TechEssence.info

We are ALL busy. Yesterday for example, I had a plan of what I was going to accomplish at work, but then I came in to an e-mail from a student asking for articles about the Second Anglo-Afghan War (for which we had next to nothing in the databases so I really had to hunt), and after that I found out about some dead links I needed to fix on a Web page, and then I got a call from a professor whom I needed to talk through some database searches, and then I had a reference shift all afternoon. So by the end of the day, I was shocked to find that I'd barely gotten any of the things I'd wanted to accomplish done. Imagine, if this is going on every day, how I, or anyone else in our profession, can actually make time for any sort of continuing education work?

My University offers faculty members a fairly generous travel stipend for professional development. I also do not have to take vacation days to go to conferences. But if I did not have funding and could not easily leave for days at a time to attend conferences, I'd have to learn from my desk. Sure, I guess I could read articles, listen to free Webcasts, and check out blogs, but of course, there are always more immediate concerns that can keep us from those opportunities (and not everyone wants to spend their free time reading blogs and articles like I do). Even though professional development is a priority here, I can't think of a time when I have actually read an entire journal article between the hours of 8 and 4:30. There are always other things I should or could be doing.

The problem here is that continuing education is often not seen as something just as important as helping a patron or fixing a Web page. If we don't set out time for it, and make it a real priority, it is so easy for things like that to fall between the cracks. Continuing education is absolutely vital to our providing the best possible services to our patrons. How else can we learn about the latest trends in libraries or the technologies available to us? How can we learn about other libraries' successes so that we can replicate them and are not constantly trying to reinvent the wheel?

For some of us, it's very easy to learn about technologies on our own. We just start playing with a blog or a wiki and we can quickly become proficient and understand the pros and cons of the technology. We jump into Web design and are soon an HTML expert. Other people may not feel comfortable experimenting on their own. They may feel comfortable in a workshop setting where there is a facilitator who can guide them and fix their mistakes.

It's true that most libraries cannot afford to send all of their staff to conferences, but this is not the only way to learn. Libraries can bring in speakers and can do in-house workshops. In fact, in many ways, it's better for library staff to learn together, because it's easier to implement new initiatives when staff are all starting from the same level of understanding.

Two models have been developed in the past year to allow libraries and other groups to learn together about new and emerging technologies. Both of these are designed to expose individuals to technologies in a hands-on way through discovery exercises. Both can also easily be replicated in order to provide online learning for your staff.

Learning 2.0 is a self-paced technology discovery program that was developed by Public Library of Charlotte and Mecklenberg County's Public Technology Director, Helene Blowers. The goal of Learning 2.0 is to encourage staff to learn about and experience new technologies that could be used to provide library services. The program used blogs, wikis, podcasts, and videos to teach participants how to use those and other emerging technologies. Learning 2.0 consisted of "23 Things," or topics, each of which includes a description of a technology and a discovery exercise. The discovery exercises require that the staff members do something concrete, like start a blog, subscribe to a podcast, or add content to a wiki. For example, the 8th thing asked staff to "create a free online Bloglines account for yourself and subscribe to at least 10 newsfeeds to your reader." They then were asked to reflect on their experience with each technology on their own blog.

What really makes Learning 2.0 accessible to even the most un-tech-savvy staff members is that all of the "23 Things" are simple, concrete and easy to accomplish, so they won't overwhelm most people, but will still give them a good sense of what the technology is all about. Over three hundred blogs were started by staff members in conjunction with this program, including most of the system's senior staff. Many of these people probably were initially motivated to go through the program because of the iPod promised to each person who successfully completed the program. However, many people at the end of the course reflected on what an incredible experience it was learning about these technologies. One participant wrote in her blog "the unexpected outcome for me was simply that it would be so much fun to learn technology." While the program was designed so that people could complete it individually and at their own pace, it did end up building community and connections among some staff members. People would read the blogs of their colleagues and learn thing about one another that they didn't know before. As one participant wrote, "it was interesting to get a glimpse into my peers' personal thoughts and feelings. I feel closer to PLCMC staff now, and I really wasn't expecting that."

The Learning 2.0 program has been replicated now by over a dozen libraries of all types. You can visit this page in del.icio.us to see a list of all of the libraries that are replicating this program and have made it their own. Some are adding synchronous components with guest speakers, others have more than 23 things and have tailored it to their own unique needs, and others are doing their programs over a longer or shorter time-span. The program is flexible enough that it can really be tailored to the needs of any library.

Five Weeks to a Social Library was the first free, grassroots, completely online course devoted to teaching librarians about social software and how to use it in their libraries. It was developed to provide a free, comprehensive, and social online learning opportunity for librarians who do not otherwise have access to conferences or continuing education and who would benefit greatly from learning about social software. I originally had the idea for the course because I was living in Vermont and knew lots of librarians in rural libraries who had no access to continuing education about social technologies. While there are some free 1-hour Webcasts on these topics, some people need the structure of a course to really reinforce learning and to get them actually using the technologies. I wanted to show other organizations that online learning could be done for very little money so that it could be made more accessible to people who can’t pay $500 or more for an online course. So last summer, I asked five other amazing women (Amanda Etches-Johnson, Dorothea Salo, Ellyssa Kroski, Karen Coombs, and Michelle Boule) to partner with me in creating Five Weeks to a Social Library.

The class was offered over the course of five weeks during February and March 2007. From over 100 applications, we chose 40 participants for the course. These participants were located all over the United States, Canada, and even in Central America and Eastern Europe. We had to limit the number of participants because it was so important to us to be able to break the class up into small groups for facilitated discussions. We spent no money on the tools we used for the course and most were open source software. We built the course around the content management system Drupal and using a wiki (MediaWiki). Drupal was kind of like WebCT or Blackboard for us in that it was where most of the course took place. It contained all of the readings, blog posts, and presentations. Drupal seemed like the best solution for the main course site, since you can have many blogs that feed into a single blog page (which is administered as a single blog) and you can have static pages. There are also lots of modules you can add to extend the functionality. For example, we had a chatroom within Drupal, which was where all of our group chats took place.

In addition to choosing our participants, we also put out an RFP for presenters. We had over thirty individuals presenting on the social software topics they knew most about. Some presented in live Webcasts (the technology infrastructure was generously provided by Tom Peters of OPAL), others presented via podcasts or screencasts, which could be watched by class participants asynchronously.

The course covered the following topics:

• Blogs
• RSS
• Wikis
• Social Networking Software and SecondLife
• Flickr
• Social Bookmarking Software
• Selling Social Software @ Your Library

Each week, participants were assigned discovery exercises in order to get them using the tools. They were then required to reflect on their experience with the tools and how they could be used in their library. This reflection really got them thinking about the practical uses for social software. At the end of the course, students were required to create a proposal detailing how they would implement a specific social software tool at their library. This was designed to be something they could take to their library director and actually implement.

I think the best thing about the model is that there are so many different types of learning experiences. Each week, the participants watched screencasts, listened to podcasts, looked at concrete examples of the technologies, engaged with the technologies and perhaps read the optional readings. In addition to those solitary endeavors, they attended live Webcasts and had the opportunity to ask questions. They took part in weekly small group chats with between three and five other classmates and one of the organizers. For each of those screencasts and podcasts they watched alone, they had the opportunity to spend an hour with each presenter via our chatroom where they could ask questions and engage in conversations. And finally, they blogged, each week writing about their impressions of the technologies they were working with and whether or not they saw any use for them in their own library. This blogging and commenting on each other’s blogs created a whole additional level of dialogue. With all of these different synchronous and asynchronous, interactive and static, solitary and group learning experiences, the participants really were brought together in a way that I’ve never seen before in online learning. It was a lot of work, but the comments from our participants show that it led to much more meaningful interactions. While the material and the technologies were obviously valuable, I think it was the interactions with others that really gave participants the most valuable food for thought.

There were a few things that made our program different from the Learning 2.0 program. The first was that it was not affiliated with any library or organization. This was started by six librarians from the U.S. and Canada who wanted to show that a course of this kind was possible and could be done on the cheap. Secondly, the course was not self-paced. There were synchronous chats and Webcasts and certain activities that needed to be completed before the end of each week. While I think this may have put more pressure on the students, they also were learning more communally because everyone was completing the same things (and were writing blog posts about them) together. It also didn't allow them to put things off. One participant wrote "you may never again hear a student of any kind say this, but my favorite part of the course was the homework (a.k.a. activities). Without the expectation of producing something every week, it would have been very easy to put everything else off with good intentions of catching up later but never getting around to it. There’s no replacement for getting in there and getting your hands dirty, and it provides a point of reference for everything else.” Five Weeks to a Social Library more explicitly social since participants were actually communicating with each other (synchronously and asynchronously) and with the presenters each week. Since we had small group chats each week, facilitators could keep up much more easily with participants in their group(s) and could provide support and assistance when needed. Obviously, that is only possible when you’re working with a sufficiently small group. Finally, there was no incentive associated with the course. The participants chose to participate because they wanted to learn more about social software. Their reward was actually being able to use these tools in their library and many have since implemented social software tools for internal use and for their patrons.

I think both models are excellent, but different. Five Weeks to a Social Library will probably require more time from facilitators during the course, between facilitating the chats and providing support to the learners. However, the model offers a lot more support to users and makes them feel more a part of a group, which might lessen attrition. Learning 2.0 is self-paced, so is good for people who are not given much time during work to complete the activities. It also did not have quite as many requirements, which made it easier for people to complete. However, because participants are working so independently without as much support, perhaps a carrot at the end (an iPod or whatever) must be offered to keep some people motivated. Some folks need the structure and support of a Five Weeks to a Social Library, while others could go through the 23 Things on their own with no problem. It’s important to look at your staff and what their needs and limitations are when designing an in-house online learning course.

Both courses have left their materials up online so that anyone can benefit from them or can easily replicate the course in their organization without starting from scratch. I don’t think I can stress enough the value of programs like this. Not only do they put all staff on a more level playing field when it comes to understanding technology, but they can become an incredible community-building activity as well.

So dive in! Check out these wonderful courses and think about how they might benefit your library!

More readings:

Five Weeks to a Social Library Website.

Participant Proposals from Five Weeks to a Social Library

Reflections on Five Weeks to a Social Library from the participants

Farkas, Meredith. A model for the future of online learning. Information Wants to be Free. 21 March 2007.

Farkas, Meredith. Making Five Weeks to a Social Library happen: The down and dirty. Information Wants to be Free. 22 March 2007.

Salo, Dorothea. Random Thoughts on Five Weeks. Caveat Lector. 22 March 2007.

Public Library of Charlotte and Mecklenberg County’s Learning 2.0 Website.

Learning 2.0 Evaluations on del.icio.us.

Stephens, Michael. Steal this Idea: Learning 2.0 at PLCMC. ALA TechSource. 15 August 2006.

Blowers, Helene. Learning 2.0 – Steal this idea update. LibraryBytes. 20 September 2006.

Blowers, Helene. Nine Best Practices on Learning 2.0 & Two Additions. LibraryBytes. 8 November 2006.

Blowers, Helene. Customizing Learning 2.0. LibraryBytes. 13 November 2006.