Introduction and Table of Contents (Plus Thing #1)

Welcome to ESC1 Learning 2.0: The 23 Things, an online workshop of discovery provided by the Region One ESC Library Services and Media Cooperative. Participants will have fun discovering, exploring and applying 23 Things (or Internet and Web 2.0 activities) that can be used in the library and the classroom, or just for fun.

The workshop is open to school district staff in the Region One area and to lurkers from outside of Region One, however, only Co-op members who complete the entire program are eligible to receive 18 hours of Continuing Professional Education (CPE) credit through Region One. Registration is a two-step process. First participants seeking CPE credit must register online for Workshop #31445 at http://www.esc1.net/staffdevelopment and the second step in the registration process occurs after you have completed the first three "Things." To receive CPE credit you must complete all 23 things by December 15, 2010. In addition, you must keep track of your progress in the "23 Things Log" form and submit the document electronically when you are finished to esc1library@gmail.com. You may download the form at http://esc1learning23things.pbwiki.com/f/23ThingsLog.doc.


Tutorial Format:
Each week begins with a brief explanation of a new web 2.0 topic, followed by Discovery Exercises. These exercises give you the background you need to understand the tools you're learning about. Don't skip them! After the Discovery Exercises, you'll find a Thing -- activity -- to complete. Then you comment or "post" to your online log (Blog) about what you learned and how the tools can be used in education. You will learn how to set up a blog soon. This is a tool to communicate your feelings, new found skills, ideas, questions, and favorite websites. A link to your blog will be posted in the "Links" area of the 23 Things home page. You'll receive feedback from me and from other participants. (Yes, giving your feedback to some of the other participants is a requirement for credit). It's your space! The links below will take you to each week's specific lesson.


The activities are organized by week to assist in pacing of the workshop. You may work ahead as long as you maintain the order of the activities. Create a separate post for each "thing" and don't forget to include the number and name of the "thing" in title of the post.

Activity for Thing #1: Read this blog and find out about the program. In your first post, write an introduction to your blog and post your reflections about what you anticipate in this workshop.

Table of Contents

 (Be sure to click on each link for more information about each activity!)

Week 1: Introduction
Thing #1: Read this blog and find out about the program.
Thing #2: Discover a few pointers from lifelong learners and learn how to nurture your own learning process.

Week 2: BloggingThing #3. Set up your own blog , add your first post, add an avatar.
Thing #4. Register your blog and begin your 2.0 journey.

Week 3: Photos & ImagesThing #5. Explore Flickr and learn about this popular image hosting site.
Thing #6. Have some Flickr fun and discover some Flickr mashups & 3rd party sites.
Thing #7. Create a blog post about anything technology related that interests you this week.

Week 4: RSS & NewsreadersThing #8. Learn about RSS feeds and set up your own Bloglines newsreader account.
Thing #9. Locate a few useful library related blogs and/or news feeds.

Week 5: Play Week
Thing #10. Play around with with an online image generator.
Thing #11. Explore any site from the Web 2.0 awards list, play with it and write a blog post about your findings.
Thing #12. Roll your own search tool with Rollyo.

Week 6: Tagging, Folksonomies & TechnoratiThing #13. Learn about tagging and discover Del.icio.us (a social bookmarking site)
Thing #14. Explore Technorati and learn how tags work with blog posts.
Thing #15. Read a few perspectives on Web 2.0, Library 2.0 and the future of libraries and blog your thoughts.

Week 7: WikisThing #16. Learn about wikis and discover some innovative ways that libraries are using them.
Thing #17. Add an entry to the Region One Sandbox.

Week 8: Online Applications & ToolsThing #18. Take a look at some online productivity (word processing, spreadsheet) tools.
Thing #19. Take a look at LibraryThing and catalog some of your favorite books.

Week 9: Podcasts, Video & Downloadable Audio
Thing #20. Discover YouTube and a few sites that allow users to upload and share videos.
Thing #21. Podcasts (You don’t need an iPod!)
Thing #22. eBooks and Audio eBooks
Thing #23. Summarize your thoughts about this program.
Copyright, Creative Commons, and CONGRATULATIONS!

Thing #2 Lifelong Learning Habits

It makes sense that before we embark on this online learning and discovery journey that we review a few habits that can assist in creating lifelong learners. These habits, called the Seven and 1/2 Habits of Highly Successful Lifelong Learners, will provide you with a refresher on what it means to be a lifelong learner. The Seven and ½ Habits tutorial is a great introduction to Helene Blowers. [Please note that at the end, where she invited her staff to submit their comments and questions to the We Value Your Opinion! link, DO NOT use that link. Instead, post your comments as Thing #2, instructions below].

Discovery Exercise:

1. Make sure you have headphones or speakers attached to your computer.
2. Open up the 7 & 1/2 Habits online tutorial and view the online tutorial. The tutorial was developed by the training specialists at the Public Library of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County.
3. As you watch and listen, write down which habit among the 7 & 1/2 that is easiest for you and which is hardest.
4. Instead of using the link at the end of the tutorial (pop-ups will be blocked on most of your computers and the link is for another Learning 2.0 group) use your blog (which you will set up next) to post your thoughts about lifelong learning. Have fun! Remember to label your post, Thing #2: Lifelong Learning Habits.

If you haven't jumped on board yet, it's never too late to become a lifelong learner.
Next Up: Creating your blog so you can begin tracking your journey.

Thing #3 Create your own blog & avatar, then post about it

#3 (WEEK 2) Create your own blog & avatar, then post about it

Now that you’ve done some exploring around this website and understand how this program will work, it’s time to set up your very own personal blog to begin recording your thoughts, discoveries, and exercises. For this program, you may use any one of several free online blog hosting services including Blogger, Edublogs, Wordpress, or Typepad. (Although we are recommending Blogger, you may find that your school district may block websites with the name "blog" in them or your district may have a preferred blog service.)

Discovery Exercises:

1. View this short Common Craft video, "Blogs in Plain English."




If you cannot see this video, try viewing it at Common Craft.

2. View this PowerPoint created by SpringBranch ISD library staff for an overiew of a blog's format and see samples of library-related blogs.

Create Your Blog

3. For this Discovery Activity, you may use Blogger, Wordpress or Typepad, but remember that we recommend Blogger for its ease of use and documentation available. Take a quick look at Blogger's Quick Start Tour before you begin.

4. If you do not have a Google account, create one. This account is good for all Google services, including Blogger, Gmail, Google Reader and more. Go to http://www.google.com/, click on "Sign in" on the top right side of the screen and follow the prompts.
Note:
->You do not need a Gmail account.
->Remember to write down your Username and Password.

5. Create your blog on Blogger.

6. Name your blog.
Remember that the whole web world can see your blog title and blog address. You probably don’t want to use your real name. Consider creating a blog name that’s anonymous, yet uniquely you. The URL for your blog will look like these examples -
http://librarywriting.blogspot.com/ or
http://preilly.wordpress.com/ or
http://librarianinblack.typepad.com/
(These are real blogs so of course you need to give your own blog its own unique name). The format is name.blogspot.com when you use blogger.com software. Note: There are no www in the address when using Blogger.com software. Please remember your URL address and/or bookmark it.


7. Select your template.
Blogger has several templates - have fun choosing one for you! On the Dashboard, click on Layout and select Pick New Template. If you run into problems, check out Blogger's Help file and Tutorial or post your question in the comments section at the end of this section.

8. Edit your settings. Be sure to allow everyone to post.

9. You will create a discovery post for each of the "23 Things."
Please clearly label each entry in your blog in the following way: Week 1, Exercise or Thing #1, subject. Each of your posts should provide insights into what you’ve discovered and learned. Feel free to share what worked for you … and what didn’t … what surprised you … what frustrated you … what amazed you. For example: Your ‘Thing 2’ post will talk about which habit among the 7 and 1/2 lifelong learning habits is easiest and which is hardest for you and why. TIP: This is a good time to "bookmark" your blog for easy access throughout the course.

10. Create an avatar -- a representation of yourself. Go to http://avatars.yahoo.com/ ; design an avatar with and select the background. (You will have to set up an account if you don't use Yahoo!) Save your avatar and export to your blog.

HELP: Here's how to export your avatar to your blog.

a) When you are on the avatars.yahoo.com page, go to "home" tab and look to the right column.

b) Find the box labeled "Download/Export your Avatar" and click on "Export."

c) In the Center of the page, one option is your avatar's HTML code. Copy the code (Control-C), go to your blog (Sign in. When you first sign in, there is an option to add a post OR manage posts, settings, or layout; Go to "LAYOUT."

d) Click on "Add a Gadget" in the sidebar area.

e) Select "HTML/Javascript." Add a title, and then copy (Control-V) the code in the gadget box. Preview the post to make sure you have the avatar in the desired location. You can drag the gadget to a new location if you wish to move it.

Another option is to copy the avatar as a .jpg file and add it to your blog.

a) In the "Export/Download your Avatar" page, click on DOWNLOAD, found uder the words "Yahoo Avatars." Click on the Download button under JPG. When the popup window comes up, choose SAVE and save the file to your desktop.

b) Click on the Layout tab, select "Add a Gadget" on the sidebar. Select "Picture," add a title, browse for your picture that you saved on your desktop and add your picture.

The advantage of copying the HTML code is that the picture will change every time you edit the picture at Yahoo Avatars and the JPG picture will be static.

11. Write about the process of setting up your blog and your avatar in the Thing #3 post. have you looked at anyone else's blog? Now is a good time to explore what the others are doing or have done and to post questions and comments.
These exercises are all about discovery! Have fun … and happy blogging!!
IMPORTANT NOTE: How you choose to identity yourself on your blog is up to you. You can blog under a screen name, anonymously, or with your real name. Either way, in order to qualify for CPE credit, you will need to register your blog with Region One by sending an email with your blog URL to esc1library@gmail.com. Guest participants (non-Region One) are welcome to register but will not be eligible for CPE credit.

Technorati tags: blogging, Blogger
[Note: Please remember to include Week# and Thing# in your heading posts.]

Thing #4 Register your blog with...Region One 2.0: 23 Things

If you’ve made it this far, you already have three items or “things” completed of the "23 Things." We hope you are enjoying the adventure so far and having fun. Remember to share with colleagues knowledge or experience that may help them out if they get stuck or vice versa!

But how do you qualify for the CPE credit? Good question! You need to do three things. You have to:

1. register online for Workshop #31445 on the Region One Staff Development system at http://www.esc1.net/workshops .

2. send an email message to esc1library@gmail.com with the following information
a. Enter the following in the subject line: Blog Registration for 23 Things: [name of your blog]
b. Full name (Last name, first name)
c. District
d. Campus/Department
e. Email address
f. Blog address

3. record your progress on each of the "23 things" on your blog.

Reminder: Clearly identify each exercise (THING) in your entries, one entry per THING. Please do not combine THINGS. Region One will track and verify your progress in a log that they will maintain.

So, here’s Thing #4 – Register your blog right away. You will then be officially registered and become eligible to receive 18 hours of CPE credit upon completion of all “23 Things.” Post about it.

Remember … your blog name is in the title bar. Your blog address is in the format http://yourblogname.blogspot.com/.
It's really that easy and just think, now there are only 19 more things to go. :)



Curriculum ConnectionsIdea #1: A blog is an excellent forum for discussion of issues. Create one for the next school, local, state, or national election and discuss the issues of the day.

Idea #2: A book discussion blog is a classroom or library favorite. Start one today and then branch out into other topics such as pro/con topics of interest, student opinion surveys, or campus activity discussions.

Nancy Pearl with Tejas Star Books

Tejas Star Books2
Originally uploaded by esc1library

This is an example of an image added with Flickr's blogging tool.

Thing #5 Explore Flickr and learn about this popular image hosting site

Photo sharing websites have been around since the 90s, but it took a small startup site called Flickr (now owned by Yahoo) to catapult the idea of “sharing” into a full blown online community. Flickr uses "tags" or what we would call keywords to help identify and search for photos.

For this discovery exercise, you are asked to take a good look at Flickr and discover what this site has to offer.

Read 7 Things You Should Know About Flickr.

As you know, not all images on the Internet are copyright-friendly. That is also true with Flickr photos.

However, Flickr has arranged separate collections based on the copyright-friendly Creative Commons rules. The photos found on Flickr can be downloaded and used by visitors to the site.

Discovery Exercise:

1. Take a good look around Flickr and discover waht the site has to offer. Find out how tags work, what groups are, and all the neat things that people and other libraries are creating thanks to Flickr.

2. Visit the Flickr Creative Commons site and explore what kinds of photos you could use for you library or classroom assignments. Do a search using a keyword or two from your subject or curriculum. Save a photo to your hard drive (Desktop or My Pictures). Add that photo to your Thing #5 posting and post about the experience.

NOTE: Do not use the Search box found on the top right side--it takes you to the general collection where not all photos are part of the Creative Commons collection. Here is some help in downloading photos from the site (from the Spring Branch ISD wiki).


Optional Exercise: If you are up to an easy challenge ... create a Free account in Flickr and use your digital camera to capture a few pictures of something in your school library. Upload these to your Flickr account and tag at least one of the images “esc1library” and mark it public. Then create a post in your blog about your photo and experience. Be sure to include the image in your post. Once you have a Flickr account, you have two options for doing this; through Flickr's blogging tool or using Blogger's photo upload feature. Click here to view an esc1library post using Flickr's blogging tool. So go ahead, explore the site and have some Flickr photo fun and if you're interested in looking at some photo hosting sites, then check out Picasa Web Albums from Google and another service called Smugmug.


PS: A quick word about photo posting etiquette - When posting identifiable photos of other people (especially minors) get the person's permission before posting their photo in a publicly accessible place like Flickr. Never upload pictures that weren't taken by you (unless you have the photographer's consent) and always give credit when you include photos taken by someone else in your blog.

Discovery Resources:
· Flickr Services (3rd party applications & mashups) and here's another Flickr site that lets you create movie posters, CD covers, magazine covers and so on.
· 365 Days of Library Pictures in Flickr.



[Note: Please remember to include WEEK# and THING# in your heading posts.]

Thing #6 Flickr fun, mashups, and 3rd party sites

What is a "mashup"?
Wikipedia offers a great article that explains mashups. Basically they are hybrid web applications that take features from one application (like Flickr) and mash it up with another (like Google Maps). In this example, you get Mappr (http://mappr.com/).

Like many web 2.0 sites, Flickr has encouraged other people to build their own online applications using images found on the site. Through the use of APIs (application programming interfaces), many people have created third party tools and mashups* that use Flickr images. Here is just a sampling of a few …
 
· Mappr - takes Flickr images and allows you to paste them on a map

· Flickr Color Pickr - lets you find public photos in Flickr that match a specific color.

· Mosaic Maker – create photo mosaics from photos found on Flickr.

Discover more mashups, web apps, and Flickr tools.

Discovery Exercise:
Your discovery exercise for this “thing” is to:
Explore some of the fun Flickr mashups and 3rd party tools that are out there. Create a blog post about one that intrigues you. You might want to check out FD Toys’ Trading Card Maker. And there’s a ton of librarians out there that have created their own Librarian Trading Card. So have some fun discovering and exploring some neat little apps.

For your post, discuss about some ways Flickr and/or Flickr mashups could be used in your library program or your classroom. If you are up to the challenge while you’re at it, create a trading card of your own and post it in your blog.

Take a look at more fun stuff from the Big Huge Labs.

Here is an example of a mashup created with FD Toys' Trading Card Maker.

Curriculum Connections:

Idea #1: Use Flickr toys to make a magazine cover. Many classes make their own magazine. This would be perfect! Example for covers: "Crusade Times," "Heading West," or "Genetics Today." Students could create a magazine cover and headlines for a famous person, historical event, or story character.

Idea #2: Create trading card sets. Liven up 5th grade mission projects, annual "animal" or "state" reports, and other topics that are ripe for change. Each student could create a card or student groups could design their own trading card pack. Trading the cards can be a fun game, but they can also be useful for recommended reading, books, illustrators, authors, and historical bios/dates. How would you use them? How about using them as Flash cards for vocabulary, periodical table, foreign language or ELL.

Thing #7 Cool Google Tools

Google is the most famous search engine on the web these days, with the very name becoming a verb in our language. Here's Wikipedia's entry on this phenomenon:

"The verb google (also spelled Google) refers to using the Google search engine to obtain information on the Web.  A neologism arising from the popularity and dominance[1] of the eponymous search engine, the American Dialect Society chose it as the "most useful word of 2002." [2] It was officially added to the Oxford English Dictionary on June 15, 2006,[3] and to the 11th edition of the Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary in July 2006.[4] The first recorded usage of google used as a verb was on July 8, 1998, by Larry Page himself, who wrote on a mailing list: "Have fun and keep googling!"[5]

Although we generally equate Google with web searching, that's not what this "thing" is about. Google also has a variety of free web tools that can be particularly useful in education. Some of these are:

Google Alerts - will e-mail the news to you as it happens. Just enter a search term (educational term, news topic, person, event, sports team, etc.) that you would like to keep tabs on. Whenever that topic appears in a news item or on the web, Google Alerts will send you an e-mail.

Google Calendar - lets you organize your schedule and share it with family, friends, teachers, students...

iGoogle - gives you a customizable home page where you can add links, news feeds, gadgets, etc. (Be sure and look at the gadgets - these are really fun!). Students can use iGoogle as their home page. They can have tabs for separate subjects or projects. They can set up gadgets to deliver information on topics, etc...
Picasa Web Albums - similar to Flickr; Google's version of photo sharing.

Google Scholar - Google Scholar provides a simple way to broadly search for scholarly literature. From one place, you can search across many disciplines and sources: peer-reviewed papers, theses, books, abstracts and articles, from academic publishers, professional societies, pre-print repositories, universities and other scholarly organizations.

Google Advanced Search – Allows you to search by file format. In other words, if you want a PowerPoint already created about a particular topic, you choose the PowerPoint (.ppt) and search for your topic.

Google Earth - Google Earth combines the power of Google Search with satellite imagery, maps, terrain and 3D buildings to put the world's geographic information at your fingertips.

Google Docs - Look at all the new things you can do with plain ol' text, spreadsheet and presentation items!

And more! From the Google Search page, click on the "more" pull-down at the top middle of the screen. Then click on "even more" at the bottom of the pull-down list.

Discovery Exercise

After looking at each of Google tools, choose two of them to explore further. Try setting up an alert, calendar, notebook, or iGoogle page and using it. If sharing is an option for the tools you choose, make them public.

Blog about your experience with both tools and include a link (if you make it public) to your creation. Be sure and include possible educational uses.

Thing #8 Learn about RSS feeds and set up a blog reader account

Have you heard of RSS? Maybe you’ve seen those little orange symbols on websites? Possibly you have heard colleagues and friends talk about their readers. In the information world, RSS is not only revolutionizing the way news, media, and content creators share information, but it also is swiftly changing the way everyday users are consuming information. As leaders in the acquisition of information, it is one Web 2.0 tool that you MUST know how to use and use regularly.

RSS stands for “Really Simple Syndication” and is a file format for delivering regularly updated information over the web. Just think about the websites and news information sources you visit everyday. It takes time to visit those sites and scour the ad-filled and image-heavy pages for just the text you want to read, doesn’t it? Read more about RSS here.

Now imagine if you could visit all those information sources and web pages in just one place and all at the same time … without being bombarded with advertising… without having to search for new information on the page you’d already seen or read before… and without having to consume a lot of time visiting each site individually. Would that be valuable to you? Well, it’s available now through a newsreader and RSS (sometimes called an aggregator).
Background Information:

To learn about RSS feeds and what free tools you can use to do this, here are some activities you need to complete.

1. Watch this video-RSS in Plain English at commoncraft.com or on YouTube by clicking below:




2. Read Newbie's Guide to Google Reader.

Now that you have background and understanding about RSS and readers, it's time for some Discovery Activities:

1. Select a reader and create a free account.

• Google Reader - Tutorial - Tour. We recommned Google Reader. If you set up your blog on Blogger, you already have a Google account.
• Bloglines - Tutorial

2. Now add at least 5 blog sites to your reader plus any news sources you may follow. Most likely, you will paste the address into the links bar inside the reader to add the feeds you choose. Just follow the directions provided by your reader.

Here are some suggested blogs to look at. You may search for others by going to Google Blog Search and searching keywords of your choice.

Cynsations - Author, Cynthis Leitich Smith
A Fuse #8 Production - A blog at School Library JournalNeverendingsearch - another blog at School Library Journal
Information Wants to be Free - by Meredith Farkas
Tame the Web - by Michael Stephens
Reading Rants
Storylines
Virtual Dave..Real Blog by Professor Dave Lankes
Librarian in Black - by Sarah Houghton-Jan

3. Create a post in your blog about Thing #8. Think about these questions:

• What do you like about RSS and newsreaders?
• How do you think you might be able to use this technology in your school or personal life?
• How can schools/librarians/teachers/administrators use readers or take advantage of this new technology?

Optional: If you're up to the challenge, create a public page with Google Reader or proved a link to your public Bloglines account.

Sharing information is a key component for 21st Century life-long learners and you have made that activity easy now that you have an RSS reader set up. Have fun reading all about whatever!

Thing #9 Locate a few useful School Library related blogs and news feeds

Now that you have an RSS Reader (your Google Reader or  Bloglines account), you can begin adding other feeds that interest you. Technorati, a blog tracking site, reports that they are currently tracking 133 million blogs. Out of the millions of blogs available, how do you find the ones that are of most value to you? There are several resources that you can use

Discovery Resources:

When visiting your favorite websites -- look for RSS  feed icons (like this)

 that indicate the website provides it. Often a feed icon will be diplayed somewhere in the navigation of the site.

Google Blog Search - See what appears when you search "ESC 1 Learning 2.0" or "esc1library."

Use Blogline's Search tool - Bloglines recently expanded search tool lets you search for news feeds in addition to posts, citations and the web. Use the Search for Feeds option to locate RSS feeds you might be interested in.

Check out the top "Edublog" award-winning blogs. Each of the winners and the other nominees in each catagory have blogrolls containing useful, helpful and often highly respected representative blogs that could meet your need. Click a catagory and go see what is there!

Some Other Search tools that can help you find feeds:

Topix.net - This search tool allows you to locate recent newsfeed items based upon keyword or phrase searching. The tool focuses specifically on news and media outlets RSS feeds for information, not weblogs

Syndic8.com - Syndic8 is an open directory of RSS feeds that contains thousands of RSS feeds that users have submitted.

Technorati - Technorati is a popular blog finding tool that lets you search for blogs. Since RSS feeds are inherent to all blogging tools, Technorati Blog Search can help you find RSS feeds for topic specific blogs you may be interested in.

Blog Pulse - Tracks conversations (try putting CSLA 2.0 to see who is talking about us)

Technorati is a popular blog finding tool that lets you search for blogs. Since RSS feeds are inherent to all blogging tools, Technorati Blog Search can help you find RSS feeds for topic specific blogs you may be interested in. Additonal Resource: Technorati Tutorial on finding and adding your blog

Discovery Exercises:

1. Explore some of the search tools noted above that can help you locate some RSS feeds.

Add any pertinent feeds to your RSS reader.

2. Create a blog post about your experience that answers these questions.

• Which Search tool was easiest for you?
• Which was more confusing?
• What kind of unuseful feeds did you find in your travels? Or what kind of unusual ones did you find?
• What other tools or ways did you find to locate newsfeeds?

EXTRA STUFF -- Feed icon information:
In February of 2006, the adoption of a standard feed icon among websites and browsers finally began to assist in stopping the madness and confusion caused by so many variations. So far this icon has been adopted by many websites and browsers, including Opera and FireFox, where it displays in the address bar:

Internet Explorer 7 has something like this as well. For more information about this emerging new standard, see Feedicons.com.

Thing #10 Play around with online image generators

Generators? No, I’m not talking about those gas powered back-up things. The generators I’m talking about are websites that allow you to easily manipulate images. See example:



(Images on this page created at http://www.imagechef.com/.)

For this discovery exercise, we want you to have even more fun than you're already having! Find a few fun image or text generators to play around with and write a post in your blog about one of your favorites and the display the result. Often adding the image you mocked up to your blog is as simple as copying and pasting code that the page provides. If not, you may just need to right click on the image and then save it to your hard drive before using Blogger’s image button to add it to your post. If you’re having difficulty getting your image added to a post in your blog, ask a colleague for help or post your comments below.

Discovery Resources:
Comic Strip Generator
Custom Sign Generator
Image Chef
Big Huge Labs
Dumpr
Wordle
Glogster
Trading Card Maker

Also try a Google search for online generators, text generators or image generators.


Discovery Exercises:
1. Play around with some image generators and find one that you like.
2. Create several different types of images and save them to your computer.
3. Describe your discovery process in your blog. Be sure to include ways you might use these image generators in the library or classroom.

Note: Be sure to include a link to the image generator itself, so other participants can discover it too. Take some time and have fun with this exercise. And remember to be tasteful too!*


Curriculum Connections:

Idea #1: Image generators: Show how to make an interesting image to use as interesting story starters. For example: using the star image on Hollywood Boulevard, a teacher or student could add the name of a character, a famous person, or any name. The students could make up a story about how that person got his/her very own star on the Hollywood walk of fame.
Idea #2: Use comic strip generator to make cartoon directions - students and fellow educators might follow THOSE directions!!

Idea #3: Generate an image for your library website, newsletter, or bulletin board.

[Note: Please remember to include THING# in your post headings.]

Thing #11: Explore Web 2.0 award-winning applications

Throughout the course of this Learning 2.0 program we’ve explored just a small sampling of the new internet technologies and websites that are empowering users with the ability to create and share content. But given time there are so many more we could explore! A recent estimate placed the number of Web 2.0 tools at somewhere close to 500 with only a handful emerging as market dominators. And although time will only tell which of these new collaborative, social networking and information tools will remain on top, one thing is for sure, they're not going to go away (at least anytime soon).

For this discovery exercise, participants are asked to select any site from this list of Web 2.0 Award Winners and explore it. With so many to choose from, it might be handy to first select a category that interests you (like Books or Personal Organization) and then select a tool/site to explore. Be careful to select a tool that is Free and that doesn't require a plug-in or download. The majority of these are free, so this shouldn’t be a problem.

Discovery Exercise:
1. Select any site/tool from the list of Web 2.0 Awards winners (If you prefer to select from just the winners, here’s a link to the short list.)

2. Explore the site you selected.

3. Write a blog post for Thing #11 about your discovery. What did you like or dislike about the tool? What were the site’s useful features? Could you see any applications for its use in a school or library setting?

4. Play -- check your Travel IQ.

Web 2.0 – with so much to explore, just start with ONE. :)We hope you're having fun with the exercises.

Thing #12: Roll your own search tool with Rollyo

Do you have a group of websites that are your favorites? Or a set of online resources that are similar that you frequently use to answer homework or reference questions? Do teachers frequently ask you to recommned a few web sites for a specific assignment? Well Rollyo may be the tool for you. Rollyo allows you to create your own search tool for the just the websites you know and trust-with no programming required.Take a look at some of these search rolls that have already been created:

Public Domain e-Books Search
Quick Quotes

Explore other rolls here.

Not quite ready to roll? We've created a starter kit of Searchrolls you can personalize. What else can Rollyo do?
Share Your Searchrolls

You can explore and save searchrolls created by the community of Rollyo users and share your knowledge on a particular set of topics. You can even edit Searchrolls created by others. More than a thousand new Searchrolls are created every day!
Search Your Top News Sites and Blogs

Rollyo searches for the latest news articles and blog posts, giving you up-to-the-minute search results from the news sources you know and trust when it comes to a particular topic or area of interest.
RollBar

The RollBar Bookmarklet allows you to drag your entire Rollyo experience onto your browser. Search any site, use your Searchrolls wherever you are, add sites to your rolls on the fly, even create new rolls from the site that you're on.
Roll a Firefox™

Search Engine Firefox™ users can quickly create custom Searchrolls and add them to their browser toolbar in one click. You can include one site that you search all the time or a topical list of up to 25 sites. Any Rollyo Searchroll can be added to Firefox™ with one click.
High Rollers

Rollyo welcomes several high profile, High Rollers: Debra Messing, Arianna Huffington, Rosario Dawson, Brian Greene, Diane Von Furstenberg, our friends at PBS Frontline and many top bloggers have all rolled custom search engines. You can be a High Roller too if your searchroll becomes popular with the Rollyo community. Think of it as our version of Star Search.
Single Site Search

If you're always going back to the same site over and over again like Dictionary.com, Amazon or Ebay, you can create a searchroll that includes just that single site so all your searches are in one place.

Web Search

You can always expand any search to include the whole Web. With Rollyo you can search one site, the whole web, and everything in between.
Tools (from Rollyo)

"We are constantly adding new tools to make Rollyo more useful. A few of these include a Firefox™ Plugin, a custom searchbox for your site, our RollBar, and a simple way to import your bookmarks so you can use them to quickly create a variety of searchrolls. You can check out our excellent buzz and there's plenty more that you'll discover as you start using Rollyo. But ultimately Rollyo is really about a very simple idea: Quickly and easily getting you the results you want from the sites you trust." Ready?

Here’s a searchroll created for this workshop: Homework Help. Try a search for broad term like "math” or “history” to see results listed from multiple sites.


Discovery Activity:
Create your own customized search and write about it in your blog and post a link to it. See if this video (created by a Spring Branch ISD Library2Play workshop participant) will help you.

Thing #13: Learn about tagging and discover Delicious (a social bookmarking site)

Tagging is an open and informal method of categorizing that allows users to associate keywords with online content (webpages, pictures & posts). Unlike traditional library subject cataloging, which follows a strict set of guidelines (e.g., Library of Congress subject headings), tagging is completely unstructured and freeform, allowing users to create connections between data in any way they want.

In the past few weeks, we’ve already explored one site – Flickr - that allows users to take advantage of tagging and some of you even used a common tag to create an association between photos that we individually uploaded.
Why social bookmarking? Well, have you checked your list of favorites or bookmarks on your internet browser lately? If you’re like me, your favorites list may need some pruning or organization. Or, if you don’t happen to be on your regular computer, how do you even remember all the sites you’ve bookmarked?

Delicious


Delicious is a social bookmarking manager which allows you to bookmark a web page and add tags to categorize your bookmarks.

Many users find that real power of Delicious is in the social networking aspect, which allows you to see how other users have tagged similar links and also discover other websites that may be of interest to you. You can think of it as peering into another users’ filing cabinet, but with this powerful bookmarking tool each user's filing cabinet helps to build an expansive knowledge network. For this discovery exercise, you are asked to take a look at Delicous and learn about this popular bookmarking tool.

More About Tags and Delicious

If you save an article about how to make a certain kind of cake, you can tag it with recipes sweets yogurt or whatever other tags you might use to find it again. You don't have to rely on the designer of a system to provide you with a category for French cake recipes. You make up tags as you need them, and use the tags that make the most sense to you.
This is great for organizing and finding personal data, but it goes even further when someone else posts related content using the same tags. You begin building a collaborative repository of related information, driven by personal interests and creative organization.
For instance, to view everybody's bookmarks about sweets, visit http://delicous.com/tag/sweets. To see the most popular items tagged as sweets, visit http://delicious.com/popular/sweets.

If you don't get it right away, that's OK -- you don't have to. Tagging is pretty intuitive and can take some practice to fully understand. Try it and experiment a bit! There are no wrong tags.

How do I tag?

When saving or editing a bookmark, there is a field for tags. In this field, enter as many tags as you would like, each separated by a space. You may notice lists of tags underneath this form. Popular tags are what other people have tagged this page as, and recommended tags are a combination of tags you have already used and tags that other people have used. You are under no obligation to use these! They are only there to help you. What tags or words would help you remember this page a few years from now? That's a good place to start. Learn more about saving bookmarks.

Some examples of tagging

You can use tags describing an article or website's subject, location, name, category, people, places, ideas -- pretty much anything you can think of. The more tags the better! (Well, most people use from one or two up to five or six tags for an item.)

The only limitation on tags is that they must not include spaces. So if your web page is about a two-word place like "San Francisco", you may want to tag it as sf, san-francisco, SanFrancisco, san.francisco, or whatever else makes sense to you. You probably don't want to use commas, though, since a comma will be become part of the tag.
You can also use tags to describe metadata about the bookmark. For example, you can use asterisks to rate bookmarks. So a tag of * might mean an OK link, *** is pretty good, and a bookmark tagged ***** is awesome. You can tag something "toread", or "via:friend". Items that you want can be tagged "wishlist", and links that might not be safe to visit at work can be tagged nsfw.

A tag can be anything you want.

Here's a neat place to start exploring tags: a cloud of frequently-used tags on delicious.

For this discovery exercise, you are asked to take a look at Delicious and a couple of other social bookmarking sites to see how this tool could be used in your school.

1. Start your exploration of social bookmarking by watching this Delicious video (direct link) by the Common Craft guys. Here is the video on YouTube, just in case you can't see it at Common Craft.



3. Check out Digg, Diigo and Top 30 Social Bookmarking Sites.

Discovery Exercise
1. Review the resources above to get a good overview of social bookmarking.
2. Take a look around Delicious using key words /tags that fit your professiona (and perosnal needs)
3. See if you can figure out how to share your delicious site with others (students).
4. Create a blog post about your experience and thoughts about this tool. Can you see the potential of this tool for research assistance? Or just as an easy way to create bookmarks that can be accessed from anywhere? How can libraries or classroom teachers take advantage of social bookmarking sites?


[Note: Please remember to include THING#  and title in your post headings.]

Thing #14: Explore Technorati and learn how tags work with blog posts

So now that you’ve been blogging for awhile, you might be wondering just how big is the blogosphere? Well according to San Francisco based Technorati, the leading search tool and authority for blogs, there are “over 175,000 new blogs (that’s just blogs) every day. Bloggers update their blogs regularly to the tune of over 1.6 million posts per day, or over 18 updates a second.” Technorati currently tracks 112.8 million blogs and over 250 million pieces of tagged data.

Yes, these numbers are astounding, but as you’ve already seen for yourselves, blogging is so easy that these publishing tools are being taken advantage of by almost every industry, including libraries.

So how do you get your blog listed as part of the blogosphere and how can you tag your posts with keywords to make them more findable through a Technorati search? The answer to the first question is that your blog is probably already being captured by Technorati due to the fact that you’re already using Blogger, the most popular blogging tool. But if you want to join the party and have your blog officially listed on Technorati and also take advantage of the watchlist and other features, you’ll need to claim your blog yourself. As for tagging posts with Technorati tags? This is easy too. All you need to do is add a little bit of HTML code to the bottom of your post (see example below) and Technorati will pick up these tags when it spiders (or web crawls) your site.

There are a lot of features in Technorati including the capability to search for keywords in blog posts, search for entire blog posts that have been tagged with a certain keyword, limit a search by language, or search for blogs that have been registered and tagged as whole blogs about a certain subject (like photography or libraries).

Background information:

1. View the blog from Technorati. View the tags used to categorize the information included in the posts.

2. Watch this video of the leadership at Technorati talking about their "product."



3. Read this blog post that discusses tags and tagging in things like Technorati, Delicious, amazon.com, and the effect it is having on advertisers.

Discovery Exercise:

1. Take a look at Technorati and try doing a keyword search for “School Library Learning 2.0” in Blog posts, in tags and in the Blog Directory. Are the results different?

2. Explore popular blog, searches and tags. Is anything interesting or surprising in your results?

3. Create a blog post for Thing #14 and express your thoughts regarding how Technorati and its features could assist you. Since you have now looked at several tools that use tagging (Technorati, Delicious, and Flickr), add your thoughts about the value of tagging information.about your discoveries on this site.

Optional Discovery Resources:

1. Register and claim your blog. It will increase the traffic that visits your blog.
2. Browse topics of interest - http://www.technorati.com/blogs/directory/

Curriculum Connections:

Idea #1: Use these tools to locate blogs and other sites relating to election or other issues.

Thing #15: Read some perspectives on Web 2.0 Future of Libraries

Library 2.0 or Classroom 2.0 are terms used to describe a new set of concepts for developing and delivering library services or classroom instruction. The name, as you may guess, is an extension of Web 2.0 and shares many of its same philosophies and concepts including:

• harnessing the user in both design and implementation of services,
• embracing constant change as a development cycle over the traditional notion of upgrades,
•  and reworking library services to meet the users in their space, as opposed to ours (libraries.)

Many have argued that the notion of Library 2.0 is more than just a term used to describe concepts that merely revolve around the use of technology; it also a term that can be used to describe both physical and mindset changes that are occurring within libraries to make our spaces and services more user-centric and inviting. Others within the profession have asserted that libraries have always been 2.0: collaborative, customer friendly and welcoming. But no matter which side of the debate proponents fall, both sides agree that libraries of tomorrow, even five or ten years from now, will look substantially different from libraries today.

Discovery Exercise:

1. Read two or three of the perspectives on Library 2.0 from the list below. Create a blog post about your thoughts on any one of these.

2. Library 2.0 - It's many things to many people. What does it mean to you? What does it mean for school libraries?

Discovery Resources:
OCLC Next Space Newsletter – Web 2.0: Where will the next generation of the web it take libraries?

Five Perspectives:
Away from Icebergs
Into a new world of librarianship
To more powerful ways to cooperate
To better bibliographic services
To a temporary place in time
Wikipedia – Library 2.0 Library 2.0 Discussions (list of great references from Wikipedia)
The Horizons Report - 2008 Applications of emerging technologies to teaching, learning, and creative expression.

We hope you're enjoying all the exercises you've done so far. Keep having fun exploring and thinking about Web 2.0/Library 2.0/School Library 2.0

Thing #16 (WEEK 7) Learn about wikis and discover some innovative ways that libraries are using them

A wiki is a collaborative website and authoring tool that allows users to easily add, remove and edit content. Wikipedia, the online open-community encyclopedia, is the largest and perhaps the most well known of these knowledge sharing tools, but with benefits that wikis provide the use and popularity of these tools is exploding.

Some of the benefits that make the use of wikis so attractive are:
-Anyone (registered or unregistered, if unrestricted) can add, edit or delete content.
-Tracking tools within wikis allow you to easily keep up on what been changed and by whom.
-Earlier versions of a page can be rolled back and viewed when needed.
-Users do not need to know HTML in order to apply styles to text or add and edit content. In most cases simple syntax structure is used.

As the use of wikis has grown over the last few years, libraries all over the country have begun to use them to collaborate and share knowledge. Among their applications are pathfinder or subject guide wikis, book review wikis, ALA conference wikis and even library best practices wikis.

Discovery Exercise:
1. For this discovery exercise, you are asked to take a look at some library wikis and blog about your findings.

Here are a few examples to get you started:
SJCPL Subject Guides – a pathfinder wiki developed by the St. Joseph County Public Library system.
Book Lovers Wiki - developed by the Princeton Public Library.
Library Success: A best practices wiki
CSLA Conference 2007 wiki – an example of a wiki created to support a specific event.
The Albany County Public Library Staff wiki – an example of a wiki created for library staff to document procedures.
Library Bloggers Wiki
Sample school wiki
Sample Literary Circle Wiki (10th Grade English)
Sample AP World History Wiki
http://teacherlibrarianwiki.pbwiki.com/
pbwiki for educators and librarians
Other library wiki examples such as library instruction.

2. Create a blog post about your findings. What did you find interesting? What types of applications within libraries and schools might work well with a wiki?

Discovery Resources:

Use these resources to learn more about wikis:

· Wiki, wiki, wiki - from the Core Compentency blog of the Public Library of Charlotte-Mecklenburg County.
· Wikis: A Beginner’s Look – an excellent short slide presentation that offers a short introduction and examples.
· What is a Wiki? – Library Success wiki presentation.
· Using Wikis to Create Online Communities – a good overview of what a wiki is and how it can be used in libraries.

Curriculum Connections:

Wikis can be made for any classroom!

Idea #1: Collaborative note-taking. Everyone pitches in and adds a fact or two about a topic. Teachers can encourage students to include opinions, challenges, and appropriate criticism. Students would then write essays using only these notes. Make sure that each addition includes a citation to website, book, or database, including page numbers so that it can be checked.

Idea #2: History. Students can compile a wiki of famous artists, architects, writers, and other key historical figures from a city, state, or country.

Idea #3: Create a "top 10" lists and supporting material. This could include scientists and their discoveries, top writers and their books, ... you get the idea.

Idea #4: Mission trading cards (see Week 3), once completed, could be added to a class wiki.

So what's in a wiki? Find out by doing some exploring on your own.

[Note: Please remember to include WEEK# and THING# in your heading posts.]

Thing #17: (WEEK 7) Add an entry to "Sandbox" Wiki

A sandbox is a term that wikis often use to describe the area of the website that should be used for pure play so for this discovery and exploration exercise, go to the Region One Sandbox (http://esc1learning23things.pbwiki.com/)-- go ahead and play! The magic password is "library."

Note: The Region One Sandbox was created with PBwiki 1.0 because the general invite key is not an option in PBwiki 2.0. You may choose either version for your own wiki.

Discovery Exercise:

1. Visit the California Curriculum Connections wiki and go to the section devoted to one or more of the topics covered in the 9 weeks of the School Library Learning 2.0 course.

2. Create a post in your blog about the experience. How might you use wikis?

Discovery Resources:

· PBWiki Video Gallery - Short videos of PBwiki features
· PB Wiki Tips

Curriculum Connection:

Idea #1: Select one of your favorite curriculum ideas from your own blog. "Copy and paste" it to the Region One Sandbox wiki. Password is "library."

Thing #18 (WEEK 8) Take a look at online productivity tools (word processing, spreadsheets, and more)

One major benefit to web-based applications is that they eliminate the need to worry about different software versions or file types as you email documents or move from PC to PC. Another bonus is that they easily accommodate collaboration by allowing multiple users to edit the same file (with versioning) and provide users the ability to easily save and convert documents as multiple file types (including HTML and pdf). And, you can even use many of these tools, such as Zoho Writer and Google Docs (Formerly known as Writely) to author and publish posts to your blog.

It’s this type of integration with other Web 2.0 tools that also makes web-based apps so appealing. For this discovery exercise, you are asked to take a look at a web-based word processing tool called Zoho Writer, create a simple document and then document your discoveries in your blog. If you are up to the challenge, you might even export your document as an HTML file or publish it through Zoho to your blog. With Zoho and web-based applications, the possibilities are endless.

Discovery Exercise:
1. Create a free account for yourself in Zoho Writer
2. Explore the site and create a test document or two.
3. Try out Zoho Writer’s features and create a blog post about your discoveries.

Optional: If you’re up for the challenge, try using Zoho’s publish options to post to your blog.* *Note: You can also explore Google Docs (formerly known as Writely), Google's online word processing, as an option for this exercise. FYI: On Oct 11th, 2006, Google re-launched Writely (which it acquired in Spring 2006) as Google Docs.

BTW: Here’s a Zoho-created document (viewable as a webpage) about some of the beneficial features of Zoho.

Discovery Resources:
A short list of web-based productivity applications – Note: This list was authored in ZohoWriter and exported as HTML.

Curriculum Connections:

Idea #1: Have your students count all the books in their house (not including cook books.) Have them sort them by type (fiction/nonfiction, mystery, sports, subject, size, color -- their choice) and list these on a spreadsheet. [Note: you may want to limit the books to 200.]

[Note: Remember to include WEEK# and THING# in your heading posts.]

Thing #19: (WEEK 8) Check out LibraryThing

Are you a booklover or cataloger at heart?Do you enjoy finding lost and forgotten gems on the shelf to read?Then LibraryThing may be just the tool for you. Developed for booklovers, this online tool not only allows you to easily create an online catalog of your own, it also connects you to other people who have similar libraries and reading tastes. Add a book to your catalog by just entering the title (it’s so easy that you don’t even need to know MARC format) or connect with other users through your similar reading tastes. There are lots of ways to use LibraryThing. You can even view your books on a virtual shelf, add a widget to display titles that are in your catalog, or install a LT Search box on your blog.

Not just for personal collections, libraries have started using LibraryThing as well. “Small libraries are using LibraryThing to catalog their collections. Libraries are using the LibraryThing widget on their web pages to recomend books and list new titles.” (via http://wlaweb.blogspot.com/). Being a non-commercial site makes LibraryThing a good option for libraries. According to their website, LibraryThing "is exploring relationships with libraries, to offer non-commercially motivated recommendations and other social data." See also a blog comment by the Librarian-in-Black.

So why not join the ranks and create your own library online. With over 400,000 registered users (LibraryThing also has group forum for librarians) and 26 million books cataloged, you’re bound to discover something new.

Discovery Exercise:

1. Take a look around LibraryThing and create an account.
2. Add a least 5 books to your library.
3. Blog about your findings and be sure to link to your LibraryThing catalog. How popular were your books? Did you find any discussions about your favorites?

Discovery Resources:
· About LibraryThing
· Library Thing tour
· LibraryThing blog (updates & news)
· Thingology blog (“LibraryThing's ideas blog, on the philosophy and methods of tags, libraries and suchnot.”)How libraries are using LibraryThing

Some Libraries using LibraryThing:
Shenandoah Public Library
Creston Public Library
Southwestern Community College LRC
Washington State Library (RSS feed also on their blog; Note - They chose to use Wordpress as their preferred blogging software).

Curriculum Connections:

Idea #1: Have your students count all the books in their house (see Curriculum Connection idea for THING #18), then create a LibraryThing catalog of at least 25 books. [Or, some students could make a LibraryThing catalog of the classroom book collection.]

Thing #20: (WEEK 9) Discover YouTube and a few sites that allow users to upload and share videos

Within the past year online video hosting sites have exploded allowing users to easily upload and share videos on the web. Among all the web 2.0 players in this area, YouTube is currently top dog serving up over 1 million video views a day and allowing users not only to upload their own video content easily, but also embed clips into their own sites easily.

Do some searching around YouTube yourself and see what the site has to offer. You'll find everything from 1970s TV commercials to library dominos and a video made by library school students for National Library Week. There's also the cult classic Conan the Librarian.

See also:
Introducing the Book
Web 2.0
Library 2.0 Manifesto
March of the Librarians

Of course, like any free site you’ll also find a lot stuff not worth watching too. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t explore and see for yourself what the site has too offer. :)

Discovery Exercise:

1. Explore YouTube & find a video worth adding as an entry in your blog.
2. Create a blog post about your experience. What did you like or dislike about the site and why did you choose the video that you did? Can you see any features or componets of the site that might be interesting if they were applied to library websites?

OPTIONAL: Try placing the video inside your blog using the copy and paste code for the for "Embeddable Player.” Note: you'll need to use Blogger's Edit HTML tab when pasting this code.

Discovery Resources:

Other popular video hosting sites:
Yahoo Videos
Google videos
TeacherTube
Jumpcut by Yahoo!Teachers

NOTE: Videos, like music downloads, are bandwidth hogs.
It is recommended that you complete this exercise during light Internet usage times.

Thing #21: (WEEK 9) Podcasts (No iPod Needed)

The word podcast is used to refer to a non-musical audio or video broadcast that is distributed over the Internet. What differentiates a podcast from regular streaming audio or video is that the delivery method for podcasts is often done automatically through RSS.

In 2005, "podcast" was named the "word of the year" by New Oxford American Dictionary and with the growth of podcasting over the last year and a half; it’s easy to see why. Podcasts take many forms, from short 1-10 minutes commentaries (like the ones used in this Learning 2.0 program) to much longer in person interviews or panel group discussions. There’s a podcast out there for just about every interest area and the best part about this technology is that you don’t have to have an iPod or a MP3 player to access them. Since podcasts use the MP3 file format, a popular compressed format for audio files, you really just need a PC (or portal device) with headphones or a speaker.

iTunes, the free downloadable application created by Apple is the directory finding service most associated with podcasts, but if you don’t have iTunes installed there are still plenty of options.For this discovery exercise participants are asked to take a look at some popular podcast directory tools. Do some exploring on your own and locate a podcast that is of interest to you. Once found, you can easily pull the RSS feed into your blog reader (i.e., Bloglines or Google Reader) account as well, so that when new casts become available you’ll be automatically notified of their existence.

Discovery Exercises:

1. Take a look at one or two of the podcast directories listed and see if you can find a podcast that interests you. See if you can find some interesting library related podcasts here like book review podcasts or library news.

-Add the RSS feed for a podcast to your blog reader account.

-Create a blog post about your discovery process. Did you find anything useful here?

Discovery Resources:

· To find out more about podcasts start with Common Craft's Podcating in Plain English.

· There are many, many podcast directory and finding tools out there. Here are just three of the more popular ones that don’t, like iTunes, require a software download:

o Podcastalley.com
o Yahoo Podcasts.
See also Educational Podcast Directory

Curriculum Connections:

Idea #1: Interview candidates for local office, or town officials about top issues in your community.

Idea #2: Create a daily school news podcast, including an issue of the day such as copyright/music downloading/file sharing, Internet safety tips, or newest web 2.0 applications.

Do you want to learn how to be a podcaster ? (Here are optional Resources for those who want to learn to create podcasts)
Yahoo: Publish a podcast
Odeo’s Studio – online recording studio.
Beginners guide to Podcasts & Creating Podcasts
How to podcast tutorial

Thing #22: (WEEK 9) Explore ebooks and Audio eBooks

For this thing, you will explore where you can get free ebooks and get an idea of the types of titles you can find here. Take a look around and locate a few titles of interest. Many school and public libraries have audiobook and ebook collections, so check what they have in their collections. Audiobooks are popular for ELL and Special Education students, as well as communters who enjoy a good story during a long ride. There are a number of commercial audiobook and ebook sources, and many of these companies have exhibits at library conferences.

Discovery Exercises:

1. Explore World EBook Fair' site for FREE downloads from the Gutenberg Project. Also just explore the site - there's much to check out.
2. Create a blog post about your findings.

Discovery Resources:

1. LibriVox, audiobook versions of copyright-free books from the Gutenberg Project. Read by volunteers. Started in August 2005 by Hugh McGuire. Check it out!

2. Check out this "Best Places to Get Free Books" site, too.

Thing #23: (WEEK 9) Copyright, Creative Commons, and Congratulations!

Putting the ‘social’ into social networks allows us to freely exchange information. But with the free exchange of information comes the responsibility of how we share it, and how we give credit to the author of that information. Check out this video, “A Fair(y) Use Tale” and learn some history of copyright.



In the school library and classroom, we are often faced with copyright challenges of when it is acceptable to copy something and how much of an item [book, website, music, video, etc.] we can copy. Faced with declining budgets and little time, we are tempted to make the copies. But with the advent of file sharing, downloading, and RSS, we must acknowledge and teach the ethics of information gathering and sharing.

Creative Commons is a copyright license that allows us to choose to share our intellectual property. This course is designed under a Creative Commons license and is an example of how one can take a piece of information or a product and re-work it to make it fit your needs. By acknowledging the original authors, they have given permission for you to share. One place for good information about what's going on with the Creative Commons is Lawrence Lessig's blog. Lawrence Lessig is one of the Creative Commons developers and a Stanford University professor.

Discovery Exercise:

Find an example or attribution that shows this program has been modified from it's original.
Discovery Resources:

-Online copyright comic book developed by students at Duke University Law School.
-Creative Commons website.
-“Wanna Work Together?” YouTube video about Creative Commons.
-California Technology Assistance Project, Region IV cybersafety website. See Piracy.

Congratulations!! You’ve reached the 23rd thing. Give yourself a pat on the back for completing the program.

Now you need to go back and check that you completed all required activities. (Yes, adding to the Region One Sandbox is a requirement). You are also required to post on some of the other participants' blogs....and you need to submit your log to esc1library@gmail.com. The blank form for the log is at http://esc1learning23things.pbwiki.com/f/23ThingsLog.doc.

Please give us your feedback on your experience by completing this online workshop evaluation and by relecting on your learning journey by posting a few thoughts. Here are some questions to prompt you:

1. What were your favorite discoveries or exercises on this learning journey?
2. How has this program assisted or affected your lifelong learning goals?
3. Were there any take-a-ways or unexpected outcomes from this program that surprised you?
4. What could we do differently to improve upon this program’s format or concept?
5. If we offered another discovery program like this in the future, would you choose to participate?
6. How would you describe your learning experience in ONE WORD or in ONE SENTENCE, so we could use your words to promote CSLA learning activities?

We hope this is not the end of our learning journey together as a staff and a system, but the start of something amazing …such as:

-maintain your blog as your educational journal
-add your blog URL to your e-mail signature line
-re-purpose it as your school library blog
-share it with your colleagues and administrators