#23 Is this really the end? Or just the beginning …

Wow! Congratulations! You’ve reached the 23rd thing. Be sure to give yourself a pat on the back for completing the program. Your reward for completing this journey by the Jan 16, 2009 deadline is an MP3 player.

For your last and final exercise for this program, please reflect on your learning journey and post a few thoughts to your blog. Here are some questions to prompt you if you’re drawing a blank:

  • What were your favorite discoveries or exercises on this learning journey?
  • How has this program assisted or affected your lifelong learning goals?
  • Were there any unexpected outcomes from this program that surprised you?
  • What could we do differently to improve upon this program’s format or concept? 

Thank you for participating in this project. We hope that you have learned something lasting and that we as a system can all benefit from our new knowledge.

Once you have completed this last post, you may submit your completed tracking log to receive your MP3 player. Completed tracking logs should be emailed to 23things@ccls.org by January 16, 2009. You will receive your MP3 player along with instructions on how to do the 24th Thing. If #24 is completed by January 31, 2009, you will be entered into the grand prize drawing.

Again, congratulations for making it to the end. Thanks for participating in CCLS 23 Things!

January 7, 2009 at 12:38 pm 1 comment

#22 E-Audiobooks (or “The end is in sight “)

With your new MP3 player right around the corner, it’s time to take a look at OverDrive and downloadable eAudiobooks.

Downloadable eAudiobooks is a service provided by CCLS which is available through the system’s subscription to OverDrive.

For this discovery exercise, you need to download any eAudiobook from the CCLS OverDrive eAudiobooks site. Take a look around and locate a few titles of interest. You are very close to earning that MP3 player, and once you have it, you’ll definitely have a reason to try out this popular library service.

Discovery Resources:

Introduction to OverDrive – this tutorial covers the downloading process for OverDrive.

Discovery Exercise:

  1. Access OverDrive through the CCLS site.
  2. Download an eAudiobook to a computer. Note: If you are not a member of the CCLS staff or don’t have a CCLS library card, full access to OverDrive will not be available.
  3. Write a blog post about your experience.

January 5, 2009 at 11:10 am 8 comments

#21 Podcasts!

The word podcast is used to refer to a non-musical audio or video broadcast that is distributed over the Internet. Unlike streaming audio or video, podcasts can be distributed automatically.

Podcasts take many forms, from short 1-10 minute commentaries to much longer in-person interviews or panel group discussions. There is a podcast out there for just about every interest area. The best part about this technology is that you don’t need to have an iPod or a MP3 player to access them. Since podcasts use the MP3 file format, a popular compressed format for audio files, you just need a computer (or portable device) with headphones or a speaker.

iTunes, the free downloadable application created by Apple, is the directory finding service most associated with podcasts, but if you don’t have iTunes installed, there are plenty of other options.

For this discovery exercise, participants are asked to take a look at some popular podcast directory tools. Do some exploring on your own and locate a podcast that is of interest to you. Once found, you can put the RSS feed into your Bloglines account, so that when new podcasts become available you’ll be notified automatically of their existence.

Discovery Resources:

  • To find out more about podcasts start with this video from Common Craft:

Discovery Exercise:

  1. Take a look at one of the podcast directories listed and find a podcast that interests you. See if you can find some interesting library-related podcasts, such as book review podcasts or library news.
  2. Add the RSS feed for a podcast to your Bloglines account
  3. Write a blog post about your discovery process. Did you find anything useful here?

Remember, we are adding a few catch-up weeks.

Thing 22 will be posted on January 5, 2009!

December 17, 2008 at 10:01 am 1 comment

A little housekeeping

Greetings all! 

We’ve decided to divide week 9 into two weeks, 9 and 10. There will be two Things (#20 & 21) posted this week. We will add a couple of catch-up weeks due to the holidays. The last two Things (#22 & 23) will be posted the first week in January. This will still give everyone plenty of time to finish by January 16 to be eligible for the MP3 player.

In order to receive the MP3 player, you will need to submit your completed tracking log. You can use these catch-up weeks to make sure you have blog postings that correspond with each Thing on the tracking log.  You should have permalinks for #5 and on, plus links for #2 and #3. Completed tracking logs can be submitted after Thing 23 has been posted.

Happy Holidays!

December 15, 2008 at 11:04 am 4 comments

#20 You too can YouTube

YouTube is one of the most popular video hosting sites, allowing users to upload their own video content and embed clips into their own sites.

Do some searching around YouTube and see what the site has to offer. You’ll find everything from 1970s TV commercials to library dominoes. Of course, like any free site, you’ll also find a lot stuff not worth watching. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t explore and see for yourself what the site has to offer.

Discovery Exercise:

  1. Explore YouTube & find a video worth adding as an entry in your blog.
  2. Explore the CCLS YouTube page, which includes the entries for our YouTube contest.
  3. Write a blog post about your experience. What did you like or dislike about the site? Do you see how libraries might use YouTube?

December 14, 2008 at 11:34 pm 3 comments

#19 Social Networking Tools

You may have been hearing a lot about social networking tools in conjunction with Web 2.0 and Library 2.0. What exactly is social networking? Well, you can read about it on Wikipedia or you can watch this Common Craft video:

For thing 19, we will take a look at social networking and libraries. There are two major social networking sites libraries are using: MySpace and Facebook. With both of these sites, users create a page about themselves listing interests, hobbies and news. The sites allow users to “friend” each other, creating networks. Many libraries are using these tools to reach their teen patrons.

Some of the other Web 2.0 sites we have looked at also have social networking components:

  • Flickr allows users to tag photos and share them with groups and pools. Many of the Flickr groups have discussion forums for users to share ideas and stories.
  • Library Thing allows users to see each other’s libraries and join discussion groups around common interests.
  • Delicious users can create networks of bookmarks and even send tagged items to each other.

One of the newest social networking crazes is microblogging. One of the more popular resources for this is Twitter. Once again, we turn to a Common Craft video to find out more about Twitter:

Discovery Resources:

  1. Library Success Wiki: MySpace and Teens (a list of libraries with MySpace pages for teens)
  2. West Chester Public Library MySpace page: WCPL Teens
  3. West Chester Public Library Facebook page: West Chester Public Library Teens
  4. Library Success Wiki: Microblogging (a list of libraries who use microblogging and articles on libraries and microblogging)

Discovery Exercise:

  1. Explore some library MySpace pages, including WCPL.
  2. Explore some libraries using microblogging.
  3. Write a blog post on social networking in libraries. What do you think about libraries having a presence on MySpace and Facebook? What do you think about microblogging?

December 12, 2008 at 12:21 am 1 comment

#18 Discovering Web 2.0 tools

Throughout the course of this Discovery 2.0 program, we’ve explored just a small sampling of the new internet technologies and websites that are empowering users with the ability to create and share content. There are many more we could explore. Only time will tell which of these new tools will remain on top, but it seems they are not going to go away (at least anytime soon).

For this discovery exercise, participants are asked to select any site from this list of Web 2.0 Awards nominees and explore it. With so many to choose from, it might be handy to select a category that interests you (like Books or Personal Organization) and then simply select a tool/site to explore. Be careful to select a tool that is free and that doesn’t require a plug-in or download. The majority of these free, so this shouldn’t be a problem.

Discovery Exercise:

  1. Select any site/tool from the list of Web 2.0 Awards nominees. (If you prefer to select from just the winners, here’s a link to the short list.)
  2. Explore the site you selected.
  3. Write a post about your discovery. What did you like or dislike about the tool? What were the site’s useful features? Do you see any applications for its use in a library setting?

December 10, 2008 at 8:25 am 3 comments

#17 Web-based Apps: They’re not just for desktops

The availability and use of online productivity web-based applications (think word processing and spreadsheets) has exploded over the past two years, and for good reasons! These powerful applications provide users with the ability to create and share documents over the internet without needing to install desktop applications. Some experts speculate that this emerging trend may mean the death of Microsoft Office and other software-based productivity tools; others think web-based applications have their place but not in the office.

One large benefit of web-based applications is they eliminate the need to worry about different software versions or file types as you email documents or move from PC to PC. Another bonus is they easily accommodate collaboration by allowing multiple users to edit the same file and provide users the ability to save and convert documents as multiple file types (including HTML and pdf). You can even use many of these tools, such as Zoho Writer and Google Docs, to author and publish posts to your blog. It’s this type of integration with other web 2.0 tools that also makes web-based apps so appealing.

For this discovery exercise, participants are asked to take a look at a web-based word processing tool called Zoho Writer, create a simple document and then document your discoveries on your blog.

With Zoho and web-based applications, the possibilities are endless.

Discovery Exercise:

  1. Create a free account for yourself in Zoho Writer*.
  2. Explore the site and create one or two test documents.
  3. Write a blog post about your discoveries.

* Note: You can also explore Google Docs , Google’s online word processer, as an option for this exercise.

December 8, 2008 at 12:21 am 1 comment

#16 Playing around with PBWiki

“Sandbox” is the term that wikis often use to describe the area of the website that should be used for pure play. For this discovery and exploration exercise, we’ve set up a CCLS 23 Things wiki* for you to practice using a wiki.

For this “explore-and-play-with-wikis” exercise, you are asked to add an entry or two to the CCLS 23 Things wiki. The theme of this wiki is simply “Favorites”: favorite books, favorite restaurants, favorite anything … all you need to do is play and add your thoughts.

Discovery Resources:

Discovery Exercise:

  1. Access the CCLS 23 Things wiki and create an account for yourself. Once you have created an account, you will be able to edit the wiki.
  2. Add your blog to the Favorite blogs page. That’s how we’ll know that you’ve been there. It’s easy to do–we have put instructions on the page.
  3. Write a post on your blog about the experience.
  4. OPTIONAL: Add a favorite or two to a few other pages (Favorite Books, Favorite Movies, etc.). And, if you feel up to the challenge, you might even want to create a new Favorites page. Be sure to link this page to the sidebar.

* NOTE: The CCLS 23 Things Wiki was created using the free version of PBWiki, a tool that lets you create webpages that anyone can edit.

December 3, 2008 at 9:20 am 1 comment

#15 So what’s in a wiki?

A wiki is a collaborative website and authoring tool that easily allows users to add, remove and edit content. Wikipedia, the online open-community encyclopedia, is the largest and perhaps the most well known of these knowledge sharing tools. With the benefits that wikis provide, the use and popularity of these tools is exploding.

Some of the benefits that make wikis so attractive are:

  • Anyone (registered or unregistered, if unrestricted) can add, edit or delete content.
  • Tracking tools within wikis allow you to keep up with what has been changed and by whom.
  • Earlier versions of a page can be viewed and reinstated when needed.
  • Users do not need to know HTML in order to apply styles to text or add and edit content. In most cases, simple syntax structure is used.

As the use of wikis has grown over the last few years, libraries all over the country have begun to use them to collaborate and share knowledge. Among their applications are pathfinder or subject guide wikis, book review wikis, ALA conference wikis and even library best practices wikis.

Discovery Resources:
Use these resources to learn more about wikis:

Discovery Exercise:

  1. For this discovery exercise, you are asked to take a look at some library wikis and blog about your finding. Here are a few examples to get you started:
  2. Write a blog post about your findings. What did you find interesting? What types of applications within libraries might work well with a wiki?

So what’s in a wiki? Find out by doing some exploring on your own.

December 1, 2008 at 12:22 am 3 comments

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