Thing 15: Attending, Presenting at and organising seminars, conferences and other events

I am not the most outgoing person and speaking at a conference is not something I would be particularly comfortable with.  However, when it comes to teaching, as I know what I am talking about I am confident and talking to a group of people does not phase me. 

One way I have found of becoming more involved in events is to offer to write about them for the official publication.  By doing this, I found that I had to focus on everyone and what they were saying more than if I was simply listening.  I also had to pay more attention to the questions asked and I feel that this helped me to engage more fully with the whole event.  By writing the official report, I mixed with more people during the breaks, to get an overall impression of what other people felt. 

I would like to think that as my knowledge and experience grows, I would consider speaking at an event.  I have expressed an interest in joining various committees as this feels like a more comfortable way of interacting in a group setting compared to offering to formally talk on one particular topic.

I feel very strongly about several issues, such as promoting the value of libraries and the work librarians do as well as the importance of teaching information literacy skills.  I am sure we all cringe at the comments that all librarians do is "shush" people and stamp books.

I enjoy attending events, but there are certain issues which mean I can't attend all, such as the cost, the inconvenience to the rest of the team at work if I am not there etc.  However, they are valuable and we can learn so much from attending them.  What we take away from these events makes up for any temporary inconvenience and cost which arises from us going in the first place.

Thing 14: Zotero/Mendeley/citeulike

I'm in between portfolio building and felt I really wanted to have a look at CPD23 again before I start to get behind.  I have learned so much from these activities so far, it's such a great initiative.  Just been looking at the tools for referencing.  It is excellent that these exist now, I've had a look at all three and will be looking at them in greater detail.  I particularly like Zotero due to the fact that it sits in the web browser.  This is really convenient and useful as it is always readily available.  I like the idea of being able to annotate with Mendeley.  I have seen something useful being demonstrated at the London Book Fair, which the Bodleian Library were trialling which has similar features in terms of providing references and provides the annotating facilities.  I can't remember its actual name now but all these things will really help scholarly activity in the future.

Subject launchpad

I have been looking at useful websites and found the PINAKES subject launchpad.  This looks like an interesting site.  I can see that many universities provide links to it, so clearly it is seen as a useful academic source. It has a clear layout so it is not complicated to find subject related links.  I have heard of it before but never really looked into it until now.

Collection development and supporting Libraries

Worked on ebook collection most of today, looking into new items to add and liaised with staff over their ebook needs.  Continued with cataloguing new books so that they are ready for staff and students.  After work made a point of visiting the public library due to it being WI Birthday Library Action Day.  I don't need an excuse to go to the public library but thought that I would definitely go today to support this.

Busy week

It's been a busy week with new student inductions, lots of new stock to catalogue, fire drills and portfolio building.  Working hard on forthcoming ebook week, looking at as many possibilities as possible for this.  Also want to do something for European Languages Day.  Various ideas, not much time to put them into practice.

Progress

Made great progress today with chartership portfolio.  Been working on it nearly all day but its been worth it.  Still lots to do but now I've made a start on putting everything together I feel so much better.  I still keep thinking of new things to add or new areas I can develop, but that's why I love the job so much. There is always something else to build on, or new projects to develop.  I think I should call it a day now though, it is Saturday night after all.

Thing 13 - Google Docs, Wikis and Dropbox

I often work at home and either print a document off or if I need it at work email it to myself.  This doesn't always work as the format often changes.  Google Docs, Wikis and Dropbox will all help me to access my work from wherever I am.  I don't very often work on shared projects, but there have been occasions.  We have saved the work in shared documents at work.  The problem with this though is if I want to continue at home, I can't access the document easily.  Thing 13 has provided the solution to this.  We don't have to worry about saving the document in shared, it can be saved on any of these three applications.  From watching the really easy to understand video, Wikis looks like the best application for collaborative work.  I will certainly be using Dropbox to save work I do at home which I want to use at work and vice versa.  For documents that I want to share, I think either Dropbox or Google Docs look best as it looks easy to set up who can share.  How I have understood these applications, Wikis is best for actual collaborative work, whereas the other two are good for accessing documents from different locations by using log-ins, and are good for sharing information with others, which can be added to or edited.