Catchup

Although the college is closed for the mid-year break Library staff have been working hard behind the scenes. The bulk of our stocktaking assignment is complete at Leederville campus and we are getting ready for the influx of new students next week. I'll be leaving my very capable team to manage on their own as I'm swanning off to Bali for two weeks, my first real holiday in years. I'm so looking forward to having no responsibilities for a while as well as finding out about another culture and its people. Then, of course, there's the shopping and I've been given a list of things that various people want me to bring home for them. I hope my luggage allowance will cope with it all.

During the so-called break I've prepared a project brief to have a trial run of "23 Things (Learning 2.0)" at our library and had it accepted to start in week 5 of the new semester. My manager wants to be involved himself and I don't think I'll have any difficulty finding 5-10 volunteers for the trial.

I've also done a lot of reflection as I worked on my performance management review. It seems that our HR department has had to justify its existence by producing more and more forms to replace the old ones. So much is repetitive and doesn't seem to serve any useful purpose. Why not just a few simple questions such as:
What have you done during the past period?
What have you been unable to do - and why?
What do you plan to do during the next period?

The beginners Virtual Librarianship course is complete. Last weeks' session was interesting and some quite lively discussion evolved but it ended very suddenly leaving me with a feeling that there must be something more. We didn't even have an end of course party - not that I would have been able to keep my eyes open much later than the 12.30 pm Perth time the session ended. I'm planning to register for the intermediate course and, now that SL is available on the staff computer network, I'm hoping to be able to attend classes at a more reasonable time.

Swan TAFE asked me to give a brief demo of SL at their Black Friday function last week. If only they'd told me about the theme I'd have dressed more appropriately both on and off screen! It went down well and I hope to have made a few converts among people who are looking for new ways to get in touch with our students.

A Hipper Crowd of Shushers

Many people have blogged about this post in the New York Times and it is recorded as being at the top of their most emailed article list. My comments yesterday about librarian's appearance/style were written before I saw this article but I'm pleased that I am on the same wave-length as so many other people.
People's perceptions about our profession are important. I'm tired of the comments about sexy librarians hiding behind a bun and glasses as well as "But you don't look like a librarian!" or "I'd like to be a librarian because I love reading". How did we ever get that way?
When I was at university and in my teens a boyfriend once suggested that I might be interested in librarianship. I was horrified at the thought because my perception of people who worked in libraries (if they worked there they must all be librarians) was someone of indeterminate age who sat in a large, badly lit room and said "Shh!". Later, as a secondary school teacher I was asked to run the school library and then I found out how stimulating the job could be. Several years later, when my children had left home, I had the opportunity to return to study and complete a Grad. Dip. in Information Management and I've never looked back.
I find it stimulating to be on the cutting edge, know what is meant by Web 2.0 and Library 2.0 and try to have aspects of it implemented in our college in spite of some solid resistance. Meeting with like-minded people and bouncing ideas around is also very useful. I loved Kathryn's post 20 reasons why learning emerging techologies is part of every librarian’s job and wish I could attend Librarians2.0 on the loose: a free unoffical unconference for Western Australian libraryland. Don’t think I’ll cancel a long-awaited holiday to get back to Perth in time though – in spite of the heightened security alert.

What does a Librarian look like?

I got to thinking about the stereotypical image of a librarian after my last Second Life Virtual Librarianship class and then saw a link to these pictures on Flickr. We had a somewhat heated discussion about the need for librarians in SL to dress up their avatars (or not) and the fact that finding clothes and changing one's appearance had been covered at the beginning of the course. One of the participants thought that appearance was not important as she was there to learn how to provide a service to her clients. The facilitator, Puglet Dancer, was of the opinion that her appearance was very important to her and often led to her making business contacts might not otherwise have come her way.
In many public and college libraries staff tend to dress casually and normal business standards of dress don't apply. I think appearance is as importance in SL as it is in real life and love the opportunity the virtual world gives me to look young, wear stiletto heels and change my hairstyle as often as I want. In RL I also try to dress well without reverting too often to "twinset and pearls".

Ssshhh!!!

I did attend the Perth BarCamp briefly last Saturday. Wish I could have stayed longer but Saturdays are always so busy and my mum (aged 95) hates to have me out of her sight when I'm not working. Many others have blogged about the event and it appears to have been very successful. Did manage to catch Kathryn's presentation on SL. So glad that someone had radio access and she was able to give a proper demo.

But ... this morning when I fired up my pc I saw the SL icon that I had tried to use but failed when Central TAFE's firewall blocked access. Decided to download the new build anyway to use at home and, I don't know why, tried to access SL again. Success!! I don't know if this is just an experiment and it may last for only a short time but I sure hope not. Considering that I've been doing a lot of agitating to have it enabled at Central I don't understand why I wasn't advised.

100 Words

100 Words That All High School Graduates — And Their Parents — Should Know is an ad for a book but the hundred words are listed on the web page. "If you are able to use these words correctly, you are likely to have a superior command of the language."
I think I'll print them off and try to use as many of them as possible in my everyday conversation. Hmm... some may be a bit a difficult. After all when did I last maintain a soliloquy about how to subjugate a supercilious suffragist?
Some of the words would confuse a Scrabble player. I wonder how many of them you could use correctly?

The digital native thingy

I knew that my obsession with video style games such as Morrowind and Oblivion was not just a case of my being a "gaming granny" but something a bit more deep and meaningful. Now, as reported in insidehighered.com, College and university librarians have some unconventional advice: Play more video games. When ‘Digital Natives’ Go to the Library.
This irks me somewhat in that it categorises librarians once again using the Digital Native/Digital Immigrant tags. I recently attended "Nerd School", hoping to become more familiar with new terminology and usage of new technologies, but was instead subjected to a test to see whether I was an immigrant or a native. I defy many so-called "natives" to achieve as high a score as I got! I suffer from insatiable curiosity and am always trying out new things and learning all the time.

Google vs. Library

I think I'll use this Unshelved cartoon next time I present a web search skills class:-)

Educational Projects in Second Life

Many of Central TAFE's staff last week attended AFLF's E-learning Networks June 19-20 Online Conference. Much of it was conducted via Eluminate but there was also a session online in Second Life, In-World Presentation: Showcasing Australasian Educational Projects in Second Life something that made people start to question why no-one in our college has access to this phenomenal new teaching and learning tool.
With educational sites popping up everywhere in SL it is a shame that our Department of Education has seen fit to block it with a dirty great firewall. Too many people see it as just a game and a place to waste time. Certainly you can have fun in SL (I attended a very lively party there on Info Island on Friday night, Saturday morning our time), but you can have fun in a classroom situation too.
Our IT Department has been working with the Dept. of Ed to try and overcome the resistance and, fingers crossed, they may actually be getting somewhere. I look forward to the time when, in the Library at Central, we'll be able to offer courses to our students and lecturers advising them how to make the most of their Second Lives, as well as offering virtual library services in addition to the real life ones.

Best SL session so far

Classroom in the sky

Last Friday's session on Second Life was the most well-planned of all in the course so far. The class met at the usual meeting place on Info Island and students were directed to a teleporter which took us to a classroom in the sky. A copy of the Reference Desk was adjacent to the classroom so when we visited that we didn't cause any disturbance to the SL librarians who were rostered on duty at the "real" desk on the ground.

Reference Desk

The discussions revolved around Reference Desk experiences, griefing and how to resolve problems with difficult clients (yes, those are not limited to real life situations). We were also informed about an application called Babbler that ref desk librarians can use to translate their messages into any one of 10 different languages (including Pirate).

Griefing example


We started at "sunset" then watched clouds drifting across a starry sky and finally the sun rose slowly as a beautiful orange fireball.

SL as a showcase

The Virtual Librarianship course I'm doing is very stimulating. It's great to thrash out ideas with other librarians, mostly from the US, with the same problems that we have here. I'm currently trying to persuade our IT people of the need to lower the firewall so we can utilise all the wonderful possibilities.

SL also has great potential as a showcase for our colleges. Visit the new Swedish Embassy in SL to see how they do this.

This wiki has great ideas for using SL as a teaching and learning tool http://www.simteach.com/wiki/index.php?title=Second_Life_Education_Wiki

And here is the URL for a wiki relating to an education island maintained by an Ohio University in SL. http://www.bscsecondlife.info/. I met one of the lecturers while I was online observing a reference librarian in SL for my course this morning.

Or this YouTube video from The New Media Consortium (NMC), a community of hundreds of leading universities, colleges, museums, and research centers. http://www.bscsecondlife.info/

Bits and Bobs

In LibraryStuff I came across this video ridiculing copyright. It's very clever.

Why should libraries blog? Here's an article about why the Wilton Library is doing it.

There's a new human-powered search directory in cyberspace, Mahalo. If it's as good as the first page is attractive it'll do well. Like all true directories, however, the amount of information it can deliver is limited, though what there is is usually of high quality.

More from Second Life - Sweden has opened an embassy there. I haven't had a chance to visit yet (damn this firewall) but it looks like fun and I plan to travel there when I get home this evening. To get to the Second House of Sweden, go to http://www.sweden.se/secondlife and follow the instructions.
Images at: http://imagebank.sweden.se/, User name: second_life, Password: sweden

Do you want to get into podcasting but aren't sure if you have the necessary software? Most people I've spoken with are using Audacity but here is a possible alternative, PodcastPeople. It advertises itself thus: a simple web-based service that allows individuals to create audio and video episodes, write blog posts, and interact with their audience. There’s no software to download and nothing to install.

"Web 2.0-centric" librarians

The meeting last Saturday with like-minded "web 2.0-centric" librarians was awesome. See Kathryn's post in her blog, Librarians Matter. I was particularly enamoured with being introduced to lolcats and lolbrarians. Why have I not heard about them before? Does no-one in my milieu have a sense of humour about our jobs?
It was great to meet face to face with real people in real time. Great too to hear about the variety of responses that various IT departments give to our access requests. Perhaps I should move to another library, though on a recent Second Life chat room one of the participants asked if we all (from diverse corners of the globe) had the same IT department intent on blocking access to any possibly controversial site without investigating our needs.
The meeting renewed my interest in running a course on Learning about social computing the “23 Things” way. I've been given the go-ahead and will now try to drum up some enthusiasm among my colleagues.

A Second Life Experience

WOW!
And wow again.
Last week I signed up for a free account in Second Life so that I could experience the SL training in Virtual World Librarianship. This was the most amazing trip I could have imagined. Before the first session I spent a bit of time wandering around Info Island trying to get acclimatised. I was also able to change my appearance, learn to fly, make a virtual cup of coffee in a virtual library and relax on the comfortable furniture.

I met several other interesting people wandering around and we communicated using our computer keyboards to type in text.

I'd miscalculated the time in SL compared to Perth RL and the session started at 10:30pm - 2 hours later that I'd anticipated. Still, it was a real buzz. There were a few issues with the presentation - hopefully these will be resolved next time around - but I'd never realised that work could be such fun. When we finished at 12:30 am I was too hyped up to sleep.

The pictures show

1. the class having flying lessons
2. examining exhibits in one of the libraries.

That's me in the striped jumper. I must try and find another pair of jeans - don't like having the crack in my rear showing.

We've been told that next week we'll start having fun - as if the first session wasn't already a load of fun! I also look forward to learning how to use SL for real work.

Some of the issues I have encountered locally

1. TAFE has a firewall that won't allow me to access SL from my office.
2. Must have broadband or cable access - dialup is way too slow.
   
3. SL is very download hungry and I have had to upgrade to a more expensive ISP account.
4. Luckily I have a new computer with good video graphics - very important.
   

It's Library Week and libraries all over Australia are pulling out all the promotional stops. But what happens next week, or the week after that? We should never stop promoting our libraries and all the wonderful things that can be found in them.

In the Shifted Librarian this week is a link to a video posted that looks at the future of libraries: [Public] Libraries in 2010 - What Happened? Also shown on LibrariesInteract.info.

Here at Leederville we hosted a breakfast for all staff and were pleased to see many unfamiliar faces. Now that they know how to find their way to the Library I hope we may see them more often.

Perth Barcamp and Unconference

Kathryn Greenhill's blog, Librarians Matter, this week refers to two unusual library-type events in Perth. The first is a Barcamp to be held on June 30th at Central TAFE's eCentral campus and the second is an Unconference scheduled for early August. I'll be on holiday in Bali for one of them (not sure which) but definitely plan to attend the other. Not sure what they are? Read Kathryn's blog.

Nerdy Things

Tomorrow I'll be attending "Nerd School", a PD session run by the college's IT department. Can't wait to improve my nerdy skills.

On Friday I'm teaching one of our Library Technician classes about blogs and on Monday I'm repeating the PD session for staff "Making the most of wikis and blogs". There's little need to supply handouts as all the links I refer to are already on this blog.

I'm thrilled to have been enrolled in Virtual World Librarianship - Your Second Life run in virtual time by Illinois Alliance Library System and GSLIS. Because it will be coordinated from the other side of the world I'll have to be online in Second Life from 8.30 pm on Friday nights for 6 weeks. Bang goes any social life I might have had. Friday is the only evening that my husband and I usually have a chance to go anywhere without my mother who is 95 and lives with us. However, I've been interested in experimenting with SL for some time (there have been previous references to it on this blog) but the college firewall has prevented my doing anything at work. Hopefully my new whiz-bang computer at home will give me a better experience.

Who participates in Web 2.0?

A post by Peter White on DownloadSquad had me giggling when I read it during a Librarian's meeting this morning, Most US citizens not participating in web 2.0. Peter has a cynical turn of phrase which has drawn several comments both agreeing and disagreeing with his philosophy.

Wikipedia

Last week I was fortunate to attend the Challenging How Knowledge is Created workshop at Burswood Entertainment Centre in Perth. Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia, gave a stimulating talk about knowledge sharing and the opportunities available for making knowledge freely available to everyone. The panel discussion and group participation that followed were insightful and gave much food for thought.

Educators (and Librarians) are divided about the value of Wikipedia as a reference tool. Jimmy himself considers that, like any other encyclopedia) it should be only a starting point for research.

The Denver Post has an article, Grading Wikipedia, that reports on the results of a study in which five Colorado scholars were asked to review the Wikipedia entries on Islam, Bill Clinton, global warming, China and evolution. Four out of five agreed their relevant Wikipedia entries are accurate, informative, comprehensive and a great resource for students or the merely curious.

Information Literacy Blog

I've added a new link to this blog today, Information Literacy Meets Web2.0. It is definitely worth a look for anyone interested in InfoLit.

Butterflies

Whew, that's over. I was flattered when asked to be the keynote speaker at this forum but didn't realise that it would involve so much work. Deciding which of all the myriad of Web 2.0 sites to introduce to a body of mostly volunteer language tutors was a trying task. I managed to get my butterflies flying in formation and received good feedback from the delegates with whom I was able to chat during our delicious morning tea. I celebrated afterwards by buying myself a new pair of shoes!