YouTube and the Guggenheim

Really, The Guggenheim Museum. This is an intriguing way to incorporate art, video, and the visual arts in museums; YouTube Play: A Biennial of Creative Video.

"YouTube Play. A Biennial of Creative Video aims to discover and showcase the most exceptional talent working in the ever-expanding realm of online video. Developed by YouTube and the Guggenheim Museum in collaboration with HP, YouTube Play hopes to attract innovative, original, and surprising videos from around the world, regardless of genre, technique, background, or budget. This global online initiative is not a search for what’s “now,” but a search for what’s next. Visit youtube.com/play to learn more and submit a video." -- Guggenheim News

Learn more about this collaboration on YouTube Play, the Official YouTube blog, or Google Blog.

Worth another look

It's Friday and while "patiently" waiting for the Internet to catch up with my goals today (YouTube is taking forever to load an instructional video), I decided it was time for another edition of ... posts from my Bloglines account:

• Is there such a thing as social media elitism?
  "We’re developing a tunnel vision as social media is becoming the most important pillar of the online world." - Jay Dolan, Social Media Today
  
  
• Google Kills Background Images on Home Page
  "Fourteen hours into a 24-hour experiment with background imagery, Google's home page is once again stark white." --Tom Krazit, Cnet News
  
  
• Internet Procrastination at it's absolute finest. This is you, really YOU
  A cartoon originally from comics.com on The Next Web Sharables.
  
  
• Blogger Template Designer Now Available to Everyone
  "we’re excited to announce that the Blogger Template Designer is now available to everyone." -- Blogger Buzz
  
  
• City of New York Blankets Times Square with Giant QR Codes
  "To celebrate Internet Week 2010, the City of New York outfitted Times Square with giant QR codes earlier today. It’s called “The City at Your Fingerprints” and eleven New York agencies participated in the interactive billboard initiative." -- Jennifer Van Grove, Mashable.com
  
  
• PewResearch Report: The Future of Cloud Computing
  "Technology experts and stakeholders say they expect they will ‘live mostly in the cloud’ in 2020 and not on the desktop, working mostly through cyberspace-based applications accessed through networked devices." -- Future of the Internet
  
  
• This last entry features a Plagiarism Video (subtitles in English) from the University of Bergen's YouTube Channel. I found it via iLibrarian who in turn found it via Librarians Matter.
  
  
  

ORCON: The Science of Oil Spills

Becoming a Facebook fan of the Ohio Resource Center has already created another student fan of the ORC. Thursday afternoon I was discussing the recent oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico with a student creating a lesson on the topic and working with databases, including Middle Search Plus, to find articles for middle school students. When I logged in to Facebook on Friday morning I was pleased to see a wall post detailing the most recent ORC ON topic e-publication, The Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill.

"Current events present us with unique learning opportunities. The Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico gives us a chance to connect what budding scientists are learning in the classroom to the world. We've pulled together a set of materials that can be used to examine the oil spill through a variety of lenses. - ORC*ON, The Ohio Resource Center

E-publications are presented by grade level, K-2, 3-5, 6-8, and 9-12, and detail a variety of information such as podcasts, internet resources, lessons, and activities covering the oil spill, it's environmental impact, clean up, and response. After emailing the resource to the student in question, I was thrilled to see her working in the library not long after lunch Friday afternoon. Exploring the Grades 6-8 tab, we found a great web connection link; Gulf Coast Oil Spill Map. In conjunction with Google Earth, this site compares the size of the oil spill with different global locations. Selecting Ashland, Ohio, the oil spill covers an impressive portion of the state from Lake Erie through Cleveland, Ashland, and Columbus, and then trails through the southeastern counties and into West Virginia (screen shot, Google Maps).

I spent a longer period of time working with this application than was necessary, but it definitely provides opportunity to put the spill into a more easily understood perspective for students. To be honest, it was eye-opening for me as well. Visit ORC ON: The Science of Oil Spills, for more great resources.

Pew Internet Report: Reputation Management and Social Media

A new Pew Internet report focuses upon privacy, social media, and managing your profile; have you Googled yourself lately (Icerocket has interesting blog returns)?

Reputation management has now become a defining feature of online life for many Internet users, especially the young. While some Internet users are careful to project themselves online in a way that suits specific audiences, other Internet users embrace an open approach to sharing information about themselves and do not take steps to restrict what they share. -- Reputation Management & Social Media

This report follows an interesting post by the Distant Librarian earlier this week that featured links to a Facebook Privacy Scanner available from Reclaim Privacy.org.

CMCIG 2010: Visiting Mazza Museum

Lunch, a tasty salad and soup buffet, and the final workshop session took place at the Mazza Museum International Art From Picture Books, The University of Findlay. Mazza docents provided information facts about the museum (see below) and treated us to small group tours of the five museum galleries, each with unique picture book art and artists displayed.

Quick Facts @ http://www.mazzamuseum.org

• Is supported by a volunteer group known as the "Mazza Enthusiasts"
• Is served by Docents specially trained to lead tours through the museum.
• Has a mailing list of over 2,000 interested persons living in over 45 states and 8 countries
• Annually provides formal tours through the galleria for over 5,000 children and adults.
• Provides a "Discovery Series" to highlight new talent in the field of illustrating books for children.
• Has conducted 14 Mazza Study Tours visiting over 210 of our artists in their homes and studios.

We were privileged to meet the new Deputy Director of the museum who gave us a behind-the-scenes look at the gallery vault and detailed the many steps involved in taking proper care of the art entrusted to their gallery. It was amazing to learn how the art is prepared for display and protected from the elements (including state-of-the-art fire protection). Museum calendars in hand, we finished our tour in the gift shop.

Many thanks to CMCIG co-chair Kathy Yoder, Gaynelle Predmore, and the entire CMC staff at BGSU's Jerome Library for another great CMCIG workshop.

CMCIG 2010: Show & Tell Roundtable

Informal and fun, the show & tell session was a definite workshop highlight; each attendee was asked to bring three favorite or new things for sharing. With our technical services area full of wonderful new toys and resources, it was tempting to search and select something not yet cataloged. Good sense prevailed and I selected two of the new picture books recently added to the juvenile collection; Palazzo Inverso and Chalk (both exceptionally well done, I have them set aside for the fall Mock Caldecott session).

CMC items were varied and included children's literature, regular collection, activity books, materials kits, and DVD. As we moved around the tables, notes were taken and the complete list shared at the end of the day. Links from this post go to Amazon for additional information.

Juvenile Literature

• Big Red Lollipop
• Fever Crumb
• Bad News for Outlaws: The Remarkable Life of Bass Reeves, Deputy U.S. Marshal
• Palazzo Inverso
• Chalk!
• Woolvs in the Sitee
• What the World Eats
• Ubiquitous
• The Hunger Games
• The Black Book of Colors
• Nevermore: A Photobiography of Edgar Allan Poe
• Here Comes the Big, Mean Dust Bunny!
• Rhyming Dust Bunnies
• What if?
• How Fast is it?
• How Strong is it?
• How Weird is it?
• How Big is it?
  

Activity Books

• 100 Games and Activities for the Introductory Foreign Language Classroom
• Activities, Games, Assessment Strategies and Rubrics:For Oral and Written Communication in the Foreign Language Classroom
• Magic Coloring book of Feelings
• The Music Teacher's Almanac: Ready-To-Use Music Activities for Every Month of the Year
• Moving and Learning Series: Preschoolers and Kindergartners
  

Library & Literature

• The Coretta Scott King Awards: 1970 - 2009, 40th Anniversary
• Reading Raps: A Book Club Guide for Librarians, Kids, and Families
• Virginia Hamilton: Speeches, Essays, and Conversations

Education Topics

• The Dyslexia Checklist: A Practical Reference for Parents and Teachers
• The RTI Daily Planning Book, K-6: Tools and Strategies for Collecting and Assessing Reading Data & Targeted Follow-up Instructions
• Best Practices for Teaching Reading: What Award-Winning Classroom Teachers Do
• Science Formative Assessment: 75 Practical Strategies for Linking Assessment, Instruction, and Learning
  

General

• Hungry Planet: What the World Eats
• The Elements: A Visual Exploration of Every Known Atom in the Universe

Materials Kit Resource Links

• Free Spirit Publishing
  Choices in a Jar
• Learning Resources
  Measurement Center
  Cross Section Plant Cell Model
  
• Lakeshore Learning Materials
  Go Away, Big Green Monster story kit
• Math4All
  Money-in-Mind (coins and cash)
• EnableMart
  Social Standards at School Program
• Folens Educational Publishers
  Influential Artists
• Delta Education
  Decimal Dog Game: Fast Food for Thought
• Educational Innovations
  Silver Spheres
• Folkmanis Puppets
  Peacock Puppet
• Thumball
  One Catch Starts a Conversation
• Ticket2Tagging
  Tags for puppets
  

DVD Resources

• Disney Educational Productions
  The Science of Disney Imagineering
  Bill Nye's Solving for X
• Learning Seed
  From paper to Practice Your Guide to Applying I.D.E.A. in the Inclusive Classroom
• Human Relations Media
  Service Learning: You Can Make a Difference
• PBS American Experience
  In the White Man's Image
• ASCD Store
  Differentiated Instruction in Action

It's a great list!

CMCIG 2010: Ohio Resource Center

Yesterday was the Curriculum Materials Center Interest Group, or CMCIG, annual spring workshop. Held at Bowling Green University's Jerome Library Curriculum Materials Center and hosted by CMCIG co-chair Kathy Yoder, workshop attendees came from Ohio, Michigan, and Pennsylvania to discuss "What Works" in their curriculum material centers. Three separate sessions were planned for the workshop; a demonstration of the Ohio Resource Center; a new resource round table, a session of resource sharing which bookended a tour of BGSU's curriculum resource center, and a docent led tour of Mazza Museum.

Ohio Resource Center Ambassador Debbie Reynolds, Library Media Coordinator for Findlay City Schools, provided an overview of the ORC web site. What is the ORC?

"The ORC provides links to peer-reviewed instructional resources that have been identified by a panel of Ohio educators as exemplifying best or promising practice. Available resources also include content and professional resources as well as assessment and general education resources that will support the work of pre K–12 classroom teachers and higher education faculty members. The resources are correlated with Ohio's academic content standards and with applicable national content standards."

Debbie guided us through the web site and we had time to sign up for a free account, a great opportunity since options to create collections and receive newsletters is part of the service. At this time, the Ohio Resource Center focuses primarily upon mathematics, science, and language arts. Each curriculum area has an overview with features and quick links, and provides menu options for topics, grade level, and desired resources. It's possible to keep up with the ORC via Facebook, Twitter for math, science, English language arts, and early childhood, and their YouTube Channel.


This is a wonderful resource for preservice teachers served by curriculum materials centers, or in my case instructional resource centers, as well as new and established teachers. I hope to investigate this more closely as the links and videos it provides will be a great addition to existing education LibGuides.

Why didn't I think of that?

I've mentioned before my interest in following Hot Stuff to view their "word of the day," peruse what they recommend as other interesting blogs to read, and see how Library Cloud rates; yes, that explains the meter in our sidebar. Today one of the blogs I read for the first time was The Strange Librarian, authored by Julie Strange. Her post, Solution for libraries: digital photo frames, details a variety of uses for simple, and often relatively inexpensive digital photo frames, in the library.

Why didn't I think of that? Especially considering I received one for Christmas (it is currently awaiting photo uploads) and look at it every day in my living room. This idea would work well at the circulation desk for hours, OhioLINK updates, marketing our blog, LibGuides, and web site, and general library information. It could be expanded to our library classroom in the basement posting classes, workshops, and seminars scheduled for the facility. I could use it in the Instructional Resource Center mirroring the circulation desk updates as well as announcements specific to the IRC.

With a bit of planning, this could be a time saver as well as visually appealing. While not horrifically expensive the frames would require budget funds, I do have a fiscal concern. Given the fact that within the last two months four computer mice have left the second floor under mysterious circumstances, is there a need to explore making them secure? Generally speaking, there is usually someone at the circulation desk. But if we submitted work orders to have them mounted outside the IRC or Library Instruction Classroom in the basement, would they follow the mice? Or, would tattle tape be a viable solution (it works for staplers and tape dispensers)?

Keeping up with tech services

The UPS driver continues to bring new orders the technical services. With the first - and second - start-up funds spent and cataloging under way, responsibility for these items circles back to me. Keeping up with our cataloger's brisk pace has been a daily challenge! Within three days she has cataloged activity books (sixteen different classifications), a collection of leveled book kits, and this afternoon the reference collection.

Building electronic access links to the collection is time consuming, especially since I elected to do so from catalog records prior to book order slips being delivered, and essential. The information it presents to the IRC Columbus Center Committee, translates to an immediately viable resource as end of year staff meetings in Columbus featured the blog and web page with mention of the LibGuide planned for the next few weeks.

The same, but different

The first wave of purchases for the AU Columbus Center IRC is arriving; cataloging has begun on book kits, reference books, and activity books. Fun factor aside, I was playing with the new puppets earlier, as items are placed in containers prior to cataloging it is obvious the new IRC will be unique, not a carbon copy of the current IRC. More importantly, that's how it should be. As noted on the IRC web site, the IRC collection "supports the teaching programs and curriculum of AU's Dwight Schar College of Education." Students at the Columbus Center will have different needs than traditional main campus users, as such the collection needs to adequately address and reflect this distinction.

In a previous post I mentioned the classification system / call numbers planned for the Columbus IRC would utilize simple word classification and numerical accession, with LC for reference. This will do more than make it simple for locating and shelving items initially; students will be able to use "other call number" in the catalog to have immediate access to only Columbus IRC items. Location codes have been added to the catalog allowing for search limits to be set by users. Cataloging has begun on the following items:

• Activity Books
• Book Kits
• IRC Reference

Using the other call number of "col activ" for activity books and "col bookkit" for book kits, it is easy to create links to these collections. Because location codes were developed for Columbus Circulating and Columbus Reference, users are also able to search in the traditional fashion and limit to a single collection. The IRC Reference link was created by using our catalog's word search option, placing an asterisk as the search term, and limiting the location to Columbus Center Reference (something I've previously used with students scanning the catalog for big books).

Corresponding web support for the new collections are following the same path, as collections are cataloged descriptions and links are placed on both the blog and web page. I've been a bit chagrined to discover my previous collection descriptions will not suffice. The basic bones of each provide a great template, but new information will accompany the new collection on the new support pages. That's how it should be, too.

Feast or famine

One of my instructors in the school library tract consistently evoked the wisdom of and end of year wish list, something prepared when the principal came to the library with an opportunity to spend a specified amount of money in a short period of time. It is a policy that has served me well over the years, allowing me on occasion to say, "Yes, buy this!" When my funds are spent, I routinely create a folder and hold requests for the next fiscal year. But I have wondered which would be worse, feast or famine; having insufficient budget funds or having to scramble to find something when a windfall opportunity arises. After this week, the wondering is moot.

Today was the first day of summer hours for the library, the first day of summer courses at Ashland University, and the first day of the final push to spend remaining budget funds for this fiscal (academic) year. I was on target to finish late last week, until receiving an exciting phone call about the status of the new AU Columbus Center IRC (info here, here, and here) and its collection budget. Unexpectedly the days, hours, and weeks spent preparing a budget proposal and collection overview became an exciting reality. Time and effort put forth gels as the collection begins to takes shape.

• Head of circulation traveled to Columbus to train staff members using OhioLINK and has become a touchstone for those charged with handling responsibilities of being an official OhioLINK pick-up point.
• Systems librarian traveled to Columbus to set up systems, load OhioLINK software, and trouble-shoot connection issues.
• Cataloging librarian created necessary location codes, will be cataloging all of the purchases, and developed a system of call numbers (accession and item type) that will make locating and re-shelving items simple for student workers.
• Acquisitions library ordered everything and managed multiple budget lines as different departments provided start-up funds.
• Technical services assistant is processing all of the collection items, many of them non-traditional in nature.

As a result of this particular feast, I have a bit of collection/resource envy. Why? The roll-top laminator slated for purchase is easy-load with a counter and the materials kits are all fresh and new. But for now, my car is loaded with Ellison starter sets and I will be in Columbus tomorrow for meeting scheduled for 9:30 am and we will be mapping the layout of the new IRC!