' needs, our skill needs and shaping the next workforceRoxanne Missingham ALIA President[audio recording]

Where to now? Positioning a school Library in the 21st CenturyKay Pisel, Kormilda College[paper]

What is Library 2.0 and do we need it?Sue Chilman, Manager City Library, Darwin City Council Libraries[paper]

Evolving and Changing with Workplace E-Learning: 23 ways your staff can grow.Julia Gross and Lyn Leslie, Edith Cowan University[paper]

e-volving profession: key findings from the nexus census of library and information professionalsDr Gillian Hallam, Associate Professor School of Information Systems QUT[paper]

Information Literacy - Online TutorialsLiz Short, Taminmin Community LibraryRuth Sheridan, Palmerston High School[paper]

Broadcasting Library Information - a Podcast Project at CDU Library Jessie Mahjouri and Marg Purnell, Charles Darwin University. [paper] [audio recording]

Evolving Librarian Symposium

Well here I am again, with my 15 minutes a day gone out of the window. since my last report, Julia and I have presented a paper at the Evolving Librarian conference in Darwin. The accomodation was first rate, as can be seen from the photos of the pool. We spent the late afternoon sipping mango drinks overlooking the water, which was a nice way to wind down after the hard work networking all day.

The symposium covered a range of topics dealing with changes in the library work place. Our symposium paper, Evolving and Changing with Workplace ELearning: 23 ways your staff can grow, was well received. We were pleased that there were a number of questions. The two keynote speakers papers provided useful background to the current work environment.

Roxanne Missingham, current President of ALIA and Parliamentary Librarian spoke about work trends and the need to change the way we employ staff to ensure that we retain professional expertise in the workplace.Gillian Hallam spoke of her research on library staff in the workplace and provided some interesting statistics on levels and age of staff ect.

A paper from staff at Charles Darwin University on podcasts is worth noting, particularly the introduction where they recorded a definition of a podcast to begin the talk. Some other notable topics covered teaching referencing to primary school children and teacching Web 2.0 technologies in the school environment.The papers should be going on the ALIA website soon.

For photos from the conference, checkTop End Tales; a Photo Blog of Stephen Michael Barnett, now working in Darwin, Northern Territory, Australia. Its a grab bag of things, personal interests ect illustrated with my digitial photos. Friday, October 05, 2007: 5th ALIA Top end Symposium - e-vovlingeducation

http://topend.blogspot.com/2007/10/5th-alia-top-end-symposium-e-volving.htm

Scholarpedia

Hi All
You maybe interested in checking out this new encyclopedia, which is a similar concept to Wikipedia and covers science related topics. It is very much in its infancy and needs to be further populated, so a chance for some experts in the field to become involved. It is called Scholarpedia:

http://scholarpedia.org/
From the introduction-
Scholarpedia, the free peer reviewed encyclopedia written by scholars from all around the world.
Scholarpedia feels and looks like Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit. Indeed, both are powered by the same program - MediaWiki. Both allow visitors to review and modify articles simply by clicking on the edit this article link.
However, Scholarpedia differs from Wikipedia in some very important ways:
Each article is written by an expert (invited or elected by the public).
Each article is anonymously peer reviewed to ensure accurate and reliable information.
Each article has a curator - typically its author -- who is responsible for its content.
Any modification of the article needs to be approved by the curator before it appears in the final, approved version
ELLE

Learning more about HTML

Hi
Some of the group have expressed a desire to learn more about HTML. I have found this useful information in the Blogger help screens which may assist, see:

How can I learn some basic HTML?
There are lots of easy HTML tags that you can add to your text to change its appearance. This page lists some of the most common tags. If you want to learn more, please see: How can I learn more about HTML? http://help.blogger.com/bin/answer.py?answer=42069&topic=8920

I hope that you find this a useful guide
ELLE

15 minutes a day

Hi
I have been trying Kathryn's 15 minutes a day to getting things done. I can add that this is great for adding a posts, but I may need to make it 30 minutes a day to be able to read a few entries.
Cheers
ELLE

How to use Web 2.0 in your library

Hi
I have just read a great little book that I thought I should share with you.

How to use Web 2.0 in your library / Phil Bradley.
London : Facet Publishing, 2007.

It was easy to read and covered a wide range of technologies such as weblogs, start pages, instant messagingsearch engines, tagging, Flickr and more. For each of these technologies, there were suggestions for using the technology as part of the library service and a short list of useful web addresses.

I particulary liked the idea of the library photo tour (with accompanying voice). My team currently has a key objective to promote our library resources and this seemed like a great idea for advising students where specific subject areas are located and a visual snapshot of some new items in the area. We do have some general podcasts of the library, but the photo tour particularly appealed to me. I must be a visual person.

Read the book and want something online then you might find these addresses useful as Phil has made a spot where you can contribute.
www.zimbio.com/portal/How+to+use+Web+2.0+in+your+library or
Http://doiop.com/web2.0 or
http://tinyurl.com/ybmx4c
Good hunting and don't forget to share any good ideas.
ELLE

Challenges and Opportunites: Peer Produced Knowledge and Australian Education

Hi
I am trying Kathryn's 15 minute a day trick to getting things done in Web 2.0. I cames across the following report, which I havn't read, but thought I would share it with you as the author is an interesting one and I did attend the Jimmy Wales seminar and this may be one ofthe papers. i shall catch up with it over the weekend.

*REPORT: CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES: PEER-PRODUCED KNOWLEDGE AND AUSTRALIAN EDUCATION* This report, by Mark Pesce, reflects on the education.au 2007 seminar featuring Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia. Mark identifies three areas that present opportunities and challenges entitled: Control vs Chaos; Firewalls vs Freedom; and Staying Current vs Staying Present. Educators were encouraged to ponder the challenges and opportunities of peer-produced knowledge production.
Further Information: http://url.edna.edu.au/SqC7
Happy reading ELLE

Round two on its way...

I have been practising with the image generator because I wanted to make a comment about all the new Blogs linked to our sight. I am Blogged out from reading them all, but I enjoyed the diversity, the creativity and the words of wisdom. Some managed to express much in few words. Weak 2, virgin thoughts were a few which spring to mind. The names are great. My favourite is papillon, mainly because I am partiall to butterflies. This new round of library 2.0 is going to be an exciting interactive exercise for us all. I have had fun trying to guess who everyone is, with not much success I might add. I hope that youare al enjoying it so far. ELLE

Library Connect Seminar

Some of our ECU Librarians had the opportunity to attend the recent Library Connect Seminar in Perth where we heard a number of interesting presentations. Daviess Menefee from Elsevier discussed the challenges that the new technologies and the concept of social networking pose to publishers and how Elsevier was embracing these in its new developments: dynamic linking, more like this links, tagging tools, presence in search engines, more speedy publication (1-2 weeks for pre-publication titles), high value content available to be shared asap, archiving and more.

The National Library of Singapore reported on their approach to provide more information via images. Mobile phone friendly is a must. Posters around the library include a coloured pad of dots which will copy the poster to the mobile phone if it is matched to it.

Kate Sinclair from Flinders University reported on some the experiences they have had implementing new technologies within their library service. Replacing the reference service bookmarks or favourites with a collaborative tagging approach using Del.cio.us was on great idea. Another was developing a student tracking program in Web CT so the relevant library help page for the units taken were accessible to the student in a personalised manner.

When we get the link to the presentations I will include it so you can all get the full account of an informative day.

ELLE

Take two library learning 2.0

Another round of discovery learning is about to happen at ECU Library. A big welcome to all those library staff who are taking up the opportunity to ivestigate the new technologies. I look forward to your comments and hope that you find it as fun to do as I did.

Thanks JayGee for the image generator, it saved me looking for it. I must say they are fun to use.
ELLE

Unconference

Recently a few of the librarians at ECU attended an Unconference held at the State Library of WA, where experiences with Library 2.0 technologies were being shared by librarians across the sector. It was a great way to network and find how others were grappling and succeeding with the new technologies.

The Unconference began by providing us all the experience of using a wiki. We registered via the wiki, were invited to contribute to sessions or organising the event and were kept up to date on progress of the event organisation if we wished. The entire unconference was organised through the wiki. On the day, the interactive nature of the networking continued. Wikipedia tells us that this is the nature of the unconference "An unconference is a conference where the content of the sessions is driven and created by the participants..." I for one applaud this type of professional gathering as a way of sharing ideas.

I found the ideas in all of the sessions interesting and the following technologies particulary appealed and I will be investigating them further:

• Using del.icio.us to replace bookmarks or favourites on the PC to provide benefits in creating collaborative subject resources


• Using Twitter as a professional development tool

Check out this link to view the wiki. http://unconferencewalibrary.pbwiki.com/

Grand Finale

Well finally I too can add my reward for finishing the 23 things, was it only that many? I have enjoyed the program and I love being able to have such a cute dog on my site. Just as klickety says, I feel I have just begun...

ELLE

!

ECU Library Learning 2.0 - My Thoughts

Just because I can...This was my first ever digital photo...Kings Park WA - Fraser Ave.

Hi

My final task for this program is to share some thoughts with you about the Learning 2.0 program. I have found the discovery approach ideal and have enjoyed the social networking aspect of this program. I have had a great time working with our pilot group of staff and look forward to sharing the program with the rest ofthe staff next semester.

What have you personally learned from this program?

Participating in this program has reinforced how much I enjoy working with people. I have learned some useful skills and had fun at the same time. There is so much information, that tagging was a welcome skill as it made finding information that I was looking for easier. I think the idea of some organization appealed to the librarian in me and also because of the efficiency aspect, although I do enjoy serendipidity from time to time. A place to manage your sites and your passwords is also useful.

What have you learned about yourself, others and the organizationin which you work?

I have found that the organization in which I work is filled with people who are interested in others and what they are doing and are willing to contribute in any way they can. through this program I have had support from instructional designers, learning development staff and academic staff. ECU has a key focus in engaging students, so others in the organization are interested in social networking tools and how they may be used in an educational setting.

The pilot group was a great group of early adopters that embraced the program and helped us learn from each other. I think they shouldall be proud of their achievements.

I related to the discovery learning aspect of this program as you learned as you used the technology. Many of the activities involved using the technology and at the same time exposed you to others output and so couldexperience and particpate in the whole social networking idea. As a library we have always embraced engaging with our students, however, these technologies take us out of our safety zone and expose us to a greater degree of engagement than we have previously experienced.

What was the most important skill you learned and why?

I liked the Blog as it could be used as an effective reflective journal. The most important skill I learned was that social networking was key to engaging others. Tagging was important to facilitate getting connected to others with like ideas. How current library technologies were often restrictive was also reinforced. This maybe linked to pricing structures used. Many of the Web 2.0 technologies required passwords to access, so it is not this aspect that is the problem. I think this one needs more thought.

What action will you try now if any?

I would like to try a number of things. Firstly, encourage the Library to replace its Web news with a Blog News so that we can get direct comment from our users.

Secondly, investigate replacing our subject guides with a subject Wik, so that we have greater flexibility.

Begin a Blog aimed at Faculty or School level as this is a useful diary.

Participate in our ILCommittee approach o provide small learning bites on various subjects covering a range of formats to cater for varying learning styles - podcasts, printed sheet, camtasia PPT etc.

Would students use these technologies as part of the library's online environment?

If the technologies were done well and applied adult learning principles, I am sure students would use them: ie short, well done and relevant. I think students muight enjoy commenting on library news and services as this would be an extension of the library as part of their community.

Is there some specific technology that you would like to see the library adopt?

A news Blog to replace the Web news

Use a Wiki , rather than email when gathering comments from staff on a collaborative project

Develop more podcasts for IL purposes

Adopt corporate tags and a corporate look for some technologies

Collect useful topic podcasts etc. and include as part of subject directories of useful websites

I look forward to hearing others ideas in the focus group meeting with the pilot group. Thank you all for sharing this journey. This program has only been a beginning as there is so many more things which capture ones imagination and need following up. I didn't list them as important, but Flickr and Youtube certainly require further investigation.

ELL

Youtube

Hi
Well I love Youtube and all these free videos. They can be quite amusing and useful for whiling away a bit or a lot of time. Like all of these web services they range from perile rubbish to educative and very interesting to the individual. I would, however, expect a very different continuum of titles for each individual. I think there is immense capacity for those interested in a topic for research.

I must say I liked the video of library dominos, but it doesn't beat the Wonder Women episode where she knocked all the Library of Congress shelving into a domino with one kick.

But for something serious, I like the set out of Yahoo videos.If you search for Information Literacy, you get a lot of titles. I particularly like the approach in a video called Discovery Information Literacy (~8mins). another video called What is IL? also provides useful background (also ~8mins). Sunny's Speech (1 min) was an interesting study in bad classroom management, with Sunny up the front, obviously trying to lecture using a screen with invisible text. Sunny couldn't be heard and the class was consequently playing around with each other out of control. A useful training video.

From Google video I noticed that education videos had the longest durations per title, often longer than 1 hour. The Facebook lecture was useful and maybe should be explored by academic libraries as it is aimed at campuses. A benefit for students using Facebook is that it can organise friends in class groups.

GoogleTech Talks are worth a look also, with many useful topics covered. Customizing Collections was a video that I liked, as it provided an historical context for where collections are headed from an humanities point of view.

Youtube has some great music clips, and not just modern teenage. I found some great stuff on American folk songs such as Pete Seeger and the Weavers.

Social networking is certainly alive and well in video land and the question about whether serious stuff should be included as well is often asked. Does this mysterious group of social networkers want to mix social and serious stuff. I suspect that 'they' is a very diverse group, just as the content is diverse and so there is a place for all types of content. I think that usage statistics on categories or types of topic would be a nice feature for those with a research bent. The platform allows for searching by keyword which is great when trying to locate material.

I have chosen the Discover Information Literacy video to illustrate that I can embedd the HTML required to save a video to my Blog.

Web 2.0 Awards

Hi All
I tried to get an award image for this entry, but it was taking too long, so no picture. I found the award site most interesting as it gave a very good indication of what social networking is all about. I didn't find some of the sites very appealing, but then that is ok.

Libraries need to keep an eye on moblile technology developments such as twitter, as a possible distribution platform for services.

these award winners were firmly based in social networking. I liked the service that posed the question: what are you doing? Many of the answers were in foreign languages unfortunately.

Collaborative writing and word processing site has potential. It could be quite handy to use when jointly writing a paper.

some sites rate quite low on usefulness, such as fuzzmail. Why would anyones friends want to see all the corrections and typos in real time when writing to them.

I need to chse up more info on widgets as they sound like a great idea. You can insert a translator widget into your site which will convert it to one of about six different languages.

I recommend everyone take a look at the awards as they give you a flavour of Web 2.0. Particulalry interesting are all the site names. Well onto Youtube for my next assignment and some more fun. I shall be investigating some folk music videos I have been told about and also the library ones of course.
ELLE

Catching up after holidays

Hi Everybody

I have one more exercise to go and I to can add the cute little dog to my Blog. I had two weeks holiday of which some was spent with the family in Kalbarri. It was very nice and relaxing and I would recommend it for those wanting to get away and particularly for those with children. we had the 4 year old grandson and he had a ball at the river. he wan't too keen on the idea of catching and eating fish though.

Kalbarri, situated north of Geraldton in WA, is based at the mouth of the Murchison river and the sea and is surrounded by National park, so one has the benefits of a seaside holiday with the calm of the river and inland activities such as the gorge. In addition, the is some good spa or beauticians where one can get facials, massages and other treatments to add some variety.

Enough of my reminisces as I have to get on with the next task as I am lagging behind the others. Once I have done my final task it will be back to Del.ious and Flikr for some further playing around.

ELLE

Podcasts

I found this week's activity most interesting. Just as some people are addicted to Blogs, others are to Podcasts. Subscribing so that you receive new content is a great idea, as it means that you do not have to search far and wide again to get updates. I would recommend the Yahoo tutorial. I found this approach easy to follow and pleasant on the eye. Additional information was quickly available. www.nonstopmac.com
This tutorial identified podcasts as audio.
A number of video applications are out there which follow a similar format, but the are not technically podcasts.

I would recommend this tutorial format for use by library information literacy aspects of learning. The pictures at the top of the page added colour and appeal, and everything was delivered in short clear snapshots in steps of three and with only minimal links out. I recommend it as template.

I would recommend that we add RSS feeds to our existing library podcasts or at least, investigate making them a series to which we could add an RSS feed. We also need to add the length against each one. I found this invaluable in planning my time, when deciding whether to listen to a podcast now or reschedule it. Some of the Sirsi Dynix podcasts go for an hour. These are very good podcasts, but not targetting the net genners out there.

I think, that like all social networking technologies, strict selection criteria is needed when creating a directory suitable for attaching in an academic library collection. Nontheless, I believe that this is a task worth investigating as it enhances our existing collection, providing a format to many who maybe too busy to investigate scholarly sites and evaluate them. I would suggest that by being critical, the lists we as librarians choose for this purpose would remain small and focussed.

An additional activity is to create podcasts in the library setting to either advertise a service or to teach some aspect of library knowledge, such as identifying the different types of journals and their uses. I think podcast technology quite suited for this . As podcasting is an audio platform it assists librarians in providing for differing learning styles in their teaching materials. This option is suited to those with an 'aural learning style."

ELLE

RSS and Wiki tutorials - (short)

Hi All

You may wish to check out these tutorials- one on RSS feeds

and one on Wikis. They are short and to the point.

http://www.blip.tv/file/205570/

Cheers

ELLE

Second Life

Second Life is a most interesting place. Some people, it is said, become quite taken with it, so much so that they have the same emotions and reactions as a first life. For me, I prefer something more tangible - the trees, flowers and birds and the sound and feel of the surf.

As for a library environment, I can imagine we could create exactly what we have now if we so wished, even the fact that we live on an island. Seems a bit depressing though. I suspect if the university had a presence in second life similar to the real world, then we would be obliged to folleow and provide the services required.

Not only would our libraries be providing a physical comunity hub on campus, but in second life as well. I would like to choose the seating. We seem to have done quite well with that aspect at Joondalup.
ELLE

RSS Feeds

Hi
I am late finishing this exercise on RSS feeds and yes, like everyone else, I found this exercise the most difficult. Well , the only difficult bit was the RSS feed from EBSCO. Selecting and managing RSS feeds from elsewhere was a breeze. I can also see how useful RSS is in trying to manage an explosion, not only of information, but information sources. It is useful using Bloglines to search for Blogs on a topic as well as using it as a host for managing sources of interest.

I think it interesting that the RSS feed from the database was so difficult , even when following instructions. Even when following others intructions, Ebsco doesn't seem to want to email me my alert, so I give up on it for now. This is how students feel I am sure, when they revert to using Google instead of the databases. It all just seems too difficult.

For now, I need to move on

ELLE

Wikis to be sure

Hi Did you know that Wiki means fast or quick in Hawaiian?


My thanks to Rod Maynard in Flickr for this photo of Hawaii - unfortunately, this is somewhere that I have not visited.

Another post to comment on the Wiki exercise. I am quite excited about Wikis as they seem to have lots of potential from providing a web presence for the institutions as used by a number of public libraries to being a useful forum for group work. The excercise that we had to do asked the group to comment on the library orientation brochure and make suggestions for its future design. this type of exercise seems to be one being picked up by educators using the Wiki for group work and administration tasks such as working on policy manual changes.

When I was discussing this exercise with a colleague, they asked the question about how this was different from email? A very good question, I thought, however, easily explained in that the comments made by individuals are in one spot for all the group to see. There is also less chance of things going astray. A Wiki generally has a coordinator whose job it is to take the comments forward, synthesising them into a reporting mechanism.

Jimmy Wales at the Education.au seminar in Perth recently, commented that Wikis are generally successful when dedicated to a single suject. His example was the Muppet Wiki. Anyone visiting this Wiki knows that if a subject like Perth is prompted then the information sought and provided will relate to the Muppets and Perth.

I would like to investigate a Wiki as an information sharing tool for a subject area or maybe a whole of library news forum. My thought on this is required though.

Enough of my rambles for now as I am so longing to do the RSS feeds exercise which everyone has advised is the most difficult of all. I have done the reading, but not the exercises - too many things happening at the moment. You find that once embarking on the path of social networking the information overload that one may have previously been experiencing just becomes a whole lot larger - I did say enough of my rambles.

ELLE

Welcome to my Blog

Hi
I've set up this blog to track my learning through the 23 Things discovery exercises in the ECU Library Learning 2.0 Program. I've got this far in setting up the blog, which is Week 2's exercise. It was not too difficult, but I think I have a problem with my Google Account user name and password. Also, my email address is on display. I am hoping it goes away when I finish this page.

I have had to set up a new Blog as I could not access my old Blog to add new posts. I worked my way through the help offered but still no joy. There is a learning message somewhere in here but at present I can't see it for the frustration. I expect that it might be : when all else fails start again. In my old Blog I noted that a picture made the entries look nicer, so in this one, I have tried adding a picture of the new Joondalup Library at ECU, but it was much too large. I have added another of my favorite things instead: a picture of roses.

It is a shame about the Joondalup Library bbuilding, as it is a building to be excited about, not the least because it was only opened this year. The students love the atmosphere and are regularly seen in groups with their laptops in heavy discussion. A social atmosphere created in the physical environment.
Enough chatting for now ELLE