Thing 5: Curation Tools

I have never considered myself a curator until now.  It makes sense that as a librarian, I am collecting information, not just in print materials, and cataloging it into different subject areas.  I have bookmarked many great resources in Google Chrome by hitting the star on the toolbar and saving them into private folders, but I have not considered the value of sharing my digital collections.  Social networking allows us to share all sorts of great information, so why not curate my collections with sharing in mind.  Social bookmarking allows us to expand our knowledge and resources through a variety of bookmarking sites such as Diigo, Delicious and Pinterest.  Assigning tags to our content lets anyone using these sites find resources by the subject(s) tags.  The tags also help us organize and find our own resources.  We also are likely to find other librarians and educational colleagues through this online community, so that's an added bonus.  Lastly, my cloud-based bookmarks can be accessed anywhere, which is pretty handy!

So, I set up an account with Diigo a long time ago, but haven't made much use of it, despite the occasional email with from the Diigo in Education group.  I think I needed to have a few groups that fit my needs, like Teacher-librarians!!!  If Joyce Valenza is posting, it will be very useful!  In addition, I joined the Cool Tools for Schools & Google in Education groups  I also went ahead and added Heather, Buffy and Shannon to people I follow, so I think Diigo will be a good source for me now.  I added the bookmarklet to my toolbar, so I can quickly put useful digital content in to my Diigo library.

Flipboard is not new to me but I love it and use it often on my iPhone, so I added the examples that Polly posted to explore at my leisure.

Pinterest is GREAT and I have used it many times for library displays, storytime lessons and related crafts, library skills lessons, etc.  Here is a collection of pins that I put together to help librarians promote Banned Book Week:  Banned Book Week Pinterest Board 

Since I needed to explore a new curation tool, I have created an account with Symbaloo and currently have a board that will be added to my school library website for digital resources.  I believe the graphic symbols on a webpage will be much more inviting and user-friendly to my students.  It is not easy to get them to bypass a quick Google search for information, but if they can access all the best sites on a single page, it is more likely to be used.  They will also see other resources that will help them find related subjects of interest.  The link to my new Symbaloo Webmix is:  SWW Library Resources

Thanks for the great curation resources and the inspiration to revisit forgotten curation tools. 

Thing 16: Digital Tattoo & Digital Citizenship

Getting started on this subject was difficult with all the information I read and reviewed!  I like the way Thing 16 starts with the "Mind Reader" - a great video that features gullible young people from different backgrounds in an exotic foreign location (Brussels) that have plenty of personal information online, but don't realize it.  It would be a fun way to start a lesson with students on digital footprints.  Thing 16 also provided a plethora of lessons on the subject of digital literacy (citizenship, footprints).  I found myself bookmarking EVERYTHING into a folder on my computer for this subject. I was not aware that there was a week designated for awareness on the topic in October  (Digital Citizenship Week).  With lessons/videos from Common Sense Media - Education, iKeep Safe/Google, Cyberwise, Teachinctrl.org (InCtrl), Digizen, and the Teaching Channel, it would be easy to put some lessons together to raise awareness of the issue and teach digital literacy during Digital Citizens Week.  I could also find posters to display through some of these sites or Pinterest (I now have a DC board on my account).  Really, ideas are everywhere; thanks to Cool Tools for Schools, I have a wonderful set of resources to start with & will likely find many more.

Digital citizenship, copyright, plagarism, etc, can be had topics to get students excited about.  I have heard numerous times how dry the topics can be.  Students think they know how to behave on their "digital playground", but until they witness a hurtful or punishing consequence, they will ignore this topic.  This is where I plan to have multimedia lessons that are interactive.  One lesson that I watched through Teaching Channel could help engage students with a hands-on lesson Understanding the Impact of Digital Footprints. First the students go online and google the classroom teacher, who maintains a professional digital footprint as a good example. Then students are asked to investigate two people online for a job position and determine which one was honest and more reliable.  They need to make inferences to decide some factors, but collect evidence to back up why they chose one candidate over another based on profiles found on the internet.  This type of lesson could be very interesting and make a lasting impact on students.

One of the sources highlighted a book that may be useful to have on the shelves of the school library: lol...OMG by Matt Ivester.  This book is in our public library and I will check it out in the future as well as others that may be a little more up-to-date.

Lastly, I was interested in the article on sexism in the gaming industry with bullying or "doxxing" of female game designers who comment on the industry.  The term doxxing means to expose someone's true identity online (full name and address).  Most people do not want to have personal information online for safety reasons.  If you want to have your background information removed from the general public, you can contact various databrokers such as Pipl, Spokeo, Whitepages, etc.  Time-consuming, but likely worth it!

PS.  I did google myself and fortunately, I am not concerned about my own digital footprint - probably because I do make the effort to remain positive and professional with posts, pictures and personal information.

http://www.cybersmart.gov.au/Kids/Get%20the%20facts/Digital%20footprint.aspx

Thing 19: Social Reading & Book Stuff

It made sense that this lesson started with Goodreads; it has been my number one resource for cataloging my books and reading book reviews for years.  I started out with Library Thing for cataloging my books, but gravitated to Goodreads, which seemed more user-friendly (particularly for mobile devices.  Anyway, when I read about the Goodreads widget, I was happy to add it to this blog and I plan to add it to my school library webpage too.  I have showed my students this site numerous times, especially when they want to know what book comes next in a series; all they need to do is find the author profile and scroll down to the books written by him or her.  I check reviews for numerous reasons, but I really love it for perspective - seeing both the positive and negative comments helps me moderate discussions in both adult and teen book clubs. There are so many different ways to interpret a story and share other related information (similar books, movies, authors, places, historical events, etc.).  Goodreads is bookmarked on my laptop, and desktop; I also use the Goodreads app on my iPhone.

Libary Reads was a new site to me and I have bookmarked it into my "Book Reviews" folder with the intention of checking it for new titles.  The top ten titles looked really interesting and in the future, I would love to contribute to this social recommendation site.  Now I just need more time to read!

I have opened an account with Net Galley for advance reading of new titles, but I have an issue with the fact that I have 2 kindle accounts and I am trying to correct that with Amazon.  Net Galley needs the address of the device(s) I plan to use.  I hope to talk with them again tomorrow when my little-used kindle is fully charged.  I use the kindle app most of the time on my smartphone or my iPad and apparently I inadvertently opened a second account.  It will be good to get this straightened out!  To be honest, I really prefer paper books, but I know how important it is to stay on top of current technology and use eBooks too.  The Book Bub was a great resource for discounted eBooks and after signing up for an account, I receive daily emails with the really good pricing deals - this will encourage me to get back into the eBooks!

I have an Overdrive account, but I've used it mostly to get audio books onto my phone ('love audio!).  Downloading books is easy, but I tend to forget about them and they expire before I finish them.  If I could renew the eBooks, I may be more likely to borrow them.  For now, borrowing eBooks just doesn't work for me.  I do recommend them to others though.

I started a new folder in my bookmarks for Spartan Guides, which was so fully loaded with useful library information, that it will take me some time to sort out the things that I can use.  Thanks for posting - love LibGuides!

Common Sense Media is a wonderful site, but it is geared towards parents, teachers and librarians that have children under 14 years of age.  As a high school librarian, the reviews and ratings on books and movies were pretty limited.  Still, I liked the variety of "best of" lists for titles.  I did use this site when I worked with younger students and the app worked really well (although it does take up a lot of storage space on your phone).