Video embedding, oh yeah!

I'm so excited -- I just embedded a video in my Battle of the Books wiki! Yahoo! Now I'm going to see if I can embed a video in a blog. As I told a teacher here, we'll never catch up with the kids, but at least we've crossed the bridge * into this century!

Speaking of which, we had a flat screen monitor go out ,and the tech guy put in an old, bulky tan one for the time being. It's the first thing the kids notice when they come in. They think it's amazing! I told them we're starting a tech museum. They never saw the computers of the sixties, the ones that filled up whole rooms and required key punch cards. Now that was technology.

*Tappan Zee Bridge, heading west, July 2007

We Put a Toe Into the 21st Century

So I'm sitting here in the computer lab listening to a presentation on blogs, wikis, and whatnot. Since out Tech. Director is leading it, maybe the practice will catch on here. Teachers are so busy, near-overwhelmed, with class preparation, grading, coaching, being house parents, and learning to use SmartBoards, NetClassroom and Blackboard that it's hard to expect them to consider, let alone embrace, yet more new apps. But I hope the infusion of these tools into our school will be viral.

I'm feeling conflicted, too, about this workshop, since i could have presented it but wasn't asked. I have to let go of ego and focus on sharing, on everybody's learning things that will enhance their lives and teaching. Maybe now that this is being presented people will begin to catch on. I'll email faculty again with a link to my school blog. I've told the director that I can teach these sessions and would like to. we'll see.

What I really want to do is to copy Helene Bowers' wonderful 23 Things and design a self-teaching course for our faculty. I think, now that we've had this technology morning, teachers could easily keep up with a self-directed course.

Giving Up on Web Page Design

I've seen the light, at last. After months of struggling to make a library webpage with a weak tool and little knowledge, not to mention NO desire to learn HTML, I've taking good advice from SLJ and have decided to use a wiki for my page. Yes, yes, I know wikis are meant more for collaborative projects, and I intend to keep control of this one, but last spring's SLJ article on wikis convinced me that wiki is the way to go. So I've chosen wikispaces, because it's easy and it's nice looking, AND it gives free accounts to educators.

I'm uncertain about the final success of this, since I don't know, for instance, how much data I can fit in, but I'm feeling liberated and happy. Now, if I could just get my camera out of the repair shop so I can resume taking pictures. All technologies are like this: once you learn to use them, then you feel handicapped if you lose them. I feel as though a hand's been cut off with the loss of use of my camera.

P.S. Don't look for significance in the picture, as related to this post. there isn't any: it's just a nice picture I took downtown.

Small but important tech tip: don't carry your camera loose in your purse: put it in a protective case.

Ning!

Recently I attended the wonderful conference of AISL (the Association of Independent School Librarians, hosted this year in Philadelphia by a team of fellow librarians. After the conference I started an AISL site on Ning, the new social networking site started by Marc Andreesen of Netscape fame and Gina Bianchini, who serves as Ning's CEO and stars in an excellent video which demonstrates how easy it is to set up a community on Ning. Here is Gina's blog, http://blog.ning.com/, and here's a link to the video.http://www.podtech.net/scobleshow/technology/1373/build-your-own-social-space-with-ning-version-2# I haven't figured out yet how to post the video on this blog, but you can go to it. It's 12 minutes long and very good.

April Springs Forward

I went to a lovely and inspiring conference of AISL in Philadelphia last week and was surrounded by intelligent, friendly, and charming librarians from all over the US and Canada (anyone from anywhere who's in an independent school is welcome). I came back recalling comments in reaction to different sessions ranging from "Wow! I found out I'm doing a pretty good job!" through "Hmmm ! I guess I can pick it up a bit next year" to "Zow, maybe I should retire!" Seriously, it was inspiring to be among these 110 or so school librarians, riding buses with time to chat, having meals, etc. Everyone should get out -- and nowadays you can do that by travelling to conferences, workshops, and fellowships, or by cybertravelling, or communicating online.

Some of the schools we visited were Quaker schools, serving diverse populations while continuing Quaker practices. In a meeting house on school grounds, children begin in prekindergarten to practice the keeping of silence; the high schoolers are observing forty minutes at a time. This has to become a very significant part of a teenager's life, gently coerced and so completely countercultural.

Detail of mural at Abingdon Friends School, PA

To this end I've joined the online school library community at http://teacherlibrarian.ning.com, begun by the quietly blazing Joyce Valenza of Springfield Township High School in Pennsylvania.

I've also started a similar Ning community for independent school librarians, and it's rocking so far!

Welcome to the New Dunstan Too

The old St. Dunstan blogs have disappeared and sprung up with new names and new looks, in an effort to separate school from private life. In Dunstanology (borrowing from LibraryThing's "Thingology" blog) I will think about school libraries and where they're going. I hope this will be part of the national conversation in Libraryland.