Since I don’t teach the same groups of people all the time, I don’t often get to see what the folks in my classes do with what they’ve learned. But this week two librarians let me know how they’d put their learning to work! I love it when that happens!
Sam Cook of the U of Hartford Allen Library was in my Screencasting class on Wednesday. Today, he posted his first tutorial to the library website! Speedy! And he did a terrific job.
During the same class, Gretchen Durley of the Terryville (CT) PL told me about the project she’d launched after the Podcasting class she’d taken some months ago. She holds a monthly Discussion & Dessert book group for 3rd & 4th graders. As part of that they record their reactions and reviews of each month’s books. And what fun and thoughtful reviews these kids are doing. Have a listen and see if you don’t agree.
A big thanks to Gretchen and Sam for sharing what they’ve created.
Have you tried FourSquare yet? It’s a new-ish social networking tool that lets you use your phone to checkin at the places you visit during your day. You can share those locations and tips about them with your friends.
Along the way, you can earn badges for checking in at certain locations, traveling around, etc. I just earned the gym rat badge and the jetsetter badge (and yes, I still have my girl scout badges, so obviously I like badges!) In addition to sharing with your friends, you can become the mayor of a location by checking in more times than other people. Competition!
Ok, maybe this all sounds a bit silly? But, hey, it is fun! And many locations (think coffeeshops, bars, restaurants) are offering deals for people who checkin and/or become mayor. Starting to see the opportunity to build some brand loyalty here?
Over 1600 libraries are listed on FourSquare and some are offering rewards for checkingin. Since anyone can add a venue, I do wonder how many of the libraries are actually aware that they’re listed? I’d like to think that all of them do! Check to see if you’re listed. Update your listing. Add some tips and some tags to describe your services. If users search for ‘free wifi’ when they’re in your area, they’ll find you.
I’m putting together a ‘FourSquare in Libraries‘ resource page for my classes. It’s just a start, but there are some ideas and tips that might be fun for libraries to try. Many of the ideas came from recent blog posts and twitter posts, including:
Help us protect NY’s libraries and library systems. We need to tell the NYS Legislature to reject the $2.4 million cut in Library Aid Governor David Paterson is proposing in the 2010-2011 Executive Budget. This will be the fifth cut in less than two years and will bring Library Aid down from $102 million in 2007 to $84.5 million in 2010. These cuts combined total an $18 million or 18% reduction in funding for library services. Libraries are part of our safety net—they are essential to life long learning, jobs and opportunity, quality of life and community empowerment.
New York State Educators: If you are teacher, librarian or school administrator at a New York public, private or independent school, WE WANT YOU! We are conducting a survey of middle school and high school students’ online research habits, and we’d love for you to participate.
The online surveys are short, painless (we don’t ask sensitive questions), easy to understand and anonymous. They should take about 10 minutes to complete.
Please note: Students will not be asked to provide their names, e-mail addresses or any other identifying information.
I’m really pleased that Kyle Jones has asked me to collaborate with him on an upcoming issue of Library Technology Reports on “WordPress for Libraries”. Like Kyle, I love working with WordPress and believe it’s a great solution for many different types of libraries and services. For more information on the project, please visit Kyle’s post on his blog, thecorkboard.
A colleague emailed today asking how to get a nice print calendar out of Google Calendar. I have to confess, I’d never clicked on the little PRINT button on top of my calendar to see what the options are.
After fiddling with all the options, I think the AGENDA format prints out with the most useful info.
Open your Google Calendar
Select the AGENDA format at the top of the calendar
Click on the PRINT button on the same row of tabs at the top of the calendar
Select the range of dates you want to print
Select other options - include printing descriptions, start and end times, lists of attendees and more.
Click on SAVE AS at the bottom of that dialog box to create handy, full-color PDF file.
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A colleague emailed today asking how to get a nice print calendar out of Google Calendar. I have to confess, I’d never clicked on the little PRINT button on top of my calendar to see what the options are.
