Thing 14 Web 2.0 tools: Mendeley, Zotero & Citeulike

So, in investigating web 2.0 tools such as Mendeley for organising and referencing, my obvious response is : make sure you have a backup of everything you save! Mendeley looks good, and could be useful to students in particular. There seem to be so many choices of different tools in this area, I would say see what suits you best. Mendeley doesn't seem to do much more than Dropbox and Neil's toolbox put together in one place, although I may be underestimating it's power having not fully explored all its capabilities. I do like the fact that you can attach articles, which will prove useful for Extended Essay & IB students. It has a fancy 'dashboard' but I didn't find it intuitive to use and had a very American 'look'. In my view simple is good. For our 6th form students, Studyvibe from Autrialia seems better presented and a one stop shop for research tools. As ever, time is an issue with finding out more. Zotero and Citeulike have slightly different perspectives. Citeulike could be very good for collaborative learning again with IB students in particular. I have shown 6th formers these kinds of tools in IL lessons. You can only take a horse to water! I do however think that just showing the Library staff know about these things does change the perception of us as just the 'caretakers of books'. It has meant over the past year that individual students are happier to approach us with questions about sourcing articles, websites and referencing. If only teaching staff would do the same! All good stuff though. I do like the first part of  Thing 14 which succinctly describes what students need whether they are 6th formers, IB students or undergraduates.

Thing 5 Reflection

This is my second time around with CPD23, so you could say that the whole course is a reflective practise for me. I wanted to see how far I'd come in a year, what tools I use on a regular basis, as well as getting updated on new things. I agree that reflective practise should be cyclical, analytical and should feed into further development. I often learn more from the difficulties than those things that go smoothly, so those who read this and think the Librarians have an easy life...better think again! One issue that crops up is the ever changing tools, so that a tool like Evernote works one day, but not the next. Very frustrating, but I think it's them not me! What I am bad at is recording, so having this blog helps me enormously.  One thing I have found difficult following last year's course (which was truely enlightening,) is using that knowledge to persuade senior management that these tools need to be integrated across the entire organisation. Maybe CPD23 could do a 'Thing' on how to influence managers??? As to the 'Things' so far this year, I have managed to integrate a lot of them into my daily life except for Storify which isn't available in school because of restrictions on Java script and browsers. I can get this from home, but that means there is limited access for our students too. Yes I even sound like I know all the geek speak too!

Thing 4 Current Awareness

Some things have changed since I last looked at this. Twitter is proving to be a valuable tool for keeping up with what's going on in the Porofessional and I use it to follow fellow librarians rather than friends. However, certain professionals don't do the same and I often see their holidays snaps as well as the latest on Library issues! However it's my favourite method of keeping in touch. Note to self: 'must post more'! RSS is fabulous too, as I've managed to link RSS feeds into our intranet. Those that get directed into my web browser are a little lost because I have to remember to click on the right tab. That's as much my fault as browser inefficiency.
I failed to look at Push note last time around but was sad to see a farewell note online when I checked http://www.pushnote.com/farewell. Maybe something will replace it eventually. However, it does demonstrate the fickle nature of web 2.0 tools if they aren't popular enough. It seems that we need to stay with the big ones like Twitter, Facebook, Dropbox & Evernote which are my current favourites. One area not included in the CPD23 list is an online forum. I belong to the SLN forum which goes directly into my email inbox. I find this invaluable in connecting with the latest and very specific issues that are affecting school libraries in particular. It also helps those who are one man bands feel connected.

CPD 23 2012

I've signed up to cpd23, an online professional development course in order to update some ICT skills with new applications. Our new school, Bedford Girls' School was officicially in September 2011 and our Grand Opening was on 4th May 2012. I would like to use my blog and other applications as a way of connecting to the student body in a space that they understand, available 24/7