Whew! -The 23rd thing (for now)

I have mixed feelings about this "end of the beginning". One is relief at not having another thing to do among all the "happened over the weekend" stuff when I get to work on Monday. One is a let-down feeling that I'm sure will surface next week because part of me looked forward to the new challenges this training brought.

My favorite discoveries or exercises on this learning journey: Easy and honest answer! Hands down favorite was Play Week. I found the Web 2.0 Awards interesting. Both Bloglines and del.icio.us are helpful. It was great to find an RSS reader that was web-based and great to have Favorites I can access from any computer.
How this program assisted or affected my lifelong learning goals: It's enhanced my lifelong learning and made me stretch myself a bit more. In fact, I should be 10 feet tall by now.
Take-aways or unexpected outcomes from this program that surprised me: I kinda scoffed at the idea of blogs but I've been won over. I can see some practical uses beyond online journaling and cyber-exhibitionism. I'm hoping that I can get an ILL Informational blog approved by the higher ups that would answer the FAQs not covered by the policy FAQs. The beta version is at: http://jplinterlibraryloan.blogspot.com/ .

What can be done differently to improve upon this program’s format or concept:

• I would suggest either doing a self-paced tutorial-- kind of like the old LAP (Learning Assisted Program) packs ca 1970's--instead of the weekly releases. Some of the weeks seemed more labor intensive than others. While I knew to peek at PLCMC's program to see what was coming up, I knew I couldn't count on our lessons being the same as PLCMC's -- though they often were. It would have been great to have been able to pace myself and be able to fit the lessons in with my workload a bit better. Half my staff dropped out because they couldn't fit the lessons in with their workloads.
• I -and many of my colleagues- got the impression that this supposed to be geared toward newbies. There were a lot of times that I stumbled upon what I was supposed to do, rather than had it spelled out for me. Instructions needed to me more spelled out. My staff and I coached each other through this and nlisted the help of other participants from time to time.
• Speaking of which- having coaches on the sidelines help. We did have the online help offered during specific time periods in the later weeks but on-demand coaching would have been great. Having them a bit earlier would have been more helpful. Now that a group of us has been through this, we may be the source of a cadre of coaches for the next group.
• The program needs to be constantly updated and tweaked. It definitely is not a "copy and run" training. At times- links failed to link or I found myself at a site with a different name. When you're just learning, this can be unsettling.
• Having it come at the end of the FY as it did provided less of an incentive to follow through. My staff and I had already completed our training requirements so dropping out of this training didn't have any great consequences for them-- apart from missing out on the MP3 player. The MP3 player- hint, hint, hint.

If offered another discovery program like this in the future, would I again chose to participate: Yes. In fact there are opportunities out there in Library 2.0-land which I'll look at later after a short break:
http://explorediscoverplay.blogspot.com/
http://www.librarybytes.com/
No doubt others have already done this, but why not have a version of this for our library users (albeit without the MP3 prize) accessible from the JPL website?

Thanks for this opportunity. All in all, it was a great experience.

The Uninivited- Crashing the Sandbox Party- Test #17

So..... I dutifully attempted to do the exercise for Playing Around with PBWiki only to find out that I needed an invitation to the JPL Learning 2.0 Sandbox. It would not let me in. I did not have an invitation and did not know the secret word. So, I sent out some SOSes. And NO ONE ANSWERED ME! sniff! No one told me that it was exclusive invitation! HA! We'll just see about that!

So- I guessed it. And I got in there and played around in the sandbox. Don't worry. I raked the sand so it's not that obvious that I was there.

Tagged Out: #15 On Library 2.0 & Web 2.0 ... and another rant!

Library 2.0 - It's many things to many people. What does it mean to you?

I have to say this: What's changed? True- this is not the library of my childhood. That's a good thing; my public library was a bookmobile. But- in a way- what we do these days is to get the "goods" of the library to the people we serve like the bookmobile did. We've found different ways to do it. In many cases, just as we've had to adapt to changing economic conditions, to "do more with less" (a phrase that is due a rant in itself), so changing technological conditions are another part of the evolution in services. It's not like we upgraded suddenly into a Library 2.0 revolution. In my view, the concepts described in all the Library 2.0 are just evolutionary blips on the greater library/librarianship continuum.

And now- my somewhat-connected rant: This training has not provided a smooth journey of discovery. What the creator of this training -and all those who appropriated it- failed to realise is that -verily- the Internet is an inconstant creature. You can't build a set-it and forget-it course around it. Sites -even those that look rock-solid- disappear. Sometimes, you can find the information elsewhere on the Web but -often- the whole shebang is gone-baby-gone. Those rock-solid sites with well-written information don't change as the technology changes. So newbies to the former next-big-thing site find that they can't understand what the Internet Sage is talking about in his or her beginner's guide because the next-big-thing site has morphed in the meantime and changed the site around, renamed buttons, eliminated buttons, and -now- it's changed so much that the guide is no longer useful.

The appalling thing- from a training standpoint- is that this is the nature of the beast and that any training based on this beast has a built in redundancy factor. It makes exploring and attempting to work with the Internet both aggravating and exciting. The job of an Internet tour guide has become one where the seasoned fearless leader encounters detours, dead ends, and dragons that weren't there when they last took the journey-- even if that journey only took place a month or a week before. Before you sit back and say- "Whew! I'm glad that's not my job." , I remind you that, dear heart, it is. As library workers at any level, we guide travellers through the Internet maze on a daily basis. Everyone- parents, students, teachers, government leaders, business people, et al - needs to have more than a working knowledge of the Internet. Surfing the Internet has gone from a pleasurable pastime to a tool we use everyday. While the library profession and the view of the public formerly portrayed librarians as being professional know-it-alls, experts in the field, and founts of all knowledge, with the Internet, the best we can realistically hope for is to be knowledgeable guides. We can help customers avoid pitfalls and steer them in the right direction. Instead of being the sages on the mountain-tops that seekers of wisdom consult, we become fellow travellers on the journey with them. I think that change is an improvement in our relationship to our customers.

#7 The Technology Blog Rant

There is just much, too much out there and this course hasn't even scratched the surface of everything that's out there! Definitely TMI! When I look at the blogs done by others in the library field that just go on and on and realize how much time they've spend on them, I wonder how anything gets done. It's all fascinating but it's also a bit overwhelming. I wonder how the Internet can maintain this rate of growth and also wondering what's new around the corner.

I'm very impressed by the blogs that others at JPL have done and frustrated that mine is so plain by comparison and -since- I am in the middle of a project, it's also frustrating that it'll just have to stay that way. It's also a bit irksome that I can't get my pictures from Webshots to Blogspot- though it looks like others are doing it. I'm currently updating information in our ILLiad database and tagging all the libraries that lend to us for free. There's 50 typed pages of them. I have to stop now and then to give my eyes and my fingers a rest.

Whew!