This is the key to CPD 23 and to professional development in general. We are all trying out new things and then reflecting on our experiences. That is the only way to progress in any field.
I don't think I've mentioned this on here but I had a previous career as a teacher before I moved into librarianship. I mention this now because the importance of being a reflective practitioner is something that the teaching profession emphasises heavily. Teachers at all levels are encouraged to reflect on each lesson. To think about what worked and what didn't and then use their conclusions to improve the next lesson. This is a good example of the do - review - plan - do circle.
I'm used to thinking of reflection as an important part of my working life. I have brought that across into my new career. I've tried to keep up good habits.
The Chartership process and being a part of CPD23 have both helped to underline the importance of reflection, and the advantages of putting my thoughts into writing.
Encouraging me to record my reflections and to share them with others is perhaps the most important thing that CPD23 has done for me. I really enjoy having this blog and I've found it very useful as a tool for reflecting on my professional development. It would exist without CPD23 but the scheme has given it a greater sense of structure.
Sharing ideas with others has been the heart of my CPD23 experience. I love the sense that we are building a community here. The scheme has been quite foccussed on that aspect of professional development. The next two things are the offical networking things but really almost everything we've done so far has had a networking element. We've set up blogs to share our thoughts, we've explored each other's blogs, we've thought about how we come across to others, and we've tried new tools for sharing information. Networking, community building, idea sharing seems to be the thread running through everything we're doing.
Readers who look beyond my CPD 23 posts will see that I write quite detailed reflective posts on training course that I attend. They are all tagged as 'training'. Reflecting on training experiences is the only way to gain anything lasting from them. Obviously if you never think about what you've learnt it's a waste of time! The process of reflecting in writing helps me to think about how I'm going to incorporate new ideas into my actual practice. It also makes it easier for me to get other members of staff on board when I want to suggest something new.
Reflection is the key to personal and professional development. The alternative after all is to rely on habit or to blindly react. We need to reflect on what we're doing if we want to get better at it.
Tuesday, 19 July 2011
Wednesday, 13 July 2011
CPD23 - Thing 4 – Current Awareness
Thing 4 is all about using different tools to keep up to date with the fast moving library world. We all try to stay informed and engaged but the myriad distractions of everyday life and the disorientating effects of information overload mean that it can be tricky. I have been asked to investigate three online tools that are designed to help.
Current Awareness Tool Reviews
1. Twitter
The first tool is one that I imagine almost everyone on the scheme was already fairly familiar with. Although no doubt some people have previously recoiled in horror from the thought of being overloaded with celebrity gossip and random comments.
Current awareness of library and information issues was actually my original reason for joining Twitter. On the first day of my Library Science course we were told to sign up. Our lecturers wanted us to use it to communicate with them and with each other. They also highlighted its use as a current awareness tool. But behind those practical arguments was the clear implication that this was the future of information and we needed to be a part of it. It did prove to be a useful tool for staying in touch with other students, sharing information and for developing awareness. Is this the future? It is always too soon to tell.
Since signing up I’ve slipped into using it for other things. I found some of my non library friends on there. I also went through a period when I was mostly using it to publish very short stories on the excellent but sadly now defunct tweetzine Thaumatrope. (Is tweetzine a real word? I might have just made that up.)
As an aside I should say that I found @UKLibraryJobs very useful when I was trying to find my first professional librarian post. I recommend following them if you’re job hunting.
Prior to setting up this blog I did go through a bit of a tweet drought. CPD 23 has already helped to bring me back into the flow. I’ve been using twitter to tell people about my blog posts. I’ve also started following some of my fellow participants. Mostly because I was following their blogs and I thought having them on my tweet feed would remind me to read their entries.
I’ve also increased the number of library and information thought leaders that I’m following. I intend to use the crowd sourced recommendations on the CPD23 blog to start following even more interesting and insightful library folk.
2. RSS
RSS feeds are a useful way to make your online reading more organised. You can bring together the latest updates from all the blogs and such like that you follow. This is one of those online tools that I’ve long thought I probably should be using.
I have now signed up with Google reader as recommended. I will gradually build up the number of RSS feeds that I follow. I think this will quickly become a helpful part of my online routine. I do need a way to make my professional reading a bit more focussed.
As a note of warning if you have only just signed up to Google reader I’m not sure following the whole cpd23 bundle is the best way to start. My experience was that opening that led to a serious sense of information overload. I’m sure they are all great but I’d rather slowly build up the number I follow or just wander from blog to blog when I have some time to spare.
3. Pushnote
Social media tools have a bit of a chicken and egg problem. However clever the actual tool is they are only really useful if a reasonable number of people are using them. In most cases preferably people you know.
As far as I can tell I don’t know many people who are using pushnote. This means that I am unlikely to make much use of it myself. It would be different if there was a sense of enthusiasm from cpd23 participants. We could just use it amongst ourselves to share useful library or professional development websites. Presumably that was the plan. Unfortunately my impression is that the group consensus is that people are fairly underwhelmed by pushnote. Please let me know if that’s wrong.
This must be very annoying for people who are trying to develop new social media tools. There seems to be only two ways round it.
1. Aim your product at a niche market. Design it for people who share a particular interest or specialist need.
2. Make sure that your product has a unique selling point. It should be doing something that the more established services don’t.
Pushnote is clearly meant for the general market so I can only assume that we are meant to see it as a tool that does something new. I’m not convinced. I feel that we already have lots of ways of using social media to recommend websites to each other.
Not being compatible with Internet Explorer is probably a handicap in terms of gaining a larger number of users. For our purposes it means that fewer of us can even try it at work. Like many libraries my own workplace uses IE. This is something that the pushnote team should try to sort out.
As I write this I’m haunted by a nagging fear that this last review will look silly in a year’s time. Perhaps everyone will be using this. Of course if they are it will be much more useful and I will probably join them. Chickens and eggs.
Current Awareness Tool Reviews
1. Twitter
The first tool is one that I imagine almost everyone on the scheme was already fairly familiar with. Although no doubt some people have previously recoiled in horror from the thought of being overloaded with celebrity gossip and random comments.
Current awareness of library and information issues was actually my original reason for joining Twitter. On the first day of my Library Science course we were told to sign up. Our lecturers wanted us to use it to communicate with them and with each other. They also highlighted its use as a current awareness tool. But behind those practical arguments was the clear implication that this was the future of information and we needed to be a part of it. It did prove to be a useful tool for staying in touch with other students, sharing information and for developing awareness. Is this the future? It is always too soon to tell.
Since signing up I’ve slipped into using it for other things. I found some of my non library friends on there. I also went through a period when I was mostly using it to publish very short stories on the excellent but sadly now defunct tweetzine Thaumatrope. (Is tweetzine a real word? I might have just made that up.)
As an aside I should say that I found @UKLibraryJobs very useful when I was trying to find my first professional librarian post. I recommend following them if you’re job hunting.
Prior to setting up this blog I did go through a bit of a tweet drought. CPD 23 has already helped to bring me back into the flow. I’ve been using twitter to tell people about my blog posts. I’ve also started following some of my fellow participants. Mostly because I was following their blogs and I thought having them on my tweet feed would remind me to read their entries.
I’ve also increased the number of library and information thought leaders that I’m following. I intend to use the crowd sourced recommendations on the CPD23 blog to start following even more interesting and insightful library folk.
2. RSS
RSS feeds are a useful way to make your online reading more organised. You can bring together the latest updates from all the blogs and such like that you follow. This is one of those online tools that I’ve long thought I probably should be using.
I have now signed up with Google reader as recommended. I will gradually build up the number of RSS feeds that I follow. I think this will quickly become a helpful part of my online routine. I do need a way to make my professional reading a bit more focussed.
As a note of warning if you have only just signed up to Google reader I’m not sure following the whole cpd23 bundle is the best way to start. My experience was that opening that led to a serious sense of information overload. I’m sure they are all great but I’d rather slowly build up the number I follow or just wander from blog to blog when I have some time to spare.
3. Pushnote
Social media tools have a bit of a chicken and egg problem. However clever the actual tool is they are only really useful if a reasonable number of people are using them. In most cases preferably people you know.
As far as I can tell I don’t know many people who are using pushnote. This means that I am unlikely to make much use of it myself. It would be different if there was a sense of enthusiasm from cpd23 participants. We could just use it amongst ourselves to share useful library or professional development websites. Presumably that was the plan. Unfortunately my impression is that the group consensus is that people are fairly underwhelmed by pushnote. Please let me know if that’s wrong.
This must be very annoying for people who are trying to develop new social media tools. There seems to be only two ways round it.
1. Aim your product at a niche market. Design it for people who share a particular interest or specialist need.
2. Make sure that your product has a unique selling point. It should be doing something that the more established services don’t.
Pushnote is clearly meant for the general market so I can only assume that we are meant to see it as a tool that does something new. I’m not convinced. I feel that we already have lots of ways of using social media to recommend websites to each other.
Not being compatible with Internet Explorer is probably a handicap in terms of gaining a larger number of users. For our purposes it means that fewer of us can even try it at work. Like many libraries my own workplace uses IE. This is something that the pushnote team should try to sort out.
As I write this I’m haunted by a nagging fear that this last review will look silly in a year’s time. Perhaps everyone will be using this. Of course if they are it will be much more useful and I will probably join them. Chickens and eggs.
Wednesday, 29 June 2011
CPD 23 – Thing 3 – Personal Brand – Further Thoughts
I said at the end of my previous post that I might come back to this thing later in the week. The reason for that is that I was aware that my initial thoughts were fairly general. The google task was more focused but I didn’t really talk about my own ‘personal brand’.
This blog and my twitter account now share a similar visual identity. The background image for both is a picture of trees. I’m quite happy with this idea. It links visually with my name and it creates a calm, reflective image. In the case of this blog the metaphor of going for a walk through a forest fits neatly with the journey motif conjured up by the title. It also fits with the idea of a librarian as a guide.
To be honest I only recently changed the blog. I tidied it up for thing 2 because I wanted to make a good impression on any visitors. It used to have an inoffensive but unexciting theme featuring some clouds and a lighthouse. That did fit my journey based title but it didn’t stand out.
The description was even worse. It was very much a generic librarian blog description. I’m much happier with the new one. It gives readers a clearer idea of what the blog is going to be like. I wouldn’t normally phrase it like this but I suppose I’m saying it fits my personal brand better. It fits the thoughtful, friendly image that I want to get across.
The picture of me is also new. It’s different to my twitter picture. Is this a mistake? I can see the argument for using the same picture across different platforms. My reasoning was that my twitter picture has my fiancée in as well as me. I didn’t think that would work on a professional blog. I chose this particular image of me for a mixture of reasons. Some personal, others more ‘brand’ related. It is a picture that brings back happy memories. That’s Halong Bay in Vietnam in the background. On a ‘brand’ level it fits the imagery of travelling beyond what we know, travelling together into the unknown to experience new things.
My facebook profile has another picture again but that seems like less of an issue because it is aimed at family and friends. This blog is obviously purely professional and I increasingly only use my twitter account for library related stuff. This brings us back to the issue of the divided nature of identity but I think I covered that in my last post. Essentially I feel we need to accept that everyone has slightly different identities depending on the different audiences and contexts that are parts of their lives.
Let me know if you would like a critique of your ‘personal brand’. I promise to be very polite. Rudeness doesn’t fit my brand image.
This blog and my twitter account now share a similar visual identity. The background image for both is a picture of trees. I’m quite happy with this idea. It links visually with my name and it creates a calm, reflective image. In the case of this blog the metaphor of going for a walk through a forest fits neatly with the journey motif conjured up by the title. It also fits with the idea of a librarian as a guide.
To be honest I only recently changed the blog. I tidied it up for thing 2 because I wanted to make a good impression on any visitors. It used to have an inoffensive but unexciting theme featuring some clouds and a lighthouse. That did fit my journey based title but it didn’t stand out.
The description was even worse. It was very much a generic librarian blog description. I’m much happier with the new one. It gives readers a clearer idea of what the blog is going to be like. I wouldn’t normally phrase it like this but I suppose I’m saying it fits my personal brand better. It fits the thoughtful, friendly image that I want to get across.
The picture of me is also new. It’s different to my twitter picture. Is this a mistake? I can see the argument for using the same picture across different platforms. My reasoning was that my twitter picture has my fiancée in as well as me. I didn’t think that would work on a professional blog. I chose this particular image of me for a mixture of reasons. Some personal, others more ‘brand’ related. It is a picture that brings back happy memories. That’s Halong Bay in Vietnam in the background. On a ‘brand’ level it fits the imagery of travelling beyond what we know, travelling together into the unknown to experience new things.
My facebook profile has another picture again but that seems like less of an issue because it is aimed at family and friends. This blog is obviously purely professional and I increasingly only use my twitter account for library related stuff. This brings us back to the issue of the divided nature of identity but I think I covered that in my last post. Essentially I feel we need to accept that everyone has slightly different identities depending on the different audiences and contexts that are parts of their lives.
Let me know if you would like a critique of your ‘personal brand’. I promise to be very polite. Rudeness doesn’t fit my brand image.
Tuesday, 28 June 2011
CPD 23 - Thing 3 - Personal Brand
Protecting your ‘personal band’ [insert alternative term here]
I suspect I’m not alone in feeling a bit uncomfortable with the term ‘personal brand’. It just sounds like something a contestant on The Apprentice would say. There are a lot of us doing CPD 23. Do you think if we all come up with an alternative name and started using it we would be able to make it stick? Suggestions welcome.
Quibbles about terminology aside I agree that we do need to think carefully about the image that we present to others, particularly in online environments which give that image a much wider audience. Thinking about your audience is the key here. You need to think about the huge variety of people who might stumble across or deliberately uncover something that you put online. Is this comment, blog post, picture, joke, poem etc suitable for everyone who might read it? The classic example is the facebook pictures that your friends would appreciate but your mum or your boss (or worse a potential boss) definitely wouldn’t.
I am actually slightly divided on this. As a librarian I feel I should be on the side of careful use of social media as a point of professional principle and on a personal level I always feel very uncomfortable when I see people using social media in a thoughtless way. Everyone really needs to remember that their comments will hang around indefinitely. I’m sure you all know the kind of comments that I mean.
I also feel that everyone should take the time to write properly online. Please don’t use this as an excuse to point out any mistakes I’ve made though. I’ll be horribly embarrassed and it will completely ruin my day.
On the other hand I think we should avoid promoting paranoia. I am very sceptical about the idea that potential employers are going to hunt down pictures of you online and then trash your application on the grounds that they’ve found a picture of you drinking. Apart from anything else they would be recruiting from a vanishingly small pool.
(If I’ve applied for a job with you please be assured that I only drink in moderation. If you’re my current employer this bit is for the future it doesn’t mean I’m thinking of leaving. Wow, this could get complicated.) Don’t slip into paranoia.
It seems reasonable to think in terms of intended audiences as well as the potentially infinite possible audience. I’ll give you an example. I wouldn’t put a picture of me dressed as a pirate on this blog because this is a professional space but I know that there are pictures of me dressed as a pirate out there on a publicly accessible website. I’m completely calm about that because the picture would make sense to the intended audience. Also it is actually a good look for me.
We all have slightly different identities for different contexts and different audiences. It would be self-defeating to overlook that in the name of managing your ‘personal brand’.
Finding Myself – Google task
Googling ‘Alan Green’ was a humbling experience. You’ll be shocked to hear that I didn’t appear on the first ten pages of search results. I had to give up at that point to protect my fragile self-esteem. Most of the results were about the BBC sports commentator of the same name. I think it’s unlikely that people will confuse us. Although worryingly there were a few hits about him saying something racist and there was a site headlined ‘I hate Alan Green’. I’m really not sure that he is doing my ‘personal brand’ much good. As a librarian writing about my online reputation I can laugh this off but would it be a problem if I was trying to pursue a career in radio?
‘Alan Green Library’ was more successful but only thanks to CPD 23. My twitter account comes up because I recently tweeted about this library blog. It was the second hit when I tried it. That’s progress.
Following that success I had high hopes for ‘Alan Green Librarian’ but I wasn’t on the first page of hits. Page two was another victory for cpd 23. Thank you to Lisa Hutchins who kindly mentioned this blog in her thing 2 post.
The lesson of the googling exercise seems to be that taking part in CPD23 is doing wonders for my online professional presence. That and I shouldn’t try to get a job in radio. Thank you to everyone who helped set this up.
I might post about this again later in the week. Let me know what you think of my 'brand'. Also please suggest alternative terms.
I suspect I’m not alone in feeling a bit uncomfortable with the term ‘personal brand’. It just sounds like something a contestant on The Apprentice would say. There are a lot of us doing CPD 23. Do you think if we all come up with an alternative name and started using it we would be able to make it stick? Suggestions welcome.
Quibbles about terminology aside I agree that we do need to think carefully about the image that we present to others, particularly in online environments which give that image a much wider audience. Thinking about your audience is the key here. You need to think about the huge variety of people who might stumble across or deliberately uncover something that you put online. Is this comment, blog post, picture, joke, poem etc suitable for everyone who might read it? The classic example is the facebook pictures that your friends would appreciate but your mum or your boss (or worse a potential boss) definitely wouldn’t.
I am actually slightly divided on this. As a librarian I feel I should be on the side of careful use of social media as a point of professional principle and on a personal level I always feel very uncomfortable when I see people using social media in a thoughtless way. Everyone really needs to remember that their comments will hang around indefinitely. I’m sure you all know the kind of comments that I mean.
I also feel that everyone should take the time to write properly online. Please don’t use this as an excuse to point out any mistakes I’ve made though. I’ll be horribly embarrassed and it will completely ruin my day.
On the other hand I think we should avoid promoting paranoia. I am very sceptical about the idea that potential employers are going to hunt down pictures of you online and then trash your application on the grounds that they’ve found a picture of you drinking. Apart from anything else they would be recruiting from a vanishingly small pool.
(If I’ve applied for a job with you please be assured that I only drink in moderation. If you’re my current employer this bit is for the future it doesn’t mean I’m thinking of leaving. Wow, this could get complicated.) Don’t slip into paranoia.
It seems reasonable to think in terms of intended audiences as well as the potentially infinite possible audience. I’ll give you an example. I wouldn’t put a picture of me dressed as a pirate on this blog because this is a professional space but I know that there are pictures of me dressed as a pirate out there on a publicly accessible website. I’m completely calm about that because the picture would make sense to the intended audience. Also it is actually a good look for me.
We all have slightly different identities for different contexts and different audiences. It would be self-defeating to overlook that in the name of managing your ‘personal brand’.
Finding Myself – Google task
Googling ‘Alan Green’ was a humbling experience. You’ll be shocked to hear that I didn’t appear on the first ten pages of search results. I had to give up at that point to protect my fragile self-esteem. Most of the results were about the BBC sports commentator of the same name. I think it’s unlikely that people will confuse us. Although worryingly there were a few hits about him saying something racist and there was a site headlined ‘I hate Alan Green’. I’m really not sure that he is doing my ‘personal brand’ much good. As a librarian writing about my online reputation I can laugh this off but would it be a problem if I was trying to pursue a career in radio?
‘Alan Green Library’ was more successful but only thanks to CPD 23. My twitter account comes up because I recently tweeted about this library blog. It was the second hit when I tried it. That’s progress.
Following that success I had high hopes for ‘Alan Green Librarian’ but I wasn’t on the first page of hits. Page two was another victory for cpd 23. Thank you to Lisa Hutchins who kindly mentioned this blog in her thing 2 post.
The lesson of the googling exercise seems to be that taking part in CPD23 is doing wonders for my online professional presence. That and I shouldn’t try to get a job in radio. Thank you to everyone who helped set this up.
I might post about this again later in the week. Let me know what you think of my 'brand'. Also please suggest alternative terms.
Friday, 24 June 2011
CPD 23 - Thing 2 - Reading blogs
One of the good things about the 23 things for professional development programme is that we are all being encouraged to build a community and to learn from one another. That is the focus of thing 2. We’ve been asked to look at some of the other participating blogs, comment on them, and then write up our impressions.
This sounds easy but there are now over 600 people taking part. Simply deciding who to read was quite tricky. Fortunately I’m a trained information professional so I was able to develop a sophisticated research strategy. I started off by reading blogs from my sector. Then I started looking at the blogs of people who’d taken the time to comment on blogs that I was looking at. Finally I ended up looking at blogs that had eye-catching names.
To the untrained eye that might sound like an incoherent, almost random strategy but actually…ok yes it was pretty random.
On the plus side this approach did mean that I think I’ve looked at a reasonable cross section of this new community. I know I’ve only read a tiny proportion but I think I have wandered across the sectors, across the nations and across different levels of experience.
The interesting thing for me is that we all seem to have a lot in common. The most obvious common feature is that we all have the same goal. We want to improve our skills and to develop professionally. There also seems to be a shared sense of enthusiasm for what we do. I guess that too is implied by our decision to join the scheme but it is still nice to see. Everyone seems very supportive and friendly.
One of the factors that seems to divide the cpd23 bloggers is their attitude towards blogging. Some are already experienced bloggers. However a lot of people were more hesitant. Perhaps everyone who sets up a blog finds themselves wondering who is going to read it. I’m glad so many people overcame their hesitation because the truth is that we are interested in what each other have to say. I’m looking forward to reading about your experiences. This project creates a readership for each one of us. It puts us all in touch with people who are interested in the things that we are writing about.
One week in the scheme seems to be going really well. I’m looking forward to the other 21 tasks. Bit wary of this personal brand thing we’ve got coming up next week though…
This sounds easy but there are now over 600 people taking part. Simply deciding who to read was quite tricky. Fortunately I’m a trained information professional so I was able to develop a sophisticated research strategy. I started off by reading blogs from my sector. Then I started looking at the blogs of people who’d taken the time to comment on blogs that I was looking at. Finally I ended up looking at blogs that had eye-catching names.
To the untrained eye that might sound like an incoherent, almost random strategy but actually…ok yes it was pretty random.
On the plus side this approach did mean that I think I’ve looked at a reasonable cross section of this new community. I know I’ve only read a tiny proportion but I think I have wandered across the sectors, across the nations and across different levels of experience.
The interesting thing for me is that we all seem to have a lot in common. The most obvious common feature is that we all have the same goal. We want to improve our skills and to develop professionally. There also seems to be a shared sense of enthusiasm for what we do. I guess that too is implied by our decision to join the scheme but it is still nice to see. Everyone seems very supportive and friendly.
One of the factors that seems to divide the cpd23 bloggers is their attitude towards blogging. Some are already experienced bloggers. However a lot of people were more hesitant. Perhaps everyone who sets up a blog finds themselves wondering who is going to read it. I’m glad so many people overcame their hesitation because the truth is that we are interested in what each other have to say. I’m looking forward to reading about your experiences. This project creates a readership for each one of us. It puts us all in touch with people who are interested in the things that we are writing about.
One week in the scheme seems to be going really well. I’m looking forward to the other 21 tasks. Bit wary of this personal brand thing we’ve got coming up next week though…
Wednesday, 22 June 2011
CoFHE Conference 2011 - Day 3
The Hive – Plenary session
Judith Keene – University of Worcester
The Hive in Worcester is Britain’s first fully integrated joint public and university library. It is due to open in July. Judith is in charge of planning and resources for the University of Worcester’s learning resources department.
The project itself sounds very interesting but she focussed on the importance of ensuring that all of the staff were fully on board. Research from other countries suggests that staff commitment is the key to success in joint library projects. The university library and the public library teams are still going to be employed by their respective organisations but the services will be presented seamlessly. From the perspective of most users there will be no distinction.
Judith made some interesting points about the differences in values between public and academic libraries. The central one was that in public libraries the ideal is to give the user the information they want but in an academic library the ideal is to teach users how to find the information they want. The Hive project tried to overcome this and other potential culture clashes by setting up staff workshops to think about values and to come up with a shared vision.
Experimenting with mobile technology use in libraries – Workshop
Jo Alcock – University of Wolverhampton
Jo’s presentation is available at:
http://www.slideshare.net/joeyanne/experimenting-with-mobiletechnologiesinlibraries
All of the resources she mentioned are available at:
http://www.delicious.com/tag/cofhemobapps
This was a particularly good workshop because Jo had obviously spent a lot of time researching the use of mobile technologies in libraries. She’d uncovered lots of examples of good practice and lots of interesting resources. She was really throwing ideas at her audience and everyone left the room feeling very enthused. This was an excellent way to end the conference.
Having introduced the idea that mobile technology had reached the point where we all need to start taking it much more seriously she split her examples into three sections.
1. Library content
2. Library services
3. Mobile specific content – i.e. new services that we couldn’t have provided without mobile technology.
Library content
- Academic publishers are not yet providing e-books in mobile friendly formats.
- Ebscohost has a specialist service which provides journal articles for mobile devices. This is great for libraries that subscribe to Ebscohost.
http://www.ebscohost.com/academic/mobile-access
- The British Library has an app which allows users to view digitised material on their mobiles. http://www.bl.uk/app/
Library services
- ‘Know it now’ text enquires. The state library of Ohio runs a leading SMS enquiry service. http://www.knowitnow.org/- Text library tips and tricks. The University of Huddersfield texts students tips and tricks for using the library and studying effectively.
- Mobile catalogue. Library thing for libraries offers a service which adapts your catalogue for mobile use. Keele University is already using it. http://www.librarything.com/forlibraries- Roving enquires. At the University of Warwick library staff carry around ipads so they can instantly access the opac and the net in order to deal with any student enquires. This saves them from having to walk to a computer (I’m assuming Warwick University library is big).
- Collecting library statistics. Counting the number of users in the library on a mobile device allows you to process statistics instantly.
- Room booking by mobile phone. Use of QR codes to check availability and book if free. QR codes are those blocky square pictures that work as links for smart phones. People can scan them with their phone and then they are taken to the site or online resource.
Mobile specific services
- QR codes to direct people to e-books. This is clever. If you have an ebook copy of a popular book you can put a QR code for the e-book near the shelf where the print copies are kept. You can even have a dummy book (a DVD case or something) with the QR code on it and instructions to use it. Students with smart phones can scan the QR code and they will then be taken directly to the e-book.
- Induction treasure hunts.
- Scan me. Charles Darwin University Library promoted their use of QR codes by having staff t-shirts with QR codes on and the slogan ‘scan me now’. (I’m not sure about this one.)
- Scanning book barcodes to see if the library has a copy. The library equivalent of finding something in a bookshop and using your mobile to see if Amazon has it for less.
- Checking PC availability from your mobile.
- Foursquare. A location based app that allows people to comment on places they visit and to set up communities based on those places. Slightly worryingly if it’s your place you can claim it on the site but if you don’t any user can set up a community for it.
- Shelf sorting app. An app that can spot library books that are in the wrong place and tell you where they should be. Currently in production.
Jo finished by offering some parting words of advice.
Aim for high impact, low cost.
Don’t over invest.
Use free resources.
Examples: Animoto – Video generator, Zbar – barcode reader, Kaywa – QR code generator.
After Jo’s talk it was time to grab some lunch, say my goodbyes and head back home. The conference was a great experience. I hope you find some of this useful.
Judith Keene – University of Worcester
The Hive in Worcester is Britain’s first fully integrated joint public and university library. It is due to open in July. Judith is in charge of planning and resources for the University of Worcester’s learning resources department.
The project itself sounds very interesting but she focussed on the importance of ensuring that all of the staff were fully on board. Research from other countries suggests that staff commitment is the key to success in joint library projects. The university library and the public library teams are still going to be employed by their respective organisations but the services will be presented seamlessly. From the perspective of most users there will be no distinction.
Judith made some interesting points about the differences in values between public and academic libraries. The central one was that in public libraries the ideal is to give the user the information they want but in an academic library the ideal is to teach users how to find the information they want. The Hive project tried to overcome this and other potential culture clashes by setting up staff workshops to think about values and to come up with a shared vision.
Experimenting with mobile technology use in libraries – Workshop
Jo Alcock – University of Wolverhampton
Jo’s presentation is available at:
http://www.slideshare.net/joeyanne/experimenting-with-mobiletechnologiesinlibraries
All of the resources she mentioned are available at:
http://www.delicious.com/tag/cofhemobapps
This was a particularly good workshop because Jo had obviously spent a lot of time researching the use of mobile technologies in libraries. She’d uncovered lots of examples of good practice and lots of interesting resources. She was really throwing ideas at her audience and everyone left the room feeling very enthused. This was an excellent way to end the conference.
Having introduced the idea that mobile technology had reached the point where we all need to start taking it much more seriously she split her examples into three sections.
1. Library content
2. Library services
3. Mobile specific content – i.e. new services that we couldn’t have provided without mobile technology.
Library content
- Academic publishers are not yet providing e-books in mobile friendly formats.
- Ebscohost has a specialist service which provides journal articles for mobile devices. This is great for libraries that subscribe to Ebscohost.
http://www.ebscohost.com/academic/mobile-access
- The British Library has an app which allows users to view digitised material on their mobiles. http://www.bl.uk/app/
Library services
- ‘Know it now’ text enquires. The state library of Ohio runs a leading SMS enquiry service. http://www.knowitnow.org/- Text library tips and tricks. The University of Huddersfield texts students tips and tricks for using the library and studying effectively.
- Mobile catalogue. Library thing for libraries offers a service which adapts your catalogue for mobile use. Keele University is already using it. http://www.librarything.com/forlibraries- Roving enquires. At the University of Warwick library staff carry around ipads so they can instantly access the opac and the net in order to deal with any student enquires. This saves them from having to walk to a computer (I’m assuming Warwick University library is big).
- Collecting library statistics. Counting the number of users in the library on a mobile device allows you to process statistics instantly.
- Room booking by mobile phone. Use of QR codes to check availability and book if free. QR codes are those blocky square pictures that work as links for smart phones. People can scan them with their phone and then they are taken to the site or online resource.
Mobile specific services
- QR codes to direct people to e-books. This is clever. If you have an ebook copy of a popular book you can put a QR code for the e-book near the shelf where the print copies are kept. You can even have a dummy book (a DVD case or something) with the QR code on it and instructions to use it. Students with smart phones can scan the QR code and they will then be taken directly to the e-book.
- Induction treasure hunts.
- Scan me. Charles Darwin University Library promoted their use of QR codes by having staff t-shirts with QR codes on and the slogan ‘scan me now’. (I’m not sure about this one.)
- Scanning book barcodes to see if the library has a copy. The library equivalent of finding something in a bookshop and using your mobile to see if Amazon has it for less.
- Checking PC availability from your mobile.
- Foursquare. A location based app that allows people to comment on places they visit and to set up communities based on those places. Slightly worryingly if it’s your place you can claim it on the site but if you don’t any user can set up a community for it.
- Shelf sorting app. An app that can spot library books that are in the wrong place and tell you where they should be. Currently in production.
Jo finished by offering some parting words of advice.
Aim for high impact, low cost.
Don’t over invest.
Use free resources.
Examples: Animoto – Video generator, Zbar – barcode reader, Kaywa – QR code generator.
After Jo’s talk it was time to grab some lunch, say my goodbyes and head back home. The conference was a great experience. I hope you find some of this useful.
CoFHE Conference 2011 - Day 2 - The afternoon and the evening
New online resources for information skills – Workshop
Ella Mitchell and Erica Plowman – University of East London
Ella and Erica were discussing the development and use of UEL’s infoskills site. Observant readers might remember that I saw Ella present this site at the CoFHE LASEC Teach Meet last month.)
The library team worked in partnership with the university’s learning technology team. They started off by identifying information skills websites that they saw as examples of best practice.
What they liked out there:
Staffordshire Assignment Survival Kit - http://www.staffs.ac.uk/ask/
Cardiff Information Literacy Resource Bank - https://ilrb.cf.ac.uk/index.html
Leeds Skills @ Library - http://skills.library.leeds.ac.uk/
OU Safari - http://www.open.ac.uk/safari/
Having looked at these resources and consulted widely they agreed on some basic principles for their project.
- An open clear structure that allows students to jump to the aspects that they are interested in. This was intended to make the site relevant to ‘strategic’ (last minute) learners.
- Openly accessible. They felt that students were resistant to having to log in and they wanted to remove any possible barriers to use. This also allows the wider academic community to use the resources.
- Information skills advice from a range of sources including teaching staff and very importantly other students. Peer advice was seen as a very effective way of getting the message across.
The actual production process involved bringing together a lot of expertise from within the university and from outside.
The completed website features information skills tutorials, info skills tests (surprisingly popular apparently), videos of useful advice, demonstrations and various other resources. It is an excellent site. Have a look.
www.uel.ac.uk/infoskills
Note on copyright. The UEL site is creative commons so their resources can be used for educational purposes as long as they are properly credited. The Cardiff Information Literacy Resource Bank and the Leeds Skills @ Library site are also creative commons.
Hard Times – Plenary session
Lloyd Ellis - CILIP Cymru
Llloyd is the head of CILIPin Wales / CILIP Cymru. His talk started off with a library closed sign, a map of library closures across the country and the promise that the end of the talk would be more cheerful. I’m not quite sure he delivered on that promise. He concluded that partnership and cooperation were the solution. That’s reasonable enough but the overall tone of his talk still struck me as being pretty downbeat. I’m not sure we got the promised happy ending.
CofHe AGM
CofHe and the UC&R group are going to be replaced by a new CILIP group for college and university librarians. This is part of CILIP’s strategy to save money by streamlining itself. The current committee are working hard to ensure that FE and HE will still both be catered for.
The evening – Conference dinner and a disco
Dinner was very nice. In fact I can recommend the food generally.
The head of library services at Glyndwr University Paul Jeorrett gave an after dinner speech which used poetry and audience participation to put a more cheerful spin on the conference theme.
We won’t talk about the disco. (It was fun really.)
Ella Mitchell and Erica Plowman – University of East London
Ella and Erica were discussing the development and use of UEL’s infoskills site. Observant readers might remember that I saw Ella present this site at the CoFHE LASEC Teach Meet last month.)
The library team worked in partnership with the university’s learning technology team. They started off by identifying information skills websites that they saw as examples of best practice.
What they liked out there:
Staffordshire Assignment Survival Kit - http://www.staffs.ac.uk/ask/
Cardiff Information Literacy Resource Bank - https://ilrb.cf.ac.uk/index.html
Leeds Skills @ Library - http://skills.library.leeds.ac.uk/
OU Safari - http://www.open.ac.uk/safari/
Having looked at these resources and consulted widely they agreed on some basic principles for their project.
- An open clear structure that allows students to jump to the aspects that they are interested in. This was intended to make the site relevant to ‘strategic’ (last minute) learners.
- Openly accessible. They felt that students were resistant to having to log in and they wanted to remove any possible barriers to use. This also allows the wider academic community to use the resources.
- Information skills advice from a range of sources including teaching staff and very importantly other students. Peer advice was seen as a very effective way of getting the message across.
The actual production process involved bringing together a lot of expertise from within the university and from outside.
The completed website features information skills tutorials, info skills tests (surprisingly popular apparently), videos of useful advice, demonstrations and various other resources. It is an excellent site. Have a look.
www.uel.ac.uk/infoskills
Note on copyright. The UEL site is creative commons so their resources can be used for educational purposes as long as they are properly credited. The Cardiff Information Literacy Resource Bank and the Leeds Skills @ Library site are also creative commons.
Hard Times – Plenary session
Lloyd Ellis - CILIP Cymru
Llloyd is the head of CILIPin Wales / CILIP Cymru. His talk started off with a library closed sign, a map of library closures across the country and the promise that the end of the talk would be more cheerful. I’m not quite sure he delivered on that promise. He concluded that partnership and cooperation were the solution. That’s reasonable enough but the overall tone of his talk still struck me as being pretty downbeat. I’m not sure we got the promised happy ending.
CofHe AGM
CofHe and the UC&R group are going to be replaced by a new CILIP group for college and university librarians. This is part of CILIP’s strategy to save money by streamlining itself. The current committee are working hard to ensure that FE and HE will still both be catered for.
The evening – Conference dinner and a disco
Dinner was very nice. In fact I can recommend the food generally.
The head of library services at Glyndwr University Paul Jeorrett gave an after dinner speech which used poetry and audience participation to put a more cheerful spin on the conference theme.
We won’t talk about the disco. (It was fun really.)
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