Webinars and Change

The webinars I attended were all pretty good.  None of the ones I saw had any major problems, and everything seemed to go really smoothly.  The topics of helping a specific patron group in the library and copyright all gave me new information, so I learned a lot, too.

I was impressed with our ability to plan and present a webinar.  It really wasn't quite the struggle I was anticipating.  In fact, the worst part for us happened when we lost our sound several times in the middle of the webinar.  Also, even though we reserved a room in the library to hopefully cut back on the potential of technical problems, we still lost internet a couple of times.  Oh, and our recording did some wacky things.  So all in all, we did figure out how to pace and use the webinar tool Elluminate relatively painlessly, but we had unforseen problems that we couldn't really control.  Grrr.

I can see myself participating in and using webinars through the rest of my career.  Webinars allow you to present useful information to those who are long-distance.  Webinars are convenient to attend, and they can be archived so that if the timing does not work, you can still view one you missed.  Webinars are a great way to keep up with the goings-ons in libraries.  Plus, webinars are a great way to exercise new technology skills.

Keeping up with technology was the focus of the articles we had to read for today.  In all three articles, the importance of change and keeping up with change is important for librarians, especially in their role as teachers.  In the Semadini article, teachers took time out of their contract hours to highlight an area in which they wanted to become better teachers, and then met to discuss how their methods were working.  In the Blowers & Reed and Fontichiaro articles, teachers and librarians trained their peers to use technology effectively and to be able to quickly assist students and patrons should something go wrong.  In today's world, it is especially important to keep up with technology - for technology is now even being used to teach others about technology.  


I especially appreciated the picture in the Blowers & Reed article in which three successful older women held up their mp3 player prizes which they had won after completing the technology program offered through their library. As I grow older in my profession, I can see myself not wanting to keep up with all the new stuff that is certain to arrive.  But, like these women, I know I will have to take the initiative to stay current in my field.

Using Twitter

Last week in class Paul Courant came and spoke about the Digital Public Library of America.  In the midst of his talk, he mentioned that he thought textbooks would all eventually switch to online formats, and would become a necessary package to purchase along with a student's tuition.  As an SI student, I have become used to the numerous readings online, and so the physical textbook does not matter so much to me anymore.  The ability to have online textbooks and be able to access them whenever and wherever I want without lugging them around in my backpack would be a blessing.

Our second topic of the night was embedded librarianship.  I think the embedded librarian can be a great addition to a school department.  For myself, I do not think I would necessarily enjoy this position, because I would want to have fellow librarians on hand to run to if a patron came to me with a question I could not find the answer to.  I would also not want to be on edge about my embedded position being the first one cut in an economic slump.  

During this past week, we had to engage with Twitter as a resource for staying in touch with the library world, and I maintain that Twitter is not my favorite thing.  First, while I did have a Twitter account, I rarely use it, because I do not find it very useful or interesting.  All the information thrown at you in Twitter seems choppy and and there is no way to keep up with all the tweets ever posted on your account.  Publishers, librarians, and authors seem to throw up any sort of posting on Twitter.  Some of the news is interesting - perhaps an interesting article about an author or will be posted.  But most of the news seems to be more about what this author is eating for lunch, or what book this publisher recently released.  I also do not enjoy having to sift through the random information, find the few tweets I am actually interested in, and then click on the link to go to a whole new page.  On the whole, I find Google Reader a much better resource for staying in touch with the library world.  Blogs can be chosen based on the blogger expertise and personality, and once you find a blog you like, you can stick with it and generally be pleased with the postings.  Blog postings are long and generally thorough, and they have a title so you know what information to expect in the post.  Because of the nature of the blog post, bloggers do not post every little detail about their lives.  I much prefer the blog for library news.  When I check Google Reader, I know what to expect; when I check Twitter, I dread picking through all the useless bits of information to find the few that appeal to me.  Although I will say I did have fun designing my Twitter account.