Creating and maintaing a school's library website requires experience and time. Many Media specialists don't have the skills to build a website nor the time to maintain one. In addition, school districts impose many restrictions on web sites, which make it difficult to be controlled by the media sprcialist. Both blogs and wikis allow immediate publishing and editing, whereas the traditional web page sites require that the update and pages be uploaded through a file transfer protocol. Due to the time involved, web pages are not updated to keep up with current information.
Blogs and wikis are alternatives to web pages as sources for online promotion of the media program. They are great collaborative tools. You can easily create new pages and add links to resources without having any prior experience. Information can be added in a timely manner. They can be maintained by someone other than the media specialist, like parent volunteers. Both have excellent security measures as to participation and usage. Most of the applications are readily available, free, and can be accessed from a location other than school.
With time, cost, and restriction being factors in media web page design, media specialists are creating blogs and wikis to povide information to it users. They are becoming more popular and may be the answer to traditional web pages. I think they will work well with media specialists that are reluctant to use technology.
Here's an example of a library blog: http://blossomwoodlibrary.edublogs.org/
I personally think that every media center should have a webpage that is easily accessible from the school’s homepage. It definitely takes experience and time to have a webpage but I believe that it is well worth it.
ReplyDeleteWhat if you included the blog or Wiki on the media centers webpage? This way the webpage could have set information such as introducing the media center staff, hours of operation, policies and procedures and then the Wiki could have teacher resources that everyone could add to and book reviews that are done by students or a blog could be included. North Elementary School’s Virtual Library Media Center (http://www.nobl.k12.in.us/North/NorthMedia/index.htm) is a great example of this. Making all of the resources easily accessible to stakeholders is the key because we want them all to be able to easily access the sites and to utilize them.
Whether or not it is a blog, Wiki or webpage I believe that the media center has to at least do one. It is important for us to inform our stakeholders about our media center and all of the great resources that are available to them.
I too think that there needs to be some way for a media specialist to "toot their horn" and blogs, wikis, or websites are the way to go. It is an easy way to showcase student work and get your name out there as an influence on student achievement.
ReplyDeleteI like the idea of combining the website with a blog. I also think there are many people in the field that do not have the technology experience to do some of these things. I have sat with teachers for hours to help them with creating a blog for their classroom and we already have the template. But, I do think that it is our responsibility as media specialists to have our name out there and information about the media center on the web.
I definitely think that the school media center needs a webpage that provides basic information and links to the online catalog and online research resources. These resources make the media center available from home 24/7!! I think it would take time, training, and experience to create the webpage as a blog or wiki. The media specialist has to learn to use these tools and then develop them into the website.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading your post, I found a middle school media center that has the basic website required by our county but then the bulk of the resources are on a wiki. Here is the link for both. They are worth looking at.
http://portal.cherokee.k12.ga.us/Schools/rusk-ms/media/Media%20Center/media.aspx
From what I can tell, many of the links on the left side of the website are to the different parts of the wiki. There is also a link to the media specialist's blog.
http://askdrlibrary.wikispaces.com/
A media web page is great to have for several reasons. It can be used as a source to relate important information about books that are useful to teachers. Teachers can express their wants and needs on the web page. Futhermore, they can learn valuable resources on several topic from the media specialist. Parents can also benefit from a webpage.Bookfair information can be on the webpage for the parents to see and view.
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