LIBR 246-04/13 Web 2.0 (Spring 2010)

Wow! I can't even believe that the class is nearly over! I just finished grading your group projects (let me know if you didn't get an email from me with your grade and comments) and now all that's left are the final course reflections. Your enthusiasm in the class was truly inspiring to me and your reflections helped me to see many of these tools and ideas in new ways. I love how in this class we all get to be teachers and learners, so you're not just learning from one person, but from 23 other people (plus all the authors and bloggers we read!).

I just wanted to let everyone know that I'll be out-of-town at a conference in Buffalo today (Thursday) until Saturday afternoon. I'm not sure what my internet connectivity situation will be there, but at least I should be able to check my email on my phone and respond to any urgent issues.

Great job last night, everyone! I was really pleased with all of the presentations -- very polished, clear and concise.

The SOTES (Survey of Teaching Effectiveness) is available now! For those who don't know, this is a survey that examines your satisfaction with the class and my teaching.

I wanted to let everyone know that I finished grading all of the Community Dynamics papers. You should either have received an email from me with an attachment or your comments and grade will be in a Google Doc. Let me know if you have any difficulty locating your grade. I was very pleased on the whole with the papers this semester. The topics you chose were fascinating and you all found some really interesting research studies to support your ideas.

If you have any questions about your paper, please email me.

This is a reminder to email me your Group Experience Report after you've completed your group project. This is a part of the grade for the final project and it's critical that I receive one from each of you. To refresh your memory:

It's hard to believe, but your Final Project presentations are fast approaching! Each group will be presenting on the social software tool or tools you'd like to implement in your setting this coming Wednesday at 6pm PST. Remember that you're pretending that we're staff and administrators at your library and you're trying to sell us on your idea. Presentations should be no longer than 7 minutes and we'll take questions for a few minutes after each while the next group gets set up.

I just wanted to make sure that you all saw our Elluminate Assistant, Richard Santos' message in the forums about getting help with Elluminate and preparing for your group presentations. This information will be very useful as you work on your final projects.

For our last Elluminate session with guest speakers tomorrow evening, we have a community-builder whom I know you will find inspiring. Chrystie Hill is the Director of Community Services at WebJunction, which is an amazing online support and learning community for librarians (which every person in the profession should be aware and taking advantage of).

Hi folks! I will be out of town on vacation in Chicago from tomorrow (Saturday) through the following Friday. I'll be checking email as often as I can and that's likely the best way to reach me if you have a question during this time. Obviously I'll be online Wednesday evening for our Elluminate session with another fantastic guest speaker, Chrystie Hill (I'll tell you more about her in a subsequent email).

From Sunday morning (tomorrow) until Wednesday night, I will be in Arlington, Virginia at the Computers in Libraries Conference. Consequently, I'll probably not be quite as available as I normally am, though I will check my email periodically. At the conference, I'll be giving two talks: one on Organization 2.0 and one on Teaching and Learning with Drupal (both of which are topics you're familiar with!).