Notes on "Morphing from Teacher to Cybriarian" by Ted Nellen

It was funny reading about Nellen's day since some of it is very familiar. "Upon reaching the fourth floor, I'm greeted by students sitting on the floor outside the class. 'You're late, Mr. Nellen,' they chime and tease. 'Yeah, I decided to have a chat with my family this morning; sorry,' I quip." I can imagine Nellen's chaotic class room environment fairly easily; it sounds like a lot of fun, but I think it requires a very subtle balance to be successful. Reading this, I was thrilled at the idea of students doing virtually all of their work on computer and online. The use of "telementors" sounds like a tremendous opportunity, but it only takes one cynical, paranoid perspective to worry about exposing young students to potentially harmful strangers. Suddenly the hope and excitement of the World As Your Classroom turns to fear and suspicion. If you have students who surf safely, and an administration who understands and embraces technology and parents who are not paranoid then I think Nellen's class reaches the ideal, but ultimately I think harnessing that kind of chaos is a tricky endeavor

Setting students up with an iGoogle page

http://docs.google.com/Presentation?id=ddrtch8j_0cdd2j6fc

Ironically, I've had trouble putting this presentation up to help students learn 21st century web skills because our school has blocked YouTube and "Gaming Sights" due to bandwidth issues.

Saying the book is dead is like sooo last page . . .

Who's afraid of Kindle 2? Saying the Kindle will kill the book is like saying the vacuum cleaner killed the broom. We should know better-- at this point saying the book is dead is just flamebate. And yet I have heard more than one librarian share this fear and even worse that it spells the end of libraries.

I'll make it clear for you.

The library is not just a book warehouse, and librarians are not just book-pimps. Find a bigger vision.

Bibliography on the web & reading patterns

I've been considering bibliography on the web a bit more these days. PermaLinks.cc is an interesting site that I want to watch.

http://www.permalinks.cc/Default.aspx

Link rot is real and I think librarians need to be on top of this.

On a different topic, reading the article "Electronic Journals and Changes in Scholarly Article Seeking and Reading Patterns" in D-Lib Magazine I came across this interesting bar graph (click to zoom in):

Good sites to show faculty

http://www.dangerouslyirrelevant.org/2008/11/teaching-administrators-about-wikipedia.html

http://www.dangerouslyirrelevant.org/2008/11/help-wanted---v.html

G1 is a reference librarian's phone

You can take reference calls,



and then you can scan books :~)

Few days later I saw this. . .



Google reads my blog!

Review of Pete Scott's Library Blog

Peter Scott's Library Blog
URL: xrefer.blogspot.com
Blogging since: February 2003
Updated: Daily (could be automated)
Average Visits Per Day 61

Peter Scott (b.1947) was the Internet Projects Manager in the University of Saskatchewand Library in Saskatoon. He created Hytelnet "the first online, hypertext Internet directory"

This is a minimalist blog that points to online resources as they are made available.

For example today's entry included Library of Congress Digital Preservation Newsletter, September Early Reviewer books at LibraryThing, 2009 ALA Midwinter Meeting Announcement, Vol. 13 No. 9 issue of First Monday, EBSCO's Hobbies and Crafts Reference Center, Bloomsbury Academic, ACRL Podcast: The Desk and Beyond, I Love My Librarian Award 2008

Looking over the past couple of weeks I found that he posted about newly released newsletters, conference and online class information, new databases, podcasts, information on library acquisitions, book prize information, book festival information, information software, websites, etc. The scope of this blog seems far reaching and its consistency (everyday for the last 5 years) for a blog is noteworthy.

You won't find any personal revelations here, but it looks like a great blog to follow in order to stay abreast of new reference resources.

Browsing Librarian Blogs and came across. . .

"Any librarian who ever thinks the solution to a problem involves hiding information should go into a quiet room somewhere and slap themselves with a copy of AACR2 until they come to their senses."- Darth Libris

Possibly the funniest librarian joke ever.

Two questions from my Reference and Information Services class

What do you think are the requisite qualities for a reference librarian?

A deep and abiding respect and kindness for all people.
A joy in service.
An eagerness to quest for art and knowledge with and for another.
A fearless self awareness in order to follow the curiosity of another without assumptions or bias.
A thrill in the hunt!

If I sound as old fashioned as Green I apologize, but if you allow me, I'll try to explain what may seem to some as "over the top."

I have a friend who said, "I think people are born librarians," and I believe this is true. Now I don't want to be accused of mysticizing librarianship, but when I compare what I do everyday for high school students to phrases like, "using interpersonal communication to identify information needs" I feel like my garden grown potatoes have been changed into McDonald's french fries. Yes, talking about librarianship in this way releases an air of scientific accuracy and neutrality, but it also insidiously complicates and devalues what we do.

Justin said in his excellent post, "In my own job, people groan and roll their eyes when customer service is mentioned, but ultimately, that is what we are there for." I think we all understand why people roll their eyes when they hear the phrase "customer service;" it changes a civil or educational service into a function of the market. And while "customer service" for a shoddy librarian might be an improvement and probably for whom it is being invoked in the first place, I think for most librarians it sounds like a cheap ploy. Justin is right, ultimately and primarily we are there for the people of the library; but I do not want to exploit them as customers, I want to serve them as guests. Unfortunately for many the sacred trust of Host is simply unknown and the shadow that is left is "customer service."

Perhaps Green was right about his own time, but I think today that he does not go far enough. He says to, "Instruct this assistant to consult with every person who asks for help in selecting books. This should not be her whole work; for work of this kind is best done when it has the appearance of being performed incidentally. Let the assistant, then, have some regular work, but such employment as she can at once lay aside when her aid is asked for in picking out books to read." I don't want to wait for someone to ask for help. I believe we should seek out people in the library and ask them how we can be of service. I do this everyday with students and many do not need my help, but I don't want any student to leave the library without feeling like I wanted him or her to be there and I was ready to help him or her personally.

I was amazed to read Karen Crow's comment: "I wish that I were allowed to leave the desk, wander the floors, and accost (for lack of a better word) patrons with questions like: "Are you finding everything you need?" "Can I help you?" "What are you researching today?" "Topic X/ is certainly interesting. What specifically are you looking for within the topic? Have you tried looking under _Fill in the Blank_ for more information on the subject?" "Hey! That's a really cool book. If you enjoy this title, you might like _Fill in the Blank_."" I know that working in a one person library is different than working in a large public or academic library but I can't help but feel this is tragic.

The reference desk must not be a ball and chain, especially with the technology tools that we posess today. The reference librarian needs only a headset and mobile phone and the phone number posted prominently around the library. Instantly she would be free to walk among her guests and answer their questions even if it meant walking a library that has multiple floors.

As for Genz's question of professional vs. the paraprofessional I hope it is not too arogant or provoking to say that I find it tiresome and ultimately distracting from far more important topics. Don't get me wrong, I think it is a solid piece of scholarship and a handy review of the literature on reference librararianship (and it would be politic of me to say that this is not criticism of its selection), but to me it screams insecurity like that person who insists on being called Doctor so-and-so because they earned that PhD damn it!

What has changed over the past century and what are the constants?

To me what has changed is what is least important: the media that convey art and knowledge. Today I may laugh at a YouTube video that I watch on my iPhone while in days gone by a person would chuckle at the Jibes-n-Jokes section of their local news paper, but humanity and our desire for truth and beauty have not changed and will not change. I believe it is simply the job of the librarian to help others in this search. Again if this sounds "over the top" please forgive me.

iPhone nympholepsy

So I'm in line in front of the Corte Madera Applestore. I've been waiting with my brother for 45minutes, he's been waiting four hours. I'm not buying an iPhone. I'm here in my anthropologist capacity studying a post-post modern historical phenomenon. . . iPhone techno-lust.

Overheard:

"Alright my friend, your getting close, close. I can smell the iPhone from here." -Apple employee giving out tickets for a free drink at Peet's.

"I called at 8am, they said it wasn't a long wait. When I got here the line was back there," she points to the line about 100 people back and rolls her eyes.

"Are you getting the big one?"
-a woman asks my brother, who then goes on to discuss with her whether or not she needs to store video on her husband's phone.

"Wow, it's moving now!"
-a man with his son talking about the line.

"I saw a software demonstration where you could look at your iphone and see everyone on a map."

"I imagine there is a way to turn the GPS off on the phone."

"How long have you been in line?"-Man with a cane.
"Four hours."-Woman in line
"Wow. . .Good luck."-Man with a cane.

"I still haven't seen that guy come out, and it's been like 25minutes."





Above: My brother looking at this blog post on his new iPhone. Like I said, post-post modern.