The Unquiet Librarian

“How worn and dusty, then, must be the highways of the world, how deep the ruts of tradition and conformity! I did not wish to take a cabin passage, but rather to go before the mast and on the deck of the world, for there I could best see the moonlight amid the mountains. I do not wish to go below now.”—Henry David Thoreau, from Walden

When you want to search the web, what is the search engine of choice?  For most of us, it is Google.  Certainly, Google features many great tools, but like anything else, it is easy to become comfortable and get stuck in a “rut”.  Why not venture out and try some lesser known but effective search engines that can give you different results? 

I came across this great article in July about alternate search engines to try besides Google!  You can visit this slideshow to learn more about these search engines and even give them a test drive!  I am still playing with the “Magnificent 11″ as of right now (in my spare time, LOL!), but Clusty is the one I particularly like—you can view results by “cluster” (which is a type of subject heading or tag system), sources, and type of web source (such as .gov, .com, .edu., etc.).

When you get a moment, play around with some of these engines and let me know what you think!

A few years ago while working on my Ed.S. at UGA, I took EDIT 7500, Digital Storytelling.  At that time, we played with blogs and wikis as part of our exploration of ways to tell stories using multlimedia.  I could not have foreseen the Web 2.0 explosion that is happening right before our eyes in education!  As most of you know, I am totally in love with blogs as an educational tool, but now I am discovering all kinds of other great Web 2.0 tools that I hope to incorporate into my collaborative planning with you during 2007-08.

One of the more established Web 2.0 tools, the wiki, can be a great medium for sharing and collaboration.  While public education seems to be a little slow to jump on the Wiki train, higher education is all over the Wiki mania.  Check out this library wiki:  http://wiki.lib.uconn.edu/wiki/Main_Page .

There are also many professional wikis out there that can inspire us to think of creative and meaningful ways to use Wikis and Web 2.0 technologies in our classrooms.  Two of my favorites are the Classroom 2.0 Wiki and the Information Fluency Wiki.

I would love to collaborate with faculty members to incorporate a class wiki as part of a project or even your regular instruction.  If you are interested, please see me or drop me an email! 

As a teaser, check out this video from Teacher Tube called Wikis in Plain English.  This video provides a simple yet effective overview of the principles of a Wiki.

Also, if you want a more general overview of Web 2.0 tools, check out this great presentation on SlideShare:

[slideshare id=50739&doc=web-20-tools-for-your-classroom-right-now-10302&w=425]