FINAL POST

How has this program assisted or affected your lifelong learning goals?

• Although I often WANT to learn about new tools and websites, my daily obligations usually take up my time and attention, and I keep putting off the shoulds of my own professional development. Having this extended structured time was very helpful in giving me the opportunity -- or the excuse -- to fulfill my goals. The role of a school library media specialist / instructional technology facilitator is to help teachers to learn and use new technologies and to embed them within their curricular practices. This program has helped me by allowing ME to learn new tools, as well as spreading the word that media specialists are available to help teachers who also want to learn and use new tools.
  

Were there any take-a-ways or unexpected outcomes from this program that surprised you?

• Not really. I expected to learn new things, and I did. I expected to find some wonderful new tools, and I did. I expected to be amazed at the things my colleagues created, and I was.
  

What could we do differently to improve upon this program’s format or concept?

• I can't think of a single improvement. It is portable, flexible, and incorporates a variety of TYPES of tools that can be used in a variety of instructional settings.
  

If we offered another Web 2.0 program like this in the future, would you encourage colleagues to participate? What would you tell them?

• ABSOLUTELY! This is a wonderful format for learning new skills - especially those that center on web-based tools. Learning hands-on, with an eye towards implementing these tools in one's job, made this relevant and motivating. I could work on it at home or at school. I could do two lessons - or even three or four - at a sitting. I could fall behind, only to catch up when I had a chance. This really takes into account all the demands on a teacher's time and attention.

How would you describe your learning experience in ONE WORD or in ONE SENTENCE, so we could use your words to promote the program in the future?

• (Now, you KNOW I'm anything but concise!) But here goes . . . "17 Things is just the Thing to jump-start your energy and enthusiasm for teaching in a way that meets students where they live - and where they'll need to be able to work in their future."

Thank you for organizing this for us, Alicia! It has been really fun - AND educational, and collaborative, and all that web 2.0-type stuff!

Thing 17 - My Choice

I looked at about 9 different sites from the Webware 100 list, and I think I'll add Webware 100 to my Delicious account. This will be a great resource to return to if I want to "up my skills" in new technologies. The ones I chose to tell you all about are listed below, with brief descriptions:

• Good Guide This site is a good one for consumers wanting to preview products in order to select items that are environmentally friendly, safe, and healthy. You can search for something, let's say a soup. The results will rank by rating in each category (Health, Environment, and Social), as well as an average rating on all three criteria. Then you can sort the results by price or by ranking -- and you can filter them by other criteria. For example, you might wish to see highly-ranked soups that are low in saturated fats, or low in salt. You might wish to see floor cleaners that are fragrance-free, or that weren't tested on animals. Reportedly this site will soon be available in an app for an iPhone -- irrelevant to me, but a great idea because of its portability.
• Aviary I love this one -- it's a replacement for Adobe's expensive suite of programs like PhotoShop, Illustrator, etc. With this free web tool, people can not only edit photos, but also edit vector images, adjust colors, apply visual effects, and more. People can also collaborate on a project. I think that a background knowledge of what's possible to do with these tools would help -- or else plan on a steep learning curve and a significant amount of time devoted to learning how to use Aviary. But this is definitely one I plan to use - and would maybe offer a workshop on this in the future.
• Hulu My son had already told me about this one, and I had a hard time imagining that producers of movies or TV shows would voluntarily post their products for people to watch on line -- for free! But here it is. When I learned that there is a valid business-plan reason for them to share their content, it made more sense. They believe that viewing shows boosts DVD sales -- and the stuff is only posted for a limited time online. So if people want to see a show, they'll need to buy it for future viewing. I can tell that this is true, because I looked for the last episode of "Monk," and all I could find were clips and interviews. Bah. -- But I COULD watch this week's episode of "NCIS." Yea!

And now, for the one I will promote, dig into more deeply, etc. etc.:

• diigo This is a content sharing and bookmarking tool -- but I like its uses for research. In our big6 lessons we emphasize students' interactions with the written word -- the reading, paraphrasing, summarizing, synthesizing, etc. Students are taught how to identify the main idea(s) in an article, highlight (or underline) the main words, summarize them in an annotation along the side, and then paraphrase the idea or fact into their own words on a Notes Page graphic organizer. Diigo would help with the highlighting and annotating (they call this 'adding sticky notes') part of it, allowing students to save paper, to use a cool Web 2.0 tool, and yet still accomplish the goals of reading, writing, and thinking. (One reason we've focused on these skills is past observation of students doing too much copy-and-paste when "doing research." They would capture words without really reading or understanding them, and then would regurgitate them in some kind of pseudo-written product -- really more of a plagiarized collage of words taken from various articles they'd found online.
• The bookmarking and tagging features are like Delicious (hey, does this mean I can eliminate ONE of the many useful sites on my list, to consolidate features under one useful window? Yea!)
• One possible disadvantage to diigo is that you have to download a free toolbar -- which subsequently allows you to bookmark, highlight, save for later, send, or do other things with webpages that you're viewing. I was able to download the toolbar -- but haven't yet rebooted my computer to see if it's still there. On your home computer, this should not be any problem at all. And diigo is FREE!

Here is a video which shows what diigo is, and how to use it:

Diigo V4: Research ~ annotate, archive, organize from diigobuzz on Vimeo.

Thing 16 - ScreenToaster

Since I couldn't get the embed thing to work, here's the URL for my ScreenToast: http://www.screentoaster.com/watch/stUEpWQEdIRFtZSFVZX1JaVldd

I had a lot of trouble getting the audio to work, but after some superhuman rescue attempts by Deb Friedman, I was ready to go for my 5th attempt at recording the same no-script how-to video. (So if I made mistakes or repeated myself, blame the repeated efforts.) By and large, however, I like this THING a lot! Now that I've successfully completed it, I can imagine making many more instructional videos to post to our website for new staff, for mini-lessons (how to do a mail merge, for example), how to set up your library account so that you can track your circulation, how to use SWAN to find a book -- and then how to get the library to order it for you -- and so on , and so on, and so on.

For classroom teachers, this could be a great teaching tool -- but for students, what wonderful practice in oral expression. Good for learning how to deliver information verbally (a Speech component of the English curriculum?), and also good for information technology skills -- how to "do" technology language and literacy. If they can teach it, they will know it themselves. I would limit the length of a video presentation - to teach how to be concise, and also so that the "teachers" don't lose their audience. So pre-planning (storyboarding, practicing, etc.) are important.

All in all, a good thing!

RSS, etc. -- Thing 7

I didn't have to set up an account in Google Reader - when I went to that link from the 17 Things blog, it opened up my already-established account (I guess since I have a Google account, that was already included). And it showed that I already could "read" all the blogs of the colleagues I'm following for this 17 Things project.

I added three others:

• Blue Skunk Blog (Doug Johnson, of the Mankato (MN) public schools)
• Ed. Week
• Book Blogs - a place where book lovers share reviews, recommendations, etc. Bliss!

So -- I think this would be a good way to keep up with some people's progress, work, thoughts, etc. -- but as I keep gathering more and more of these "things", I do wonder when I'll have time to keep up. Theoretically this will all make "keeping up" easier and more efficient - and I believe it will -- but since I've done very little in the way of keeping up with other people's work and ideas in the past and still felt very busy, how will I add this to my plate?

I've heard other librarians say that they devote one period per day to their own professional development. Could I do that? Shut the door and just read stuff?