Alkek Library Information Literacy Blog

Testing web cell phone "clickers"

2009-08-18T16:58:00.002-04:00

We are testing out Polleverywhere.com to use as an activity with our Freshman Orientation.

Replace your audience response systems with Poll Everywhere

Interesting article on assessment

2009-06-19T18:01:00.004-04:00

Our Assistant Vice President (library director) forwarded me this article recently: What Are They Learning? Pre- and Post-Assessment Surveys for Libr 1100, Introduction to Library Research" by Jon Robert Hufford. It's from College and Research Libraries preprint articles page, which incidentally has a feed.

It's an article about the experience of a group of Texas Tech librarians who administered a pre- and post-test to their library research course. Although our situation is a bit different in several significant ways, I found it very helpful, and very much wish I might have had a chance to read it before we got started in our assessment efforts.

Elapsed time--from what I understand, they tested their students at the beginning and at the end of a semester. In our assessment, we pre- and post-test one shot classes at the beginning and the end of class. Although ours is different, its very illuminating to compare results of a semester-long class as opposed to a 50 minute session.

There is a useful literature review in the beginning, though elsewhere the author laments the fact that there are not many articles written in the literature on this particular subject, and near the end of the article encourages other people to contribute with their experiences.

They included an analysis of their questions and the responses, which was also highly useful.

Assessment fun with clickers; and mobile phone clickers too

2009-05-26T13:18:00.001-04:00

And welcome back from the hiatus--I don't know where the semester went! Please forgive the retro-post, getting back into the saddle and finishing up some of the posts I started and didn't quite publish!

We are continuing to focus on our assessment efforts. We have our big assessment project involving first year English composition students. We crunched the numbers with that and also going forward with revising our tests again. I will save that for a later post, but we did do our first pilot assessment using our Senteo/Synchroneyes clicker software and equipment as part of our continuing efforts to extend assessment into other classes. We are targeting next our Freshman Seminar classes.

I am looking forward to trying this out. I did not personally do the pilot clicker assessment but my colleague indicated that he felt it went very well. It was a simple post-test consisting of three questions, given at the end of the instruction session. I can say that I handled the statistics for the class. Synchroneyes/Senteo has a very decent system for results--they come out in a neat graph with basic statistics like class average and percentage answering correctly in an Excel file.

The only drawback is that the statistics do not appear to be cumulative, and so to extend this to all our other Freshman Seminar classes we'd have to evolve a system to name each Excel file with the name of the librarian, class, and possibly date or time, and then save in a shared folder. And then later if I wanted to add up the statistics for all the students taking that post-test, I would have to combine the Excel files....

If anyone out there has used Synchroneyes/Senteo and has a better approach, please please do let me know!

Another intriguing development is the use of web-based software so mobile phones/smartphones can be used as clickers. (an example would be Polleverywhere) I did a very desultuory search on Google and there were a few links. One of the things that came to mind immediately as a possible use for this technology would be our massively large Freshman Orientation sessions.

The fall orientations usually last 3 days, working about 3000 students in batches throughout the day. We generally show them several videos, and the last few years we have given them a paper "quiz" which we collect at the end of the session. It's quite rough to tabulate so many "quizzes" and so it seems having the students vote on the answers to various simple questions tied to the outcomes for this orientation, with a chart displayed on the big screen of the teaching theater where the orientation sessions happen would bring a welcome sense of interactivity to the library portion.

I am not quite sure given the scale of this orientation, that it might work well, but it's definitely an interesting idea..........:) and one I hope might come to pass eventually.

ACRL 2009 - the assessment sessions

2009-04-20T12:43:00.006-04:00

Hello. I am back with more about some of the sessions I attended at ACRL. The last post was about some useful technology for researching and creative instruction ideas. This post will cover assessment topics that were presented at ACRL 2009 in Seattle.

I attended the Fishing for Information: Using Focus Group Research to Discover Student Perceptions of Library Services and Resources The presenters, Rebecca Byrum and William Wearefrom from Valparaiso University in Valparaiso, Indiana had 3 volunteers from the audience pretend to be their example focus group to demonstrate the methods used for a focus group study. The presentation was active rather than passive since they were using the same type of questions for the volunteers as they did for their original focus group. The original focus group was conducted to find out what the students needs were in the library.

They pointed out some good things to know when you are planning a focus group study:

Need to get and oral and written consent from the participants
Names of participants should not be revealed
Let participants know that results will be used for presentation
Make participants feel comfortable, so they will be honest
Use clear simple questions

Here they types of questions they suggested to use:

Intro Question
Transition Question
Key Question - grade certain characteristics of topic (report card)
Discussion of report card - Allow participants to drive questions, e.g. "Are there any other categories that you would like to assign a grade to?"
Open question - "Do you have anything else you want to say or tell us?"
Ending Questions - Summary, "Have we missed anything?"

Summarize the results and you have done a qualitative study that you can use to improve your services with. Thanks for the good practical assessment ideas!

More on assessment in the next post.

ACRL 2009 in Seattle, Washington

2009-04-15T18:05:00.009-04:00

It has been about a month since ACRL 2009 in Seattle but spring break was right after the conference and it takes a little time for all that I learn and see to sink in. I thought the conference overall was very well organized and engaging. I was very pleased about the green theme and happy to see the green practices being followed through with during the conference.

The location of the conference was excellent since it was in the beautiful waterfront city of Seattle. I did see the famous Seattle Public Library and was quite amazed and the modern architecture and design of the building. There were many patrons busy using the resources when I went in to tour it. Below is a photo I took of the "Living Room" area on the the 3rd floor of the Seattle Public Library.

I attended a little bit of all the different types of presentations. I saw a couple of Cyber Zed Shed presentations which were 20 minute presentations about how libraries are using different new technologies. Nedra Peterson, the Director of Woodbury Library in Burbank California, had great ideas to make instruction classes more engaging and memorable by using video or audio clips from popular movies or songs that reference research related topics. Her presentation was called Popculture Multi-Media and Library Instruction.

She pointed out that the emotions invoked by the media clips can help students identify with the content you are presenting which will help them remember it better. She mentioned using clips from the movie School of Rock, the show Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and a music clip from a Green Day song. Now hopefully I can keep my eyes and ears open and be as creative as Nedra is about finding research related clips to use for my library instruction classes. Thanks for the great ideas!

Another Cyber Zed Shed presentation I saw was iMacros presented by Todd Quinn at Northern State University. iMacros extension is a very efficient Firefox extension that you can use to create a series of search steps into one click. Or in other words, it is a little program to perform repetitive, multi-step tasks on your browser. Quinn said you could use it as a poor librarians federated search. iMacros that you make can also be bookmarked on your computer or on sites like delicious and shared with others. This handout has a link to the Firefox iMacros extension and other important info to get you started using iMacros. Also, Quinn's LibGuide page at Northern State has a list of other useful tools he has presented about at other conferences. Thanks Todd!

See you all in my next post when I talk about some of the contributed and invited papers as well as panel discussions I attended at the ACRL 2009 conference.

Interesting Second Life educational activity

2009-02-18T12:13:00.004-05:00

Time to play catch up. :) The semester started with a bang! and in the slight break in the business that I have had, I'd like to share an interesting experience I had in Second Life, a month or so ago. In addition to my librarian/IL duties, I am also part of the group developing and steering our Second Life campus. I participated in a test learning activity, designed by one of the other members of our group, Robyn Herry. I have to admit at first I was slightly skeptical, when presented with a scenario that involved the kidnapping of an Avatar character, and then the need to solve several puzzles to get clues to be able to find out where to locate and rescue the kidnapped character.

We were assembled in world, on our Second Life campus, and given the first "clue" which linked us to the evil genius' MySpace page. I was lucky to have the game designer there helping and giving clues, because otherwise it might have been a little too hard for me. But what was fascinating was the use of outside webpages along with the in-world element. This lesson appeared to be about codes and code breaking--I had to figure out to highlight the myspace page to get the code sequence to find out the name of a clue (using the letters of the people on the friends list) , go to another website, and use the decoded phase as a password to get the next set of directions. and then from there I flew in world to a statue to figure out the next sequence. I had to google the name of the code, and then use the chart to try to begin to decode for the next set of clues. Unfortunately this is as far as I got after an hour, but I can begin to see the potential for educational activities using Second Life without having to build major structures. I admit it was quite fun too, because after the first 15 minutes or so I felt very involved and motivated to solve the puzzle.

On the whole it was a really cool experience and I think I would like to try to do something similar for our classes eventually.

ACRL Assessment Immersion notes part one

2008-12-07T12:39:00.005-05:00

I had the very good fortune to have attended the ACRL Assessment Immersion in Nashville, TN the past 4 days, and I must say it has really been exceedingly helpful. I had attended an Immersion for Teaching a few years back, and found it was a very important experience in terms of my development as a teacher.

And my expectations were pretty much exceeded in regards to the amount of useable information that I will be taking back with me. Our Teachers/Leaders are Anne Zald, Deb Gilchrist, Megan Oakleaf, and Lisa Janicke Hinchliffe.

The only hard part of immersion is the gruelling schedule, which goes from 8.30 in the morning to 9pm at night (with meals and breaks of course). But as an experience for someone who will be doing assessments, in terms of what you learn, and how you learn it, it is literally the best thing you can do to get a thorough balanced overview and also practical tools.

I am snatching a few moments in our final day to note a few things that pop up in my head, but probably when i have more time to reflect and collect my thoughts, I should have a little more.

One of the main revelations for me was learning of the existence of database/assessment collection/data management systems like Zoho, which appears to be a Google docs like version of Access. This is definitely something I'd like to look at for our library.

So, we are about to do an activity, so I will wrap this up for now. :)

Target Marketing Library Instruction

2008-11-05T17:38:00.002-05:00

This is a flyer that I made for the Art & Design department here at Texas State. I am the Art & Design subject librarian and wanted a way to let the students know that I am available for personal art & design research help. I also wanted to use a format and images that would catch their eye. After finding the type of images/emotions I wanted in my art books and then finding them on ARTstor to download, I put them in the comic template. I made it using a program called Comic Life which you can try with a free trial and then if you like it you can buy it pretty cheap, like twenty bucks. I will be hanging the flyers around the art building and a few here in the library. We will see how it goes. Next semester I may tweek it a bit depending on the kind of feedback I get from this one. And I think we will try this approach for different subject areas to make students and faculty more aware of our services.

Information Literacy Across the Curriculum Workshop part 2

2008-10-17T14:10:00.010-04:00

I attended the second part of the "Information Literacy Across the Curriculum", workshop which is given jointly by the TLT group and ACRL this last Tuesday. Michelle Millet was the presenter for this installment of the series. I had attended a previous presentation she did in person, which was very informative. This presentation was also very helpful because it had a slightly different focus and I picked up several good ideas.

Michelle's institution has chosen Information Literacy as their "Quality Enhancement Plan" which is required for their reaccreditation. Her perspective is very interesting because this level of support and widespread integration is not always so easy to achieve and I personally think it is a wonderful example of how to do things, and I find her recommendations to be very enlightening and practical as well.

Some of the major ideas/points/interesting bits that I came away with:

Her description of the marketing and publicity. She mentioned t-shirts and also a Youtube video
She continued to stress assessment as a very important step
It interested me very much to hear that they had an annotated bibliography assignment as part the First Year Experience program. It sounded like they had the students prepare it over the summer.
She mentioned Graduate students which interested me as well, I believe she also mentioned workshops for those students.
It sounded like they had quite alot of ways of reaching faculty--such as annual workshops, course stipends, travel grants, and a standing Information Literacy committee.

And of course her final recommendations, which were again to stress assessment, to find and learn from other programs, to host discussion, and to be persistent.

A Sad Day

2008-10-14T11:37:00.006-04:00

If you are reading this, wherever you are in libraryland, I would ask you to pause for a moment in remembrance of Devin Zimmerman. If you have been a regular reader of this blog, you might have remembered that Devin was the Information Literacy Coordinator here at Alkek from January to August 2007. Tragically he was shot and killed while on duty yesterday at his workplace in San Antonio. Although I only worked with him for a relatively short time, he made a lasting impression on me and the people here at Alkek.

I think Devin was one of those special people who bring a light with them in the darkness and illuminate everyone around them, a catalyst that causes those around to grow and change. I have seen the tributes on his facebook page, and I know that he made a difference to many people. For me myself he was a mentor, and in a friendly competitive way spurred me onto new things. As I sit here in the office that he once occupied I remember and am grateful for his encouragement and advice even after he left to work at Alamo Community College.

By way of a memorial I'd like to link to his youtube videos and his very first blog post. He had also posted some podcasts but sadly the files did not survive. It may seem an odd memorial but I think although it may only reveal some of Devin's unforgettable character in a small way, at least they are his own words.

Interesting Online workshop

2008-10-07T14:06:00.011-04:00

I just attended the first part of a really interesting online workshop called "Information Literacy Across the Curriculum", which was given jointly by the TLT group and ACRL. There will be two other meetings, on the 14th and the 21st of this month. There will be three other presenters, each to present a case study of their experiences in their institutions. Today's session was given by Lisa Hinchliffe, who is the Coordinator for Information Literacy Services and Instruction at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

One of the first things I noticed as she was speaking was the size and diversity of their program, or rather as she described it as " multiple IL programs." I may have heard this incorrectly but I thought she said that they had from 20-50 staff teaching classes.* If it got that right, it sounds quite vast.

* Note: Special thanks to Lisa H. who graciously sent me the correct numbers via her comment below:
70-100 librarians
20-30 graduate assistants (library school students)
35-45 library units in 27 different campus buildings. (Wow. That *is* vast.)

It was very interesting though to me because although our university is not as large as UIUC, we still are pretty decently sized (29,125 students according to our website) and I could see how some of the things she spoke about could be adapted in our situation.
My ears perked up at several outreach/marketing activities that she mentioned; the idea of having a person dressed as a book and roaming around campus so students could take pictures with him is very endearing. And apparently they have iconic frisbees they give away as well. That is one area that I would like to learn more about--ways to advertise and get the world out in very creative approaches.

I found the interrelated relationship between their IL program and Reference to be also very intriguing, mostly because what she described corresponded to some observations that I had made about our own situation. She described consultations (I thought she meant individual type research consultations) , workshops (in particular for graduate students), tours in several different languages (Chinese, French, etc), and also very heavy IM use. For us IM usage has been steadily increasing although it isn't exactly "heavy." I have noticed though that our individual consultations are increasing and I wonder if this is something that other folks are seeing.

Some other things that stuck out in my mind (and notes):

A graduate level IL credit course--I'd always heard of IL credit courses for undergraduates.
She mentioned getting assessment plans for programs on campus--sounds interesting

I may be adding more as time permits, but for the most part felt that this was a very useful presentation.

An Interesting Find (Unity, a game development tool)

2008-09-18T17:58:00.005-04:00

One of my colleagues who is the main architect/builder of our Second life campus passed me this link to Unity, a game development tool. Of course I am probably the last person in the world to learn about this program. I haven't had a chance to really look into it, but it seems really cool. It's web-based, and the website says you can make MMOs and Virtual Worlds with it. It appears that you have to download their player first to actually use it. I had fun playing with their little demo.

I like the fact that they have lots of tutorials and documentation. I am mostly a user of Second Life, but one of the things that is so hard at first for people new to Second life, and a potential headache, is the fact that you must create an account and download the software, etc. If this game maker is easy to use, well, oh the fun we could have!

I am deeply curious if anybody else has tried this game maker for their Information Literacy games. This is something that has interested me for a very long time, but I have only recently had time to really begin to research. The 2008 ALA TechSource Gaming, Learning, and Librarians Symposium is coming up in November, and I'd dearly like to go.

Back from Hiatus

2008-08-13T12:01:00.006-04:00

And I am terribly sorry for the delay. It's been a bit of an interesting summer. I went to Hungary and the Czech Republic for vacation most of July, and then it was pretty much straight to Denver at the beginning of August for the Reference Renaissance conference. (I think i will save some of the presentations and our presentation for a later post).

Assessment

But there are lots of interesting and cool things to catch up on. Over the summer, we continued to work on our Assessment efforts for our second-semester Freshman English course. Since we only had two classes it gave us a chance to test the Synchroneyes quiz/test tool a little more comfortably. In the contest of Synchroneyes vs. Survey Monkey, my admittedly non-scientific preference at this time is for Survey Monkey, only because when I used Synchroneyes I had to print out every single survey.

I wasn't able to make it to the LOEX of the West conference, but my colleagues did, and they told me about a great presentation from University of Texas Libraries(which is about 30 minutes away up I-35) called "Assessing out Assessment: Failures and Successes at UT-Austin." I think it is proving to be helpful for understanding and planning our assessment effort, and I wanted to give a shout-out to AJ Johnson, who let me ask questions about their presentation/project and generally let me pick his brain.

And, along other lines, we are going to experiment with using "clickers" to do assessment. We have used them in some of our classes as part of our active learning activities. With that in mind I have been reading this article: Clicking your way to library instruction assessment.

Embedding Librarians in TRACS (SAKAI)

I know this is already something that has been happening in other places, but this semester we are going to make an effort to "embed" ourselves in the course software. We have done some things in the past, with a few classes, mostly building wiki pages using the course management software wiki function (as distinct from our wiki) But we'd like to try more classes and do more, like embed a meebo widget in the class site. So stay tuned for that.

I think I will stop for now. :)

Back to LOEX of the West 2008....

2008-06-19T16:56:00.006-04:00

The next session I went to was called a Pecha Kucha. It was three different presenters with about10 minutes each on the same topic and was called A MUVing Experience: Three Perspectives on the Curricular Integration of Second Life. The presenters were Colleen Carmean - Director, Information Technology Services, Arizona State University, Sandra Ley - Instruction Librarian, Arizona State University, and Lisa Kammerlocher - Librarian, Arizona State University. All of the presenters discussed their experience as instructors using Second Life to teach their courses. Most of the students responses to the experience were positive.

The next day I went to a great session given by Jerremie Clyde- Liaison Librarian, University of Calgary and Chris Thomas - Liaison Librarian,University of Calgary entitled Benevolent Blue: Playing with Information Literacy. This was the best session I went to because it actually included a virtual game that the presenters are creating that we the audience actively played on the computers. The game addressed information literacy in a very political theme with violence and adventure.

The interactivity and then short survey of our experience really made this session worthwhile and interesting because, remember, I was looking for ways to make my classes engaging. Here I found it but it still wasn't an easy answer. It wasn't just the game they had made, it was the combination of their case study type presentation, along with the hands on experience and the short survey questions they gave us that made the whole session more energetic. We were all participating and exchanging information, audience and presenters. Now that is a class. Their project is still in beta and they did ask us to email them if we wished to be included in the future in the testing before the game goes public.

I really went the opposite way with the next session I chose because it was a discussion of information literacy competencies. I went from hands-on with game to discussion of the information literacy theory. I felt like I was playing the game where someone hides something and they tell you when you are hot or cool as you get closer to what you are looking for. I was cool to almost cold.

Cold was a good way to be in the hot dessert city of Las Vegas. I took a tour of the beautiful LIED Library to see what a ultra-modern library has to offer. It didn't disappoint me with its automated retrieval (space saving) system and comfort in the interior of wood and steel. I loved this library and actually took a lot of pictures to help me with our library's space assessment team that I am a member of.

I never found the perfect game to use in my instruction sessions so I will just have to make up my own game. But I guess now I know what parts of a session make it engaging for me and that games do make you think, which is better than watching someone blather on sans active participation. Yeah for games, LOEX of the West and for Vegas!

LOEX of the West 2008 in fabulous Las Vegas

2008-06-18T11:41:00.016-04:00

After a little more than a week of being back from the LOEX of the West 2008 conference at the fabulous UNLV, Las Vegas, I have had some time to think about and summarize my experience. Just like I went there hoping for easy wins, I also went thinking I would get some easy answers to my ongoing search for adding engaging activities or games into my library instruction courses that I teach here at Alkek. On both counts I was wrong. As far as winning, I did come out ahead, but only thanks to the awesome roulette and blackjack lessons that we were given at the LOEX reception which took place at UNLV's International Gaming Institute in the Casino Lab. As far as getting quick and easy ideas for games I could use in my instruction sessions, I got ideas to help me think of my own games or tutorials but no easy handouts.

The first Session I attended was A Library of Learning Objects: Teaching Tools to Quickly Tailor Instruction and Meet Class Needs presented by Lori Mardis, Information Librarian, Northwest Missouri State University and Connie Ury, Library Outreach Coordinator, Northwest Missouri State University.

They basically talked about project management and how to think of instruction in smaller parts that you could piece together later for fast complete sessions. They use flash tutorials made by student interns. The tutorials allowed for multiple learning styles to be addressed as well as quick ways to customize instruction sessions. The tutorials could also be used outside of the classroom accessible via the web.

Beating the Odds with the Insider's Scoop: Tips and Tricks from the Library Secrets! Librarian
presented by Jennifer Kelley, Resident Librarian, College of DuPage was a case study of Kelly's implementation of Web2.0 tools, including a blog, and other marketing techniques to increase student awareness of the library and all it had to offer.

I was happy that our library is already doing this as well as engaging in other Web2.0 activities. We have a delicious site, Facebook group, MySpace page, Flickr account and have a YouTube Channel where we post our tutorials and other vidoes. We use instant messaging for reference questions and have two blogs, the Alkek Library News & Research Help Blog and our Information Literacy Blog that you are reading right now! Needless to say, we are very into Web2.0. In fact, three of the librarians here at Alkek, including me, just presented a staff development workshop entitled Web 2.0: What is it and Why Should I Care?

More about LOEX in the next post...

Better Late than Never: Summary of Computers in Libraries 2008

2008-06-12T17:01:00.024-04:00

Here is my long overdue but hopefully useful summary of the Computers in Libraries 2008 conference in Washington D.C. Overall, I found this conference to be cutting edge and very applicable to our library and instruction team's activities. I have included many links to open source software and to the presenters' information.

1. Monday - Session: Going Local in the Library: Web 2.0, Library 2.0, Local 2.0Link to slideshow: http://www.slideshare.net/BizBrary/local-library-presentation-computers-in-libraries-2008
Presented by Charles Lyons, Business Librarian, University at Buffalo

Internet is not as local as you might think. Local web is the joining of the virtual world and the real world. It is about the community you live in and you and your library are a part of it. Ways to advertise library in local virtual world.

Examples:

Google Maps http://maps.google.com/
SketchUp http://sketchup.google.com/
3D modeling of local areas
Local News
Local Government Info
Blogs
Social networks (Facebook
http://www.facebook.com/, MySpace, etc.)
People!

Local Search Engines allow you to create more of sense of community in the virtual world:

Metroblogging
http://www.metblogs.com/
Google Custom Search Engine
http://www.google.com/coop/cse/
Guide spot
http://www.guidespot.com/
City Guides
http://austin.citysearch.com/
TimeSpaceMap
http://www.timespacemap.com/home.htm
E-Podunk http://www.epodunk.com/

Gathering Guide http://www.gatheringguide.com/

Your Street, local News, http://www.yourstreet.com/san-marcos-tx

Many more local search engines on C. Lyons slideshow, http://www.slideshare.net/BizBrary/local-library-presentation-computers-in-libraries-2008 ,slide # 13.

2. Monday - Session: Library Web Presence: Engaging the Audience

Presented by Ellysa Stern Cahoy, Information Literacy Librarian,
Pennsylvania State University, Emily Rimland, Information Literacy
Librarian, Pennsylvania State University, Binky Lush, Web Developer,
Pennsylvania State University, Kristina DeVoe, English &
Communications Librarian, Temple University, Derik Badman, Digital Services Librarian,
Temple University

They talked about tools to improve web services and make them
more 2.0 or interactive. Using customizable widgets to make library
services more portable and allow users to put library created widget
anywhere they want.

Librarians did this at Penn State: Made downloadable widgets to
search library catalog, search research guides, and for library
quick links. Very cool! http://www.libraries.psu.edu/instruction/jumpstart.htm

They used: Widgetbox
http://www.widgetbox.com/ lets you make your own widgets!

Librarians at Temple University purchased LibGuides. Link
to their slideshow: http://madinkbeard.com/library/SubjectGuides.ppt
Customizable research guide pages with interactive functions.
Research or subject guides can be connected by the tabs with course
guides or class outlines be connected with Example:
http://www.libraries.psu.edu/instruction/jumpstart.htm

Has meebo chat window
Calendar for apts on research
guide
Uses tabs
Uses RSS for up to date news
and research articles from popular subject journals
Can add polls
Users can rate the guide
Users can comment on content or
co-edit, “community building”, conversation from
university community. This gives chance for faculty collaboration
Can imbed video
Search boxes directly on page
for faster searching

Other tools like LibGuides and in addition to are:

My Library
http://mylibrary.library.nd.edu/demo-implementations/
-- Open Source or Freeware for organizing library resources,
research guides, course guides, etc.
Google webmaster tools
https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/docs/en/about.html
-- for tracking site statistics and supporting changes.
Subjects Plus - http://ithacalibrary.com/subsplus/
-- Open source tool for organizing library resources, research
guides, course guides, etc.
LibData - http://libdata.sourceforge.net/
-- Interface for subject guides, course guides, Open Source
ResearchGuide
- http://researchguide.sourceforge.net/
-- Web-based management of subject guides for academic libraries. An
example from the University of Michigan, Harlan Library, Darlene
Nichols’ Resources on Sociology Subject Guide
http://www.lib.umich.edu/grad/guide/guide.php?id=4
LIbCB -
http://sourceforge.net/projects/libcb/
-- Open source tool for organizing library resources, an example at
the University of Rochester, Earth Science subject guide by Katie
Clark http://www.library.rochester.edu/index.cfm?PAGE=160

Monday - Session: Fast and Easy site
tune-ups by Jeff Wisniewski, Web Services Librarian, University
of Pittsburgh

Update copyright date
Add photos to contacts/names
Replace instances of “click
here” with the real content. “Click here for
current articles” should be “Current articles are
available here.”
Create and read microformats.
Firefox has an add-on called tails
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/2240. Or Operator
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/4106
Both let you connect with the semantic web. Allows you to collect electronic
business cards and connect with other websites like Flickr or Google
Calender. For more info about Microformats go to
http://microformats.org

Use 3 question surveys:

1.What is purpose of your visit to our site today?
2. Were you able to complete your task today?
3. If not, why?
4. Ask for their email address.

Add forward slash to href
directory links (?)

Web 2.0ify your logo with Web
2.0 STYLr http://web2.0stylr.com/stylr.aspx
– free logo maker!
- Sans serif font
- Cheery colors
Use the WikiMedia
Commons to add bling to your site. Make icons, use
photos, art symbols.
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Icons_%28computing%29
Speed up your site:

Firebug
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1843
YSlow
http://developer.yahoo.com/yslow/
Set media types, CSS, PDFs,
and image file types not to expire.
Combine multiple images into
single image map. Speeds up downloads due to fewer http requests.
Eliminate inline scripts
except home page
Use WC3 validator to clean up
page.
Have good page titles

Get Google Webmaster
https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/docs/en/about.html
account

4. Monday - Session Learning Commons: The “In” in the CIL
presented by Tom Impri, Head of Media & Computer Services,
University of Nevada at Las Vegas

link to slideshow: http://www.slideshare.net/Tombrarian/learning-commons-the-in-in-cil

2nd Life is compliment to physical space
More Laptops!
Group Study Rooms
Movable furniture
Rich application suite (Open Source?)
White Boards
Smart Boards
Multi-media production editing
Vending machines
Practice presentation room

REALLY IMPORTANT FEATURES!

Students define the space
Variety of spaces (indoor, outdoor, cafe)
Comfort
Engaging environment
Human centered design
De-centered-ness
Positive emotional experience leads to better learning!

Other important ideas to keep in mind:

Active construction of knowledge by the learner - Constructivist/Cognitive theorists
GROUP WORK - sharing and learning from each other
Space facilitates or hinders learning
They leave if not comfortable
Need seamless work environments

access
manage
produce info
all @ same workstation

Check out The ECAR Study of Undergraduate Students
and Information Technology, (Sept) 2007

5. Tuesday - Session: Mashups for the Nontechies by Jody Fagan, Digital
Services Librarian, James Madison University
slideshow link http://cil2008.pbwiki.com/f/Mashups+for+the+Nontechies_Final.ppt

FURL – social bookmarking site like delicious where you can also create a feed of your bookmarked sites so others can subscribe to your feed and stay up-to-date with your bookmarks.

Yahoo! Pipes – a tool to aggregate RSS feeds together in one feed. I tried this at work and it works! Here is our Alkek Library News Blog and Information Literacy Blog together in one blog! http://pipes.yahoo.com/pipes/pipe.info?_id=ghVpfv0S3RGnpnFoy6ky6g

6. Tuesday - Session: The Library Sandbox: Testing Innovative Ideas by Barbara Tierney, Science Reference Librarian,University of North Carolina

She basically read from her book

Transforming Library Service Through Information Commons :Case Studies for the Digital Age, D.

Russell Bailey and Barbara Gunter Tierney, ALA Editions

Academic, public, and school librarians who
are considering an IC or are looking for ways to improve their IC will find a
wealth of information here. More

Case Studies she mentioned:

NCSU

EmoryUniversity

Temple University

20 case studies are listed in the book.

Points to keep in mind when planning a learning commons:

Substance over space (?)

Learning commons as classroom – this is a very simple view, I think

IL as program

Evolution from users needs creates tech changes

Study spaces into LC conductive to group work, coffee shops, comfort, modular furnishings

(I really like this idea, point)

7. Tuesday - Session: Libraries as Laboratories for Innovation by Matt Gullett, Emerging Technology Manager, Public Library of Charlotte & Mecklenburg County

Talked about how he created the virtual village for patrons to play with new technologies like a lab.
Virtual village music playing
Can share community stories
INFORMAL INSTRUCTION at COUNTER
Game lab at PLCMC
UNC the playground
Tech connect CMS
Linden Labs
Institute of Museum and Library Services

8. Tuesday - Session: Video, You Tube, & Libraries by Karen McBride, Web services
librarian, Des Plaines Public Library and Nick Baker, Reference & Web services
librarian, Williams College Libraries

Basically they presented how to do simple screencasting and upload to youTube. Pretty simple
presentation.

I find the fuzzyness of UTube videos for displaying screenshots
of the library’s website unacceptable.

9. Wednesday - Session: ELearning: IL Instruction & Out-of-the-Box Software by Robert Monge, University of South Dakota; Steve Borrelli, Washington State University; Julie Cavender, Jones Knowledge e-Global Library

Analysis>Design>Develop>Implement
Publish in flash or HTML

Software for creating tutorials Free or up to $6000 :

Articulate
Trainer soft
Toolbook Trainer
Courselab this one is freeware http://www.courselab.com/

Books they discussed:

1.
Wednesday - Session: Open Source Solutions to Offer Superior Service by Amy De Groff, Head of Library Technology Services, Howard County Public Library, Ching-hsien Wang, Manager, Library & Archives System Support, Smithsonian Institution, George Bowman, System Adminstrator, Smithosnian Insitution Resea, Smithsonian Institution, Eric Atkinson, Information Systems Department Head, Orange County Library System, Kimberly Babcock Mashek, Information Literacy Librarian, Wartburg College

Link to slideshow http://www.slideshare.net/mlibrarianus/computers-in-libraries-2008-open-source-solutions-to-offer-superior-service

· Open Office.org

· Google Docs

· Opera Desk Now

· Joomia

· Koha

· Finetune.com

· SIRIS Image server

· SOLR Interface Application

11. Wednesday - Session: Integrating Second Life (SL): Courses & Collections by
Craig Anderson, Reference Librarian, Kean University, Krista Godfrey, Liaison Librarian, McMaster University, Troy Swanson, Teaching & Learning Librarian, Moraine Valley Community College, Larry Sloma, Adjunct Librarian, Moraine Valley Community College

Integrating
Second Life & Google Maps
One of them says 3D exhibit is not easy to design
For exhibit – intro area is good to orient people that are new to SL
Computer on a desk that can link to gallery webpage

POST-CONFERENCE Session: Screencasting 101: Creating Online Tutorials in Less than 30 minutes by Greg R. Notess

Online tutorials are better for many reasons:

self-paced
video and audio make it interesting

Points Notess made:

Should not record full screen - don't need to see what other programs you were running when you filmed
smaller screen size better (640X480)
to produce video choose Adobe Flash - get more flexibility and features in this format - Flash is streaming format/larger audience acceptance
Sometimes it is more efficient to redo entire tutorial rather than edit
can get statistics
save as a file to server
can link sttraight to .swf file and it will play
embed video in a web page (Video code embed generator )
make tutorials for databases that have little tips that need to be explained
Could use dreamweaver to imbed flash or other video file format
don't go full screen
don't start off talking a lot - no long intro - boring
Could use music trac too - then use call outs or bubbles

Some software Notess talked about:

Jing jingproject.com

free
comes with some hosting
has pause
for Mac and PCs

TipCam www.utipu.com

windows xp and vista
20 min max
can share private or public with url

Webinaria www.webinaria.com

windows
screenshots produce an .avi file
public or private
free
limited editing

Screencast Recorder freescreencast.com
Screencast-o-matic screencast-o-matic.com

web based so for windows ro mac or linux
output as Java
no editing

Wink www.debugmode.com/wink

windows and linux
records as screen shots
free

CamStudio http://camstudio.org/

patent debate

Of classroom software and assessment

2008-05-16T14:11:00.007-04:00

Although it is the May mini-mester and there are relatively few students we are keeping busy with various projects. Next week will be a bit more busy with several workshops for faculty and also for IL librarians as well. I will be conducting a short training (something of a refresher course) on our classroom equipment. We have a SMARTBoard, along with Synchroneyes classroom control software and Senteo clickers. We are all at different levels of comfort with these tools.

I would very much like to hear from anyone who uses any or all of these tools, and any interesting tidbits about using them in the classroom. One of the things we noticed about the SMARTBoard is that because our classroom is good-sized, it can be difficult for visibility with large classes. I myself love to use it with smaller classes, in particular with ESL classes. I have done a desultory search on google for more (Synchoneyes and assessment in particular) but haven't found much in the literature as of yet.

We will be testing the Synchroneyes quiz function this summer hopefully to see if it is better or easier to use for our Freshmen English assessment. We have gotten through two semesters with Surveymonkey, which works pretty well, but is a bit awkward in terms of delivery (the teacher has to send the quiz link to the students). The other consideration though, is the ease of availability of the raw scores/results. Surveymonkey has a download feature that lets you get the raw scores and results along with other information in an excel file. It has also been helpful to be able to print out the surveys in case of technical malfunction, and then enter in the paper responses manually, which is another feature of Surveymonkey.

At any rate, I foresee a future blog post once I know more, comparing one and the other.

An idea for Google notebook, and catching up

2008-05-07T17:07:00.008-04:00

I was noodling around and rediscovered Google Notebook again. I had noticed it last year (judging from the date of the little snippet I had saved) and most probably forgot about it. It seems to have been around for a while, and probably people are already using it. It just occured to me as I looked at it again that maybe it might be a good tool to use for an assignment for evaluating websites. Students could be assigned several websites, and they could evaluate each assigned site and make notes in their notebook, and then share them with the class. The only hitch is that the students would need a Google account. I did a quick search to see if anybody else is doing something like this--I found this blog post written by Laura Pressley of Wake Forest University referencing a presentation by Jennie Hunt. I am curious how that class/assignment worked out. I am sure to find more if I look deeper, but in the meantime I am thinking it might be an interesting activity to develop, possibly.

I am considering to test it as an activity with an ESL undergraduate class, that is normally a two part class, and only about 10 students.

Interim/Summer is always a very busy time, because although there are less students, we are preparing projects for upcoming semesters and finishing up old projects. Our team has gone through two semesters of assessing freshman year English composition classes, and so currently we are revising the survey and looking to investigate using either our class management software TRACS or Synchroneyes as possible alternatives to using Survey Monkey. I know there have been gallons of ink spilled on assessment already, and really all I venture to add to this vast knowledge is the observation that reading about how other people do assessment is helpful but there is no better learning experience than putting a project into practice. I think i will save a detailed description for a separate post.

We are also setting up several workshops/trainings for staff which should be interesting. One will be on using our our SMARTBoard, Synchroneyes (classroom control software), and Senteo (clickers). Another will be a Web 2.0 presentation for staff. So, looking up to be a busy May.

Catching up........and Conference Slides

2008-04-30T09:33:00.002-04:00

I finally posted my slides from my TLA Netfair presentation on April 17th here:

| View | Upload your own

I am really happy to have gotten a chance to talk about my experiences as a volunteer. I have really enjoyed my volunteer shifts at the Second Life library.

We are wrapping up our semester and I personally am catching up on various and sundry things. And still digesting some of the CIL 2008 stuff.

Computers in Libraries 2008, day two highlights

2008-04-09T21:05:00.009-04:00

One of the difficult things about this conference is that so many of the sessions look really really interesting, and I always desperately wish I could be cloned, at least for the few days I am attending.

The first session of the day (for me) was Next Generation Library Interfaces by Marshall Breeding. This was particularly interesting for me because our library had gotten a new OPAC relatively recently, and I had also read the Library Technology Report on Next Generation Library Catalogs he had written. He started out with a sobering statistic from a 2005 study, that 89% of college students go to search engines and only 2% go to the library website when searching for information. He then went on to ask if OPACs were really just computerized card catalogs, and did library websites both meet information needs and also attract interest? In addition to these considerations, he pointed out some flaws of ILS OPACs, namely:

not good for delivering e-content
text-based interfaces
hampered by weak keyword searches
poor relevancy sorting
narrow scope of content

What I found most compelling and/or prescient was his characterization of the searching experience as "disjointed." In other words, one must know to search in different places for different content, different places for books, articles, etc. He prescribed several things to update OPACs for users--that OPACs must be re-envisioned and traditional ideas of the catalog should be discarded. A new-style OPAC should:

integrate print and online resources
not force people to use different interfaces
better relevancy ranked results
incorporate social networking traits
bread crumbs
spell check and search suggest (do you mean this? like in google)
re-make, evolve LCSH, MARC

The next session was on Twitter and Del.icio.us with several presenters--Michael Sauers and Christa Burns presented on Twitter, and Aysegul Kapucu, Athena Hoeppner, and Doug Dunlop presented on Del.icio.us.

The presentation began with the del.icio.us segment, which explained that it is a web-based social bookmarking tool, available from any browser, and how their university (University of Central Florida) uses it to increase access to library resources by creating quick on the fly resource lists for classes and individuals. They made an account for ucflibrary and also uploaded 400 database links, tagged resources for students and classes by name in research consultations and library instruction, and trained librarians to use del.icio.us. They are working on subject specific accounts like art and engineering, and also did a survey to assess student awareness. They found that there may need to be some outreach to students, as their students were not natively aware of del.icio.us.
Our library has been using a del.icio.us site, but it was very interesting to see how this library was using theirs pretty extensively.

The Twitter portion was presented by Michael Sauers and Christa Burns. I am regular reader of Michael Sauers' blog, so I was keenly interested to see what he had to say. I have also used Twitter sporadically in my personal life and so was curious how libraries use it institutionally. A few examples that they gaver were the Ann Arbor District Library, that is using it for announcements, and also the Nebraska Library Commission , that uses it to post questions. They also showed BBC technews headlines. Some of the issues about using Twitter were:

too many sms tweets
the ephemeral nature of tweets
it's posssibly too distracting
the need to participate to get any reaction
the need to follow and @comment others
link to your stuff
Don’t take non-responses personally
Be patient
Avoid addiction
Use your name

The next session was on Facebook in Libraries, presented by Laurie Bridges and Cliff Landis. Popular with generation Y, and has applications for outreach, social aspects, information organization, advertising, and virtual networking.He notied it is the most popular site for people aged 18-24 is and more popular than google.Facebook has about 58 million users, and about half return daily.It is also the “stickiest” website—average users stick around 20 minutes and average 32 page views.He talked about Library webpages and how library applications are not social, and therefore not as popular. Some of his interesting conclusions were:

that Library catalogs are social networks for ideas
Ideas are social
The line between intellectual and social space was never there
it is never a mistake to give users more options
Talk to users
Use the tools they are using
Broadcast what you are doing
Earn your audience

The next two sessions were also very interesting. One was on Video, YouTube, and Libraries. I saw the first half with Karen McBride. It was very much a how-to start doing videos with very simple equipment. I liked that she emphasized that 2.0 video is raw, edgy, and badly lit, and that it is okay not to be perfect. She talked about the various options with cameras, etc.

The next one I attended was about Virtual Reference, and in particular I caught the part of the presentation about American University's efforts in that realm. They started to transition to IM only in 2006, and they talked about how IM service providers weren't just limited to librarians, but also paraprofessionals. They stressed how it built rapport and helped grow the service. They also talked a bit about their marketing efforts, involving graphic design with faculty and staff input and student reaction. They showed some of their branding, as well as other things like valentine's day themed stickers, candy, and imprinted sharpie pens. They also spoke of how they marketed using facebook, the student news, in-class, on campus newspaper, shuttlebuses, etc. I was also very intrigued as they spoke of evaluating and expanding their service further with meebo, VOIP, and sms/texting.

Computers in Libraries 2008 highlights, day one

2008-04-08T12:06:00.009-04:00

I am currently attending Computers in Libraries in Arlington, Va. I went last year and found it amazing in terms of exposing me to all the new things out there that people are doing and using with Web 2.0. It really energized me and inspired me to do try many things. I am still processing all the information from the presentations I attended, but I intend to post some highlights of the sessions I attended.

Apart from dealing with the excitement of the night before (my colleague Tara's and my luggage didn't arrive when we did, but luckily it was delivered to our hotel at 2 am.) the first day was very interesting.

The first session I attended was on Going Local in the Library presented by Charles Lyons--and the gist of the presentation was how to use Google, mashups, and other web tools to create local information sources for our users. He pointed out that this localization of web services is becoming quite common, even to the point of social networks being created for a block or an apartment building in a neighborhood. I can see perhaps where in an academic setting, this type of idea could be something like an extension of maybe a facebook group for a particular dorm or class maybe. or even commuter students.

The next session on Mobile Search, was very fascinating. It was presented by Gary Price and Megan Fox, and it was jam packed with information. I had thought of myself as a heavy user of my blackberry but I had no idea what was out there in terms of applications for the phone. I found this session very relevant because as they pointed out, having an internet enabled phone/device allows people to access information 24/7. They also discussed characteristics of how users ask questions with these devices, mostly short "ready reference" types of things. The discussion they had on using barcode readers in phones to get information about objects was really cool. I also learned about "snippets" which are widgets for your phone. I really think this is very relevant information for a growing group of users, and I suspect that it will be the pivot point for the next evolution of library services--not only in the places we can see being affected (txt chat service) but also because it changes user behavior so much, and will in turn shape their expectations.

I also went to the What's new with Federated Search presentation given by Frank Cervone and Jeff Wisniewski, another very relevant session as we are discussing implementing federated search in our library. The main point that seemed to be stressed was the idea that the use/concept of federated search as a standalone product is evolving into a more holistic view of federated search as a component of the new library catalogs. This means that the federated search results include all library content, not just aggregating results from databases. And, when they mean all library content, it literally means getting results from the library catalog, digital holdings (I think that would include items from institutional repositories and also digital collections) and articles. They mentioned some products by name with some features that they felt were "standouts." Worldcat Local (OCLC) for its level of granularity, Encore (III) for the tag clouds (that map to LCSH), Primo (Exlibris) for facets that enhance searching, and also a few other new and interesting products/companies, such as University of Chicago's implementation of the Opera browser (would definitely like to see this) and also Autographix, who they described as being comparable to the main library vendors although they focus on enterprise business and academic libraries.

I think i will stop for now, my apologies if my irregular posting is causing havoc, but I have started drafts the day these things occured, and naturally meant to post that evening, but was caught up in conference doings. At least we have the Airline flight cancellations to thank for this stretch of uninterrupted alone time so that I may catch up. :)

Interesting proposal and upcoming conferences

2008-03-26T13:46:00.003-04:00

March is always such an interesting month, bisected by Spring Break. Hopefully everyone has had a nice one. :) And of course we are getting to start of April, which is a big conference month in Library Land.

A quick prop to my colleague Arlene Salazar, who passed along this Call for Proposals for the Library Instruction Cookbook. Both the book and the companion blog look really cute and enjoyable to read, and I love the premise of lesson plans being written as recipes.

I will be going to Computers in Libraries 2008 in Arlington, VA from the 7th to the 9th of April and looking forward to the presentations. I am also going to do a short presentation at the Texas Library Association Annual Conference's NetFair II on my experiences as a volunteer reference librarian in Second Life. So, that should be interesting.

my first glogger IL poster

2008-03-04T14:38:00.004-05:00

i tried to embed this and it was so big it looked funny, but at least i know it works. i made this poster today and will unleash it on my unsuspecting English class tomorrow morning.

i am curious how it will be received.

Interesting new tool--Glogster

2008-02-29T17:54:00.004-05:00

I was churning through the web looking for something new, and I stumbled on something I had never seen before--Glogster. It's a social poster site. Poster, as in graphics, and multimedia. I just signed up, and haven't made anything yet, but I can totally see using these as part of my teaching repetoire. Apparently it is supposed to be very easy to make them, even if one does not know HTML.

Now, I am probably the last person in the universe to have seen this website, but nevertheless I was so interested I just had to blog it.

I can immediately think of a few ways to use this in IL instruction:

an assignment for students in IL classes (have students make one)
a quick and cool way to make posters to illustrate concepts for each class I teach.

I also think it would be great as well for those who are very visual in their learning styles.

I was particularly intrigued by Cybrarian's Glogs. I think i feel inspired to go make one for next week's classes.

"Clickers" in a IL classroom setting; an experience

2008-02-15T16:29:00.007-05:00

We recently got new classroom management software (allows for broadcasting screens for students and such) by Synchroneyes, and also we got "clickers," the inelegant term for "interactive response system. "

I have had a chance to recently try these out, and I thought it might be interesting and or illuminating to share my experience. I did a quick google on clickers and IL and some scattered links came up, so obviously it is being done. My particular experience was very interesting because it was for a first-year class, though some of them were upperclassmen and transfer students. Normally my preferred audience participation aid would be candy, but we had run out.

So I started by handing out the clickers and explaining that I would normally have candy. This seemed to amuse them. I noticed they were very pleased about being able to participate in the process. We talked about topics to research, and I opened up the Notebook software that goes with the clickers and entered in the topics they proposed, and had them vote. It seemed to go well, with the quiz question, a pie chart displays with answer percentages and a status count for votes.

I also had converted an activity where I show them magazine and journal covers and identify them as scholarly or not to use with the clickers. That seemed to work very smoothly.

I am now curious how other people are using this in their classrooms, and wanting to expand their use in other situations.

Finding Reserve Materials by Using the "Hard Copy Reserve" Search

2008-02-06T16:39:00.000-05:00

Have you ever wanted to know if your professor has your textbook on reserve but wasn't sure how to find out? Did your professor tell you to read an article from a book that's on reserve at the library? Or do you want to know if there are any old tests on reserve to help you study for your next exam? Finding the answers to these questions got a lot easier last year when the new library catalog was released. The catalog now houses all the reserve items in a way that can be searched by everyone.

All you need to do to find reserve items for your class is to click the "hard copy reserve" link on the main library catalog page. Next you will see the option to search by course or professor. The course search uses the same abbreviations the university uses, "bio," "comm," "mc," etc. Enter the last name to search for the professor, lecturer, or instructor.

If you do not find a textbook on reserve by your professor, sometimes you can find it under another professor's name...especially for the larger core classes that use the same textbook. Try searching by course too.

Another thing to remember: this is different from the "electronic reserve." E-Reserve, or ERes for short, is for electronic access to reserve materials. In order to access ERes materials, you will need a password, given to you by your professor. The materials (usually articles or book chapters) can be downloaded and printed. Hardcopy reserve will be on the 4th floor at the Researve desk and most items must be used in the library. Photocopying articles or chapters is allowed.

Interesting Presentation on CMS/Library Integration

2008-01-25T16:36:00.001-05:00

Over the holidays I was forwarded this interesting powerpoint presentation, from the 8th Sakai Conference, held at the beginning of December 2007. Entitled " Integrating Library Resources into Sakai," and given by Jezmynne Westcott of The Claremont Colleges, it discusses how she built a library site in SAKAI for their Science Library. (SAKAI is a Course Management System used by our university)

Although a casual perusal of the biblioblogosphere and a cursory google search brought up large amounts of literature on integrating libraries and library services into CMS, I still thought it interesting in light of some of the experiments we have been undertaking in our Information Literacy classes.

We generally make a class outline in our Information Literacy Wiki for each Information Literacy session we teach. Our wiki is outside of our classroom management software, and so a few of us have been asking professors to enable their TRACS wikis and then add librarians in the course, so we can go in and build wiki guides for each class. Hopefully we can do more.

Welcome back!

2008-01-14T13:03:00.000-05:00

It's the beginning of the semester!

Our new website is up, and so are our new workshop offerings. Some of the other new features/pages of our website include:

Downloadable Library Walking tour (download to your iPod)
Tutorials Page (includes link to Alkek youtube tutorials)
Library Toolbar (install in your browser so you can search library resources like the catalog wherever you are)
Research RSS Feeds

And don't forget, if you would like us to make a tutorial or a workshop, you can send in a suggestion.

Happy Belated New Years!

2008-01-08T11:16:00.003-05:00

We have been on vacation, but will be back soon! Hope everyone had wonderful holidays. :)

Accreditation as the impetus for IL integration--is that the answer?

2007-11-08T14:31:00.000-05:00

What follows is a (extremely) belated account of an interesting presentation I attended in San Antonio, as part of the Council of Research and Academic Libraries (CORAL). One of the member libraries of this consortium is Trinity University, which has made the news lately as they have chosen Information Literacy as their Quality Enhancement Plan (QEP) project for their 10 year accreditation renewal.

For those not in the know, the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS) is the regional body/committee that accredits schools and universities throughout the South. One of their requirements for re-accreditation is for institutions to develop a QEP project which is supposed to be a long term project (like 5 years) and the institution must support the project financially as well.

Michelle Millet is the Information Literacy coordinator at Trinity University, and she did a presentation on Trinity's (and her) experience during this process. There have been some articles written about Trinity University's adoption of Information Literacy (integrating it into the curriculum) as their QEP project, but this presentation was very detailed about the actual process of writing the proposal, etc. It was a very illuminating (and practical) look at how to plan and implement such a large undertaking.

It made me wonder if this perhaps is the best way to get IL integrated into the curriculum. There are other examples of schools that have done similar plans. Michelle Millet herself touched on this briefly in her presentation. She outlined benefits of this process--namely that the university must support the chosen plan, so the necessary institutional support is there, and because of this it speeds up the process of integration.

The other main point I took with me from this presentation is the importance of data and data collection, which Michelle Millet emphasized pretty strongly. She noted that it was good to have assessment data to justify the proposal, as well as assessment of program progress as well.

I admit I am somewhat ignorant of other accreditation bodies and how they work, but I believe that this process is similar at least in other states in the U.S. I am curious about how this would work in other countries.

Catching up.........and welcome

2007-10-24T15:25:00.000-04:00

It's been a very very busy semester.....just now getting a bit of a break from our classes. There's quite a lot to catch up on. :)

I'd like to welcome (somewhat belatedly) our new IL instruction librarian Tara Spies. :) Hopefully she will be posting soon. :)

Hooray Tara! :)

Top 10 Alkek library tools for college students? that maybe you don't know about?

2007-09-12T10:41:00.000-04:00

I had meant to post this way back in July, but I'd come across this page on the top 10 Web Tools for College Students and although I know this list is old, and I have seen several variants on it as well, it got me thinking. What would be the top 10 Alkek library tools for college students? So I came up with this little list here--though trying very hard to shake off my naturally librarian-centric point of view. And then I wondered how many people knew about them.

1. Worldcat

Worldcat is listed on the library databases page, but it's not for searching articles. It's more of a gigantic library catalog (the name implies this too) and it's helpful for looking to see what other libraries have a certain book or journal. Unfortunately we don't have every book and journal that people need, and if you need it very badly and want to know if it's in a nearby library, Worldcat will tell you. see also #9 on this list.

2. Refworks (or technically any citation management tool)

Refworks will really make your life easier. It organizes your citations and generates bibliographies for you in different style formats. You can even export the citation information to Refworks as you collect your sources. There are other free open source citation managers out there like zotero, but Refworks has some nifty features and it's free to use if you are a Txstate University student.

3. Databases & Refworks RSS feeds feature

Our discussion on Refworks leads us into our next essential tool--database and Refworks RSS feeds. If you are unaware what RSS is or how to use a feed reader, see this wiki page. Some of the databases (EBSCO databases for sure) provide a feed link so you can cut and paste your search and your search results into your favorite feed reader. Every time a new article that matches your search comes up, you'll get it in your new items list. Sweet, no? With Refworks RSS feed reader, this is even cooler. Take the feed from your search, and it will import the citations from the feed into your Refworks account.

4. Online catalog

The catalog may seem old-school, but it's got some nice enhanced features that will save you some time. One new feature is the My Account login. You can renew your books online (you can renew online up to 3 times) and also save searches and get email alerts (similar to the RSS feeds but you'll get an email with the new items that match your search). You can also login to request checked out items to be held for you at Circulation when they are turned back in.

5. Using Google Scholar to link back to Alkek Library articles

This is another underappreciated little quirk to using the Library webpage. If you are on-campus this little trick should work any way you get to Google Scholar, but if you are off-campus you need to go to the library databases page to get to Google Scholar. When you search this way, articles that you have access to via Alkek Library subscriptions will have a link beside them saying either TxState E-Journals or Findit@Txstate. This is unlike regular searches where they try to make you pay for articles. Most of the time the library has access to them.....why pay when you have free access?

6. Setting up Google Scholar to export to Refworks

So, hopefully you have tried number 5 and now want to figure out how to get your citation from Google Scholar to your Refworks account. Go to Scholar Preferences and at the bottom next to Bibliography Manager you'll get a choice to "show links to import citations into" and then a dropdown menu. Pick Refworks on the dropdown and save preferences. Now when you get your Google Scholar results you'll see a link at the bottom of the citation that says "Import into RefWorks." Clicking on that link will import the cite into your Refworks account. If this is really confusing, see the nice video that shows you exactly how to do this.

7. Periodical List

Another underappreciated library tool. It's not for searching for articles exactly. Its for looking to see if the library has a particular journal or newspaper and showing any full text databases with links, and also with any print info. You can also browse by subject to see a list of our journals/magazines/newspapers in any given subject. You'll use this the most when you just have a citation and no full-text, and you have to search by hand for the full text somewhere else or print copies.

8. Sign-in Feature in EBSCO databases

Don't mean to be an EBSCO shill, but they have a nifty feature where you can sign in to the database and you can save all the citations you gathered in a folder, and then when you sign in again they'll still be there. Otherwise if you don't sign in if you log out the citations in your folder will get erased. You can also save searches and alerts, and export from your folder.

9. Interlibrary Loan (ILLiad) & Texshare

Sadly, we don't have every single book in the known universe. But, we can try to order it for you if you need it. That's the basis of our Interlibrary Loan Service. Use the Illiad online form to order things we don't have. Sometimes if you are in certain databases you'll see a link to Illiad in the database itself, and in some cases it will fill out the form for you. Otherwise login and fill out the form. If it's available online you will get your requested article online. If it's in print, come by Alkek 213 to pick it up, or just ask at the reference desk.

Texshare is slightly different. Interlibrary Loan Service can take up to 2 weeks to be delivered. Sometimes you don't really have the time to wait. Texshare is a card you get at the Circulation desk that lets you check out books at libraries across Texas. In fact, you can use #1 Worldcat to see where a certain item is and then go check it out with your Texshare card.

10. E-Book collections

What if you need a book and you want it online? We have a growing collection of ebooks. You can set the catalog to display only e-books, and access them from there. We also have a webpage that has links to all the major collections of e-books.

Catching up at the Beginning of the Semester, and in with the new............

2007-08-28T09:36:00.001-04:00

So the semester began officially last week, and we are welcoming the students back to campus. We have a new roster of workshops and Refworks sessions, as well as Library Orientations.

On another note, yours truly (Lorin Fisher) am now Information Literacy Coordinator, so expect to hear more about our program and Information Literacy in general.

RSS and Refworks and Research

2007-08-10T17:16:00.000-04:00

Did you know you can use Refworks as a feed reader? This nifty webpage from the Refworks folks explains it all. But this is really a wonderful development--now you can set up database feeds
for your searches from the databases and then use Refworks' RSS feature to import citations from those feeds.

Summer fun! and gearing up for the Semester

2007-08-03T11:39:00.000-04:00

Summer II semester is winding down, and although we've been a bit more silent on the blog, we've been busily working towards the fall semester. The library is a part of the freshman orientation known as Paws Preview, which is coming up next week. Check out our new updated orientation video here. Also, watch for our updated orientation schedules and workshops coming soon.

Our first informational machinima

2007-07-13T16:59:00.000-04:00

Here's a link to a short machinima semi-tutorial meant to introduce unaware Texas State University students to Second Life and show a glimpse of our online campus.

using zotero to manage citations

2007-06-29T17:18:00.000-04:00

I am probably the last person in the world to find out about zotero, but I have downloaded it and find it extremely cool. It's an extension for firefox, and you can use it to keep citation information and other extremely useful things.......like adding notes, taking a picture of the page, even adding tags to citations. This is a list of databases/sites that work with zotero, and they don't have all possible citation styles yet. Here's also a nice youtube tutorial from zoteron which explains it pretty well.

Summer update

2007-06-20T17:04:00.000-04:00

ah, the summer. We've been actually fairly busy with classes, and also a new instruction librarian has joined our team as well, Charles Allan. The ALA annual conference is coming soon--several librarians will be attending. Hopefully that will generate even more interesting new ideas to post about. :)

I am curious how many people use adobe premiere/premiere elements either alone or in combination with screencasting software like camtasia or captivate for tutorials or other projects. There's been a flurry of seminars and other writing on screencasting, but most of the time people seem to be focusing on the screen capture aspect of it all. We have been producing and showing a short library video for our first year student orientation for nearly 4 years, in various different incarnations---first in Premiere 5, then Captivate, then Camtasia, and now it appears possibly a combination of both. If anybody knows of a good program that can handle both screen captures and edit video well (I know Camtasia can handle video, but it doesn't really seem to be as easy to edit video in Camtasia than in Premiere Elements) I would be definitely interested to know.

Another interesting development would be to offer a workshop in basic Second Life skills in addition to our other workshops. I would venture that especially if and when students begin to attend classes in SL, that this would probably become necessary.

Interesting ACRL poster session

2007-06-07T17:21:00.001-04:00

I got a couple of notices on several list-servs on a really cool looking virtual poster session. It's called Eye to I: Visual Literacy Meets Information Literacy and it's got lots of fabulous information on a subject which seems to be very much of the moment. Since so much of our culture's communication is conducted in visual media, it's surprising to me that this aspect of IL integration isn't mentioned more. There's alot to look at on this site--I am still plowing through the site's online posters.

Library Tutorials

2007-05-31T14:37:00.000-04:00

We're creating tutorials to help people use our resources and have recently added them to our website:

http://www.library.txstate.edu/ref/bi/libtutorials.htm

For now, we're also linking them out to YouTube, where we're getting quite a few hits (thanks to those of you who have viewed or linked to our tutorials there). We've learned quite a bit from what other libraries are doing and will continue to experiment, revise, and hopefully teach a few people how to do research along the way.

Devin

Second Life Best Practices in Education 2007

2007-05-29T10:25:00.000-04:00

Last Friday I attended a session of the Second Life Best Practices in Education conference in world. I had just sat my avatar down 5 minutes before the start time when the dreaded mandatory log-off in 5 minutes message came through. Once that little hiccup was resolved, and my avatar was re-seated, the presentation started. It was very interesting in that the speaker's voice was piped through as well, adding to the unearthly experience. It was also my first time seeing a whiteboard in action, and I was taking notes. One little quirk was the fact that it took a couple of seconds to for each new screen to rez. It wasn't terribly bad, just a bit odd--I wonder how a real student would react to that.

The gist of the session was profiling a professor's experiences with her three class sections using SL assignments and also meeting them in world with online office hours. Her classes are more like systems engineering and such, but I can see where it could go with information literacy classes. I had wanted to "go" to the action learning session, but the timing was weird.

I also had a chance to check out the poster sessions and also the exhibitors, which was pretty cool. Still haven't gone through my virtual swag though.

So far I can see a few ways of adding IL into a virtual class.

have a librarian embedded in with a class taking place in SL (and the librarian would embed library resources as much as possible)
have a "game" like that one sim (I can't remember the name just now) that is set up like myst (scattered clues and very self directed discovery type game)
have real life IL sessions in a second life classroom.

I've read in other places that people are discussing what IL means in second life--it strikes me that this ties in with maybe expanding IL instruction in libraries to include teaching students how to use Second Life (and other software).

More Multicultural Transformation........and Second life

2007-05-25T11:08:00.000-04:00

This last Wednesday our head of Reference Dr. Clara Ogbaa did another session for the Multicultural Curriculum Transformation faculty members, and yours truly did a short segment on wiki editing. Dr. Ogbaa presented on advanced searching--who knew that you could do so much with google? (see the wiki pages here). Something very interesting came up--some of the faculty were interested in the wiki features in TRACS, which is our institution's course management system. Which leads us to wonder if perhaps migrating part of our wiki pages into a TRACS site wiki might be a good vector for integrating information literacy into courses. (one of the glories of TRACS is that it has a wiki feature built into course sites)

Today there's a Second Life conference in Best Practices in Education in world. I will probably attend a few sessions. I am curious how this will work out, as this is my first SL conference. I've been to various meetings before in large groups, which is an interesting time keeping up with what's getting said.......at least there's a transcript to go over later.

2007 Multicultural Curriculum Transformation Institute

2007-05-17T18:16:00.000-04:00

Yesterday our Reference department head Dr. Clara Ogbaa presented "Multicultural Resources: Research Strategies" to faculty attending the Multicultural Curriculum Transformation Institute. It may sound like a run-of-the-mill presentation, but if you examine the presentation slides, it is not the usual library presentation at all.

The other interesting aspect is the fact that we've created wiki pages (see wiki pages) for each faculty member's class, and participating faculty are allowed to post and edit in our wiki.

nice vid on making youtube videos better looking

2007-05-09T14:46:00.000-04:00

This is old, but it had nice information that i found useful. And props to our friend in IT, Reb Thomas for sending it to me. (it's probably easier than trying to explain it to me on the phone)

RSS + Information Fluency = Multimedia producers?

2007-05-04T11:06:00.000-04:00

constantly and forever. And actually that reminds me, our Using RSS feeds and blogs for Research
class wiki page is up--I think it would be grand to convert it into a youtube tutorial, but it's extremely useful for keeping up with new developments. In fact that's how I am passing along some choice nuggets for you.

The fabulous Sheila Webber of Information Literacy Weblog has a cool post on the Web 2.0 meets Information Fluency wiki. I have yet to read the article fully, but it sounds very promising. I'd like to also suggest something that's been swishing around in the brainpan lately--probably a side effect of the conferences I've been too, but namely that we should include other skills under the IL banner, like recording audio, video, other media skills. The article references blogs, but I think it should go further into production skills like vlogging, podcasting, vidcasting, making feeds, etc. It's not as tenuous as it sounds.......if you are importing all this info like a huge funnel into your head and processing it like you are supposed to (i'm referencing the 5 IL standards here), what about the output? How do you take the information you learned and spit it out again and launch it into the social web ether?

back from Computers in Libraries 2007

2007-04-20T13:18:00.000-04:00

And there was alot of good stuff going on. I didn't have internet access sadly, so no live right there updates, but I can offer some interesting bits, which have hopefully gotten more interesting and focused while being slowly digested for a few days.

The second day really focused on instruction which is what we are talking about, so I will put in a short precis of those first.

The first instruction related session was given by Chad Boeninger from Ohio, (and I'll stop here and give him some props for being so nice) entitled "Dynamic Instructional Content." He covered a goodly number of tools like podcasts, videos, screencasts and other stuff all in 45 minutes.
Some of the stuff that stuck out in my mind (and my insanely written notes) were things like:

using a blog to teach for a business class
also putting class assignments in the wiki with helpful links for students (and probably other librarians)
using a locally hosted wordpress blog to use polls in the blog as an alternative to a clicker, or the meebo me widget embedded in the wiki or a blog page.
The meebo thing was really interesting as a way for shy students to ask questions during a class.
podcasting--discussed good free stuff like audacity and wink
camstudio (for recording screen captures and things, like camtasia or captivate)
communication tools like Skype, IM, etc
using bookmarks for classes in del.icio.us
facebook

Also the bits of good advice like:

software is free like a free kitten.
learn from failures and success
try new things and get momentum for buy-in
try looking at other tools

The next one was given by Meredith Farkas and Michelle Boule, "Learning with Blogs & Wikis".
This session discussed using these tools in the context of an online course for librarians called "Five Weeks to a Social Library".

The main points covered were short definitions of what blogs and wikis were, what their strengths and weaknesses are, and also a short comparison of each in relation to each other (blogs vs. wikis). They also discussed the effect on reflective learning They encouraged everyone to steal this idea! and also offered interesting insights and tips on how to make it work.
The main points I got from this part were: (and this is drawn verbatim from their actual presentation wiki here)

You don't have to teach this course in five weeks
You don't have to use the exact same tools
You don't have to cover the same topics (this would work for most topics!)

You do need to provide for experiential and reflective learning
You do need to provide ways for people to have many different conversations about what they're learning
You do need to use tools that aren't so difficult to learn that they become a barrier
You do need to be flexible when technology problems arise (they will!)
You do need to be open about the process and allow criticism from inside and outside the project (if it is public)
The learning experience needs to be flexible and involve multiple modes of learning (audio & video, synchronous & asynchronous, etc.)

The really cool thing about this particular project is that from what I understand, this was put together by a group of librarians and designed for librarians who wouldn't be able to have access to this sort of training otherwise. The course site is still up and freely available for people to look at.

It's getting late, so I'll continue with this later.......

Another youtube tutorial

2007-04-09T14:59:00.000-04:00

another one to add. :)

Find Articles Tutorial

2007-04-06T11:54:00.000-04:00

We're in the process of creating online tutorials to help people do research at Alkek Library. Here's a sample:

Find Articles

Devin Zimmerman

RSS workshop date changed to April 24 10-11am

2007-04-04T18:14:00.000-04:00

RSS workshop has moved to April 24 from 10 to 11 am, in room 101.

SL buzz meeting

2007-03-23T18:16:00.000-04:00

So, I went to my first SL meeting in-world last week. Apart from the disorienting feeling of coming into a meeting cold and having to catch up, there were some unique hazards that don't normally come up during a meeting--like having your avatar slump as if asleep (I've never fallen asleep in a meeting) and also interesting animal avatars lurking nearby and other avatars flying around. I was merely "listening" and so read the conversation intently, although about half of it was somewhat incomprehensible for me.

It's a pretty mindblowing experience though. Information literacy got mentioned fleetingly, though from what I remember it was in the context of finding information on Second Life, in world. (that is how I understood it at least--I don't have the transcript in front of me.) Which, to this mind at least, is a huge jump.

Back from Spring Break! Upcoming Workshop!

2007-03-20T18:01:00.000-04:00

And I hope everyone had a very good spring break this year. We're all back to our classes, as the high season for papers approaches.

It also appears to be high season for conferences. It should be quite exciting. I myself am going to Computers in Libraries 2007, and am planning to post while I'm gone. Yours truly also intends to post commentary on some of the Second life happenings for librarians. (What's Second Life?)

So why this sudden surge of interest? As usual, while reading another blog I came across this article: INFORMATION LITERACY IN THE AGE OF AMATEURS How Google and Web 2.0 affect librarians’ support of Information Literacy...........which is a new angle on everything. I am not going to rehash and enumerate every single item in this article--there's plenty of commentary on Web 2.0 and libraries (just go and google it and you'll see). But I will point out that the paper discusses extending IL instruction to include showing students how to access and evaluate information from Blogs, wikis, and other web 2.0 content. This ties into yet another cool ebook that talks about new literacies.

Where am I going with all this? Well..........all this good stuff (and more) is going to end up in some form or another in the upcoming workshop Using Blogs and RSS Feeds for Research April 5 at 10-11am, in room 101.

Alkek Library Podcast 03/07/07

2007-03-07T10:50:00.000-05:00

eCommons@TxState

Alkek Library Podcast 03/06/07 Part 2

2007-03-06T15:34:00.000-05:00

Library Workshops Podcast

Did you know Alkek Library offers drop-in workshops on topics like demographic and marketing resources for business research and on focused areas like sociology, education, and psychology?

The workshops are usually about an hour long and are held in room 101 of Alkek Library. No registration required.

Some of the upcoming sessions include:

ARTstor, March 20th, 2 – 3 PM
Using Google for Scholarly Research, March 22nd, 5 – 6 PM
Evaluating Internet Sources, April 2nd, 11 – 12
Using Blogs and RSS feeds for research, April 5th, 10 -11

More information and dates/times of Library Workshops

Alkek Library Podcast 03/06/07

2007-03-06T09:12:00.000-05:00

RefWorks Training

Alkek Library Podcast 03/05/07

2007-03-05T11:54:00.000-05:00

"'IM ME!' Ask a Librarian is Now Easier" from Spring 2007 Bookmarks, Alkek Library's Newsletter

Alkek Library Podcast 03/01/07

2007-03-01T11:55:00.000-05:00

"Information Literacy and Research Skills in a Digital World" from Spring 2007 Bookmarks, Alkek Library's Newsletter

My first Youtube tutorial :)

2007-02-23T17:58:00.001-05:00

Interesting Reading

2007-02-22T16:42:00.000-05:00

Yet another reason why I adore del.icio.us--while churning around looking for links with the "information literacy" tags I found a really interesting article called Getting Past Google: Perspectives on Information Literacy from the Millennial Mind By Carie Windham.

It's advocating IL for millennials, which I realize is very much preaching to the choir, but what I found so amusing and unique about it is that it's written by someone who is under 30 (if her reference to being 10 years older than her brother's 14 year old friend is really true), and she really has her cultural references down pat. She also really put the whole thing in perspective, which is to say, that IL is not just a skill confined to libraries.

I also came across this interesting theatre blog-- the Applied and Interactive Theatre Blog. Its inclusion in an IL blog may not be readily apparent, but I for one have always felt that teaching is a form of being on stage, using theatre skills and techniques. (Have you ever gotten flop sweat when the class is not paying attention to you or getting visibly bored?) There's a link to Applied and Interactive Theatre guide--Training and Development which has some cool and possibly usable stuff.

Alkek Library Information Literacy Wiki

2007-02-13T17:26:00.000-05:00

I'd mentioned in an earlier post about our wiki--and sadly neglected to provide a link for your perusal. The link is: http://www.library.txstate.edu/wiki .
It's still in development, of course, but check it out. It's growing every day.

In the thick of it

2007-02-12T14:51:00.000-05:00

The pace of the semester is starting to pick up. In addition to the different classes we've all been doing, we've been working on other projects as well. We've got a wiki that's still in the developmental stages, but soon will be up and operational as a resource for students, faculty, and staff.

Also, don't forget about our workshops and Refworks trainings. Next week on Feb 21st we have both a Using MRI workshop from 10-11 am & a Refworks training from 5-6 pm in room 101. We have plenty more, so check back periodically for more offerings (check the page for class times and updates).

In other news, there are two new IL journals that have just come out--one is Journal of Information Literacy edited by Sheila Webber, and also Communications in Information Literacy.
Whew! and they are online too!

bubbl.us--brainstorming fun

2007-01-25T16:41:00.000-05:00

Here's another reason why looking up sites on del.icio.us is so much fun. I found a cute little brainstorming site called bubbl.us this afternoon. It's pretty easy to use, it's free, and it's web-based, which makes me hope it takes off or at least lasts a little while. At least long enough for Google to take it over.

(apologies, x-posted to Reference Blog)

Greetings!

2007-01-19T13:39:00.000-05:00

Hey everyone, I'm Devin, the new librarian-information literacy coordinator and just wanted to say I'm happy to be here and am glad to see that y'all have been implementing some great things, with the blogs, IM, the tutorial, etc. I'm looking forward to working with all of you and learning from you, which will likely happen quite a bit. I've been really impressed with what I've seen so far, and you all have been wonderful in helping me get situated.

Gearing up for the New Semester, and the Future

2007-01-12T15:52:00.000-05:00

Check out this recent post on the Information Literacy Weblog (thanks, y'all) that discusses (and links to) the Horizons 2006 report, where I found this article on RSS feeds used as a research aid . The report is extremely interesting, read it if you have a chance. I am very curious how some of these new technologies will be used in IL. Some of them seem fairly obvious, like educational gaming and wikis and such. The section on using cellphones is particularly interesting, in light of the new iPhone announcement. Treo Smartphones and T-Mobile Sidekicks have been around, but with the seeming ubiquitousness of iPods on campus, I can easily envision a day when the white earbuds are all connected to iPhones.

In other news, everyone on campus is gearing up for the new semester, which starts next Tuesday. We've got some new things going on for us as well. Our General Information Literacy Tutorial is completed. We're also offering Drop-In Orientations the first two weeks of the semester.

SMART Board!

2007-01-08T09:50:00.000-05:00

Room 101, our information literacy classroom, is now equipped with a SMART Board, an interactive whiteboard. IL librarians attended an all day training to learn unique features and incorporate SMART Board into our teaching sessions. It's really cool!

Inaugural Post

2007-01-04T17:19:00.000-05:00

Happy new year, and welcome to the Alkek Library Information Literacy blog. We'll be keeping up with interesting developments in the field and also be discussing issues and news related to our own developing Information Literacy initiative.