Updates Since Oct 26!

I am so bad at blogging, I keep forgetting that I am supposed to blog once a week. But I have so much to update everybody about!

So here I go:

1. I got my surveys out, and have received the answers back! Yeah, I was surprised with the results.
   
2. I created, edited, and burned my online tutorial, Kathy Moore LOVED it! I am very proud of my creation.
3. We had our staff development session on Tuesday, Nov. 9th. If I remember correctly we had twelve participants to show up and, believe me, they absolutely LOVED EWOL!
4. I have to send my last survey this week to see how everybody liked EWOL!
   
5. As for Katie, I know that she is doing just fine. Being that I am located at Blowing Rock for internship, I have been willing to be the delivery person between Katie and Kathy. I sneaked a peek at Katie's completed surveys, and was a little surprised with the results. Although I know that Mrs. Trew and Kathy were impressed with the webquest.
6. As for Sara, I know she is on top about her bloggings with Safari Montage. She stated that she trying to get as many in as possible.
   
7. As for Sara, she states she is doing "good" but I really do not know.
   
8. I haven't heard anything from James since the last face to face class. We only have the gmail chats because we were trying to save him a drive, but he does not show up for the gmail chats.

Everything else is doing just fine. I can't wait to do my presentation and turn in my paper!

Update on Project

I feel that I have not kept up on my updates for my project. Yet I have made some major steps in my project.

The following list is what I have been up to since the last time blogged about my project.

1. I created my teachers' survey.
2. Kathy and I set a date. It was supposed to be on Nov. 2, but Mr. Sukow, the principal had already set a faculty meeting on that day. Kathy made an executive decision (since she is the librarian) to set a week later on Nov 9.
   
3. I started working on a script for my tutorial. I do not want my tutorial to be flaky, I really want this tutorial be helpful for the teachers.
4. As for my group, I have been constant communication with Katie and Sara.
   
5. As for Katie, I asked her if she wanted me to talk to Kathy for her. Katie and I both knew that to survey the students, Katie would have to get permission from both the principal and parents. So I asked Kathy while at Blowing Rock if Katie needed to write a letter to get permission from Mr. Sukow to video and survey the teachers and students.
6. Kathy stated the school had permission slips for all the students who can be recorded or photographed. As for permission from Mr. Sukow, Kathy went and asked him in an informal conversation about getting the approval. So exciting, Katie got approval for her project.
   
7. Kathy stated that she would give us copies of the permission slips.
   
8. As for Sara, she told me that she was trying to keep up with her blogs and trying to find interesting pieces to blog about for the teachers.
9. I have not heard from Denise or James, which worries me as if they are having trouble. I have no problem helping if I can, but neither have communicated with Katie, Sara or myself.
   

Whew! I feel SO much better now that I have updated everybody up on my project. I am really looking forward to the staff development meeting with half of my sample. I know this is not important but my goal is to have my paper, portfolio and EVERYTHING(!) done by Nov. 15, and to enjoy the rest of the semester!

Del.icio.us

I have never used the website, del.icio.us. By watching and following the YouTube tutorial, the website seem user friendly. I liked that we could add our friends; which I added Sara because I saw her name.

I really like this website, although I probably will not use it after this one time. Once I like a website and use regularly, I usually bookmark it on my toolbar.

I can see how functional this website is for someone who continuously visits multiple sites regularly. I have to say that the person who administrated the tutorial did a fantastic job of keeping his viewers attention. I hope my online tutorial will be as interesting as his tutorials.

Here is my del.icio.us page: http://www.delicious.com/mrj_03

NY Times Article

I think it is amazing how libraries can branch out from other venues and continue to still to do their duty: providing information. This article is a reaffirmation of the chapters for this week and the last two previous classes.

The questions of "what to be save, how to save it and how to make it accessible" are are legitimate and important questions to think about. Technology is constantly upgrading and changing. I think that we made an important reference in class about this topic. I think that this topic is not going to go away; we are going to have to evolve our services to deal with this problem.

Again, I stress the need for libraries to become specialized in a topic, for example Belk Library and the Stock Car Racing. I liked the idea of FRED at Stanford. I would hope that the administrators can see that FRED can provide services to other libraries for a small fee or commission.

I love the idea of the Rushdie Collection, where patrons and visitors can sit and play around with one of his manuscripts. To see patrons who have been affect by an author's words can be a touching moment. I think that providing this service can allow more people to become familiar with his works and similar authors.

For conclusion, I really liked this article. This topic of transferring information and materials to multiple devices or programs is becoming more recognized in our new evolve field!

Questions from class

1. Difficulty and urgency of problems associated with technology verses literacy.

1. I would think that if we do not teach students and adults literacy, then the ideology of technology would not be possible.
   
2. People are more likely to not to read and play/use the technology to make their life easier.
   
3. There is always the problem with cost and accessibility for all users.

2. Final Solution is....

1. I would think teaching the basics of literacy skills.
2. Also to encourage students to read and explore their imagination which would be supported by literacy.
3. By working with other programs such as English-Second Language assistance, we can achieve technology beyond what we have!
   

Week of Sept 29 through the Oct 5th

Last Wednesday, my group met on the Gmail chat. Sara, Katie, Denise and I (James was not able to attend) joined a chat together and discussed how our project was going. Most of us, if not all were at the beginning with research stage. Some of us were working our surveys, (including myself). Not much had changed from the previous week, except we were now able to get updated with Denise and her project.

I worked on my survey on Monday, Oct 4th, while worked at the Belk Library. I am hoping to get my teachers surveyed this week and see how they feel about technology and staff development.

Katie emailed me about her surveys on Monday, I failed to email her back. I planned to talk to her tonight before class during our group discussion.

Week of 22-28

Last week, Katie, Sara and I met on Gmail Chat. We started talking about our projects and how they are doing. We realized that we all on the researched stage. We also were getting ready to create surveys for the teachers at our respectable schools. We did not talk much about our projects because we were getting ready create our annotated bibliographies.

Neither James or Denise showed up on Gmail Chat with us on Wednesday, so they could not participate in our chat.

Not much has been continued on my project, I have not found the time to get down to the Mac Lab in Edwin Duncan to create my tutorial. I have worked on my survey on survey monkey.

Sept 15-22

Last week, our group met before class at 5: 30 at our regular time; everybody showed up except of Denise. We continued our discussion about our project from the previous week. Prior to class, I had sent links to Sara with examples of pathfinders. She had decided that she would be using a blog like the example from two weeks ago.

Katie and I reaffirmed our notions of what we want to do with our projects.

James was still indecisive about what he wanted and if it would fit into technology category. This problem would soon be decided when I showed him the Blowing Rock's media center webpage. He was very impressed, and I suggested that he create an user friendly webpage for his patrons instead doing the circulation. He went crazy about the idea.

We have a wonderful group where people are supportive and encouraging about each other. I feel that if I had a problem like Sara, who emailed her original media specialist and got shot down, they would come to my rescue. I emailed Sara asking if she wanted to do a project like mine for another type of computer program that Kathy is buying and installing for the teachers. If one of us needs the lending hand, I feel that we would be there for them.

Group Meeting

Last week before class, my group met for the first time. We each all talked about our projects and how technology would be implemented into library. Sara is going to create a wiki like website where the teachers can find information. James is going to try to fix the circulation problem and delete the self-check out process at his school. Katie is creating a website where fifth grade teachers can download and watch an immigration lesson that will be conducted at Blowing Rock Elementary School. Denise did not show up for our meeting.

I am going to do a staff development teaching the Pre-K through second grade, taking your advice I am going to also create an online tutorial for the teachers who cannot show up for the meeting.

Talking together last week, we got some great questions from our fellow colleagues such as how does this affect the school, how does this play a part in the daily run of the media center, etc. I enjoyed the group meeting, and cannot wait for the next one.

Interview

For my interview, I interviewed Kathy Moore at Blowing Rock Elementary School. Last week before we interview, we were talking about technology. She talked about how she and the technology person were observed by a state office about their duties. Her first comment was that she thought that one of the positions will be eliminated. She stated that she and the technology person talked about the effect will be if one of the positions is eliminated. To quote Kathy quoting the tech person told her that "she couldn't do my job, while I could do her job." To me, this statement makes sense because we can do some simple technological fixing while a tech person cannot hold book talks or do the daily duties of a librarian.

As for the interview, I asked how technology impacts her daily work, she stated she spends 70% of her day working on something due with technology. She does not like her laminator (which I consider part of technology in the library). She absolutely loves her catalog program, Destiny. She loves to use her catalog, it is very simple and straightforward. Her favorite program to use with the students is storymapping.

We talked about the future libraries and technology, she stated that major issues is the lack of money and the current advancement of technology. "By the time you put one thing in, like a SmartBoard, something better comes out it so quickly." Kathy stated that instant gratification is the best thing about having technology in the library and the kids love it! My last question was do you think that the students are more technological savvy than the teachers. Her answer was around age 11 or 12, (6th or 7th) they are.

She stated that her library does not have major problems, which is a hinder for me and my project. So we talked about the Action Learning Project, and she stated that she would wanted me to do a staff development meeting, where we (Kathy and I) would teach the Pre-K through second grade teachers about the new section on WorldBook Online. The teachers would be able to get a technological credit. We would survey the teachers on the usability and the students' reaction.

Group Meeting

Katie and I met on the email chat yesterday afternoon. We started by talking about how we, as a group, were having trouble finding time to meet outside of class. Then we started to talk about our projects. Katie is working on creating a website/link that works with her POL. She is creating a how-to-do the lesson for fifth grade teachers to use. I asked her how plans to promote/get her lesson out to the fifth grade teachers. She stated that she was going to survey the fifth grade teachers in the county to see how they teach about immigration and do a post survey to see if they would like to do the lesson in their classroom.

Then we started talking about my project, which is a staff development for Pre-K to second grade using a new website that Blowing Rock's media specialist subscribed to this year. It has sing-a-longs and ebooks. I will be conducting surveys to the teachers on the usability and the students' reactions.

We both liked each others ideas, and we talked about how each project could be used in the classroom immediately.

First Blog

So since this is my very blog for this class, I will just summarized how I feel about the readings and how they affected me.

1. I liked the readings, especially This Book is Overdue! I feel that had a great introduction which catches the reader's eye.

2. From the readings, I feel like they are reaffirming what I have been taught in this program. The more I attend classes, the more I realize that the classes compliment each other. What I have learned and taken notes from Dr. Barron or Dr. Veltze are emphasized in later classes. I feel that I becoming a better future librarian by becoming open for to new ideas and theology.