#23 Summarize your thoughts about this program and learn more about where to go from here

1.What were your favorite discoveries or exercises on this learning journey? I liked learning about bloglines. I haven't had the opportunity to return and see what new things are on the different blogs that I made feeds for. I really like Library Thing. I want to add all my knitting books to mine. Del.icio.us will be very useful. I want to also put it on my home computer so I can add my favorites there to it and have access at both locations I mainly use a computer. I liked learning about Merlin. I will use this alot to see what new things I can learn.

2. How has this program assisted or affected your lifelong learning goals?
Were there any take-aways or unexpected outcomes from this program that surprised you? That I still can learn new things and keep on task until I finish. I guess I should try somethings a little longer before giving up and seeking someone to help me. I learned a lot as I proceeded through the different parts. I don't know how much I will remember. I have been helping my supervisor also and I do remember how I did different things. I was a teacher before I became a professional librarian. I love the teaching aspect of librarianship. I was a school librarian and liked teaching library skills. This makes me want to teach some of this to someone.

3. What could we do differently to improve upon this program’s format or concept?And last but not least… The format and concept are good. So much of it was trial and error. Yes, the different things had directions, but not always good enough directions for those people who really do have trouble with technology. I don't have that much trouble with technoloy, but with this, there were times I got stuck I know that another state designed this and Maryland piggybacked it, but each county could have taken a section of it and tested it to see what difficulties individuals would have and designed a faq section or listed notes that a certain section might prove to be difficult. There should have been more instruction for doing it. Not left us out in the wind. If it hadn't been for Annette Gaskins who came to my rescue quite a few times, I probably wouldn't have finished. There were times I emailed for help and did not receive a response. I would then email Annette and she would come to my rescue. It wasn't until today when I discovered there were comments on some of my posts giving me answers to my questions or difficulties. Somehow we should have been told to check back fot comments to have our questions answered.
4. If we offered another discovery program like this in the future, would you again choose to participate? Yes, I would participate.
5. How would you describe your learning experience in a few words or a few sentences, so we can share our successes It was a good learning experience. We were told it was only 45 minutes a week. It took hours to do some of these sections. We were allowed to play. Some of it was just that - play and I am glad there was time to play. Thanks for giving us this opportunity!

#22 Learn about Audiobooks

I did subscribe to NetLibrary, but HCPL will be dropping this shortly. I tried subscribing to Overdrive, but it wouldn't let me. I guess I have to go to a public computer when we are open. I did see different books which I would like to subscribe to. My supervisor is learning Spanish and I saw titles she could listen to. Overdrive has a lot more Juvenile and YA books. I was extremely disappointed when I looked at the choices on NetLibrary. I often listen to J and YA books on tape or CD. This will be a good alternative to CD and tapes when often the book I am looking for is not on tape or CD and perhaps is available in this manner.
The Gutenberg Project has a lot of high brow titles that I have never heard of.
The proof-reading aspect of Gutenberg was interesting.
I will wait until I earn my MP3 player to download anything.

#21 Discover some useful tools for locating podcasts

I looked at Podcast.net and Yahoo Podcasts. I liked Yahoo best. There are some great things out there. I used to watch soaps and there are some that I wouldn't mind listening to. I found a Meet the Press podcast with Tim Russert. I thought Yahoo Podcasts was more general for librarians. Podcast.net had a lot of academic type podcasts, where a public librarian would enjoy more of those indexed on Yahoo Podcasts. Library Channel and Mr. Nice Guy would be fun and interesting. I added both of these to my bloglines account. I found a podcast about uses of Web 2.0. Podcasts could be very useful to teachers. Librarians also. I liked the way Denver Public Library and Kinkakee Public Library in Illinois had different podcasts. Kinkakee Public Library had an interview with Linda Lowry the author of The Giver. I want to return to it at some point and listen to it. Denver had people reading books. I may tell my friend with a three year old about them.
What did I find most useful? All the free educational podcasts one can use. There is alot of stuff out there I wouldn't take the time to listen to such as radio shows with vulgar conversations and jokes.

#20 Discover YouTube and a few sites that allow you to upload video

As you can see I have added a video as a post. I tried to add its embedded script in a page element, but couldn't make it work. The preview pictures copied. It is a video made in northern Adams County near where I grew up. I knew her parents in high school and they sell great fruit and lovely mums in the fall. If you go to Apple Blossom at South Mountain Fairgrounds outside Arendtsville, PA in the spring or Apple Harvest there in the fall be sure to go to Hollabaughs or Sandoe's Fruit Markets north of Biglerville. Why did I choose this one, because that part of Adams County is dear to my heart.
I think videos could be very useful on a library website. You might want to show one of last year's Gala. There might be some done by authors that could be linked to on Reader's Place. If you have a travel section, could have a tourist spot and change it regularly. I am sure there are more ideas than these.

A Different Side of Gettysburg Pennsylvania

#19 Discover any site from the Web 2.0 awards list

I looked at the foll0wing ones:
Furl
Biblio
One Sentence
Games2Web
Farecast
ColorBlender
YourMini (Widgets)
Wayfaring
Wet Paint
Take ColorBlender, it is probably very useful to someone who is developing a web page. It allows you to develop color blends, but also select from several thousands. It does have instructions on how to use it. It is free and you can download it. Perhaps when the branch has a laptop, our Gaming Club can design their own games using this and some other tools found here. It would be extremely useful to a libraries web designer.
Farecast is very similar to any of the websites available to purchase airplane tickets such as Travelocity or Priceline. You could point it out as a possible website to patrons. I didn't think there was any thing special about it.

#18 Take a look at some online productivity tools

As you can see from the previous post, I wrote a letter using Zoho Writer and posted it to my blog. I also signed up for Zoho Planner and received my first reminder.

Jan Letter

Dear Jan,

Hi, I am working on Libaries 2.0 which comprises of completing 23 activities. In Harford County if we complete it, we will receive an MP3 player.  I am on activity 17. I have until October 4th.  It has been a lot of work.  A lot of it has been trial and error.  I am just getting grayer by the minute. The first activity was to make a blog.   If you would like to see it.  It is http://knitterknowhow.blogspot.com/.  You can see how much gray has been added to my hair by looking at the picture on my blog.
There have been some really fun things.  You should look at Library Thing.  You can list all of your books.  When I am finished with this, I am going add all my knitting books.

Hope you had a good trip to Scotland. 

Love,

KAD

#17 Add an entry into the Sandbox Wiki created with PB Wiki

I entered my blog on the Harford County list but don't believe it linked properly. I added The Happy Hollister series to the Favorite Childhood Books list. I tried to create an account but failed to find where you do it. I went back and I have an account. I also added an entry in a knitting list.

#16 Learn about wikis and discover some innovative ways that libraries are using them

What did you find interesting? What types of applications within libraries might work well with a wiki? So what's in a wiki?
I liked seeing the different library wikis. The success one had great links for librarians such as conferences, Library Success: A best practices wiki. MERLIN has a list of ways libraries have used wikis. Wet Paint sounded interesting.

Wet Paint http://www.wetpaint.com/ is a free hosted website service that lets anyone start their own click-and-type website in three easy steps. Wetpaint combines the best elements of wikis, blogs, and bulletin boards into a single application. Harford County is building this site to collaborate about their technology plan. Please note that you cannot upload files, but you can link to where they are located. Also, the site you build must be public.

Bull Run Library Wiki

From it I learned about the pilot program offered through OCLC.It provides WorldCat users the opportunity to recoup a portion of their fees through book purchases. The program was described to this wiki in an email from Chuck Costakos of OCLC. http://bullrunlibrary.pbwiki.com/OCLC%20Information

I am sure there are many ways wikis could be used by libraries. Using one for training purposes is one of my first thoughts. Another is to put school reading lists on a local branch wiki in order for students and parents to access them easily. I would really like to see better access to school reading lists at the local library. I have worked at a branch where this worked well in the old days of paper.

I suppose almost anything can be contained in a wiki. It all depends on its purpose.

#15 Read a few perspectives on Web 2.0, Library 2.0 & the future of libraries

Discovery Resources:
OCLC Next Space Newsletter – Web 2.0: Where will the next generation of the web it take libraries?
Five Perspectives:Away from IcebergsInto a new world of librarianship
To more powerful ways to cooperate
To better bibliographic services
Wikipedia – Library 2.0Library 2.0 Discussions (list of great references from Wikipedia)

I read these articles very quickly. They were most interesting. To a temporary place in time gave me hope that what we know as a library will not necessarily die but just change drastically to be more and more like a comfortable place away from home with many ammenities. It is now, but more is to come. It was interesting to hear the ways Web 2.0 will be used to build better services by such people as the Vice President of New Services of OCLC.

Technorati location

Technorati Profile

#14 Discover Technorati and learn how tags work with blogs

I guess I am tired, but Technorati is not my favorite part of these activities. I understand it, but I think it is odd when you search something you only receive 2 or 3 hits and if you want more you need to click "view all". In the assignment they tell you to search tags, url, and blog directory. They could have told you to reach this, go to advanced search. I just hit upon it by going to that. I just transferred my bloglines feeds to Techorati. It worked! I didn't have to ask Annette. She will be so relieved. I hope she laughs when she reads this. I claimed my blog in it also.

#13 Tagging and Discover Del.icio.us

Del.icio.us, I believe can be very useful. I went throught my favorites on my work computer and added the bookmarks that I may want to use at home. When I have a chance, I will do the same at home. In the future, I will add all bookmarks to this site. Tagging can be very useful, but it is also very subjective. One person may think something should be filed by one heading and someone else may select something completely different. I think I may suggest opening a del.icio.us account that the Joppa librarian's can all use on the 3 information desk computers. I'll see what they think. As far as useful as a reference tool, it is very similar to Rollyo and could be used the same way as I suggested there.
There is a list of library systems who use del.icio.us which I looked at. I didn't see the point of looking at their sites, but found one thing interesting. One of these systems was doing an online survey of their customers/patrons about how they like the way their website is. Working at BCPL for quite a few years and here, neither system has ever done such a survey to my knowledge. I am sure it is quite work intensive, but would be quite productive also.

#12 Roll your own search tool with Rollyo

Well, I did my search roll. I think it could be very useful to a teacher you wanted to make certain sites available to students. Also to a librarian who was doing a computer program on the Internet or genealogy sites. The student who was learning would not have to type a long url with the use of a searchroll. Here is my link to my search roll Knitting Patterns: http://www.rollyo.com/suzyqsmom/knitting_patterns/. I had trouble creating a Searchbox. I need more help with it.

#11 Take a look at Library Thing and catalog some of your favorite books

I think Library Thing may be my favorite part of 23 things so far. To have a list of all my knitting books available online will be so useful. I have 11 titles listed so far. I should be able to do this at home. It won't take a lot of bandwidth. I also will be able to find links to books I am not familiar with and some of the group stuff sounds like a lot of fun. My link to my Library thing list is:
http://www.librarything.com/catalog/SuzyQsMom

#10 Play around with an Online Image Generator

I had lots of fun with this. This could be very useful for library posters or stationary I might want to make. You will see to the right towards the bottom I have stated where I made the pig sign, knitting rocks, and the newspaper article. I knew when I read that magazine article I could use it somewhere. It really is true. Lucky Leaf or Mussleman's Applesauce was selected. I have been telling people for years that Adams County Apples are the Best!