Thing 17 ELM

I like the way this Thing was set up to guide the user through some of the features in ELM.  The little videos on each are good; even as a regular user, one forgets either that the feature exists, or how to use it.  Our district media webpages all have access to ELM databases as one of the online resources we routinely provide.  I think teachers often forget (or maybe didn't know about) these great resources.  We need to help them embed the use of these in their assignments.  There's something for all ages & abilities here.

Thing 16 Research Calendar

This is a very similar approach to research as Michael Eisenberg's Big6 approach, which we already use with our district.  I love the fact that it's easy, online, and takes the user through each step.  Email reminders are great too.  One of the hardest things to do is to keep kids on task over the long haul, and this, being online, helps.  I've begun creating an online RPC for myself for my September library introduction presentations I do each year.  Very helpful.  

Thing 15: Games

I think that as librarians, we absolutely cannot afford to ignore this area (games), but all too often we do.  Especially those of us who work daily with young people - this is a great way to reach them.  The Hennepin Co. libraries here have already taken the plunge and it's given me an idea for my own media center-a special time and area here after school devoted to games, as a way to draw kids in.  I've saw Second Life last summer-cool!  I'll play around with Puzzle pirates later.

Thing 14: Library Thing

What fun!  I took the tour and it's one of the easiest ones to do.  This may be partly because of my library background in cataloging, but I noticed from other members' blogs at metronet that they found it easy & useful too.  My Librarything will be devoted to audiobooks, which I think are a way to get kids and others interested in reading and authors.  It will be posted as soon on this blog.

Thing 13: Online productivity tools

I already have an iGoogle start page.  One thing I have noticed is that if there is too much video and picture content, the page can be slow to load especially at home.  This is an annoyance if all you want to do is to search Google.  Couldn't get the countdown widget working quite right on this blog, but did activate the one on the 23things blog. I did read the Wired article about online calendars.  Our district already uses an online calendar within and between buildings, so that isn't a particularly new concept for me.  I'll go back later to Remember the milk-the title is so catchy. 

Thing 12 social media sites

I checked out Mixx, Digg, Newsvine and Reddit.  It takes a lot of time to figure each one out, but I can see the potential and why tech-savvy people would like to use it.  Whether it wastes time or enhances productivity would I suppose depend on the topic.  I used the share tools in a NYTimes article about Facebook, which was quite easy; someone else had already shared it to Digg.  

Thing 11

1.  I've already been tagging this 23things blog in Blogger-no problem there.  Sort of like indexing.  I can see how del.icio.us can be useful when you are working on more than 1 computer-also shared by a class or group of students.  Maybe used for book reviews, authors etc.  Who knows?  The list is endless.  I've created an account there, added bookmarks from eSchool news I got from emailings.  Useful to see others' bookmarks too.