Howdy from Internet Librarian 2006! Things are going well here, the weather is lovely and the sessions are so far ok. Just got out of my first session on emerging technologies… and even though they didn’t say anything about any technologies that I would consider “emerging” (Because, lets face it, blogs/wikis/online user collaboration… this is not emerging technology anymore… this is mainstream technology).
Michael Stevens said the same things he always does, so that was ehh… Jenny Levine was banging her same gong as well, so I was a little underwhelmed but I do appreciate their enthusiasm.
BUT… this lovely trainer from the Public Library of Charlotte & Mecklenburg County had a GENIUS idea for technology training… make it like summer reading for technology training! Give librarians exercises, links to the tools, not a lot of direction, encourage PLAY with the tools (hey, how do you think I learned how to do this stuff… from the manual? HA!), and dangle a carrot (she gave away MP3 players and is going to have a drawing for a LAPTOP! Way, super, extra cool). She has a 1.0 meeting about the week’s exercises (we could do Opal sessions) and gives people a chance to show off. All of this takes place over an 8 week (!) period, just like summer reading. The idea is to get people into the habit of PLAYING with technology instead of fearing it or thinking that they need someone to “tell them how to do it with a handout.”
NEKLS could SO do this. We SHOULD do this. I’ve been disgruntled lately that traditional training just doesn’t seem to be cutting it for most of our librarians… they keep wanting more but claim that they don’t have time to extend their learning once they get home after the training. Well, I think this might be the answer.
Here’s the link to the blog they are using as the basis for their training. Great, great stuff.
Learning 2.0 – Main
Comment By: Chris Carleton
October 24th, 2006 at 3:03 pm
I definitly like the summer computing idea, and it doesn’t even have to to be rocket science either. Ideas such as creating a blog, posting, and email the coordinator the link. Start a delicious account and link to 10 of your favorite links. LibraryThing your favorite books (whether you own them or not!) and do a blog post about it.
As for traditional training, I’m thinking we might have to start hitting up the screencasting to get the message across so we can be 1) on-demand and 2) extremly consistant.
Comment By: Diana
October 25th, 2006 at 8:32 am
Having put on a number of summer reading programs for kids, I think this is a great idea. How about for teaching the databases available through the Kansas Library Card?
Comment By: Jenny Levine
October 27th, 2006 at 6:25 pm
Hi, Liz – sorry our part of the session didn’t inspire you more. In all fairness, my talk was a two-minute welcome, and the overwhelming number of attendees at the conference haven’t heard Michael talk on those topics, but I’m thrilled you’ve seen us talk enough that we’re now boring.
I am also very happy that you got something from Helene’s talk. That’s why we let her take our time!
Hope you can do something similar to her program.
Jenny