Day 22 of the Photo Challenge


So, I'm kind of giving up on the whole updating every day thing, aren't i? I just don't have that much interesting going on obviously :)

Absolutely FREEZING here today. So really tried to stay right in front of the heater. Did make a trip to the library though. Start working more hours next week which I'm really excited about! One step closer to the dream job =)

This picture is of my tea tonight. So very interesting. It's my own creation called a Mega Pizza Schnitzel :) It's DELICIOUS. Even if my parents look at me weird hehe I took it via my phone so quality won't be that great. Although, I found out I could control my computer via my phone while trying to blue tooth this picture to my computer. Oh technology, you develop the weirdest things.

Hope everyone enjoys the holidays!! =D

Day 21 of the Photo Challenge



So, I missed yesterday. I'm not going to post one for then, because I didn't actually take one. Don't know if that means I failed the challenge but I'll pretend it doesn't. I'm fighting the flu at the moment so staying inside and watching a lot of tv, but I'll post one today because it's my dear dad's birthday :) Happy Birthday Dad!!

Day 20 of the Photo Challenge



The Hamilton pool in the wintertime... A home for ducks. haha =) Anybody for a swim?

Day 19 of the Photo Challenge



My failed Cheesecake Swirl Chocolate Brownies =( I'm very disappointed that these didnt work out. It looks good though, even if it is completely uncooked in the middle =(

And in other news I went to a job interview today for further hours at my current library and it went really well. The interview was a lot about Customer Service which is what last weekend's unit was about on the weekend. Thankyou Janelle! Hopefully I'll get the job!

Day 18 of the Photo Challenge



Yesterday's Photo. As of the weekend I am officially halfway to 120 hours!! *groan* Only 56 hours to go!!

Library Cats



You may have realised by now that I'm a complete and utter sucker for pets. Particularly cats and dogs. I have always had them growing up and am constantly amazed by some of the stories you hear about them. I was surfing the net today, looking up some books that I wanted and came across Dewey (The book that is). Dewey is, of course, a biography of a cat that lives in a library in America. It got me thinking on what people actually thought about the idea of having a cat in a library. (Or any other animal for that matter)

Library cats are, obviously, cats who live in libraries or cats which live with a library worker who brings them into the library. The 'Iron Frog Productions" website (as of 2009) lists 301 current library cats around the world. While most are located in America, there are a few in Australia!

You can read all about Dewey here if you're interested. Or go and get the book from your local library and have a read. It's a truly wonderful story.

Personally, I'm a huge fan of library cats. Of course, there is the sheer enjoyment and comedy that only a cat can provide, but having a cat in a library could be quite helpful for the elderly who live alone or even providing children with education on how to treat animals. I know there are issues that make people against the idea, but there is evidence that it can be effective. And can provide endless entertainment.

So, what do YOU think? Would you go to a library that had a resident cat? Would you work in a library that had a resident cat?

Gary Roma. (n.d). Library Cats Map. In Iron Frog Productions. Retrieved June 21, 2010, from http://www.ironfrog.com/catsmap.html.

Day 17 of the Challenge



Settling in, after the long drive home, and watching one of my favourite shows! MASTERCHEF!! I've positively drooling from looking at some of the things that are cooked. The only bad thing about Cooking shows, but that's okay I'm making Cheesecake Brownies tomorrow! MMMMMM Photo to come so you can all feel hungry too :)

Day 16 of the Photo Challenge



Had uni this weekend, so stayed over in Ballarat and had to take a photo down there and add it tonight! So, here it is. A photo with some very cool effects on it. Ten Points if you can guess what it is =)

Day 15 of the Photo Challenge



So, I've just returned from another day at work where I got some good news! I have a job interview next week for another job at the library I currently work at. It's mainly more hours and working on Sundays - my library is starting to open on Sunday's as of July. So I'm quite excited! This little photo is the beginning of my mum's pile of all her book covering antics. My mum (as I previously mentioned) is a teacher librarian and she buys and covers every single book she buys! So pretty much every week my mum is covering some books. Great place to be! =)

Day 14 of the Photo Challenge



So while I sit inside away from the horrible weather that has taken over recently (I actually like the cold. ha) I was looking for something to be today's photo. Everybody likes to collect things, whether it be books, snowglobes (yes I have a collection of snow globes) or in my mum's case - Frogs! This is my mum's frog cupboard. She also has frogs pretty much everywhere around the house and in our backyard as well! Everyone asks how many she has and we all tried counting one day but we lost count. It's in the hundreds! What do you collect? And why?

Day 13 of the Photo Challenge



I know, boring right, but seriously it's FREEZING! So, I've had to buy myself some gloves. I've worn them all day today. My Mum is laughing at me, but oh well. At least I'm warm! =)

RSS and Newsreaders

My final week for the 23 Things Activity brought me to the world of RSS. My main purpose in choosing this was because I didn't really have a big idea of what RSS could do and how it could be of assistance in any environment. I used 'BlogLines' and now have 10 subscriptions.

I had a bit of difficulty registering some of my Feeds through BlogLines and through my account. Some told me the RSS was not available and then other times my account was unaccessible, then I'd go into it again and the RSS feeds I wanted would be there. It was quite frustrating! Eventually, I signed up to:

BlogLines News
The Learning 2.0 Library Blog
Librarian.net
National Geographic
Rotten Tomatoes (A Movie review site)
The Shifted Librarian
Sports News (Via Yahoo! 7)
Itunes Top 25 Songs
And 2 RSS Feeds for fanfiction.net (A site where I indulge in my love of Tv and writing together)

I can see how RSS could be extremely helpful in a library setting. People could receive the latest news just by going to their Feeds, without having to go to your website. New Books that come into the library could be posted there as well as any events that were happening in the library.

While I appreciate how this could be used in a library setting, I don't think I'll continue to use it for myself. I prefer to go to websites themselves and search around for the information I want. I use many bookmarks on my Mozilla screen which is all the help I need to find what I want to find.

Day 12 of the Photo Challenge



I went on a little trip to the Gardens in my home town today and it was such a beautiful day! I love all the photographs that i took (which you can see in this set on Flickr) If you have time, let me know what you think. The above photo is just one of the picks of all of the photos I took.

Day 11 of the Photo Challenge



So, as much as it is kinda boring, today was washing day! Other than that, I spent the day watching my poor dad suffer from watching his beloved Demons play. They didn't lose, but they didn't win. Poor Team. So, that's how I spent my long weekend!

Day 10 of the Photo Challenge



My Computer decided to have some issues yesterday, hence the no photo yesterday. Here it is. This little ice sculpture (it's what I'm calling it anyway) was found in the fridge yesterday. I thought it looked so cool, and it stayed completely intact so I could photograph it! I posted this photo on Flickr and edited it using Picnik. You can go see the original on Flickr in my photostream. I really like how it looks, kinda spooky I suppose. Another photo on its way....

Hope Everyone is having a lovely long weekend!!

Day 9 of the Photo Challenge



Spending the evening watching my good ole Cats play. Sorry any Essendon fans but note the score =)

Day 8 of the Photo Challenge



So, it's Friday. I finish work at 6 (Library) and then come home and have some junk food. Then I go and play Sims. I know, it's kinda sad, but I love playing the Sims. Always have. It's pretty enjoyable playing out an imaginary persons life just how you like it. Always makes me wonder if there is someone up there directing me to do things...

Day 7 of the Photo Challenge

Technology! I did actually put this on yesterday, obviously something went wrong and it didn't work! I'll have to check to make sure it makes it onto my blog next time... Here's Yesterday's photo...



This is my gorgeous little rabbit, couldn't venture outside to find something to photograph because it was raining nearly all day! Oh well, today looks better!

Day 6 of the Photo Challenge



And Here's Day 6's photo. This photo is of my mum's library truck! I thought it was quite appropriate since we are all in a library course! My mum drives this little truck around (she's a teacher librarian) to about 9 little primary schools of under 100 kids. 2 of her schools have under 10! This little truck was pretty much my own personal library until I hit secondary school and didn't find the Aussie Nibbles, bites or chomps interesting anymore (or maybe i was just not hungry enough). =)

Rollyo

While I have been busy getting into the assignments I have ready for me, I took a bit of a break to have a look at Rollyo. First of all, I found Rollyo confusing and I was quite struggling to understand just how it worked. After a bit of a look around the site and then looking at some Rollyo Search engines which had already been made, I started to understand it a bit more. Then came trying to make my own. Initially, I had no idea what to do. Sure, just answer a few questions, but I didn't know what I could possibly make for a search engine.

While I was trying to figure this out, at the same time I was searching on some of my favourite online-book shops to find some of my favourite books which I wanted to have in hard copy for my book shelf and then realised that I could use this for Rollyo.

So... Here's my Rollyo - Buying Books Online. I've used some of my favourite sites, where I myself look for affordable book prices online!

As for Rollyo relating to libraries, I could see how it could be of help to them. Using the site to make a easy search engine for certain genre of books, or maybe for people to search for similar authors to the ones they love. Many ways it could be of great assistance.

I've really enjoyed taking the opportunity to search through Rollyo and discover another possibility to taking libraries to the public.

Day 5 of the Photo Challenge



Here's today's (8th) photo of the day. I've been looking around the backyard for something to photograph when I decided to take a photo of these two guys. I got these two for my mum, this Mother's day and I think they're the cutest things! I actually found them at a Trash and Treasure festival.

Day 4 of the Photo Challenge



So, I forgot to do a blog post yesterday. So technically, this photo is from yesterday. I took the photo yesterday so I think it still counts. I'll post my photo for today as well. =) I love this photo - it's a lovely big tree we have in our backyard with the beautiful sky behind it. I do quite like this photo

Meme!

Questions taken from
moonflowerdragon's post about Meme's. Read her blog to see where it all started =)

By the way, answering the questions that she posed - I really love Meme's. Always have. So i open most Meme posts by people, especially if they are a close friend/family member because their answers really interest me. I do sometimes scan some Meme posts though.

Do you snack while reading? Yes, I quite like to snack while getting into a good story. Although, it tends to be unhealthy so maybe I should stop that habit?

What is your favourite drink while reading? No particular drink while reading. Just whatever I'm drinking in the moment. Drinking a lot of water these days.

Do you tend to mark your books while you read, or does the idea of writing in books horrify you? Never mark my books by writing in them, the thought actually does horrify me.

How do you keep your place? Bookmark? Dog-ears? Laying the book open flat? Bookmarks. I have two lovely Twilight Saga bookmarks that i love dearly.

Fiction, non-fiction or both? Fiction. Fiction. Fiction.

Do you tend to read to the end of a chapter or can you stop anywhere? I can stop, but I don't like to. The feeling of leaving a book in the middle of a chapter just doesn't feel right. If I'm reading, I definitely have to make it to a break in the writing before I can stop.

Are you the type of person to throw a book across the room or on the floor if the author irritates you? No. Being an aspiring author, I try to understand every author and why they write what they write. I sometimes read half a book and just aren't enjoying it and have to stop.

If you come across an unfamiliar word, do you stop and look it up right away? Nope. I pretend the word isn't there and if I can understand what's going on still, then I don't even worry about it.

What are you currently reading? Nora Roberts In Death Series of books. Have been for a while

What is the last book you bought? Bought? Really? I can't even remember. The pleasure of working in a library with a catalogue system where I can get books from anywhere makes me much less likely go anywhere near a book shop. Nowadays, I only buy books if I want to keep them and read them multiple times.

Do you have a favourite time/place to read? I read just before I go to bed when I'm all tucked up and warm. Otherwise, it's in the car on long trips - it usually passes the time.

Do you prefer series books or stand-alones? Series books. I love the idea of a continuing story where you can be with the characters for longer than one book. Saying that, I love some stand alone books.

Is there a specific book or author you find yourself recommending over and over? I'd say Twilight, but I know it's a choice if you want to get involved with the craziness, so I'll suggest Nicholas Sparks. Very beautiful author.

How do you organize your books (by genre, title, author’s last name, etc.)? I don't organise, really. However they fit on my shelf usually works.

Barbara’s additional question: background noise or silence? Background noise while I read is a must. People look at me weirdly when I have music playing in the background, but I find it easier to read when i have that music going. *shrug* Call me weird.!

Part 2 of Play Week - Library Thing

I've finally got onto the second part of Play Week - Week 5 in the 23 Things activity. Part Two is having a look at Library thing and creating a catalog of your own books. Library Thing is a website where you can put any selection of books into a catalog of your own. You could put your favourite books, books you want to read, or ever books by a particular author.

My catalog (which I have only just started to it's quite small) features books that I have read and loved.

I quite love looking through catalogs and finding books by authors I might not hear about otherwise but I don't think I will continue using LibraryThing after this because I don't quite see the need for me to make a catalog of books that I have read and put them on the internet. I do believe, though, that LibraryThing would be quite helpful for people who read many books and can't keep track of which ones they have read, and which ones I haven't. They could just put each book in their catalog after they have read it and therefore just check it every time they are looking for a new book. As I'm an avid reader of only a few authors, I don't usually have the problem of remembering what books I have read.

So, while I know that there is an obviously great need for catalogs in a library environment, I don't believe I need my 'own' catalog.

Day 3 Photo Challenge



I made New York Baked Cheesecake! If you just got hungry for cheesecake then I apologise =)

Day 2 of the Photo Challenge



While I watch my good old Geelong Cats get away with a close win, I look across the room and decide that since they are the Geelong CATS I'll have my cat be the photo of today :)

Had such an interesting day at Mt Helen Library today. Listened to information all about the historical collection, it was completely fascinating. Although I'm not interested in that part of library work as much as the technological side, it was still really surprising to hear about all the ways you can save all books, or even just keeping them in prime condition. Old books are just amazing when they're in their orginal state.

As I was driving, on the way back to Hamilton (5 more hours for the logbook - up to 60! Bad news, means 60 to go) I was thinking about all the assignments I have to really get into and found myself really excited! Knowing that the work I have to do is something I enjoy makes me feel like this is definitely the career I want to go into.

On to tomorrow.

Day 1 of the Photo Challenge



Here's Today's photo for my photo challenge that I mentioned in my previous post. Yes, I couldn't resist it. I didn't really do anything of particular interest today, so I decided to take a picture of my beautiful doggy. We decided to have a a bit of a hug and here's the result. Just to make it more interesting - I uploaded it onto Flickr first and used their partnership with picnik (an excellent online photo editing site - It's Free!) to edit it a bit as it was a badly lit photo.. hope it helped a bit.

A Challenge

So, my friends over at deviantArt have taken on a challenge and urged me to take part. So I thought I might do it here as well! While my friends have pledged that they'll go for a year, I'm going to start with a month.

The challenge is to take a photo every day for a year (or month in my case) and upload it. The photo can be of anything, but you can't double up. The photo could reflect what you've done that day, or what mood you were in, or even the food you cooked! It's up to you.

Personally, I think this sounds like a really really fun thing to do! So, I'm going to give it a go. I'll post my first one later today, and see how I go!

Oh how I love 23 Things

Week 5 - Play Week.

I'm going to be doing a lot of editing of this post for this particular 'week'. I say week in that particular way because I'm enjoying all this blogging so much that I'm only waiting one or day between the supposed weeks. Maybe I should just say Day 2 Play Day. *shrug*

Okay, for all my fellow students studying this unit. Do. Play. Week. Seriously. The amount of fun you will have... Now to see If I can post some of what I've been doing!

Thought I'd put the link in here to credit where I'm having all my fun... The Generator Blog is completely awesome. Go have a look!

Generator Blog

More of my fun to come...

This is my robot that I created. He's a pretty cool guy, you have to admit :)

See My Robot HERE!

Oh, by the way. You can then make him dance. I know, I really must have nothing going on in life, but this does entertain me. haha

Finally, Here's my edit of a photo of me! I'm trying out this new look, what do you think?

piZap.com free online photo editor, fun photo effects
piZap.com free online photo editor

I've finally edited this all into one post, otherwise there would have been quite a few!

I've only done the first part of Play Week, but I'm already loving it! Online Image Generators and so much fun, and even other generators are hilariously fun - especially the robot. These generators are so easy to use, and are completely free. The things you can create pretty much stop at nothing.

While I force myself to stop wasting time with all the various generators I have found, I will now move on to step 2 of Play Week.

Onwards and Upwards!

Mia


Gorgeous Mia. As a puppy.
Originally uploaded by Amelibum
This photo was added via Flickr's blog post feature.

Flickr


Week 3 – Photos & Images

Once I knew we would be getting a choice of 3 of the 23 Things program that we wanted to do, I couldn't go past Flickr. I'm a complete photo maniac. I bought my own digital camera a few years ago and love using it to take photos of whatever, whenever. While I'm a frequent visitor of DeviantArt, I hadn't ever looked at Flickr before and I am shocked at what I could have been doing!

My previous post features one of the photos I have on Flickr (It's my brothers dog, but really she is the most gorgeous thing ever) and I posted it through the Blog feature on the site itself. Also, in my third column you'll see I have a Flickr Photostream which features 10 photos from my account (A gadget VIA Blogger).

I now have 83 photos on Flickr of various things (most are my pets - because I love them so much) and I'm sure I'll use it in the future.

There are many features on Flickr besides just the uploading of your own photos. You can add your photos to 'sets' which leaves you with the option to edit them all at once. Sets usually include photos about the same thing, for example you may have a holiday you have been to. You can then add all those photos to one set and look at only those photos. This feature is helpful for people when searching. If they want some photos of the place where you went on your holiday, they can easily click on that set instead of having to filter through all your photos.

Flickr is a photo-sharing website, so the next feature - Gallery - is made for users who go exploring on the website and find a photo that they love that is another users work. Therefore, you always have them there if you want to go looking at them again or you may like a particular topic. Say, butterflies. Therefore you can go searching on Flickr and find photos of Butterflies and can have them all in one gallery. People may see you like butterflies and want to communicate with you! Galleries can only hve up to 18 photos at once, but you can create multiple galleries.

Another features of Flickr which is quite interesting is the 'Map' Section. The Map section is not Maps of areas, it is a large world map where you can tag particular photos to. Again, I use the holiday example, you could have been on a holiday to France. Therefore you can tag all those photos in France, so people that are looking to go there might see your photos and decide 'I want to go there!' It's a wonderful feature, that has some privacy concerns - for example don't post a picture of your house for obvious reasons. Still, in some situations it'll be quite helpful.

There are other features of Flickr like Tags, that are not exclusive to Flickr so I'll let everyone discover them in their own time. That link will lead you to a FAQ in Flickr which will tell you what a Tag is if you are so inclined.

The Organise and Create tool on Flickr is where all the fun is. Here, you can edit photos, edit dates, add tags and much much more. You can create Photobooks, Photo Collages, photo canvases and more. Creating these products requires payment, though and could be difficult for some people. I'm not quite sure of the specific details and if there is an Australian outlet.

Finally, The Groups feature is where you can meet anyone and join any group you like! For example, the first group I joined was a cocker spaniel group where people talk about their dogs and post all their dogs pictures. It's fun, easy and is quite interesting to see other dogs related to you.

I have realised I just wrote just about a book on Flickr, but I hope you all got something out of what I am writing. I say, Go Join Flickr!

Information Literacy

Type in Information Literacy in Google and you will be completely swamped by the amount of terms and descriptions that are used to describe it. I struggle to find the words to give it an accurate meaning but find the description provided by The National Forum on Information Literacy (NFIL, 2010) to be quite easy to understand.

"[Information Literacy is being] able to recognize when information is needed and have the ability to locate, evaluate, and use it effectively"

These days Information Literacy is starting to branch into the world of technology and some people are starting to believe it should be Information Literacy 2.0, of course, this is in reference to Web 2.0. This great blog (Godwin & Parker, 2008) certainly outlines this fact.

Most students, when faced with a question and they have no idea of the answer, will automatically go to Google. While Google is an excellent study resource - in fact I'm sure everyone can nearly say they have used it. It is how students use Google and the way they use their results where the problems start to begin and the failure to have effective information literacy skills will ultimately leave some students behind into the future.

In my search to find a few references for this blog post I came across an excellent article (Moran, 2010) which clearly states what is needed in the challenge of teaching students effective information literacy skills.

Moran outlines the reasons of why qualified librarians with information literacy skills are one of the most essential assets in any school or public library. Moran states that "The Internet defines the way that young people learn, communicate, and create" and realistically I believe web 2.0 has changed the face of education.

It is our job as librarians to be able to teach young people how to keep the internet as a valuable resource and not an annoying distraction.

References

1) National Forum of Information Literacy (n.d.) Definitions, Standards, and
Competencies Related to Information Literacy. Retrieved on 2010, June 2 from http://www.infolit.org/definitions

2) Godwin, P., & Parker, J., (2008). Information Literacy meets Library 2.0. Retrieved on 2010, June 2 from http://infolitlib20.blogspot.com/


3) Moran, M. (2010, March 22). Young Learners Need Librarians, Not Just Google [Web Log Post.] Retrieved on 2010 June 2 from http://www.forbes.com

Joy! Joy! Joy!

I'm feeling a whole lot of joy at the moment. Finally, I have completed the design for the blog. Hope it looks good for everyone out there =)

Although I get the general template (Including background/colours etc) from another site, I have edited all the links/information and of course the layout of this lovely design through html. The fact that I spent fifteen minutes going through the code and the reason links weren't working was because of one letter gets me quite frustrated, but it's done. And I'm quite pleased with it =)

Now on with the work..