Mini-legends 08 – sweet stuff

Posted on February 20, 2008 by Judy O'Connell

You’ve got to love blogging and the Web 2.0 platform! Today I ‘met’ my mini-legend called Zelda. How did I do this?

Well, Al Upton is at it again – a new group of kids, a new set of wonderful learning experiences.

Al Upton and the miniLegends 08 are going to be interacting with the world through a unique mentoring program.

Al says:

If you’re an educational blogger of any kind (or visitor) and would like to ‘mentor a mini’ then please leave a comment on THIS page saying who you would like to be connected with. The idea is to drop into their blogs from time to time throughout the year and leave a positive comment .

Very simple … why not join in this educational adventure with the miniLegends of 08? They are after mentors for all students from as many different countries as possible. They are adding additional mentors, so there is still time for you to share a miniLegend with an international friend.

Photo: Sweet Stuff

Welcome to St Josephs College

Posted on January 29, 2008 by Judy O'Connell

2008 heralds new directions for me – and I have had a wonderful start at St Joseph’s College, Hunters Hill here in Sydney.

Joey’s is a wonderful school with an imporant history amongst our Sydney schools, and is exemplified by a strong academic and sporting tradition. A ‘joeys boy’ remains a ‘joeys boy’ for life, due partly to the boarding school environment and partly to the Marist community of learners.

A recent twitter question asked me “what is Marist?”

As a Marist School, St Joseph’s College derives its charism from the founder of the Marist Brothers, Saint Marcellin Champagnat (1789 – 1840). A priest of the Society of Mary, St Marcellin was a man of warm personality, deep faith and great vision. The Christian education of youth, particularly those of rural areas, was his first love, following the terrible religious persecutions of the French Revolution. That is why he founded the Marist Brothers in 1817 at La Valla, a little village in the Loire region of France. Marcellin’s pastoral approach to students epitomises the daily work at the college and drives the values of this community of learners

“WE MUST LOVE THEM AND LOVE THEM ALL EQUALLY.”

Like many schools, St Joseph’s College is also undergoing a transformation in e-learning.

As Head Library & Information Services I’m looking after the Resources Centre and its team, where we will focus on literature, literacy, research and a strong integration of e-learning initiatives. We are going to undergo something of a transformation starting this year and into the future – and this journey of change will become part of my blogging narrative. There may be something in our journey that inspires your own adjustments to the exciting demands of 21st century learning.

Hear are some images of the outside entrance area of the Resource Centre.

Some day the inside will look equally magical!

Walkway to the Brother Ligouri Resource Centre

Standing at the front foyer, looking out to the school

Looking at the same view on the left as you approach the Centre

…..And the view from the right as you approach the Centre

And now ….. a Webtrend map for 2008

Posted on January 27, 2008 by Judy O'Connell

Here’s an interesting find from the Information Architects Japan. This is sort of appropriate given the release of The Horizon Report – a fun way to map trends for 2008!

This time we’ve taken almost 300 of the most influential and successful websites and pinned them down to the greater Tokyo-area train map.

Enjoy the clickable online version. You’ll notice that it incorporates people, tools, and a variety of media services. Unfortunately there are lots missing – as spotted by Gary Barber on Twitter, who mentioned Seesmic as an example. Fun anyway.

The map is available two formats – ready for you to use.

1. Big, A3 PDF
2. Clickable online version

Will Richardson and the Why 2 of Web 2.0

Posted on January 26, 2008 by Judy O'Connell

You’ll excuse me if I get excited by the news that Will Richardson is going to be here in Australia later this year to share his professional wisdom with us all.

Thanks to Sybasigns, who run some excellent professional learning seminars for us here in Australia, Will will be presenting two seminars: Brisbane 7th May and Sydney 9th May.

For more information and to register visit The Why 2 of Web 2.0: How it transforms everything!

Join their online seminar Ning The Why 2 of Web 2.0!

If you like, grab a copy of the 4 page flyer The Why 2 of Web 2.0 right here!

Oh, and I am thrilled to be sharing both events with Will, by participating in the seminar along with my friend and colleague Westley Field from MLC school in Sydney. I’m also really looking forward to meeting and listening to Christine MacKenzie from Yarra Plenty Regional Library in Melbourne.

If you’re a blogger – you’ve got to come along to a seminar! One spare bed at my place for a Sydney visitor 🙂

Playing with text widgets in wordpress

Posted on January 26, 2008 by Judy O'Connell

Sue Waters has been having fun getting ideas on widgets and helping bloggers using edublogs via the new blog The Edublogger.

I have used WordPress.com as my preferred blogging platform, though I also use blogger from time to time. But for classroom use, I have always preferred to use edublogs.org (another wordpress system), because of its various options for use at schools for students, teachers, or for whole campus.

I’ve provided all sorts of support to people with blogging over the last two years, and so have learnt a few tips and tricks along the way.

Sue has asked us to share these with the edublogs community, via our own blogs. So here is one that I used for my super(woman) friend Danni Miller at her blog The Butterfly Effect – an inspiration to girls and women here in Australia. Danni’s blog was nominated for Best New Blog in 2007. I’ve been honoured to provide consultant support to this fabulous dynamo and advocate for girls and women!

Danni particularly wanted to be able to promote her various ideas and resources to her readers. Of course Vodpod took care of her video recommendations. Library Thing was the ideal choice for her book recommendations.

Here’s the code that I used to display a random selection of books from her Library Thing Book Collection as it appears on her blog The Butterfly Effect. This is placed into a text box in your widget tools and can be used in WordPress or Edublogs. I have substituted words in square brackets to indicate where you will need to insert your own links or LibraryThing profile name.

Clicking on either the image or the random selection of books being displayed will take your readers directly to your Library Thing account.

Enjoy!

Oh, and if you need consultant support in your organisation or school for introducing, establishing or using blogging I just might be able to help you out too! 🙂

Delightful diversions – end of the summer holidays

Posted on January 24, 2008 by Judy O'Connell

My last day of school holidays, so it’s time to enjoy delightful diversions!

From me:

A trip back to my home town, Albury, dead set on the border between New South Wales and Victoria and on the great Murray River. Visiting dad, who is turning 95 in February 🙂 Enjoying the bush environment of this city of 42,500 souls. We spent time just relaxing at the local park, on the banks of the Murray. Very Australian! (Wish the drought was over)

From Julie Lindsay:

Oh my, what a wonderful diversion from Julie and definitely something completely different. A great aussie in Qatar made me chuckle! Thanks for sharing the vegetable orchestra Julie 🙂

The best bookmongers

Posted on January 12, 2008 by Judy O'Connell

During my holidays I have had plenty of opportunities to visit bookshops, and my favourite local library. Searching for a book I wanted to buy at a variety of bookstores, I was struck by the changes that have taken place in marketing, accessibility and presentation of at our best bookmongers.

I must say that in a few of the stores I found myself foundering – where do I find the book? Is it there? Here I was, an information professional, confused and disoriented as I tried to make sense of the layout and organisation of the store!! Needless to say, I didn’t buy anything. Bad luck bookstore.

But in two places (both highly successful and well patronised) I felt at home – and clearly so did everyone else – ages ranging from toddlers to grey-power!

What was the common feature of these two places:

visually appealing furniture, layout, and spaces
nice displays and signage
easy to understand organisation e.g. scifi/fantasy, crime, biography, history, travel, sport
no shelf clutter, with attractive jackets on display
lots of comfy chairs to sit and browse
magazines, dvds, audio books and more
a handy computer so that I could carry out a catalogue search to help me find what I wanted – easily with a good human interface, not a “library” interface
wireless access
my favourite – a great coffee shop!

I love the carpet that’s on the floor and the different places you can settle down and read a book.

I love the use of object architecture to add interest.

Oh, and I’m a regular visitor of the coffee shop in the last picture.

So the two most successful places are Borders book store and my favourite Library, which does have its own fabulous coffee shop – including a super outdoor terrace with water features.

This is interesting don’t you think? It slams home the changes needed in our school libraries quite nicely.

But you know the great thing is that our public and school libraries can offer a lot more than even the best bookshop – loads of extra services, learning support, community support, meeting and study rooms, lots of computers, reference and information services.

Better still, at my favourite library I can scan and issue the books out to myself – sometimes after I have picked out new releases to borrow that I have just read about in the Saturday paper! Good one! Saves me a bomb.

How can a bookstore compete with this service, especially since some of the books I get are ones that I have reserved online at home.

The astounding thing is that its all free!!

First Photo: At Borders

International Edublog Awards 2007 Finalists

Posted on November 26, 2007 by Judy O'Connell

This year we see another fabulous line-up in the annual Edublog Awards.

I am genuinely amazed and proud to find this blog nominated for Best Librarian blog – special thanks to those who considered Heyjude worthwhile for the honour!!

The wonderful thing about the annual Edublog Awards is the opportunity to share our finds, celebrate our work, and discover the wonderful new people who have joined us in the world of blogs and wikis.

As my super online friend (and multiple nominee) Sue Waters said

While it is really nice to be nominated we need to remember the best aspects of the awards is it creates a fabulous resource for educators to use for ideas on how social software is used in different contexts, with a range of different learners; which means we are introduced to new sites that we might not have found if not for the awards process.

Please take the time to visit the web sites of the Edublogs Award Finalists, explore the resources, do some voting, and perhaps add some excellent educational blogs to your feed reader.

It’s great to see Best Library/Librarian listed amongst the award categories. In schools we work hard to promote the role that Teacher Librarians/Librarians/Media Specialists have to play in 21st century learning. Our work is vital (critical even!) yet not always acknowledged for being central in each of our student’s lives.

I’m a teacher and I’m a librarian. That’s special – and what makes Heyjude special for me is that I know that the audience is strongly drawn from teachers and librarians alike – all interested in 21st century learning issues. Teacher Librarians are very special people 🙂 and we all have to work hard together to makes sure that we keep good school libraries in our Australian schools.

If you are keen to help the promotion efforts, take a visit to The Hub – the campaign blog for quality school libraries in Australia!

The best Award innovation this year?

The winners will be announced at the Award ceremony which will be held in Second Life on Saturday December 8. Cool!

Congratulations to all the nominees !!!!! It’s a stunning lineup of great people.

Happy voting – and thanks to all the work by James Farmer and Josie Fraser behind the scenes. 🙂

Photo: Special

Celebrate Edna’s 10th birthday in Second Life

Posted on November 23, 2007 by Judy O'Connell

Recently Kerry Lorette Johnson from EducationAU.limited sent me an alert via Facebook about a big birthday event! My avatar, Heyjude Jenns will be dropping by!

Education Network Australia (Edna) has been providing free online resource collections and collaborative networks for the education and training community in Australia for 10 years! This is worth celebrating – and the celebration includes holding an event in Second Life on Tuesday 27 November — and they’d love for us all to be there!

Here are the details:

“Official” start time is 2:45pm Adelaide, South Australia time – or check this time for your time zone in World clock time.

The birthday event will be on the island of Terra Icognita: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Terra%20incognita/157/107/33

They’ll have free tedna -shirts, virtual cake and champagne and, after a live broadcast of speeches including the launch of myedna. Afterwards your avatar can rock out to popular Second Life band Space Junky.

When you teleport over, there will be a glowing poster on the floor of the gazebo with the edna logo and an arrow, and there will be helpers to guide you on your way. Kerry’s avatar is Pandora Kurrajong, but she’ll be busy channeling the audio from the presentations so you might not get too chat with her.

So look for Spotters Square – the name of the island quadrant they’ll be using. They’re promising a decent size stage!

Kerry has created a Twitter channel for the edna 10th birthday celebrations. The address is: http://twitter.com/edna10

The RSS feed subscription link is:
http://twitter.com/statuses/user_timeline/10456232.rss

More about Edna

For educators, the most visible products of edna are the web site and the services available through edna Groups, edna Sandpit Groups and edna Lists as well as the workshops delivered by the staff of education.au, the ministerially owned company that manages the edna web sites.

As part of the 10 year celebration you can catch up with a talk with current education.au CEO Greg Black, former CEO Gerry White, General Manager of Business Development Garry Putland and edna Communications Officer Kerrie Smith about the past, present and future of edna and e-learning.