Bit of a gap from Thing 8 I know, but I have been reading & playing with the information, & I may return to blog about that at a later date. However the attendance at conferences etc inspired me to blog straight away.
I wish I could attend more conferences and training days, but at the moment the big thing is cost. I'm on the committee of the Yorkshire branch of YLG and can't even attend the YLG conferences. The group can't afford to pay for me to attend as funds are tight & we have to be careful what we spend. Work has been fairly good & I have attended 2 training days a year since I came here, but it has to be relevant to my job & there's a limit on cost. They are very keen on the networking aspect of attending these days, so again this is why it has to be so relevant to my job. I'm sure we are all in a similar position, but there are some courses I'd like to do for my own professional development which are totally out of the question in the current climate.
A few years ago I spoke at the AGM of the Sri Lankan Library Association (I was in a different job & I paid for myself to go). I have never been more terrified! I had to be very clear in how I presented because of the language barrier. Their English was brilliant but the only word I knew in Sinhalese was Aliya - meaning elephant - not a lot of use in a presentation about running a children's library. It was an amazing experience & I learnt so much about giving a clear speech, conquering nerves (a little) and presenting in a socially inclusive way. I have done a couple of presentations over here since, and I hope that what I learnt I was able to put into practice here. I now teach Information Skills & Harvard to students as part of my job & this includes groups of ESOL students, & the Sri Lankan experience has really helped with that.
Hopefully when the economy settles down & we have have more money to play with I'll be able to attend more training etc.
Friday, 24 August 2012
Monday, 2 July 2012
Thing 8
How useful was this thing for those of us who didn't know about Google calandar? I know I use the Outlook one at work, but as this links to my phone I can use it for both personal and work purposes wow sorted! Think I must have living in a time warp, as I'm sure most people knew about it, but hey that doesn't matter, I'm in real world now.
Now onto Thing 9 ............
Now onto Thing 9 ............
Friday, 15 June 2012
Thing 7
I am a member of CILIP and have been since I qualified. What do I get out of it? Well I have attended some really good training courses when there's been money to send me on them - so obviously that means I haven't been on many because they are so expensive - however the ones I have been to were really good.
I did join the Yorkshire branch of the YLG, then joined the committee, last year I was Vice-Chair & this year I'm Chair. I joined because I felt it would be useful for networking amongst other things, and as I intend to stay in the profession until they drag me out screaming, I felt it would be useful for my career. Although I have moved from public libraries, to SureStart & now to academic libraries, they have let me remain with the YLG. I feel it's important to know what is happening in the wider library world, I work closely with school librarians and hope to also work with public librarians therefore being on the YLG with them, helps keep me in the loop. Although some of the day schools aren't relevant to my line of work, I still manage to learn from them and in some cases adapt the information to use in my College. Working with ESOL, key skills, life skills and the College creche, allows me to put quite a lot of what I learn into practise.
I have thought about IFLA a few times, but the cost of attending meetings and conferences is an issue. The reason I got to thinking about it was when I went out to Sri Lanka to work with the SLLA after the tsunami. There are some lovely librarians out there, and at the time they had lost quite a few librarians and teachers, so I met with Pramila Gamage at CILIP headquarters when she came to talk about how the tsunami had affected the libraries, and went out and delivered workshops to librarians, teachers and the children over 4 or 5 visits. I also delivered a paper at their AGM! It was hard work, great fun but very sad at times too, as stories of what had happened were told wherever I went. I would love to still be going there, but as I was self funding, the funds dried up. I hope I helped to make a difference though.
So to conclude, yes I feel it is important to belong to at least one professional body, and try to be involved if possible. You meet so many lovely people and learn so much too.
I did join the Yorkshire branch of the YLG, then joined the committee, last year I was Vice-Chair & this year I'm Chair. I joined because I felt it would be useful for networking amongst other things, and as I intend to stay in the profession until they drag me out screaming, I felt it would be useful for my career. Although I have moved from public libraries, to SureStart & now to academic libraries, they have let me remain with the YLG. I feel it's important to know what is happening in the wider library world, I work closely with school librarians and hope to also work with public librarians therefore being on the YLG with them, helps keep me in the loop. Although some of the day schools aren't relevant to my line of work, I still manage to learn from them and in some cases adapt the information to use in my College. Working with ESOL, key skills, life skills and the College creche, allows me to put quite a lot of what I learn into practise.
I have thought about IFLA a few times, but the cost of attending meetings and conferences is an issue. The reason I got to thinking about it was when I went out to Sri Lanka to work with the SLLA after the tsunami. There are some lovely librarians out there, and at the time they had lost quite a few librarians and teachers, so I met with Pramila Gamage at CILIP headquarters when she came to talk about how the tsunami had affected the libraries, and went out and delivered workshops to librarians, teachers and the children over 4 or 5 visits. I also delivered a paper at their AGM! It was hard work, great fun but very sad at times too, as stories of what had happened were told wherever I went. I would love to still be going there, but as I was self funding, the funds dried up. I hope I helped to make a difference though.
So to conclude, yes I feel it is important to belong to at least one professional body, and try to be involved if possible. You meet so many lovely people and learn so much too.
Saturday, 9 June 2012
Thing 6
I have used Facebook for quite some time now and I like to keep it seperate from work as much as possible. Yes my colleagues are on there & we chat when not at work etc, but I don't want to use it as a professional platform. That is my 'fun' side of life. I like to post silly things on there, & reply to daft posts - and some serious ones too. I have mainly family and friends and have only added a few people I don't know on to it.
Twitter on the other hand I use for both fun and my professional life. I've lost count of the amount of authors I'm following and some who are following me. Plus CILIP, and book shops and reading agencies etc. I really enjoy twitter, not so much posting, but reading it. Plus I'm following the footballers from my team, Dr Who people etc, so I still have fun there too. One of the people who makes me laugh the most is Philip Ardagh, children's author. If I'm having a rough day, I look for his posts to cheer me up. I met him at the Doncaster Book Awards a couple of weeks ago, & he's just as daft in real life!
So do I really want to join any more social network sites? No I'm not sure I do! I did get a request to join Linkedlin from a colleague and Alan Gibbons a while back. I accepted & now I can't remember my password or which email I used! I'm not sure I actually have the time to keep tralling through so many, especially as I'm trying to do my Chartership as well (very slowly I might add). So if it's ok with you guys I'll stick to Facebook and Twitter for now and maybe try again with Linkedlin at a later date!
Twitter on the other hand I use for both fun and my professional life. I've lost count of the amount of authors I'm following and some who are following me. Plus CILIP, and book shops and reading agencies etc. I really enjoy twitter, not so much posting, but reading it. Plus I'm following the footballers from my team, Dr Who people etc, so I still have fun there too. One of the people who makes me laugh the most is Philip Ardagh, children's author. If I'm having a rough day, I look for his posts to cheer me up. I met him at the Doncaster Book Awards a couple of weeks ago, & he's just as daft in real life!
So do I really want to join any more social network sites? No I'm not sure I do! I did get a request to join Linkedlin from a colleague and Alan Gibbons a while back. I accepted & now I can't remember my password or which email I used! I'm not sure I actually have the time to keep tralling through so many, especially as I'm trying to do my Chartership as well (very slowly I might add). So if it's ok with you guys I'll stick to Facebook and Twitter for now and maybe try again with Linkedlin at a later date!
Thing 5
Thing 5 has come just at the right time, the students at college have just had the presentation of their certificates for the Six Book Challenge, so that's it over for another year! My next task is to evaluate it all, so Thing 5 has made me sit back & think about more. I thought if I blogged about it, it might help me when it comes to putting it all down on paper!
This has been our third year of taking part in the SBC, and once again the figures have improved. I was however starting to think with just a week to go that it had flopped miserably! When we first started I more or less had total control over it, all the students would come into the LRC to change their books & I would be on hand to help, & then they would come in the write a blog on the SBC website, plus they would write reviews which I would display in the LRC. Due to the numbers this was all incredibly time consuming and I realised if i wanted to expand it - which I did, I would have to hand most of it over to the tutors & just oversee it! This is what I did last year as it grew in size and more groups wanted to take part. Last year it seemed to work. This year, although the numbers were well up, it didn't work quite so well. Why? Well I feel I didn't have enough input this year, and some of the tutors just let it slide and didn't embed it into the curriculum properly. Nearly 50 students who were given reading diaries never even started it. 178 students did take part which was great and 128 students actually completed the challenge which I was thrilled about.
Anyway that is the slightly negative side to it all. The tutors who did take part and encourage their students also got some fabulous work from them. Above is some of the work by the media students (the plasticine figures) and the reviews are from the ESOL students. The media students made animations based on one of the six books they had read, the plasticine figures are what they used. During the presentation I had them on a large TV screen so everyone could see them. They also produced some snake type games based on the books. The ESOL students and Life skills students all did some fantastic reviews, with the ESOL students also making a film reflecting their experiences of taking part in the SBC and how it had helped them.
The presentation was attended by nearly 80 staff and students which is nearly double last years attendance. The Vice Principal handed out the certificates to those who could attend, and the event once again went really well.
Next year will be different. The ESOL tutor and I will be delivering some training to staff on how to embed the SBC into the curriculum and how to support their students and produce some really good and interesting work. I will also provide more support from within the LRC by encouraging groups to come at least once a month for an event supporting the SBC. Watch this space next year to see if it works!
This has been our third year of taking part in the SBC, and once again the figures have improved. I was however starting to think with just a week to go that it had flopped miserably! When we first started I more or less had total control over it, all the students would come into the LRC to change their books & I would be on hand to help, & then they would come in the write a blog on the SBC website, plus they would write reviews which I would display in the LRC. Due to the numbers this was all incredibly time consuming and I realised if i wanted to expand it - which I did, I would have to hand most of it over to the tutors & just oversee it! This is what I did last year as it grew in size and more groups wanted to take part. Last year it seemed to work. This year, although the numbers were well up, it didn't work quite so well. Why? Well I feel I didn't have enough input this year, and some of the tutors just let it slide and didn't embed it into the curriculum properly. Nearly 50 students who were given reading diaries never even started it. 178 students did take part which was great and 128 students actually completed the challenge which I was thrilled about.
Anyway that is the slightly negative side to it all. The tutors who did take part and encourage their students also got some fabulous work from them. Above is some of the work by the media students (the plasticine figures) and the reviews are from the ESOL students. The media students made animations based on one of the six books they had read, the plasticine figures are what they used. During the presentation I had them on a large TV screen so everyone could see them. They also produced some snake type games based on the books. The ESOL students and Life skills students all did some fantastic reviews, with the ESOL students also making a film reflecting their experiences of taking part in the SBC and how it had helped them.
The presentation was attended by nearly 80 staff and students which is nearly double last years attendance. The Vice Principal handed out the certificates to those who could attend, and the event once again went really well.
Next year will be different. The ESOL tutor and I will be delivering some training to staff on how to embed the SBC into the curriculum and how to support their students and produce some really good and interesting work. I will also provide more support from within the LRC by encouraging groups to come at least once a month for an event supporting the SBC. Watch this space next year to see if it works!
Monday, 21 May 2012
Thing 4
Hmmm this wasn't too successful. The twitter bit was easy as I've been with twitter for a while & therefore it was easy to do. However I never really understood the hash tags before today as no one has ever explained them, so that's good. I also found someone who I already follow on the #cpd23 who is doing this so that was good too.
RSS was easy to join up to, but I'm not sure I will get any use out of it especially when I use twitter so much & have a blog.
Storify was a disaster because the browser won't accept it & the alternative options it supplied are also a no no on my computer. Will have a look at that at home.
Monday, 14 May 2012
Thing 3
So I went into Google & there I am! I had to put Doncaster in after my name though. It's a bit surreal seeing yourself mentioned so many times when you haven't put yourself there! The only thing I didn't like was my postcode was there for all to see, but I guess that's just a sign of the times. My work with the Six Book Challenge in College was there and the fact you can contact me about the Doncaster Book Awards of which I'm secretary. My twitter and Facebook are there too, which I suppose I expected. Also one of my subject pages (languages) is there, but I don't know why only that one is there and not all the others. My business subject page was on page 2 of Google, but I haven't found the rest yet!
The first reference is for a Linkedln account which I opened but never use, so I suppose that's confusing for people, however the Doncaster book Awards is the first big news atem about me, so I'm pleased with that. It is good that my things come up from work on that first page too. It just shows there's nowhere to hide in this day and age!
The first reference is for a Linkedln account which I opened but never use, so I suppose that's confusing for people, however the Doncaster book Awards is the first big news atem about me, so I'm pleased with that. It is good that my things come up from work on that first page too. It just shows there's nowhere to hide in this day and age!
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