A What?

So, I had no idea what a wiki was until I watched the Wiki's in Plain English Video (which, by the way, I thought was kind of funny:). And I still don't know exactly what we are going to be doing with our wikis quite yet. But I am sure I will learn in time.

I did learn that a wiki seems like a much simpler way of communicating with hordes of people when compared to e-mail. I also learned that the information on wikis can be edited by anyone who happens to view the page and who wants to add comments or new information. I didn't know that you could essentially make your own "wikipedia". I knew that people could change information on Wikipedia, but I never had thought that I could do so with my own wiki.

I was suprised at how fast and easy it was to create my own wiki page. I thought for sure I had done something wrong because it was so fast and simple.

I don't really know what my feelings on wikis are, seeing as I haven't really played with it and used it. However, I do like Wikipedia. Hopefully it will be something new and fun to learn about and use.

Mashed Up!

So, I took the spiral staircase to the bead art section at http://bighugelabs.com/, and this is what happened....

Radical.

Spiral Staircase

I found this photostream on Flickr too. I thought it was cool because the library has a spiral staircase. This is the Carl A. Pescosolido Library at the Govenor's Academy in Massachusetts. I couldn't figure out how to get the slide show into a blog post, so the picture is linked.

The Reading Tent

When I saw this picture, I instantly fell in love with it! What a cute idea to have a reading tent in a library!

I think this is perfect for elementary school libraries. If there had been a reading tent in my elementary school, I would have wanted to go there and read all the time. It would be a good way to entice kids to come to the library in the first place, to show that it is a fun learning environment. A reading tent could even be used as an incentive for good behavior.

Love it!!

This picture was taken by KYD Advisor at Crofton Downs Primary School in New Zealand.

Habits for Successful Lifelong Learning

Last week, I started the Quest. The Quest for the School Library Media Endorsement. I have embarked on a difficult journey, but the reward in the end will be worth its weight in gold.

To start out this Quest, I viewed a slide show by Lori Reed called Seven and ½ Habits of Highly Successful Lifelong Learners.

The Seven and 1/2 Habits are listed as follows:

1. Begin with the end in mind.
2. Accept responsibility for your own learning.
3. View problems as challenges.
4. Have confidence in yourself as a competent, effective learner.
5. Create your own learning toolbox.
6. Use technology to your advantage.
7. Teach/mentor others.
1/2 Play!

After looking and thinking about these habits, I have decide that some of them do come to me naturally, but I can improve in all of these areas. I think that habits #2 and #4 are the easiest for me. I have accepted responsibility for my own learning in that I am paying my own way through school, and I want to continue to learn new things. I also have confidence in myself as a competent and effective learner. I feel very lucky to have this habit come naturally to me. I know that I can learn anything that I want to, as long as I put forth enough effort to do so.

Habits #1, #5, #7, and #7 1/2 have become habits over time, but could still use some improvement and experience. I try to start my goals with the end in mind, so that I know where I want to take my learning experience. Sometimes I get excited though, and dive into the work without thinking about where I want to end up. I have created a learning toolbox as I have continued to go to school. Nevertheless, I think more tools can always be added to the toolbox, and I don't think that I have discovered all the right tools just yet. I have taught and mentored other people in the things that I know how to do well; however, I think I need some more practice in this area, especially if I want to become a teacher. Lastly, I love to play, but I often have a difficult time finding a happy medium. I normally study more than I play.

I think that I need to work on habits #3 and #6 the most. I view problems as problems. I view challenges as challenges. They are not necessarily the same thing to me. Yet, I do think that problems can be challenging to overcome. I guess I just need to work on combining the two concepts together. Using technology to my advantage is a habit that I hope to start forming in this class, and to add to my toolbox. When researching, I feel much more comfortable with an encyclopedia in my hand than a computer mouse. I hope that I can learn to find good resources on the Internet during this class.