Thing 16

I liked several of the sites I visited. The Library Bloggers wiki, Pedabloggy, was a great place to get an organized view of blogs on the topics specified. The Sample school blog showed a nice classroom application.
I've already explained in the sandbox about a committee application of the wiki. By using a wiki, we didn't have to try and schedule a meeting of members. We met in the wiki, commented on the business at hand, at our leisure, and accomplished the task.

Thing 15

Wow, Schultz's trip to Library 4.0 is pretty daunting. Even though I may struggle with technology, I understand its significance and inevitability. But this analogy comes to mind. How many teachers have gone to an inservice about some great innovation, learned the basics of it, gotten excited about it, then returned to campus to find that there was never really any intention of purchasing that innovation...?

This is the way I feel with regard to my kids. Their poverty restricts their access to the net. Most do not have computers and their access at school is extremely limited, and not designed for innovative web learning. My little ones come to school truly in need of Storytime as they begin the journey to learn to read. How do you balance such need for the basics with the rocketing demands of today and tomorrow?

I do agree with Rick Anderson's comments about the collection. I have allowed our reference section to become progressively dated, thanks to our state-funded databases. As our budgets shrink, this allows us to use what funding we get in the broadest, most effective manner.

Thing 14

The searches in Technorati were interesting. At first, I left out "school" in school library learning 2.0. The result was 543. When I added school, the number lowered to 180. There were 77 blogs and 28 tags. Hmmm.

I guess there's logical corelation between the popular and authority lists. I noticed many of the same names in the top 10 (and more) of each. Searches were no surprise - quite a few for movie babes, but generally a widespread of topics.

Because I deal with pretty young kids, my use of this would be more personal /professional, not really to show the kids how to. But as a means of keeping yourself advised as to what is being popularly pursued on the web, I think these tools are amazing. Trends are measured as they happen, not in retrospect or hindsight. No wonder the commercial world is all over this!

Thing 13

This is going to be so useful, in the most practical sense. The idea of being able to access my favorites from any computer is fantastic. Even more than accessing, it will be so cool to simply add bookmarks to my personal list wherever and whenever a gem turns up.
As explained in the course of the video tutorials/explanations the potential use for research is tremendous. On my pre-k to 4th grade level, the application may not be so significant, but it is certainly a great resource/tool for teachers, administrators and me, the librarian. Because of the nature of Delicious, we can share at our personal point of need.

Thing 12

Two points that hit home with me about commenting were the need to solicit comments and the need to comment with kindness. Asking a question straight out naturally brings responses, but even after a strong post, a blogger who ends with a humble, So what do you think? or Yes?, encourages comments. When responding to a comment, nothing can shut down someone faster than condescension or sarcasm. Expressing appreciation and finding something positive to say before gently disagreeing or offering an alternative view.

Having recently seen the new Harry Potter movie, I was interested in blogging about it. I ended up at Bermudaonion's Weblog. This must be an example of friends blogging with friends. The original post was a brief summary followed by a kid of disclaimer that the blogger read the book when it first came out and couldn't really remember the details to know if the movie was true to the storyline. The amazing thing was that almost every comment basically said the same thing - so long since I read it - guess it was accurate - emphasis on teen romance. Without offending the other commenters, I registered my dissatisfaction with the movie and left my comment "awaiting moderation."

My second visit was to Library Advocate (advocate4libraries. blogspot). The comment had to do with the importance to spread the Standards for the 21st Century Learner. Admittedly, my comment was a bit off-task, in that I pointed about the seeming disparity in building such a rigorous course for our responsibilities while, in Texas, although you now must earn a Masters to become a librarian, we are not considered essential personnel in a school.

Thing 11

LibraryThing is an interesting tool. I'm not sure I'm inclined to be a reviewer, just as I'm not really a blogger. However, I do think this is a useful tool in taking a look at "like" users book reviews. Elementary librarians want the most bang for the buck, and the opinions of fellow librarians can often be more valuable than SLJ or other more esteemed reviews.

Thing 10

Well, I've got the images posted, but not the links. I missed that step somewhere in the process...
The two I used are the Comic Strip (swine flu) and Kid-Friendly (party announcement). My friend Rasco Rocket discovered the Trading Card site and that sounds like it has great possibilities in the library with regard to authors and biographies. Perhaps the whole staff could do cards of themselves instead of business cards!
My Swine Flu cartoon would be good in an in-house publication for staff. The Party announcement is what it is. It's always nice to have more graphic alternatives.
I also think the comic strip site would provide a great opportunity for kids to develop their ability to convey humor.