Final Thoughts

In this final blog post, we were instructed to write about what we believe we have accomplished for ourselves in this course, which I feel is a beautiful way to reflect upon a course (rather than: what could you have done better?  What did you like or not like about the class? Etc.)

I decided to take Information Literacy Instruction for a couple reasons: I'm interested in academic librarianship, several professors told me it would be a good class to take, it's only offered every few years.  I thought it would be a good class that would teach me how to teach--since many librarians are often thrown in to teaching roles with little to no training.  Other than that, I didn't really know what to expect from this course.  Below are a few bullet points of some of my main takeaways. 

1. Collaboration.  - Ugh, I cringe just writing the word.  Not because I don't enjoy working with other people, but because that word is such a buzz word in the library field--"Libraries need to collaborate or Die," I think the Director of Minitex once said.  In this course I learned not only how to collaborate on a small scale (through group presentations and working with different personality types) but how collaboration works at the instruction librarian level. 

When I interviewed and observed three librarians from Bethel University, I was surprised to learn how much involvement the professor has in how the lesson goes.  In some cases, it's almost like the librarians are a need filler for the professor--"they need this and this and this, done in this way, and don't go into this because they won't understand and it will take up too much time."  In some ways, this isn't very fair, in others, it's a way to serve the community you're a part of.  This class has opened my eyes to these relationships I will be forming in the future, and has made me think deeply about the balance between asserting oneself and serving.

2. One-shots are hard.  You would think I would have already known this, given that, like, everybody talks about this in the library world.  But for some reason, I didn't believe them.  Or, at least, I didn't believe that they would be heard for me.  Because I'm that proud.  And because I'm brief!  I write good, short papers.  I get to the point and don't ramble.  (Wow, I apparently am sort of full of myself, now that I think about it.). 

Two assignments for this class taught me just how hard it is to stuff lots of information into a short amount of time--the tutorial and the teaching demo.  The teaching demo in a lot of ways was a lot more flexible--you could just say, "this would normally be a 50 minute presentation..." but what if, in real life, you truly only got 20 minutes, for one session?  On top of that, in order to be a good librarian, you need to talk less and let them explore more, yet half of them have no idea what ILL is.  Is it worth it to take class time to teach them how to make an ILL account?

3. I can talk the talk. This last takeaway is a little bit different but still quite important to me.  Because of this class, I've learned a lot of techniques and lingo that I can bring up when talking to coworkers or colleagues at conferences.  Because of our extensive work on ACRL, I participated in Bethel's group work on the November ACRL revisions.  Since being a reference librarian is my current career goal, it is great to already be a part of these conversations and to have teaching practice and tutorial practice to show and talk about.

Those were my three main takeaways!  I really feel as though this class has prepared me to be a instruction librarian.  I really enjoyed the Booth book and may actually purchase it (Have been checking it out from the library). 

Thanks for a great semester!

Roles.

[three reflections and then a tie-in.  this post is more abstract.  you can tell by my lack of capitalization and bracket use.  let's call this my "aha" moment.]

1. 

Once as I was checking out at Target, the cashier attempted to engage me in small talk.  Since I hate small talk but am still a decent human being, I smiled and chatted.  When I told her I was a librarian, she said something like, "Oh.  I didn't know those were still needed."

And you know how sometimes it isn't what the person says but the way they said it?

Yeah, it was one of those times.

You're a cashier, I thought.  Let me just go over to the self-check-out lane.

[But I didn't say that.]

2.

You all remember KONY 2012?  How everyone was like, "Yeah!  Let's go get the baddest of bad guys!"  And it was SUPER popular for like a month or two and now nobody talks about it?

It's like it was the first bad thing to ever happen in the world--the way people reacted.

Except it wasn't.

It was just what everyone was talking about.

Let's talk about the North Korean Concentration Camps.

Or child sex trafficking.

No?

3. 

Facebook status:

Hey does anyone know a really good site to download books from besides Amazon? 

[10 comments later]

April: The library.

So:

So, okay, this post is a little abstract.  But this is where I'm going with this.

We've read a bunch of documents this week about the changing role of the librarian.  The blended librarian.  The embedded librarian.  Moving beyond the one-shot.  These are all great things.

The fact is, our profession is a constant battle for relevancy and advocacy.

Why?

Mindsets.

It's going to be really hard to change the stereotypical image of the librarian.

A recent Pue Survey said that people still think of books when they think of libraries.

And how many,  how many times have you heard "You need a Master's Degree for that?"

My first three examples demonstrate mindset and the weight of buy-in.

It's almost like: how can we make the status of the 21st century librarian go viral?

Librarian/faculty collaboration is a key factor.

Convince the academics and the students will follow?


The relationship between faculty and the way we interact and sell our image to them is going to be key to our jobs.

How can this happen?

Maybe:
-Building relationships outside of our time of need.
-Advocating for the importance of information literacy.
-Marketing

(See: p. 374 of the Blended Librarian doc.)

Thoughts?

Review/Assessment

There were many, many assessment techniques presented this week.  Between Booth and the BCIT hand out, there were many suggestions for ways to get feedback from students in the lesson and afterward.

The Classroom Assessment Techniques handout listed many writing exercises you can use with students.  What I found especially fascinating was the "Planning" document on page three.  I honestly had never before considered coming up with an assessment based on what you want out of it. Does that sound dumb?  I guess maybe I did that, in part.  But it was much more casual.  "Oh, I need feedback.  I'll either ask for feedback or hand out note cards."  Or, "Oh, I need to insert an active learning component because my professor tells me I need active learning.  It's a best practice.  Let's pick one that will make students not fall asleep."

What a practical person I am.

I guess I never realized how many different types of assessments there were, even within one category!  For example, the packet lists muddiest point, one-minute paper, listing, application cards, matrix, one-sentence summaries, and summarizing.  While these are all writing assignments, each requires a different amount of time and gives you slightly different information.

Yes, essentially your goal with any of these is to see if the students "get it," but depending on the teacher and students, you can fine-tune the feedback for better response rates or specific issues (eg. muddiest point) to help you clarify mid-lesson.

I was intrigued by the "Confirmative Assessment" step that Booth talks about on p. 144.  She says that while "Formative and summative evaluation focus on the immediate and cumulative progress made towards objectives in an interaction...it is also important to examine the long-term realization of the ...goals and outcomes."

I wonder what this would look like in an academic setting.  Booth talked about having long-term relationships with the professors that are in charge of the class you gave instruction to, for example.  But that sounds like bugging professors during a busy paper-grading time period.  Hm.  I wonder how to approach this successfully.

Any thoughts?

Engage

This week we looked at the "Engage" section of the USER model.  In this section, you design materials and deliver instruction. 

Challenges: I think many librarians identify with the challenge of simplifying our lessons.  What comes most readily to mind is the one-shot info session commonly practiced at small academic libraries (since this is what I just wrote my paper on). No one can deny that a user is most engaged when the format is clear and simple--when the design is free of "chart junk" and everything is intuitive and clear.  

When one is pressed for time, one wants to make sure that as much content as possible is delivered--this could be your only time interacting with the students for their entire four years.  This is counter-intuitive, but is still often practiced during one-shot sessions. 

Another challenge for professionals could be engaging the listeners from the beginning.  I sat in on a really good session for my Observation Analysis paper in which the presenter led with the question, "Is Research Hard?"  There are any number of ways to get a user's attention--Booth describes a great pitch she used that both interests the learners and establishes credibility (who knew you needed a Master's degree to be a librarian??)

Despite these challenges, they are pretty easy to remedy if you constantly remind yourself of them before every lesson--simplify, engage.  Not every library info session is going to be a home run, but if we keep striving to simplify our content and engage our users, we're on the right track for success. 

Structure

The Structure phase in USER is all about focusing the things you want to teach into measurable goals and objectives.  This week we have to discuss what we are most/least confident about this part of the information literacy process.

One of my primary struggles with this process is actually setting goals before I dive into the creative process.  I tend to be the sort of person who DOES NOT outline, like, as a rule.  When I was in grade school/high school and had to create an outline for my paper before I wrote the paper, I would either 1) come up with a fake outline just to make the teacher happy or 2) write the entire paper and then create an outline afterward.

I have never been an outline person.

But!

I had a valuable life lesson during the creation of my Online Tutorial.  I had created a couple of quick learning objectives when I was working on the draft for last week and had written the script for my screencast.

After I had finished my recording and was putting the final touches on my tutorial, I glanced at my learning objectives just to make sure I had hit all of them.  And I had not!

I had forgotten that I wanted to make sure students created an ILL account as a result of the tutorial.  Luckily I could add that step in to the TedEd portion of my tutorial, but it was a great opportunity to learn from my learning objectives!

The way I went about it was probably not the most USER-friendly, but it was definitely a start.

Another struggle: goals, objectives, and outcomes are all the same in my head. Need to memorize the differences between them.

Excited that the e-librarian is coming to class today!  I will definitely make sure to form some questions, but, since I have never been an outline person, I don't have many questions currently. :)

Signed,

April Flies-by-the-seat-of-her-pants Youngblood

MLA Three Ways

[social]

This was my second year attending MLA, but my first year attending both days of the conference.  Last year I only attended Day One, had way too many nerves, and didn’t partake in what is essentially the whole point of going to conferences—networking.  I hid behind the sessions and stuffed my face at lunch to avoid small talk.  This time, I convinced myself, I’ll be at MLA for two days, so I’ll be able to get past the anxiety of being surrounded by a million people I don’t know and actually talk to a couple of them. 

My social experience at MLA was completely different than anticipated, though.  My library network has massively grown since last MLA, so I attended sessions with classmates and met people organically—friends of friends.  It is so much easier to grow a relationship when you actually have something invested in the person.  It is also easier to network when you have a comfortable job that you’re happy at—every person you meet is not a potential employer (although they could be, some day) which makes the whole experience a lot less stressful. 

I spent a lot of time hanging out with my coworkers the evening of the first day.  It was so nice to hang out, get some drinks, and just talk about stuff.  It isn’t often that life lends a nice casual environment to get to know your new coworkers—even work lunches have a sense of formality that a hotel bar doesn’t evoke.

[educational]

            I love conference schedules.  Or just schedules in general.  I love planning my day and writing down when I’m going to be where.  Whenever I go to a library conference, I try to balance sessions that are pertinent to my job (i.e., the people paying for me to go to the thing) and the sessions that just look cool.  I am currently the serialist for the Bethel University Library, so I sought out Tech Services sessions to try and gain some nugget of knowledge that I could bring back to show my supervisor. Here was my schedule for the day and what I learned from each session.

Planting Seeds, Growing Collaboration : Duluth Public Library’s presentation on their Seed Library

·         My dream job would be Seed Librarian.

·         Government sucks and should not make awful rules about sharing seeds.

The ACRL Framework for Information Literacy: A session exploring a new method of instructional design for reference librarians.

·         I had a hard time staying focused in this session.  They seemed to walk us through ACRL and offered up a few suggestions as to what each of the components could mean, which is very similar to what I’m currently doing in my Information Literacy session, anyway.

Tech Services Time Travel: Examining workflow of the materials services process

·         This session was such a waste of time, and I lamented every minute of it because all the cool kids were at the customer service session taught by my St. Kates advisor.

·         Basically this lady recently became the cataloger at a school where they hadn’t had a cataloger for a while, and developed a “new way” of handling items, which basically just meant changing the order of a few things.  I really should have gotten up and left, but I felt guilty because there aren’t many tech services sessions at MLA and I felt like I had to go to them.

[day 2]

MILE and ALA Emerging Leaders: Why Leadership programs matter

·         Maybe April Youngblood 1-2 years ago would have been super inspired to sign up for every leadership program under the sun, but listening to these people talk about the leadership programs and the applications and such made me feel burnt out and tired.  It might be because I am completing my MLIS at what feels like Warp Speed, lending little to no time for freedom, or the fact that my world has basically become saturated by libraries and the thought of filling what little time I have with more libraries sounds exhausting.  I might revisit these leadership programs after I graduate and have some sanity again.

Putting the “Tech” in Tech Services

·         In this meeting they literally showed us 5-6 different videos of tech services librarians walking around their libraries showing us how they process books when they come in.  It was the second failed tech service presentation and made me feel angry again.

How to Host a How-to Festival

·         Although this was public-libraries focused, it really inspired Erica and I to discover professor’s hidden talents and have a how-to festival in our own academic library!  It was a great end to my day, partially influenced by the fact that they were continuously passing around candy the whole time.

[tech]

            My main tech takeaway was my first experience live-tweeting a conference.  I set up a Twitter account a couple months ago and have enjoyed using it for personal stuff and a few professional articles here and there, but was excited to be a part of the hashtag conference culture. 

            How was it?  Exhausting!  Maybe it’s because my very first session (Plant Library) was spent trying to keep up with Kaia and Tony that I felt really overwhelmed by the experience.  Maybe I would get used to tweeting during sessions in the future, but right now I don’t think it’s for me.  It’s crazy-hard to multitask in that way and still glean something from the speaker in front of you.  Tweeting is harder than just taking notes.  Not only are you adding to the conversation, but you’re retweeting and following the conversations that everyone else is having at the conference and in your sessions, too. It made life feel like Eggers’ The Circle and made my brain feel fuzzy.  I think next time I go to a conference I will just try and send the occasional tweet between sessions.  Keeping up with everything is just not worth it!

The U

[What part of the Understand phase do you feel most and least confident about?]

I feel like reference librarians at an academic library are [/should] always be looking for ways to improve their resources.  Their job is to aid in the research process--whether that means teaching, guiding, or providing online materials. 

The first part of "U" or the "Understanding Phase" is "Identifying the Problem."  Before you solve a problem, you need to have a clear understanding of what it is you're going to solve.  As Booth states, "Identifying instructional problems is rarely difficult--they tend to present themselves regularly" (104).  There's always something to do or fix in an academic library.  Even as a serials librarian I could tell you at least five different things our library needs to create or update--and that isn't because of inefficient staff. 

The text talks about different ways that needs come to the surface--needs can be found due to comparative studies, something that is "felt," expressed, or anticipated, just to name a few.  I think I am fairly good at recognizing comparative needs.  When I started in my position a few months ago, one of the first goals I created was to visit or talk to each of the other CLIC serialists and compare our procedure with theirs.

Something that I feel that I am not-so-good at with regards to this step is discovering needs that don't exist yet, or, being innovative.  This could probably fall into the "felt" or "anticipated" category.  I'm really good at seeing practical stuff.  Our library needs x or is doing poorly in x, so I'm going to interview or research about y & z to figure out why this is.  I struggle coming up with "the future of" this or what such-and-such will look like in 50 years.

As for the second part of the "U," I think the biggest struggle for "Analyzing the Scenario" would be figuring out how to "select fewer topics and examine them in more depth" in order to accommodate different learning styles.  I'm thinking specifically of one-shot sessions in an academic library. 

Is it really best to do the same thing in different ways, to accommodate different learning styles?  Or would students get annoyed by this, and you would be wasting golden teaching time?

Thoughts?

Process and Assessment

Two prefaces to this post:
1. I'm typing all of this on an iPad, which isn't usually my typing-tool-of-choice.
2. I had a hard time figuring out how this weeks' questions were related to this weeks' readings.



The first question asked what the main considerations of the planning process are.  Booth recognizes one of the main considerations the same as the central motivation of librarianship: "catering to the personal learning needs of a diverse community of patrons with information insight, support, and strategy." (95)

So, basically, one of the most important considerations for planning ID is keeping your users and their needs in mind at the forefront.

I found the USER model to be quite intuitive with regards to ID planning.
-First you attempt to understand the scenario as best as possible--the students, the environment, what needs to be accomplished.
-Next, you turn these accomplishment goals into tasks and try and figure out ways to implement them into the lesson.
-The last thing you do before teaching is creating the stuff you will be using to teach with.
-Then you teach!
-But that's not the last step!  An important part of the process is reflection and revision.  Many librarians see to forget about this last step, especially after they've been teaching the same class for a while.  Some of the librarians I observed were really grateful for some debriefing time with a librarian-in-training to help them improve their teaching methods.



The second question this week talks about the difference between program, teaching, and student assessments.  The readings didn't touch on this, but my best guess is that the differences would be rooted in what each assessment is looking for.
Teaching assessments would mostly be a measure of You and how well You did.
Student assessments would probably help you gauge how much students got out of what you taught.  The readings indicate that students usually prefer immediate applicable takeaways, so a low student eval could indicate a greater need for takeaways.
Finally, program assessments would most likely reflect how much of the necessary tools students are to learn is included in what you covered.

I'll show you Mine if you show me Yours.

Guys!  Tell me what sessions you're going to at MLA.  I am not hard-core committed to many of these, but this is what I'm currently thinking.  Which sessions are you going to?

(Click on image to view larger)

Week 5: Embracing Technology & Online Instruction

Remember that old professor from chapter 6 of our reading who refused to use Power Points because of his either a) purist mentality or b) stubborn attitude?  That was me and Twitter.

I'm relatively new to the Twitterverse--I just created an account this summer and have an impressive 130 Tweets and 20 followers (the latter may have something to do with either a) my private account or b) my coolness). 

Up until this summer for the past five years or so, I was super anti-Twitter.  I thought Twitter was for people who wanted to know what Beyonce had for breakfast, or thought people cared enough to hear about what they had for breakfast.  Twitter was, in my mind, an empty shout into the void, hoping to find someone who cared enough to listen.

But, just like that grumpy professor from chapter 6, I discovered that, "When you overcome hurdles or prejudices and interact hands-on with a particular device or platform, you often uncover its unexpected potential to help you respond to learners, address problems, and diversify your practice" (64).  Although reluctant at first, I was pleasantly surprised by how much I've come to love Twitter professionally and personally. 

However, let's say I created an account and hated it.

As I talked about/ranted about in a previous blog post , "You cannot use your personal technological preferences as an excuse to be uninformed about current technology trends in the field you work in," (You know you're really cool when you start quoting yourself in your own blog). 

As Neil Krasnoff stated in his "Twitter in the Classroom" YouTube session, social media is going to be around for a while (I actually think he said "here to stay," but I'm being more hopeful that that isn't the case). 

He mentions later that you can't tell students what not to do on Twitter when you yourself either don't use Twitter or do those things that you tell them not to do.  A good information literacy instructor will embrace new and changing technologies without presenting them in a world-is-ending fashion.

Being anti-technology is not helping you nor our profession. 

Being willing to adapt to changing technologies is not only important for information literacy instruction in the face-to-face classroom, but the online environment as well.  In order to teach effectively online, you need to know information about the resources you're working with in an effective manner. 

Going off of the example in chapter 6, you can't just be like, "Oh, a virtual whiteboard.  I will use this like I would use an actual white board except virtually."  If you want to use a technological tool, you need to investigate the benefits of the tool, any special features, glitches, etc. of what makes this tool great or awful.  Watch videos of other people using the tool well or not well.  The author describes this as "purposeful playing."

Good online instruction will not simply record a lecture and tell you to watch it and post your thoughts on the forum.  Good online instructors will use their previously-aquired knowledge to match the best technologies with the best ways to use them in their virtual classrooms. 

Week 4: Teachers and Learners

The whole time I was reading about the examples of the different instruction types in chapter five I kept thinking, "I wish there were some examples of professors who demonstrate each of these methods," and tried to visualize in my head what each of the different styles looked like.  So to answer the learning question, I guess that means I'm a visual learner, right?

I feel like the text inadvertently created a sort of hierarchy between the instruction styles.  Behaviorist seemed the most "old school," while Constructivist reminded me of the professors who like to move the desks into circles at the beginning of class.

Personally, I feel like I fall into the Cognitivist camp--building knowledge off of experiences the students had, organizing the knowledge in manageable ways, while still maintaining control of the classroom.

While they all have their benefits, Constructivist felt like the "ideal" in a lot of ways. The terminology describing it is all very positive--authentic interactions, active communication...It sounds nice, right?  A learner-focused environment stimulated by a group of people who love to actively learn.

BUT!

I have rarely had a good Constructivist learning experience as an undergraduate.  And I think the reason has to do with one of my previous sentences--active learners.  Critical dialogue.

I think in order for Constructivist learning to work, your students have to be engaged.  The book states that the instructor "should provide the conditions that stimulate thinking" (52).  But when I was an undergraduate student, the minute the professor started to move those desks around I internally groaned and thought, "Why am I paying $768,000 a year to listen to the one girl who likes to suck up to the professor talk, and everyone else shift uncomfortably?"

However!

Constructivist can work really well if you do have a group of super passionate people who are actively engaged in the material.  I've experienced this in a handful of grad school courses.  (I mean, if you're going to give up 2 nights a week while you're working full time to just sit quietly in the back of the room, go home.)

Do you think Constructivist can work for undergraduate, one-shot library courses?  I would be interested to hear some thoughts.  Most of the time, it feels like librarians are struggling to try and fit every database discovery tool into their 30 minute window.  Does that scenario allow for Constructivist learning?

Where are the Scholars?

As I began the readings for this week I was reminded of my first "real" job out of college--the Instructional Design Assistant for Northwestern College's Graduate & Continuing Education Department (try typing that title over and over again!)  One of the first assignments the Dean of Graduate Studies gave me was to research critical thinking.  

"This is something we really need to teach our students; they're struggling with it," he said.  He wanted me to figure out how to effectively weave critical thinking into the program. 


What I thought at that point in my life I find myself thinking again this week:  Can you really teach critical thinking?  

I don't want to sound snobbish about this.  I believe there genuinely are people in this world who struggle to grasp deep thinking, or who are, perhaps, not old enough to go beyond the surface level.  

But honestly, I think what half of what these chapters are talking about come down to is not being a lazy person.  

Before you begin thinking that this is going to be some sort of post about our "modern tech age" where nobody can look up from their iPhone to even give the librarian the time of day, let me state: It goes both ways.  

I'm talking about lazy instructors as well as lazy students. 

Some of the best instructors I had as an undergraduate were those that kept learning.  I was a teaching assistant for one of my favorite professors for two years.  I loved being his student and employee not only because of his wit and charming bow ties, but because every time he taught King Lear, the PowerPoint looked a little different.  He brought artifacts to class that he picked up in London or Turkey.  He taped articles to his office door.  He was a learner.  

That is an element of reflective practice that I resonate with--constantly learning, growing, and changing as you discover new knowledge in your field.  

And, yes, the same goes for the hat-backwards-on head, sweatpants-wearing, smirk-faced, laughs-at-the-librarian freshman that I had the pleasure to observe during my first librarian observation for this class.  

What that sort of student is doing in college to begin with is a rant for another day.  

Students are asked to think critically--dig deep.  The students who are just attending college for the degree and a good time are not going to do this and do not want to do this.  To many, critical thinking means nothing, since they just want to turn the paper in on time with some sort of regurgitated version of a professor's lecture poorly written in their own words. 

To others, it is their passion.  

Can I take the reluctant ones by the hand and lead them to the stacks, throw my arms open wide and exclaim, "The knowledge of the greats is here!  Accessible!  Run, students!  Read!  Go discover information that is free to use in this institution that you are privileged to attend!" 

Well, no. 

Teaching a student to dig deep is teaching them to care.  Critical thinking is caring.  And some students could care less.  

But perhaps. 

Perhaps deep within some library information session you will present a student with a nugget of truth that causes them to open their eyes wide and want to know more.  Behind glazed-over eyes a brain will begin to activate, question, yearn.   Can this transformation happen?
 
Sadly, not all who attend college today are scholars, in the romantic sense of the word.  

But can we create them? 

Can we make them care? 

Changing Libraries, Changing Technologies

The advances in technology are changing the way we as information specialists view literacy.  As Mackey & Jacobson argue in one of our assigned articles, one particular advance in technology, social media, has impacted information literacy so much as to revolutionize the thoughts behind--and even the name of--the field.

Basically, information literacy is no longer the development of a set of skills, but being able to take that information and produce it and share it online properly. I think it is this authorship that really sets metaliteracy (the new term for the new information literacy) apart.  Metaliteracy recognizes social media as an area for online development and collaboration--which are skills that Mackey & Jacobson argue are not covered in other literacies.

I had an "aha" moment during our last class period with regards to how libraries should be responding to these new technologies.  As we experience in our last class period, when the topic of social media comes up, people can have some very heated opinions.

I know that it is super trendy to be "anti-social media" or "anti-Facebook" and talk about how you've never had an iPhone or tablet because your life is perfectly fine without these things.  Believe me, I understand!  I don't own a TV and turn off my phone pretty much as soon as I get home from work.  I'm not a big Facebook fan and only recently got a Twitter.

BUT.

You cannot use your personal technological preferences as an excuse to be uninformed about current technology trends in the field you work in--and that includes social media!  If you want to be a librarian, you are accepting the responsibility of being knowledgable about all kinds of literacy, and, as our readings for this week communicate, information literacy (or metaliteracy) includes "active knowledge production and distribution in collaborative online communities" (Mackey & Jacobson 64).

One of my friends recently shared a story about working at the reference desk at an academic library. A patron approached her and another coworker and said that she needed help with Facebook.
"Oh," her coworker said. "I don't do Facebook. I don't know anything about it."

We cannot have these smugly superior attitudes if we are going to choose to work in an informational field!  We may not care what our 500 friends ate of dinner on Instagram, but my goodness, as an informational professional we should have a thing or two to say about it to a patron.

*gets off soap box*

Information Literacy: Post 1

What is information literacy?

When I was an undergraduate student, one of my professors often commented on what he considered to be the difference between "knowledge" and "information."  There is plenty of information in our lives.  We live in an information-heavy society; the internet is the "information superhighway," --we are bombarded with information--ads, blogs, walls, likes, comments, .gov,.org,.com, newspapers, billboards, church signs, airplane banners, chocolate wrappers.  Some studies indicate that the number of ad messages we are exposed to per day is around 5,000.  There are over 152 million blogs online (as of last year), and over 644 million active websites.

So how did my professor define knowledge?

That's a great question.

Knowledge, to him, was what was true (which can loosely be defined as credible, useful information, because in all honesty, what is "true?").  As budding scholars, my undergraduate class was presented with the responsibility of being able to distinguish between information and knowledge.  It was our duty to weed out the opinion blogs and make sure every website ended in practically anything but .com.  When presented with a piece of information, we needed to know what to do with it.

That is what information literacy is, to me.

Being presented with some piece of information and knowing what to do with it.

For example, if I presented you with this piece of information:

13 people are killed each year by vending machines falling on them. 

What would you do with it?  Hopefully, you would begin to formulate some thoughts.

Is this true?  Who is April Youngblood, and is she a vending machine scholar?  Did she get this statistic from a vending machine scholar?  What is her source?  If her source is credible, does that mean I should stop shaking the vending machine when it doesn't deposit my Bugels promptly enough?

Then, you might take some action.

I am going to look up this statistic and see if I can verify its accuracy. 
(and, if it is accurate)
I am never going to stand under another vending machine again. 

Information literacy involves thinking critically and applying what you've learned to your situation.  It is sifting through all the information our society presents us with and figuring out what to do with it.

Shifting Gears: Instructional Literacy

There are four components of instructional literacy, or, what I understand to be "learning how to teach."  These four components and my experience with each of them are below.

Reflective practice: Or, becoming a better teacher as you teach.  The book humorously describes this as "moxie," or nerve (xvii).  The less prepared I feel when I'm teaching, whether it's teaching the front stroke or King Lear, the more panicked I feel, and the less likely I am to learn anything while I'm going along.  Note to self: be a prepared instructor.

Educational theory: Or, Teachers teaching teachers how to teach.  In  undergrad I took a tutoring course, but in all honesty I barely remember it.  I feel as though the most I've learned in my teaching career I've learned from observing other teachers.  But I suppose theory is valuable too!

Teaching technologies: Or, what physical tools do you use while you teach?  This past spring I participated in 23 Mobile Things which was a great time to learn some handy apps for personal and professional use.  If you are interested in which apps I learned about, you can browse the earlier posts in this blog!

Instructional Design: Or, the best way to integrate your knowledge and tools to effectively design a great course.  I was an Instructional Design assistant at Northwestern College for a year and a half.  At the time, I honestly had no idea that the tasks I performed would eventually help me with my library career!  I helped design syllabi, research technology trends, choose course materials, and process course evaluations. You never know what life experiences will come in handy!

Email Signature.

Apparently in order to include an image in your email signature for Gmail, it has to be available online.  You can't just use something from your computer.  Why is that??

THING 23!!

Hey, I made it!  This last thing is sort of meta: just evaluating the 23 Mobile Things MN project itself. 

I was pleasantly surprised by this project.  I think I went into this project thinking that most librarians are either not tech savvy, or like to jump on every tech bandwagon that comes along to try and prove that they are tech savvy.  Most of the Things in this project, however, seemed to be normal, useful, and inspiring.

The wonderful part about this project is that it gets you thinking.  Not only are you exploring fun video-making apps for you to send to your friends in your spare time, you're also discovering ways to better serve your patrons.  Some Things inspired me to look farther than the Thing required--like exploring the differences between a mobile site and app when looking at Thing 11. 

I particularly enjoyed the  movie making and presentation apps and hope to utilize those in the future.

This project inspired me, and I learned a lot from it.  I'm really glad I participated, and can't wait to see what the next 23 MN Things activity will be!

Thing 15: Audio

For my LAST Thing, I explored the audio app AudioBoo!  The app allows you to record and share clips as long as three minutes.  It's sort of the social media of the audio world.   Just by browsing through some "boos" as the clips are called, it seems like a lot of radio shows take advantage of this app.  I could see libraries doing little segments on special collections or events going on in the library, but I think in general visual displays are better.  I can't really see library patrons sitting down and listening to audio clips, but that's just me.

Another thought: Could this app help the visually impaired community?  It would be interesting to see the implementation of audio apps for the blind, or for those whose eyesight might not be the strongest.

Thing 15: Infographics

I was disappointed to find out that there were no infographic creator apps for Android, as I was really looking forward to playing with some of those tools.  But, truth be told, if I were to create an infographic, it probably wouldn't be on my phone--it would be too much of a hassle.  I would probably use websites like Piktochart or infogr.am.

I was doubly disappointed to find out that I could not even download Infographics Hub... am I missing something?  I couldn't find that app anywhere.

I did download an app called Energy Infographics, which stated that it would display "the latest Energy Infographics for the United States."  When I opened one in the app, I saw:

Blah!  Gross!  Okay, first of all, 2009?  That's the "latest?"  Secondly: That is a pie chart.  A boring, early 2000's pie chart.  That's not an infographic.

I think for now, since I don't own a tablet, I'll do any infographic designing on my desktop computer.  I think solid infographic apps aren't quite there, yet (at least for Android).

Thing 13: Presentations

Much of life is first impressions.  The minute one of my MLIS classmates opens up their PowerPoint from their thumb drive containing a blank white slide with WAY too many words on it, I judge them.  Don't you?  You're in for a long, boring presentation.  (The worst part is, you can't leave, because you'd lose class participation points.)

Learning how to make a snappy presentation that looks like it took a lot of effort is one of the best ways to professionally gain respect and attention.  For this Thing, I played around with Deck Slideshow Presentations.

I LOVE this app.  I think I found another keeper!  I might even try this out when I give a presentation next semester.

What you do: Plug in the text (no longer than a Tweet) or images in the order you want them displayed.  Then, pick a theme.

What the app does: Makes it look REALLY cool!  It's like Prezi without the headache!  PowerPoint with more pizzaz!

 

I made a tiny presentation and applied a couple different themes to it.  Very.  Cool.  I think many of the themes cost money because most of mine are locked. 

I don't think this app will completely revolutionize presentations.  Each slide can have no more text than a Tweet, so you can't use lengthy quotes or do a book report in this app.  But!  This app would be great for a speech companion, an intro to a speaker, or an informal gathering.  There are tons of library-world uses for this app.

(Have you noticed that I appear to gravitate toward apps that do the design work for me?  See also Thing 14.  Hah!)

Thing 14: Movie Making

For Thing 14, I decided to explore the app Magisto. The app is very slick and easy to use.  It reminds me a lot of Instagram.

First, you go into your photos and videos and select which ones you want to include in your movie.  You can choose between 5-10 in the free version of this app.

Next you get to choose the "Editing Style," which basically tells Magisto what kind of feels you want to add to the video. 

After that, you get to add Hipster Background Music, and then you get to make your movie!  I uploaded 2 at once using WiFi, and it took about 20 minutes to make the movies.  Kind of slow, but the results are pretty cool.

Below is the movie.  Not perfect, but not bad for almost zero effort involved!  I think I'll be keeping this app.

Just so you know, the clips are from a day about a month ago when my friend Carol and I decided to meet halfway between Madison and Minneapolis for lunch.  Hope you enjoy!

Thing 22: Discovering More Apps

For this Thing, I downloaded Android's Droid of the Day app, which is a great tool for app discovery.  While there is one app featured daily, you can scroll through tons of apps that will inspire and impress.

I was mostly surprised with the variety of apps--things I would never think of.  There's an app where you can write out a math equation in your handwriting and it will know what math you want to do, an app that can use your location to point out constellations (and also be somehow plugged in to physical telescopes), apps for kids, interior design, and so much more!  Sorry I didn't get the names of any of these--I was scrolling too quickly. 

A super fascinating app that I'm going to play around with is called Wheresmytime.  It uses your GPS location  to create a map of where you spend the majority of your time.  I think using this app for long periods of time--months, maybe--could be really fascinating.  I mean, over the course of a week it would show a big circle around home and a big circle around work.  Boring.  But over time, it could show you things like which friends you visit the most, or where your favorite places to go are.  Maybe it could inspire some deeper exploration of parts of the city you haven't visited before.

Thing 21: Free for all

For this Thing, we're supposed to talk about the app that we can't live without that hasn't already been covered by one of the other Things.  The only one that comes to mind is the Mint banking app.  I won't be including screenshots on this post, since all of my screenshots would reveal something about my spending habits, but here's what Mint is, in a nutshell.

Mint connects to your bank account and categorizes your spending.  It presents your spending habits in nice graphs, and let's you know if you're spending too much in one category. It starts to become "smart" as time goes on and automatically categorizes payments it recognizes (i.e. purchases from Target go in the "food" category of the budget.)

For those who love budgets and numbers, or need some help tracking their finances, this is the app for you!

Thing 17: Connecting to Community

This Thing is all about Minnesota apps.  I didn't have much luck with this Thing, to be honest.  First I tried out an app called "MN WF Lite," which was supposedly some sort of Wildflower Identification app.  Basically the "Lite" meant, "Shows you a dictionary of 20 flowers unless you decide to pay the $4.99."  No thanks!

The next app I tried was the Explore MN app.  I was actually pretty excited for this app, since I love discovering new places and things to do.  This app also disappointed, as you can see from the low ratings and negative reviews.  The app basically doesn't work.  I couldn't get past this screen, even after waiting several minutes:

The last app I tried was quaint, but useful.  It was called the "Best of Superior Hiking Trail."  It is really simple--just showing maps, distances, locations, and points of interest on the 11 hikes on the North Shore.  It would be a handy little app to have on a camping trip "up north" though!

This app would be great to include in any sort of summer camping/Minnesota outdoor display in the library.

Thing 12: Books!

A Thing all about books on a librarian blog?  Naturally.

For this Thing I chose to download and explore the Free Books app.  A simple premise: Over 23,000 classics out of copyright and freely available for download.  I loved the interface and found it very visually appealing. 

 I liked that you could download the book and then access it whenever you want to, data free. 

On a personal level, I don't think I'll really be reading books off of my phone any time soon, unless I've somehow ended up at an airport without my current read.  Screens are too shiny, and ...well, I guess I'm an old lady at heart. 

Professionally, though, I think librarians should encourage app use for book access.  This is a great option for students who need a classic novel for their literature class, but all of the copies are checked out.  For e-book patrons who love books on demand without paying for them, this is another great solution (especially for iPad users).  Book apps would make a great library display: nothing catches the eye like the words "free" and "instant!"

Thing 11: Down the rabbit hole

Thing 11 is the library thing: checking out apps for your local library.  I learned quite a bit on my journey with this thing, because through it I learned a lot about the differences between having an app and having a mobile site.

U of M mobile site

I began this thing by looking for a University of Minnesota Libraries app.  I couldn't find one, so I asked a couple librarians if they had heard if one existed.  One librarian told me that she went to a presentation on the new library mobile site, which she understood to be instead of an app. 

This led me to wonder and do some research on what the difference is between a business choosing to build a mobile site, and a business using an app.  I found this great article, which discusses some of the benefits of each mobile presence.  It really depends on what kind of business you have, but the article showed that having a mobile website seems better than having an app because: 

• They are instantly available - no need to download anything
• They're compatible across all types of devices.
• The can be updated instantly
• They can be found easily
• They are less expensive.

And many, many more reasons.  But it's good and important to realize that once you have a mobile website, the process of making an app becomes a lot easier.  So it seems like a mobile website is a great place to start for many libraries.

I downloaded HCL's app and compared it to their mobile site, and, lo and behold--they're the same!  Whether you open the site or app, you'll see this:

I think it is important for libraries to have a mobile presence and to consider their user's needs when on their mobile devices.  For example, you shouldn't just take your regular website and slap it into a mobile app.  Think of the things users are most likely looking for when on their phone: Is the library open right now?  Can I renew my book real quick?  Did that new book come in yet?

I think both the U of M and HCL's mobile sites do a great job of having a clean-cut user interface that meets user needs. 

Summer Favorites: Thing 19

Thing 19 is devoted to our hobbies and finding helpful apps to compliment them.  For this Thing, I'll talk about 1 successful and 1 unsuccessful app installation.

First, the not-so-successful: MyGarden.

I installed this app because gardening is my summer passion.  In the summer, everything stops--if I could quit work I would probably spend all day weeding.  I was really exited for this app, mainly because one of the features was having help identifying plants in our garden.  We get all kinds of things--there's currently two sunflowers growing up between our rows of unions, and climbing peas in the basil patch.  Most weeds we, of course, get rid of, but I've learned from a few friends that many are good tossed in a salad, like Doc or Lamb's Quarters.  I would love to be able to have gardeners around the world help me identify plants.

However, when I've tried to view some of the other plants people have posted and want help with, all I see is this: 

I tried exploring some of the other features of the app, but was also disappointed.  I added all of the vegetables I'm currently growing to my virtual plants list in the app, and then clicked on "Tasks."  The app simply told me when I should be sowing or harvesting each plant.  I could check off the tasks once they were completed.

All in all, I just didn't find this app that helpful.  Seed packets can tell you when you should plant and harvest each plant you're growing, and the plant identification area didn't work. 

Now let's talk about the hobby app I like: Vivino!  I use this app every time I go into a wine store.  It's super cool -- you can just take a picture of the wine labels and the app will bring up ratings and reviews.  You can store and rate your own wines--perfect for me, since I can never remember if I like Pinot Grigio or Riesling better.

Thing 20 : Games

I've been jumping around throughout the Things this week, finishing up some that are a little bit easier to try and finish up by June 15 (oh gosh that's less than 2 weeks away).

For this Thing, we were basically supposed to test out some popular gaming apps (the Thing writer stated that this was because studies have shown that "gaming is good for you."  Hm...)

I used to play Candy Crush until I got stuck on a level and deleted the app in a fit of rage.

Temple Run is also an oldie but a goodie, but gets a little boring for me after a while.

To finish up this Thing, I'll share my favorite gaming app, called "My Boy Free."  This is a Game Boy emulator for your phone.  Basically: It allows me to play old school Game Boy games on my phone for free.  That means Pokemon.

I am a Pokemon Master! ....I better stop before I dissuade any more people from networking with/hiring me.

I. LOVE. DUOLINGO.

(This is technically Thing 18 but we are allowed to not go in order.)

You guys.  I am SO HOOKED on an app called Duolingo.  I've been playing around with it for about 2 weeks now.  Nathan and I are both obsessed and competing with each other.  What does this app do?

It teaches us Spanish.

Sounds boring, right?  WRONG.

Duolingo is like the Rosetta Stone of the mobile world.  Rosetta Stone is this computer software you can buy for a million dollars that effectively teaches you whatever language you want to learn.  It's expensive because it works.  Duolingo works, too, and is free. 

You can use this app on your phone, tablet, or computer to learn up to five languages, so far: Spanish, French, German, Italian, and Portuguese.  There are also several other languages currently in the works.

Duolingo teaches you languages through games--matching, fill-in-the-blank, translation work, and speaking (using your phone's microphone--these exercises are optional.)

 

Once you've mastered a certain skill set it will turn gold and shiny--but if you don't practice those words for a while (or if you struggled with many of the words prior to mastery) the game will suggest strengthening some of the words you struggled with to boost your memory.

I've learned so much in the past couple weeks, even though a lot of the basic stuff is review for me.  I feel like I've solidified a lot of my previous Spanish knowledge, so this app is good for all levels.  If you don't want to start from the beginning like I did, you can take shortcuts to get to the level you want to be at.

Bottom line: INSTALL THIS APP. 

Artsy Pics: Thing 9 and 10

I downloaded two apps for Thing 9: LINE Camera and Color Splurge.  This Thing is all about Taking and Editing photos, and when I first looked through the choices that 23 Things provided I was like, "Hasn't anyone heard of Instagram?"  Because Instagram wasn't a choice.  Then I noticed that Instagram was under Thing 10, which involved sharing photos. 

I'll be honest, I can't see the real point of having LINE Camera AND Instagram on one's phone, unless one really enjoys schnazzing up photos.  Instagram has plenty of options for filtering, but if you want to add text and frames and the whole nine yards, then by all means, install LINE Camera!

I really enjoyed the Color Splurge app and will actually probably keep it around on my phone!  You can do artsy filters, of course:

But the real fun of having Color Splurge is the color-select tool.

The frustrating thing about this feature is the fact that you have to color in the colors you want to show.  Using your finger, you rub the picture where you want the color to pop out (much like a paintbrush tool). The ducks were pretty easy, but the flowers below were quite difficult.  I kept having to erase my mistakes because the green of the surrounding leaves kept popping up.  I wish there was some way to just tell the app what colors you want to appear and which you don't.  Maybe there is!  I'll keep playing around.

A word on Thing 10: I've used Instagram a lot in the past, but got sick of feeling like I always needed to photograph my life.  It's addicting!  Seriously, install it for one day, and every plate of food you eat looks like a masterpiece.

SnapChat is weird.  I used it for a couple weeks about a year ago.  Just think about it for a sec.  What kind of pictures would you want to send to people that only hang around for a couple seconds?  Hm...

Thing 8: How I don't qualify.

I know in order to be a really good and really trendy librarian I should have at least two Twitter accounts and want to always be in the know, but I honestly find social media really draining, and this is coming from a 24 year old.  So when I saw Thing #8 and how it is all about managing our social media, I felt super stressed out, because I had just uninstalled the Facebook app from my phone for the summer (along with Tumblr, but never Goodreads.)

I spend at least 8 hours a day in front of a computer, which lends plenty of time to keeping up with my social media and with what's trending.  I just can't justify carrying it around with me on my phone, too. 

Maybe I'm just a boring person!  But: I don't have a FourSquare, I don't see the reason to install the LinkedIn app (now I can network on the go!), and try as hard as I might, I somehow keep ending up with a Google + account even though I don't want one. 

Therefore: I do not have social media apps that need managing.  So I didn't use any of the managers.

Thing 7: Saving Sites

 Thing 7 is all about organizing the sites you visit often.  Bookmarks are a thing of the past--you might have multiple computers or mobile devices--so where does that leave you?  In the grocery store without a recipe, lamenting that you can't remember the URL. 

A quick word of praise for Pinterest:

I've been using Pinterest for about 3 years.  I used it to plan my wedding (Note: once I actually got engaged.  Not as a wedding-crazy single person.), and I continue to use it to bookmark vacation tips but mainly: RECIPES.  

I'm a super visual eater, so if I'm preparing the week's grocery list, I'll just go to my Pinterest account and scroll around until I'm drooling.  Pinterest is also a great place for discovery.  Sure, you can go to Allrecipes.com and type in what you're looking for and pin your URL from there.  Or you can use Pinterest's search feature and type in something like, "lasagna," and get a million pictures of lasagna--vegetarian, turkey, you name it.  The more pins something has, the more you can assume it's a great recipe. 

Negatives?  This is becoming less frequent, but sometimes people accidentally link their pin to the image of the food item, and not the URL of the recipe itself.  So you're scrolling along thinking, "Damn, that peanut butter cookie looks amazing!  I'll pin it and bake it later."  Three months later, peanut butter in hand, you open the pin, and all it takes you to is a slightly larger picture of the cookie.  No recipe!  Disappointment.

Thing 6: CloudOn vs QuickOffice

CloudOn and QuickOffice are both ways you can open and edit Microsoft Office documents from your mobile device.  I spent the last couple weeks with both installed on my phone.  Here's the run-down of what I liked and didn't like about both.  (Sorry that my last screenshot for some reason includes the volume control in the picture... lame!)

CloudOn

One of the huge benefits of CloudOn is that it will load the document with all the formatting displaying properly--just as though you've opened the document in Word.  Your document will not be Googlified. (Scroll down to the QuickOffice app to see how this document would load in QuickOffice--Google's product).  So if you're opening something and want it to look the way you want it to look, then I would definitely use CloudOn.  

One of the HUGE negatives is the app is super slow.  Downloading a document makes me feel like I have dial-up, and the scrolling is super glitchy.  The editing tools weren't very intuitive for me, but I didn't use them that much. 





QuickOffice
QuickOffice is Google's product for opening docs on your phone--if you have an Android you probably have it on your phone already.  And, because it's Google, it's super fast, slick, intuitive, and shiny.  I use QuickOffice for just about all the documents I open. 

THE ONLY PROBLEM is the formatting.  Look at what QuickOffice did to my resume!  So lame.   

My conclusion?  Download both.  If you need to open a fancy document that you just want to look at, you can use CloudOn.  For everything else, there's QuickOffice. 
 

Thing 5: List making and note taking

Here are some note taking/organization apps I played around with for Thing 5!

Springpad
Springpad struck me as a Pinterest-type app.  On Springpad you can create different "notebooks" where you can import recipes, books, movies, lists... anything you want to keep track of.  It has a bunch of neat notebooks like wine lists and "products"--where you can scan barcodes of items and add them to the same book.  I think that feature would especially be useful, since it enhances the mobility of the app.  If you're in a store and want to scan a bunch of things at Target that you might get your friend for their birthday, it could be an easy, mobile, and visual way to remember what your ideas were.  Since I already have Goodreads for my book collection and Pinterest for my recipes and inspirations, I think the highlight of the Springpad app for me would be the mobility.  We'll have to see if this app ever comes in handy!

Carrot
I thought I would contribute a to-do-list app that wasn't included on the Thing 5 List for fun: Carrot.  It's a to-do list with attitude.  If you don't finish your tasks, it get's angry.  It's also sort of a game.  The more tasks you get done, the happier the Carrot App is, and you can level up and earn rewards. I think this app is only for Apple products (I've seen it on my friend's devices), but it's pretty funny to play around with.  For people who want to have some fun and get motivated at the same time!

RSS Feeds: Thing 4

RSS Feeds are a way to make the information come to you.  Rather than searching your favorite news and tech sites and wasting a lot of time trying to find new articles, an RSS Feed is a one stop shop for all of your favorite content.

I really like the idea of an RSS Feed.  It seems like a great way to simplify your life and pause some of the frantic feelings of "is something new happening?"  RSS Feeds save you the hassle of checking, checking checking every five minutes. 

I installed the Flipboard app to try out an RSS Feed manager and play around with the idea.  I liked that you could insert different "genre"s--sports, music, travel--so even if you don't have a favorite tech blog, you could still be supplied with some articles on that subject.  However, to use Flipboard effectively, it seems like one would have to have many sources they like to frequent and have in one spot.

I have to be honest, though.

I don't follow a lot of blogs.  A couple at the most.   I don't have a Twitter.  I listen to NPR in the morning as my news source.  I am a very busy person, and when I'm not busy, I like to do things like read books or cook or watch documentaries.*

I don't think an RSS Feed fits my lifestyle.  I like to stay in the loop when it comes to technology and current events and the library world, but I would rather seek that information when I have time to dedicate to those articles.  I also just don't have the sort of personality that frequents several websites consistently throughout the week (unless you count Facebook and Tumblr).

Speaking of Facebook, you can integrate your Newsfeed into Flipboard.  At first I thought this was pretty cool, but the formatting for the information was just so cluttered that it seemed more frustrating than useful. Some of the images were hard to read, too.

I can see where having and RSS Feed app would be useful, but I'm going to have to say that Thing 4 is not for me!

*This probably made me sound, like, 50 years old but I swear I'm 24.