Reflecting on 5 Weeks

Hello!

The past five weeks have been excellent! I learned more than I had imagined! The course greatly exceeded my expectations and was very well organised. The organisers were responsive to blog posts, students were actively engaged and the presenters were fabulous. Thank you to all!

What were your favorite experiences in the course?

I enjoyed the presentations the most. The selected readings provided great introductions, but it was through the presentations that I was "sold" on the tools. Being able to see "real" works in progress - these "living" tools - provided me with many ideas and made the tools seem more accessible.

I have also enjoyed the blog. It has allowed me to get an idea about how everyone is progressing in the course and feeling their way through the tools. Given that the course is online, the blog definitely humanised everything for me.

What technology did you find most interesting for your personal use? What technology did you think would be most useful professionally?

Personally, I'm a fan of social bookmarking (e.g. del.icio.us) and plan to introduce it to our organisation. Flickr is fun. Slowly, but surely, I'm starting to explore others' photos (without feeling like a "peeping Reegan"). I've also started a personal/professional wiki (to be unveiled when it is a little bit more populated).

Professionally, wikis, social bookmarking, rss feeds and Flickr could all be applied in our organisation (and likely embraced by staff within short order). Upper-level management in our organisation is forward-thinking and open to trying new things. Provided with some solid rationale, I anticipate that upper-level management will approve their implementation at CIER.

Were there any unexpected outcomes from this program that surprised you?

I was very surprised at how relatively easy these tools are to implement/use, given a bit of time to explore.

What could we do differently to improve upon this program’s format or concept?

Though I thoroughly enjoyed the course, I would provide the following suggestions:

• Try to place some more attention on special libraries. I found the course to be very academic and public library centered. We special librarians, who also tend to be solo librarians, really appreciate it when we see ourselves and our library realities reflected in courses.
• Provide opportunities for individuals to select chat groups based on interests or library setting. Given the time constraints, I understand why we chose our chat group based on time.
• Identify questions for discussion to focus each chat. It would have been useful to have some questions to think about in preparation for each chat, and as a general guide to follow when the chat seemed to be "dying off" or experiencing a lull. 
• Provide a "glossary of terms"with basic definitions of the tools and commonly used acronyms.

If there is anything else you'd like to tell us about your experiences in this course, please feel free to do so.

Thank you to everyone for your level of engagement and willingness to share your ideas and experiences. I learned so much and it has been a lot of fun! I hope that everyone continues to blog and I look forward to seeing your proposals come to life!

Take care,

Reegan