Your Library Website as the Tool

Library Websites as the Tool

This article was first published in the MSLA November Forum

http://maschoolibraries.org/content/view/1061/670/ 

Six years ago when I moved from the classroom to the library, I had a vision that the Pentucket Regional High School library would be the “Hub” of the school.  An integral part of being the “Hub” is having resources available 24/7 and that set me on a journey to build a dynamic website that in and of itself was a tool for student learning. The website that exists today is the result of a marathon not a sprint.  The first year I added the Research Guide, the next year the Databases Page, but each in very much a beta form. Each year I have tweaked and added pieces as I saw other’s sites that I liked, and as I learned new technology tools. Having been a classroom teacher, I am sensitive to designing tools that all students can easily navigate, and access; identified students as well as regular education students.

In those early days I didn’t have control of the library website so I had to find tools that could be linked on the website, but could be accessible to me outside of the library website. That’s where www.netvibes.com came in. Netvibes is a start-up page similar to igoogle. David Loertscher would describe Netvibes as my personal learning environment, it is where I house my PLN (personal learning network), and where I organize my personal digital life, but more importantly each free account provides a public space thus allowing me to organize and share my professional life as well. I actually have several Netvibes accounts; the Online Resources Page is used as a place to share all the cool tools around books and technology that I find or create, and the Pathfinders Page is where I house the research paths that I have created for reoccurring projects in which I collaborate. Additionally, I have set up a public page for my school’s NEASC E-portfolio and another page I am using as a professional portfolio for certification (each of these require a separate email address or you can pay for a premium site).

Being the “hub” of the school while students are at home is a challenge, but Jing and screencast.com bridge the home-school gap. My first thought when I am teaching students or staff, is how will I reach them when they are not in front of me. Screencasting is that answer. I am a strong proponent of the flip-curriculum model, and I use screen casting for everything, many videos to teach all the great features of my MassCat catalog. I have screencasts on how to renew ones library books and how to take a screenshot. I use it to teach lessons like Photostory and how to check the audio controls on the library computers.  I use screencasting for many of my Digital Literacy Challenges (DLC) and to teach the staff how to use the electronic gradebook. At one point last year, I even had the experience of being in two places at the same time with the help of Jing. On one side of the library I was teaching (live) part of my Anti-Plagiarism lesson, and on the other side of the library I was teaching (virtually) students to create an outline for their research papers in www.mywebspiration.com  via a screencast.

The librarian whom I did my student teaching under and whom I eventually replaced, Sheila Callahan,  gave me the best advice ever. She said document everything! She (and now I) kept records on student use of the library, and she strongly encouraged me to prepare an end of the year report to share with administrators. The reality is your library program can only get appreciation and support if everyone (teachers, administrators, parents and students) knows what you are doing. When I can say 31,412 students walked through the doors of the library and received services last year-that’s powerful!  I am a data fiend and couldn’t live without Googleforms.  I use googleforms for everything from getting student suggestions for the summer reading program, to assessing my library orientation, to gathering information about our student’s home computer and technology use. I used Google forms to collect information for our NEASC self study and long range planning, to collect staff’s favorite books for a display, and I use it every time I provide professional development.

The two things that have made all the difference for the Pentucket Regional High School library website site has not been technology but collaborations.  I am a founding member of Pentucket’s Grassroots Technology Group and this is where I learned much of the technology that I used for the library website. We meet every Friday morning for a half hour before school, and it’s a group of teachers teaching teachers to use technology to improve classroom practice. One week someone presents a tool and the next week we play with the tool, and then try to use it in our teaching. The second group is my Student Library and Technology Advisory Group, we spent last year’s meetings looking at exemplar library websites, and then analyzing our own website. The student perspective is crucial when creating a tool for student use.

When we switched webhosting companies two and half years ago, I finally gained “control” of my website to the relief of everyone (I was a bit of a pest to the webmaster, which I think helped in finding a host which would allow each Department to maintain their own web space). This website is not finished, it will always be evolving as student needs evolve. I recently added a mobile library site when I realized seventy-five percent of our students own a handheld device.  In five years I will think that the 2011/2012 version of the site was a beta version. Websites, like life, are journeys not destinations. The Pentucket Regional High School library website is the home for gathering and sharing, teaching and learning; it has become the tool itself.

List of electronic tools and tips

www.netvibes.com – I use it to share everything.

www.jingproject.com and www.screencast.com –screencast tools to teach when they are not physically present

Googledocs – to collect data

italk App- Recorded all the research guide audio files on my Ipod touch

audacity.com- recorded the podcast option for library orientation

Evanced-Provided free by MLS for summer reading program, but I use it all year as an Online Book Club

http://www.proprofs.com – for the research guide quiz

photostory3 – Free Download, I use it for the video option for Library Orientation, but teach this to many classes

www.glogster.com – where I house the whole of my library orientation, and I teach this to many classes

winksite.com – hosts my mobile library site

Get an electronic catalog and link it on your website- I cannot say enough good things about MassCat.

Teach yourself to take a screenshot, and then learn to crop it in Paint.

If you don’t have access to your library website, then find a tool that will give you access and then link it to your school website.

Use your student Learning Management System, to improve your library’s scalability. Our LMS is School Loop ($3.75 per student). They have a webhosting, gradebook, and student/teacher accounts. I use the calendar feature to post library related items on every student and teacher's portal. I use the News feed to share library related information and I use the Groups feature for our summer reading program and as a private blogging tool, and I use the Loopmail feature to communicate with students

Customer Experience

Poor Customer Experience

It seems that those of us working in institutions-hospitals, schools, libraries, government 

offices - have forgotten customer service.  My multi-year frustration with poor customer service came to a head this summer when as a result of a nurse's accident I had to go to a local hospital, not my regular hospital. I was greeted by a screen upon my arrival at the lab. It was a touch screen that was not calibrated so it was impossible to use. After attempting twice to sign-in a woman sitting a mere two feet from the touch screen came and did it for me. First, I didn't have to go to the lab. I was doing the hospital a favor, and felt that my name should have been flagged, V.I.P. Second, I love technology but not to replace a human interaction.  This whole experience got me thinking about customer service in my own library. 

The Human Connection

We as librarians (or teachers, or gov't workers or hospital staff) never talk about customer experience. The first interaction a student has in a library leaves a lasting impression and may well determine if they come back again. That first impression should not be silence, but a smiling, sincere greeting. I sit at the circulation desk and say "Good Morning" to every a student, and mean it.  It is a good morning when students are using the library.

Patrons as Customers

Like many librarians I keep track of student use of the library as one piece of evidence to show the need for maintaining library services. I think of my library as a business, the more customers through the door, the more likely the profits will increase, but like any business it's not just about getting them through the door once. It's about getting them to return again and again by providing services they need, in a pleasant environment. Every time a student walks through the door of the library, my imaginary cash register rings out KA-CHING. If you go to a restaurant and the food is good but the waitress is terrible and worse she is nasty to you, then you wouldn't return. What if we started viewing our patrons as paying customers? Even though they don't hand us cash after finding a book or using a computer, they (or their parents) have paid taxes to support the school and thus the library. I know, you’re saying but our libraries are not getting their fair share of the funding. As librarians we cannot always control the fair distribution of the revenue, but we can control the product produced. Would our student patrons benefit from more money in the library—YES! Would our customer service be improved with more money? Possibly more staff would mean more questions were answered quicker, more instruction, etc., but would the basics of customer service… that feeling a student has upon exiting the library, improve? Whether we work in a "rich" or "poor" library, we influence customer service, and improving customer service costs nothing. 

Precepts of Customer Service 

• Check your affect. We often don't realize our natural facial expression may appear unhappy or even hostile, if that's the case, make an effort to smile regularly. 
• Be the "Wal-Mart greeter" by acknowledging patrons as they enter and exit. 
• Do a sound check on your tone of voice, like our facial expression we may not realize how we sound, our “neutral” may appear mean. 
• Adopt politeness as True North, say "thank you" and "have a great day." Nothing makes me happier than when I am thanked. 
• Don't wait to be asked for help, read your customers body language and offer to show customers your system. It's uncomfortable to go to a place when you don't know how the system works. 
• We all wish we could be treated like a VIP professional athlete or movie star. So to quote Gandhi, "be the change you desire in the world." Give your patrons the VIP treatment, and treat them like the rock stars they (and you) are.  

How I Snagged a Math Teacher

How I Snagged a Math Teacher

This article appeared in MSLA January 2013 Forum 

                                                        http://maschoolibraries.org/content/view/1080/691/

 Proximity and Relationship Building

For six years I longed to include the Math teachers into my library program. I call it a desire rather than a goal, because I was not actively seeking them out, but after six years I finally snagged a math teacher. The title of this article indicates that I actively lured this math teacher to the library, but that isn’t exactly true. The relationship began when Jodi Farrell was assigned a duty in the library to cover my prep period. She was a first year teacher who had transitioned to the classroom from her position as a paraprofessional. So I knew her, but not well. As a result of seeing each other every day we developed a relationship. The tipping point came one day when I was highly stressed trying to finish a project. She came to relieve me, and before I could get to my office she asked “Rachael, do you know anything about Excel…specifically how to graph a linear equation that shows the trend line?” Did I mention I was really busy! I wanted to brush her off and say “No” and just get to my office to finish my project, but my gut was screaming “this is your chance to break into the Math Department!”  I turned to her, and said, “I know the basics of Excel.” That period I put my research aside. She showed me what math problem she wanted graphed, I showed her how to get the graph, and after watching a YouTube video together we figured out how to display the trend line. The next day, I taught each of her five classes how to graph a linear equation.

Build On a Good Thing

The collaboration didn’t stop there. Several weeks later she had another project where students needed to graph a range of data, this time with two lines again with the trend lines visible. Together we figured out how to graph a quadratic equation, and again I taught her classes. Later in the year she had her students do a “Math in Real Life” research project. She wanted students to take a passion of theirs and show how math applied. They could choose any topic: sports, beauty, art or do biographical research on a mathematician. My first weeding task six years ago when I became the librarian was the 500s section, so this year even though my book budget has shriveled to nothing, she was raving about the math collection and how it was perfect for this project.  At the end of the year when all the seniors had gone, she had her remaining students create children’s math books. As she was telling me about this, I got all excited and said “we should publish them online!” I then showed her www.scribd.com and we immediately set up an account for her class. This time, she taught her classes how to use Scribd for one of her administrative observations.  At the end of the year she was telling me that her students were upset to be using the same textbook as years past, and I was able to suggest an E-book provided by the state: Real Life Math as part of the Gale Virtual Reference Library. My commitment to universal design led me to create a screencast video tutorial on how to graph linear and quadratic equations in Excel. This fall I still taught her classes live, but then emailed the links to the video tutorials which she posted on School Loop (our student learning management system) for students who needed more instruction, and for students who were absent.

Feed the Lunchroom Chatter

I have found that if the library can get worked into the lunchroom chatter then other teachers get inspired. Jodi shared her library success, and that led other teachers to ask for help. So after five years of numbing silence from the Math department, all of a sudden I had the statistics teacher asking about finding research studies for his students to analyze, and the Geometry teachers inquiring about resources on MC Escher, all because I knew how to insert a graph in Excel.

This I Know This Much is True

Modern school librarians are so busy it’s hard to stay focused on one’s GOALS when the daily To-Do list is demanding attention.  My goal from the beginning has been to teach and collaborate. My gut was screaming “remember your goals” when Jodi first asked for help. COLLABORATION is built on friendliness and trust, so first I had to build a personal relationship allowing Jodi to feel safe enough to ask for help.  PROXIMITY has been the key to many satisfying collaborations. If we don’t already have it, we need to find ways to spend time with teachers. Teachers love to talk about teaching and that’s where opportunities arise. Reach-out to NEW TEACHERS, their filing cabinet is empty, and are more likely to accept your assistance. SEIZE AN OPPORTUNITY, the day the Excel question came I was so busy and I could easily have brushed Jodi off, but my goal has been to teach and collaborate and in that moment I decided that collaboration was more important than the committee research I had planned to finish. Lastly, it’s ACCEPTABLE not to know everything; it’s UNACCEPTABLE to not be willing to learn something new. I could do basic Excel functions but I’m a librarian! I know how to learn, how to connect, and how to teach.

And so it begins...

And so it begins…

Sharing our work makes us vulnerable. Don’t let the fear stop you from sharing your experiments.

Introduction

I have been micro-blogging professionally on Twitter and personally on Facebook for many years. My dear friend Lindsey Barlow recently reminded me that when she introduced me to twitter, I replied “But, I don’t have anything to say.” For over a year, I have had more than 140 characters to say, but TIME (as always) was the issue. What has changed at this moment: my son is seven years old and a little more independent; after a full five-years, my own library is surprisingly less frenetic this year; and a cute guy* told me recently that I needed to create a blog titled Liboratory.

Why “Liboratory”

Apparently, other librarians in my local organization, Massachusetts School library Association (MSLA) have been referring to my library as a LIBRATORY. I was taken aback the first time I heard the term in reference to my library, but after some reflection I decided it was a compliment and accurate.

Do you think of a library as a place of adventure, daring and bravery? I hope your librarian does. When I stepped into my library as a librarian five years ago, I had a goal: to make the library the hub of my school. If that only meant a “physical” hub, I would not be writing this blog. For me, that goal meant creating a dynamic virtual library. It has been a feverish 5 ½ years of learning and taking risks. Are you thinking…Risk-taking??? Yes, it takes courage to invite unpredictable teenagers to an online workshop or book club. The fear: it doesn’t work, and students now think you are old-school, or they post something inappropriate in your presence. It takes mettle to teach your colleagues via a screencast. The fear: they are critiquing your every pronunciation, grammar choice, stutter, and method. It takes some nerve and thick skin to ask participants to give you feedback electronically. The fear: they say nasty things to hurt your feelings because it’s anonymous. It takes grit to propose an idea that puts fear in teachers. The fear: that people will avoid you for days so they don’t have to comment on your idea. It takes embracing frustration to teach yourself something new. The fear: you are stupid and a failure. 

Overcome your fear!

/Lib-or-a-tory/ n: a mindset conducive to experimentation, testing, investigation, observation and sharing around teaching and learning in a modern library

*Hahaha! If you know me, then you will know that it KILLS my feminist self to admit that the final push to start this blog resulted from a cute, sweet-talking guy.