You've already had to put up with some of my musings about the professional use of social media so I will focus this post on answering the questions that were part of the cpd23 post for this thing. If you would like more detail I have written about social media in thing 6 - online networking, thing 4 - current awareness and way back in thing 2 - our personal brand.
Are there any other advantages to social networking in the context of professional development other than those already outlined?
As the cpd23 blog implies social media can be used to organise and promote events. This is a good example of online networks working hand in hand with or even helping to create face to face networks.
Social media also helps us to stay in touch with the latest developments in the library world and it helps us to take a wider view of our profession. It offers us all an easy way to look beyond our day to day working experiences and think about the broader perspective. For example it gives us a taste of the variety of different roles that are part of the library and information profession.
Can you think of any disadvantages?
I think there is a danger that being a part of various different online professional networks can make you complacent about participating in face to face professional networks and building up 'real life' professional relationships. I don't want to devalue online networks or imply that they are inherently shallow but at their best they feed into and feed from other kinds of network. My point is that despite the dizzying array of different tools for online networking it is just one method of communication. We shouldn't let it blind us to the other ways that we can reach out and connect with our fellow library professionals.
Has CPD23 helped you to make contact with others that you would not have had contact with normally?
Yes, it definitely has. CPD23ers come from every sector of our profession and every corner of the world. This has been one of the huge strengths of the scheme. It has given us the opportunity to share ideas with a wide variety of different people. I'm sure lots of us have connected with people that we probably wouldn't have met in any other context.
Did you already use social media for your career development before starting CPD23? Will you keep using it after the programme has finished?
Yes and yes. The importance of using social media to stay up-to-date with developments in the field and to build up professional networks has been a recurring theme ever since I got into this profession. It was practically the first thing they told us back when I started my Library Science course. Since then it has been emphasised at almost every training event that I have attended.
As part of the interview process for my current job I had to give a presentation on how the Library could use social media to engage students.
I regularly train teaching staff in the use of our Moodle VLE. Encouraging them to use the social media aspects of the system to create active learning communities is a big part of that.
My own experience has supported this overwhelming consensus in favour of the career development potential of social media. Using social media has helped me to be part of the conversation, to stay in touch with developments in the library world and of course to stay in touch with library people.
In your opinion does social networking really help to foster a sense of community?
Yes. It's easy to be cynical and dismiss online networks as shallow or ephemeral but they do help people to communicate and to connect with each other. That said it shouldn't be the only way that we are trying to build a sense of community. It is one set of tools among many.
Showing posts with label Social Media. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Social Media. Show all posts
Thursday, 29 September 2011
Monday, 12 September 2011
CPD 23 - Thing 6 - Online Networking
Apologies for absence
I'd like to start by apologising to any regular readers for the long gap between posts. I got married in August, which was amazing but it meant that this was a pretty busy summer. I have managed to fall even further behind on the 'things' than I thought I was going to. I do intend to catch up so please bear with me.
On with the 'things'...
Thing 6 - Online networking
Twitter
There is some overlap between thing 6 and two of my earlier 'thing' posts. When discussing the use of twitter as a current awareness tool I explained that I started to tweet because my Library Science Msc lecturers told me to. As I said then cpd 23 has helped to cement my impression that twitter can be a very useful tool for professional networking. It removes barriers and gives us all a chance to be part of a million ongoing conversations about every aspect of our profession (or whatever else you want to talk about).
Facebook
There seems to be a developing understanding that facebook is primarily for the more 'social' side of social media. The informal, staying in touch with friends aspect of it all. I have 'library' friends on facebook but I draw a fuzzy distinction between staying in touch with old classmates or coworkers and seeing a site as a natural place for professional networking.
Linkedin
My impression of Linkedin is that it is primarily a job hunting tool. It wouldn't be my first choice if I was trying to exchange ideas or discuss experiences because I feel active users are primarily there to sell themselves as potential employees. Good luck to them obviously but doesn't that make the conversations less free than it is on sites where users have a less specific agenda? Is that unfair? It's arguably ill informed prejudice so please educate me if you're an enthusiastic Linkedin user. (Only if you use it for something other than job hunting though. I understand that it's useful for that. Thank you.)
Librarians as Teachers
I am a member of the Librarians as Teachers network. This 'thing' has reminded me that I really should be a more active user. As a former teacher who's now working in an FE college in a librarian role that involves teaching I'm pretty much exactly the kind of person that this site is designed for. I recommend this network if you are in a similar role.I have picked up some useful tips. I should try to contribute more.
I'd like to start by apologising to any regular readers for the long gap between posts. I got married in August, which was amazing but it meant that this was a pretty busy summer. I have managed to fall even further behind on the 'things' than I thought I was going to. I do intend to catch up so please bear with me.
On with the 'things'...
Thing 6 - Online networking
There is some overlap between thing 6 and two of my earlier 'thing' posts. When discussing the use of twitter as a current awareness tool I explained that I started to tweet because my Library Science Msc lecturers told me to. As I said then cpd 23 has helped to cement my impression that twitter can be a very useful tool for professional networking. It removes barriers and gives us all a chance to be part of a million ongoing conversations about every aspect of our profession (or whatever else you want to talk about).
There seems to be a developing understanding that facebook is primarily for the more 'social' side of social media. The informal, staying in touch with friends aspect of it all. I have 'library' friends on facebook but I draw a fuzzy distinction between staying in touch with old classmates or coworkers and seeing a site as a natural place for professional networking.
My impression of Linkedin is that it is primarily a job hunting tool. It wouldn't be my first choice if I was trying to exchange ideas or discuss experiences because I feel active users are primarily there to sell themselves as potential employees. Good luck to them obviously but doesn't that make the conversations less free than it is on sites where users have a less specific agenda? Is that unfair? It's arguably ill informed prejudice so please educate me if you're an enthusiastic Linkedin user. (Only if you use it for something other than job hunting though. I understand that it's useful for that. Thank you.)
Librarians as Teachers
I am a member of the Librarians as Teachers network. This 'thing' has reminded me that I really should be a more active user. As a former teacher who's now working in an FE college in a librarian role that involves teaching I'm pretty much exactly the kind of person that this site is designed for. I recommend this network if you are in a similar role.I have picked up some useful tips. I should try to contribute more.
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.
Wednesday, 22 June 2011
CofHE Conference 2011 - Day 1
Last week I ventured out to Wales for the CofHE conference. It was a very interesting trip. As promised I would like to share some of my experiences and a few of the ideas that I picked up.
The days were split into plenary sessions for all attendees and smaller group workshops.
The Future – Plenary Session
Phil Bradley – Vice President of CILIP
Phil Bradley opened the conference with a talk about the changing nature of information services. He predicted a future dominated by social media. In practical terms this means that libraries and individual librarians need to start thinking very carefully about the way we manage our online presence, particularly in the social media environment. Building a strong online reputation now might have huge benefits in the future.
Six Book Challenge – Workshop
Genevieve Clarke – The Reading Agency
My first workshop was about the six book challenge, a reading initiative for college students. The scheme is intended to encourage less confident readers to read more and to use the library more. It aims to help them to overcome mental barriers to using the library. The process is very simple. Students are encouraged to read six books and to record their reading in a reading diary. Library staff stamp the diary each time a student reads a book.
Those who complete the scheme are rewarded with a certificate, preferably handed out at an awards ceremony. There are also various other incentives to motivate participants including small prizes and prize draws.
The scheme is modelled on schemes like the summer reading challenge which the reading agency runs through public libraries. Most reading schemes cater for younger age groups. They felt that the needs of college students weren’t being met so they set up this challenge.
Some of the other workshop members had already used the scheme. One college had successfully piloted the scheme with ESOL students and intended to extend it to skills for life students. Those who were already planning to use the scheme next year were also planning to target one of those two groups.
The resources pack has to be purchased from the reading agency. A £75 pack contains enough resources to run the scheme for fifty people.
www.sixbookchallenges.co.uk
The reading agency also provides a useful looking recommended reading service for less confident readers.
www.readingagency.org.uk/findaread
They are investigating the use of games to encourage reluctant readers to read more. Games will be incorporated into future versions of the six book challenge. This was only mentioned briefly but it sounds interesting.
http://www.readingagency.org.uk/new-thinking/gaming-for-reading/
The Evening – A quiz
We have a quiz coming up at the college. I hope everyone else is really good or we could be in trouble.
The days were split into plenary sessions for all attendees and smaller group workshops.
The Future – Plenary Session
Phil Bradley – Vice President of CILIP
Phil Bradley opened the conference with a talk about the changing nature of information services. He predicted a future dominated by social media. In practical terms this means that libraries and individual librarians need to start thinking very carefully about the way we manage our online presence, particularly in the social media environment. Building a strong online reputation now might have huge benefits in the future.
Six Book Challenge – Workshop
Genevieve Clarke – The Reading Agency
My first workshop was about the six book challenge, a reading initiative for college students. The scheme is intended to encourage less confident readers to read more and to use the library more. It aims to help them to overcome mental barriers to using the library. The process is very simple. Students are encouraged to read six books and to record their reading in a reading diary. Library staff stamp the diary each time a student reads a book.
Those who complete the scheme are rewarded with a certificate, preferably handed out at an awards ceremony. There are also various other incentives to motivate participants including small prizes and prize draws.
The scheme is modelled on schemes like the summer reading challenge which the reading agency runs through public libraries. Most reading schemes cater for younger age groups. They felt that the needs of college students weren’t being met so they set up this challenge.
Some of the other workshop members had already used the scheme. One college had successfully piloted the scheme with ESOL students and intended to extend it to skills for life students. Those who were already planning to use the scheme next year were also planning to target one of those two groups.
The resources pack has to be purchased from the reading agency. A £75 pack contains enough resources to run the scheme for fifty people.
www.sixbookchallenges.co.uk
The reading agency also provides a useful looking recommended reading service for less confident readers.
www.readingagency.org.uk/findaread
They are investigating the use of games to encourage reluctant readers to read more. Games will be incorporated into future versions of the six book challenge. This was only mentioned briefly but it sounds interesting.
http://www.readingagency.org.uk/new-thinking/gaming-for-reading/
The Evening – A quiz
We have a quiz coming up at the college. I hope everyone else is really good or we could be in trouble.
Thursday, 9 June 2011
Changing roles, changing futures
Websites are on the way out. One day very soon (now?) when people look for information online their first instinct will be to turn to social media and try to find out what ‘thought leaders’ are saying about their topic. The tweets, blogs, facebook pages etc of respected experts will be seen as more up-to-date and more useful than old fashioned websites. The search engines of the future will be based on this new model. This is the prediction of CILIP vice president and information guru Phil Bradley.
Mr Bradley outlined this vision of a social media dominated future at a talk I recently attended in Woking. The event was hosted by CILIP South East / CILIP in Surrey. The talk was preceded by their joint AGM.
In immediate terms the practical consequence of this vision is that if you want to be taken seriously as an information professional in the future than you need to start building up a professional online presence, and you need to start doing it now.
So essentially I went all the way to Woking to have an expert reinforce my vague background sense of guilt about letting this blog gather dust. Still it has worked so he must have been convincing. I might even try and tweet more than once every couple of months.
I have been slightly wary of blogging about this talk because he talked about searching for his own name to see what people were saying about him (and presumably to pick up comic material about his namesakes but I won’t ruin that for you). Bit silly to worry about that when presumably being mentioned on librarianship blogs helps to reinforce his position as a ‘thought leader’, not that he needs any help with that.
On the negative side members of the audience did raise the issue of privacy concerns in a world where social media shapes our access to information. Phil’s response was that he personally had decided to make everything about him available online but that might not be appropriate for everyone. I’m not sure where that gets you if you are concerned about privacy. Is the subtext that you might simply be out of luck?
A more positive take would be that we all have to make conscious decisions about how we manage our online presence.
Mr Bradley outlined this vision of a social media dominated future at a talk I recently attended in Woking. The event was hosted by CILIP South East / CILIP in Surrey. The talk was preceded by their joint AGM.
In immediate terms the practical consequence of this vision is that if you want to be taken seriously as an information professional in the future than you need to start building up a professional online presence, and you need to start doing it now.
So essentially I went all the way to Woking to have an expert reinforce my vague background sense of guilt about letting this blog gather dust. Still it has worked so he must have been convincing. I might even try and tweet more than once every couple of months.
I have been slightly wary of blogging about this talk because he talked about searching for his own name to see what people were saying about him (and presumably to pick up comic material about his namesakes but I won’t ruin that for you). Bit silly to worry about that when presumably being mentioned on librarianship blogs helps to reinforce his position as a ‘thought leader’, not that he needs any help with that.
On the negative side members of the audience did raise the issue of privacy concerns in a world where social media shapes our access to information. Phil’s response was that he personally had decided to make everything about him available online but that might not be appropriate for everyone. I’m not sure where that gets you if you are concerned about privacy. Is the subtext that you might simply be out of luck?
A more positive take would be that we all have to make conscious decisions about how we manage our online presence.
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