The role of social media, well what can I say, it seems to be a double edged sword, it can be a brillant tool for communication and awareness and then on the opposite side it can misused and abused.
I do think social media has become a major part of our society especially in the last 5 years and it is replacing the physical community as more and more people facebook, flickr and twitter. There was a news item on the BBC recently about how large numbers of people are addicted to their smartphones and cannot leave them alone even when they are on the loo, like that is severe and seriously unhealthy addiction.
There are many plus sides to the new social media in that you can keep in contact with friends and relatives even if they are on the other side of the world, you can make new friends although I do not know why people need to have 10,000+ friends on facebook, its not like you are going to remember all their names, although it does help people network and make contact with people they may never even have thought about contacting before.
It also provides instanteous access to information and can help foster community in making people aware of what is going on, but on the other hand it can be abused as seen recently in the riots, it also seems to distract people from what they should be doing and it can can be abused so easily. One harmless comment can so easily be misconstrued and used against someone.
Thing 13 - GoogleDocs etc.
I quite liked this Thing, I am already using Google Docs and quite like its form feature which I have used in my teaching. I could not download Drop Box, but I had a look at the site and it looks quite a useful site to store documents. The last part of this thing I have become very interested in especially when I started to look at examples of wikis on the net and I have been inspired to set up a wiki using wetpaint to use with my law group in September. I have created a basic wiki site and I am hoping to use it to get information out to the students as well as to get them to work collaboratively online. I am also hoping that once each small group uploads their work it will be beneficial to the whole class as they will all be able to access it. I see it as a useful resource for them and hope they will use it and add to it, but only time will tell, so will add more on that later.
Tuesday, 16 August 2011
Half way through the summer holidays,
There is only about another 3 weeks until the start of the new term, this summer seems to be going so fast and it has been pretty eventful looking at the news reports.
Well I have been thinking and looking at Things 10-11.
Thing 10 - my experiences as a librarian, well I did my degree in Librarianship at the end of the 1990s and then got a job as a school librarian, although at first it was part time, over time it changed and became full time with more responisbility and stress along the way, but it has not been dull. I enjoy my job and working with the students.
I started teaching A level Law and felt like developing my professional qualifications in both the fields of teaching and librarianship, so took teaching qualifications for post 16 education and started my chartership which I found really useful as it helped my evaluate my development since leaving uni. and its surprising what skills you pick up along the way as well as areas that need development.
This leads me onto Thing 11 - Mentoring, as part of my Chartership I had a mentor from a similar background she was working at the local university and this gave me an opportunity to get another person's perspective as well as provide a willing ear to my library problems, at the time I had just started to manage people in another school library and there were problems, she gave me advice and directed to useful resources that helped resolve the issues that arose.
She also made me more aware about Web 2.0, which I have to admit I had neglected to keep up to date with at the time. I found the experience very positive and would consider been a mentee again as it defintely helps. I have also had a mentor role to some of the library staff I have worked with as two of them did not have any library experience and I helped support them while they found their feet as school librarians, for one of them it was quite a stressful time and I think it defintely helped to have someone just listen.
Well I have been thinking and looking at Things 10-11.
Thing 10 - my experiences as a librarian, well I did my degree in Librarianship at the end of the 1990s and then got a job as a school librarian, although at first it was part time, over time it changed and became full time with more responisbility and stress along the way, but it has not been dull. I enjoy my job and working with the students.
I started teaching A level Law and felt like developing my professional qualifications in both the fields of teaching and librarianship, so took teaching qualifications for post 16 education and started my chartership which I found really useful as it helped my evaluate my development since leaving uni. and its surprising what skills you pick up along the way as well as areas that need development.
This leads me onto Thing 11 - Mentoring, as part of my Chartership I had a mentor from a similar background she was working at the local university and this gave me an opportunity to get another person's perspective as well as provide a willing ear to my library problems, at the time I had just started to manage people in another school library and there were problems, she gave me advice and directed to useful resources that helped resolve the issues that arose.
She also made me more aware about Web 2.0, which I have to admit I had neglected to keep up to date with at the time. I found the experience very positive and would consider been a mentee again as it defintely helps. I have also had a mentor role to some of the library staff I have worked with as two of them did not have any library experience and I helped support them while they found their feet as school librarians, for one of them it was quite a stressful time and I think it defintely helped to have someone just listen.
Wednesday, 3 August 2011
Things 4-9
Today managed to have a look at Things 4-7, had a look at twitter and looked at some of the tweets, I think it has the potential to be a very useful network tool but also could generate alot of useless tweets. I liked the fact that you could put a question out there and get a wide variety of responses, but do not think I would have the time to tweet regularly.
Looking at the online and face to face networks(Things 6-7). I quite liked the look of LinkedIn it does seem to be the more professional older sibling to facebook. As I said in an earlier post I have facebook, but just don't use it that often, although a few of my friends are on it more regularly.
I have accessed the School library association and CILIP communities for work purposes before and found both very useful. I am also a member of the School librarian's network on yahoo groups which is an invaluable tool to ask questions and swap resources.
I joined the LISNPN and looked at the Librarians as teachers network today, when I get the time, will go back and explore more.
With the RSS feeds (Thing 4) it reminded me that I had both a Pageflakes and Netvibes account I had not accessed in ages, so did a bit of springcleaning. I also started using Google reader, with this course I am using Google applications more and more.
Unfortunately could not access Pushnote or Evernote at work, but both seem quite good, I liked the look of Evernote, although that could be due to the cute elephant symbol. Pushnote could possibly be annoying with its reminders although I liked ranking the most useful websites.
In all I did find it useful but again it requires time and if you do not have alot of time to brand, update and inform your followers it does seem to put you at a disadvantage. Phew nearly got up only Things 10/11 to do now.
Looking at the online and face to face networks(Things 6-7). I quite liked the look of LinkedIn it does seem to be the more professional older sibling to facebook. As I said in an earlier post I have facebook, but just don't use it that often, although a few of my friends are on it more regularly.
I have accessed the School library association and CILIP communities for work purposes before and found both very useful. I am also a member of the School librarian's network on yahoo groups which is an invaluable tool to ask questions and swap resources.
I joined the LISNPN and looked at the Librarians as teachers network today, when I get the time, will go back and explore more.
With the RSS feeds (Thing 4) it reminded me that I had both a Pageflakes and Netvibes account I had not accessed in ages, so did a bit of springcleaning. I also started using Google reader, with this course I am using Google applications more and more.
Unfortunately could not access Pushnote or Evernote at work, but both seem quite good, I liked the look of Evernote, although that could be due to the cute elephant symbol. Pushnote could possibly be annoying with its reminders although I liked ranking the most useful websites.
In all I did find it useful but again it requires time and if you do not have alot of time to brand, update and inform your followers it does seem to put you at a disadvantage. Phew nearly got up only Things 10/11 to do now.
Tuesday, 2 August 2011
Catch up on Things 2, 3 & 8
Got quite a few things to catch up with so may not do it in the right order.
I was a bit apprehensive about blogging as it is completely new to me, but looking at the other blogs out there its nice to know that I am not the only one new to blogging.
I had visited some blogs before I started 23 things such as phil bradley's blog which has so much useful information on it especially about web 2.0.
When I first tried to look at the blogs taking part in 23things cpd there was just so many, the delicious site definitely helped me wittle down the list to interesting blog names, those based in the UK and those working in school libraries, it was interesting to read about what others thought of each of the Things and how everyone is working at their own pace through the different Things. I also realised that I need to make my blog more personalised so will look at changing layout and background and possibly brand, which looking at the google search there are many people with my name but they are not me.
I know this is due to my hesistancy to embrace the social messaging/blogging age. Don't get me wrong I do have a facebook page, but I hardly ever go on it. I am going to have to think about what type of brand I want to project as am a bit wary about posting a picture. I have noticed on some blogs especially those recommended on the 23 things blog that the brand emblem follows through no matter whether it is a blog, twitter or business card. I quite liked the idea of this as it seems more professional and it definitely makes it more identifiable.
I jumped ahead to Thing 8 as it looked pretty useful. I liked the choice of layout and the fact it gives you a little 4 day forecast which is pretty useful. I've never used an online calendar before and am definitely thinking about using it more instead of my diary which I always seem to misplace. I also liked the way you can share your calendar with others and colour code events.
Anyway plan to look at theThings I missed out so I can post another update.
I was a bit apprehensive about blogging as it is completely new to me, but looking at the other blogs out there its nice to know that I am not the only one new to blogging.
I had visited some blogs before I started 23 things such as phil bradley's blog which has so much useful information on it especially about web 2.0.
When I first tried to look at the blogs taking part in 23things cpd there was just so many, the delicious site definitely helped me wittle down the list to interesting blog names, those based in the UK and those working in school libraries, it was interesting to read about what others thought of each of the Things and how everyone is working at their own pace through the different Things. I also realised that I need to make my blog more personalised so will look at changing layout and background and possibly brand, which looking at the google search there are many people with my name but they are not me.
I know this is due to my hesistancy to embrace the social messaging/blogging age. Don't get me wrong I do have a facebook page, but I hardly ever go on it. I am going to have to think about what type of brand I want to project as am a bit wary about posting a picture. I have noticed on some blogs especially those recommended on the 23 things blog that the brand emblem follows through no matter whether it is a blog, twitter or business card. I quite liked the idea of this as it seems more professional and it definitely makes it more identifiable.
I jumped ahead to Thing 8 as it looked pretty useful. I liked the choice of layout and the fact it gives you a little 4 day forecast which is pretty useful. I've never used an online calendar before and am definitely thinking about using it more instead of my diary which I always seem to misplace. I also liked the way you can share your calendar with others and colour code events.
Anyway plan to look at theThings I missed out so I can post another update.
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