Thursday, July 16, 2009

Thing # 8: RSS Feeds

This was a relatively easy thing to accomplish. I will come back at the end to make my reader list public if I have time after Thing # 23. I subscribed to the following: Librarian Philosopher, A Library by Any Other Name, Practical Theory, Meriwether Lewis Elementary School, and Mike Falick's Blog. I took a nap after subscribing and when I came back there were dozens of hits for almost every one of the items I had subscribed to.

What I like about the RSS reader I used, Google reader, is how simple it was to subscribe and get the information right away. Setting up the account was already done from previous things I'd done on Library2Play. And I didn't have to go searching each site. That really does save so much time. Young and old will get so much use out of a reader.

In my personal life, there are always things I am "currently" interested in. So, I can set my subscriptions to the sites that are pertinent to my current interests. In my library or classroom, I can again set subscriptions that will bring me others' teaching ideas or ideas to implement in the library. It is similar to tlc which goes to my e-mail, except that this info will go to my Google reader account. I already like TLC, so I know I'll like using the reader this way.

Libraries can take advantage of this new technology by setting the reader to get ideas for the library- how to select resources, how to organize the library, how to manage the library, how to discipline students in the library, etc. Teachers can subscribe to things that will bring them information about how to teach their particular grade and subjects. Or how to discipline students would be helpful for them also. Administrators I am sure can find sites to subscribe to that will be pertinent to following the laws in a school, getting student scores up, and managing a school. All topics related to running a school I am sure are covered by numerous sites that they could subscribe to. In their spare time, all they'd have to do is switch on the computer and read things they know are geared toward their interests. What a timesaver!

2 comments:

  1. when you include blogs or websites in a post, you should make them hot links for the benefit of your readers who will want to visit the information you recommend.

    To hot link:
    highlight the words you want to emphasize.
    go to the little chain icon on the post box toolbar
    paste the url and click ok

    ReplyDelete
  2. VWB,
    Thanks for those directions. I did use them later on in my postings.

    ReplyDelete