Week 9, Thing 22; Learn About Audiobooks

Overdrive has some interesting titles. I might try out one of the nature videos. Again, I was surprised since I thought that the material was in audio format and I discovered a small collection of videos. For a person who listens to BOCs, this might be a handy additional source for material.

Wizard western style

http://podcastalley.com/podcast_details.php?pod_id=37219

I think this will work for the Wizard of Oz.

Week 9, Thing 21; Discovering Some Useful Tools for Locating Podcasts

While looking for Library News in Podcastalley, I came across the Salt Lake County site. They have a wonderful and clever story about the circulating the Wizard of Oz. I was very surprised that this was a video since I has assumed that podcasts were audio only. Some of the others on their site are audio only. I tried to download the link to The Wizard but it is not loading well. If I can get it, I will post in in another entry. If they do another I'll let you know since I have this in Bloglines.

Week 9, Thing 20: Discover YouTube and a Few Sites That Allow You to Upload Video

After looking at some unusual videos including one on how not to use power tools while quilting, I came across this one on backwards knitting.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vT-u3MBGFtI

This was a technique I had heard of and found very easy to follow while watching the video clip. I'll try it soon.

YouTube is a place where you could get sucked in. As you watch one video, you are shown other related ones and it would be very easy to just do one more and one more... Because of the variety of clips, they certainly could be for entertainment or, as in the case of the one I have included, instruction.

In a library, the large display of clips on each page might lead patrons or librarians to areas they would be uncomfortable viewing in the library. Having short clips about very specific items could be very useful (like the new New Staff Orientation) but I'm not sure that YouTube is the format to collect and display them.

Week 8; Thing 19: Discover Any Site From the Web 2.0 Awards List

For my site I chose the Mapping winner, Google Maps. I tried to use it to map a route for a trip I am taking. Unfortunately, it did not connect to my destination. I did a search for the destination. Although there was a Map It option, I could not get it to produce a map from my home to the destination.

On the other hand, it was easy and fun to look at the hybrid maps or the satellite maps of interesting areas.

I could see using with patrons to help them with directions and then be able to show them the aerial picture of their route and, if they were lucky, the street level of it too.

Week 8; Thing 18: Take a Look at Some Online Productivity Tools

Certainly the set up at Zoho looks a lot like Microsoft Word. It seems easy to use and has a lot of other functions such as the spread sheet function. This could be very useful for multiple computers.

I am using Google Docs with a groups that I am a member of. It seems to work OK to manage our lists. The real time editing is a little scary . In addition, I find it difficult to edit someone else's list. The biggest issue, though, is that even though we agreed to use this, one portion of the group is not updating their material. It is also obvious that others are maintaining their lists off line and just updating it online. Probably it is a learning curve.

(This was published from Zoho.)

Week 7; Thing 17 Add an Entry Into the Sandbox Wiki

Exploring and playing is good but I didn't find this as easy to use as I thought a play area might be. Maybe it is because of the "Problem" with the front page or maybe more sand would be good. I did add to a favorites list as well as adding my blog.

Week 7; Thing 16: Learn About Wikis and Discover Some Innovative Ways Libraries Are Using Them

Wikis seem as if they could be useful in the library setting. However, many of the ones I looked at had not been updated in more than a year and they didn't have comments. Both of these facts seem to defeat the purpose of a Wiki - to be current with the sharing of information. I thought that subject guides were interesting but why have those, the catalog and system webs? Princeton Library has incorporated all of these things together but I wasn't able to complete a search on it. Ah, growing pains.

Week 6, Thing 15: Web 2.0, Library 2.0 and the future of libraries

Libraries need to constantly change. Where would we be, most of the time, without computers and the web? However, do we know where we want to go and why, to say nothing of how we think we might get there? Or, maybe is there a place for a wide array of libraries from the very hi tech with much exchange between librarian and patrons to the quieter, slower curl-up in a chair with a paper book and read place? Much food for thought in these articles.

Week 6, Thing 14: Discover Technorati and Learn How Tags Work with Blogs

I was surprised that in one of the top news blogs there was an article about librarians. Yes, they are the hip 20's and 30's one but still...

When looking for Learning 2.0, the search method does matter. For instance, there were 24,629 entries for it in Blog posts and only 505 in Blog Directories. Tags didn't seem to give a number but, on the other hand, also included video clips.

Pop culture certainly is what is primarily covered and of interest to people using Technorati.

Week 6, Thing 13:Learn About Tagging and Discover a Del.icio.us

Since I'm not a big collector of bookmarks, I see this most useful as a way to have your bookmarks anywhere.

Week 5, Thing 12: Roll Your Own Search Tool with Rollyo

I created a search roll called Goldens which is about Golden Retriever dogs.

I'm not sure where Rollyo would fit in in libraries. What is the advantage of this over just doing a Google search? If you were doing the same search frequently, Rollyo might help but the results page seems very cluttered.

Week 5, Thing 11: Take a Look at Library Thing and Catalog Some of Your Favorite Books

http://www.librarything.com/catalog/kidsmats

This site covers many areas from the social to the practical. For instance, if you are packing books, it might be nice to know which box contained what. As for the social, it is a way to discuss with people who are really interested in the books (but not necessarily to see their name in print as I feel happens at some other sites.)

Week 5, Thing 10: Play Around with an Online Image Generator

I have an Avatar! It's scary that it really looks a lot like me.

I also played with sketch generator. I think that the results could be OK but you need to be very selective with your pictures. The wedding one I have posted didn't work too well because of the contrast between the groom's pants and the bride's dress.

Tattoo back was interesting especially when I added a smiley face to a tattoo of Mom.

Week 4, Thing 9: Explore MERLIN and then Locate a few other useful library-related blogs and/or news feeds

I think that Merlin could be interesting. I'll see as the weeks go on.

As for finding things for the RSS feed, since I'm new to this, I found it easiest to go to the sites I was interested in and click the RSS feed button rather than use searchers. However, I did try some searches for library topics I was interested in. Unfortunately, I didn't find much. The funniest was when searching for "library weeding" the suggested spelling was "library wedding". Very little for "library weeding" and quite a bit for "library wedding"! I'll try again with some different search terms.

Week 4, Thing 8: Make Life Really Simple with RSS and a News Reader

This time I worked with RSS. It will be interesting to see how this pans out since I am still of the group that like to go and get my news rather than having it sent to me.

Week 3, Thing 7: Creat a BLog Post About Anything Technology-Related

Both my husband and I recently got new digital cameras. His is big and can be adjusted many, many ways. Mine is very small, has some adjustments and is very fast. What I like about my camera is that the subject does not go away (like the cat leaving the room) before the camera turns on and is ready for action. Also, the between pictures lag is very short so I could take several views of the same moment for comparison later. Big Bertha(mentioned in the first post) was one of the first items to have her picture taken. For more shots of her:

http://web.mac.com/nhaile/iWeb/Site/Birthday.html

Week 3, Thing 6: Flick Mash-ups & Third Party Sites

Drawing was fun in Retrievr but I didn't think that the photos selected matched up very well with the sketches. Maybe it was the artist!

Week 3, Thing 5: Explore Flickr

I looked around Flickr. It seems similar to Shutterfly and some of the other photo sites. This is a picture of The Wedding in the Library.

Week 2, Thing 4: Register Your Blog and Track Your Progress

Both of these activities went well. Slowly, I'm catching up.

Week 2, Thing 3: Set up your own blog

Even though I have set up a blog before, I thought this was very circuitous and somewhat confusing BUT, I got there!

Week 1, Thing 2: Pointers from Lifelong Learners

Certainly 7.5 Habits makes for a catchy title but doesn't this short change Play? I think play is very important as part of learning for all ages. We experiment more if we call it playing rather than working.

Week 1, Thing 1: About the Program

This gave me a good overview of how the program will be structured. No surprises.

7.5 habits

I think the easiest thing for me is to accept responsibility for my own learning. If I want to know how to do something, I frequently just try it. Sometimes I'll get a book or check out a website first.

On the other hand, using technology for my advantage is an area where I am a little slow. I think it is because I have such easy access to books and websites and they seem to meet my need very well.

Bertha's view

From our spot Bertha and I have quite a view. Right now it is REALLY filled with really full carts. Fred, Olivia and the bears provide a softer side.