Blogs, Wikis, Social Networks and Listservs. August 19, 2007
Posted by Debbie Stafford in : Hot Topics , 2 commentsThe NECC Conference is sponsored by ISTE and their particular focus is on the use of technology in education. The ISTE special focus group known as SIGMS (Special Interest Group Media Specialists) were a big presence at the conference. The SIGMS forum had a full house, requiring more chairs than originally in place. School Library Media Specialists proved their willingness to embrace technology.
While Second Live and other neat new applications (Twitter http://twitter.com/ )seemed to be the new really hot topic, blogs, podcasts, wikis and other older web 2.0 applications were evident with sessions on how to use them as well as loads of examples highlighting their use. In thinking about them over the summer I still believe that Technology is about tools, creating and using tools to make what we need to do easier. Sometimes a new tool is just the thing we need but we should not throw away older tools that often perform a function as well or better. At any rate, here are my musings on these tools.
ck out this blog posting for some great questions http://vvrotny.edublogs.org/2007/07/15/four-essential-questions-that-need-answers/ Four Essential Questions That Need Answers and engage in the discussion.
Two questions about blogging that bother me some:
1. Does everyone need to blog? In looking at the NECC blogs, just wading through that many postings takes way too much time. I would like to see more people use a central blog such as the AASL blog for this kind of posting.
2. Bloggers were often writing up their posts while the session was still going on. Why? I find the best blog posts are those done after the fact, when you can read through notes, think about the topic and reflect.
WIKIS: (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiki) seem to be springing up all over and they were often the topic of all or part of a session. One session I attended had some great ideas for using Wikis (exhibits.wikispaces.com,) in the classroom. For this post I want to focus on some wiki’s specifically for and by school librarians. This is where I really see this tool shine.
SIGMS has its own wiki http://sigms.iste.wikispaces.net/ One document begun on the wiki concerned a topic at the SIGMS business meeting What is the difference between a librarian and a Media Specialist? Check out the posts and add to the growing document. Check out the Teacher Librarian Wiki http://teacherlibrarianwiki.pbwiki.com/ for all kinds of documents on how we do our job. For those who like to see the LM_NET hits especially for the book lists check out http://lmnet.wikispaces.com/
SOCIAL NETWORKING SITES: especially myspace and facebook were, of course, topics for discussion from sessions on how to use them in the school to vendors promising they could protect students from them. I must admit to not being sure about this particular tool. I joined facebook but don’t spend much time there not sure what to do when I get there other than read what students who graduated from my school are doing.
One I found to be more useful is Teacher Librarian Ning http://teacherlibrarian.ning.com/ a much more focused environment. You can even network with other specific interest groups such YA lit in school libraries. There is also Harry Potter discussion group. The problem I have is spending the time to look around through the whole site. I would like to see some kind of cross referencing of topics, for example posts in the collaboration group would probably contain items of interest to a high school group person. But for now I have to join and monitor all the possible groups in order to see what the community as a whole is thinking about. (Kudos to Joyce Valenza who set up the last three on the web.)
Second Life is a MUVE – (Multi User Virtual Environment http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muve The Wikipedia article can tell you lots about it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Life
I will have to say that I don’t at this time feel this is really a useful tool. First of all, it needs a software download, a big one! Knowing the state of computers at my school I am not sure I want to foster a big memory hog program like this, even if my school allowed librarians to download programs. I also understand that there are frequent almost daily updates. Second, I cannot get on at home either even with the program download as my graphics card can’t handle it. Even with my brand new laptop, I still cannot get on. Any tool that requires expensive downloads, constant updates, and top of the line equipment will not get used by most of us. So, my opinion on Second Life is on hold.
My last item on this ramble concerns an old friend and great tool, LM_NET. Listservs are “old technology” but as a tool LM_NET fits the bill. First, it is easy, I don’t have to login, I just get my email. Second, the discussions range across the board. While I could be on the ning and just read items that concern me as a secondary librarian on LM_NET I can see discussions that cover all of us. A topic posted by an elementary person may well be of interest to me, if not now then later. Two recent ones illustrate my point. We have had a good discussion concerning ALA accreditation, something that affects librarians at all levels in one way or another. It is much easier to read them all at once instead of going to all the different wiki, blogs, networking sites to read the discussion. Second, people are keeping me informed on the status of an important bill the SKILLS act in Congress http://www.ala.org/ala/aasl/aaslissues/SKILLS_Act.cfm The issues centered around this act can well be discussed using the other tools, but for just getting everyone to be aware of the topic, the listserv is the best tool.
Have a great new school year, everyone!
(posted by Debbie Stafford)