USEFUL WEB 2.0 APPLICATIONS AND LIBRARIES

Over the last 18 months or so I have been excited about learning about Web 2.0 tools and their usefulness in a library situation. Although at first it was very daunting with a bit of perseverance I have developed new skills and found ways to include these tools within my own life and work within the library and introducing them to other staff and students and helping them to become familiar with them. Teachers and students are becoming so innovative at using the Web 2.0 technologies to enhance their school work.

I personally use Shelfari which is an excellent tool for organizing my reading materials. The virtual bookshelf helps me to record, rate and review the book I have read as well as books I intend to read or have leant to others. I have introduced this tool to many workmates, including book clubs.

RSS feeds have also been very useful in getting up to date information coming directly to me without me having to continually hunt around the internet to find the information or sites I like. One of my favourite library RSS feed in the SLAV Bright Ideas site that always has inspiring links to new things to try and I have passed many on to the teaching staff to introduce ideas like Glogster, Wordle etc.

Wikis are also an excellent way of communicating information to others whether an internal wiki or a community wiki. They are more interactive than a blog as many people have can input into the information that is uploaded. Some libraries have exciting wikis that inspire me to try new and different ways of meeting the client’s needs.

A new one I recently tried was Zotero which is a marvelous tool for keeping your bibliography information organised. Relatively easy to use with just a click on the URL address I am able to keep track of my useful sites, in folders and make notes about the sites I have visited for later use within my assignments or research. Once organised it is just a matter of inserting the information into my document with all the bibliography and citation information. This is very useful for the students at the College I work in who are required to complete bibliographies within their assignments from Year 7 to Year 12. This one tool alone is a real time saver particularly for the older students who are required to do a lot of research.

Delicious is another very useful tool for organizing bookmarks which can be in folders and tagged for easily access.

Combining Animoto and Powerpoint storyboard children as young as Grade 4 can produce fantastic video clips on their wikis. Using Booktrailers and a flip camera students are able to make their own quite professional looking book trailers to review books. I find when students are recommending the books they’ve read, other students are more likely to take notice and try them rather than what librarians recommend.

Disadvantages I've found is that I was originally scared of putting my real name in the constant information I needed to provide to set up accounts so I used silly ones, luckily I tried to keep track in a note book but now I think it would've been better to use the same one so I don't have to keep referring back to my notebook. In future I will be more consistant!!