Auckland Libraries Web 2.0 Staff Training Programme Thursday, Dec 11 2008

National Digital Forum 2008 Conference Report Back, Number: 3

 Building staff capacity with web 2.0 training programme: Presented by Jayne Guntry of Auckland City Libraries

 One of the workshops I attended was a report on the 2.0 learn through play self-paced online training programme run by Auckland City Libraries. (A few of you will be familiar with this programme having done The ‘23′ or ‘43 things’ in September). Jayne discussed how they ran the training programme and how they encouraged staff to participate in and successfully complete it.

The programme ran for 12 weeks and staff had a specific topic to work through each week such as learning to use social networking sites like Facebook, setting up a blog, exploring Flickr ,or downloading a podcast..

They encouraged participation in the programme by offering incentives and rewards. Staff who successfully completed the programme were given an MP3 player each.  Positive peer pressure and competition were also used to motivate staff.  A tracking log was kept of all the participants and when a task was completed it was marked off on the log. The log tracked how much of the programme each staff member had completed and how much more they had to do to get to their free MP3 player.

They also had graphs which showed what percentage of staff from each branch had joined the programme, so staff could compete with the staff at the other branches.

Staff in the programme were offered support in the form of an administrator who checked the blogs each day and commented on the blogs and encouraged participants. Tutorials were also offered at the beginning of the programme to staff who wanted help and staff were given time at work to complete the tasks, or they could choose to do them at home with their families.

The programme was very successful with high staff participation and completion rates. One of the things they discovered from running the programme was that staff received the most out of it when they could apply what they were learning in the programme to their daily work.

e.g. instead of having favorites set up on your computer you can have a de.lic.ious account, or a wiki or blog for your team,the children’s department could have a page with links to relevant webpages, you tube videos of other children’s programmes, etc, RSS feeds on children’s related issues.

More Information about the Programme is available from the programmes blog:

http://elgar-acllearn-about.blogspot.com/

If you are interested in learning about web 2.0 tools Auckland City Libraries offer a series of eight free online tutorials (for the general public) from their website:

 http://www.aucklandcitylibraries.com/aboutthelibraries/services/Computer-classes/newontheweb.aspx

 Louise

4 Responses »

 

National Digital Forum 2008 Conference Report Back: Part 2 Thursday, Dec 4 2008

Part 2: Telling our stories

I attended two local history project demonstrations, including this one presented by Vanessa James from the Coromandel:

  ”Every Community has a memory of itself”

Coromandel Community Digital storytelling Project

http://www.harakeke.co.nz/DST_CCDSP_index.html

The Coromandel Community Digital Storytelling Project aims to “record, preserve, and share the history and stories of the Coromandel community using Digital Storytelling” and the impetus of the project is to capture and preserve the memories and essence of the Coromandel before it’s too late.

although the project only started in January, seventy stories have already been added to the collection. The stories are short personal ‘documentary style’ digital films and are shared with the community at free public screenings, as well as being  available on their webpage.

 

The stories are created during two-day workshops facilitated by library staff and held around the community using portable computers, scanners and printers. The storyteller prepares a written draft of their story (any memory or topic they want) and collect around 20 images, photographs or letters. They then put together a two to five minute story using the portable technology to arrange, scan, edit and record their stories.

 

I particularly liked the ‘photo album’ comparison. When you go through a photo album and look at the photos you get one level of understanding. However if you go through the photo album with the photographer, or someone who was in the photos, they tell you the stories and context around the photos and you have a better comprehension of the events.

 

I highly recommend checking this website out. When you consider the age of some of the storytellers and the fact they put the stories together almost entirely by themselves, it is quite amazing. It’s a fantastic idea and it’s something that would be great to see done in our communities as well.

 

http://www.harakeke.co.nz/DST_CCDSP_index.html

Louise

2 Responses »

 

Report back from NDF 2008 Conference Wednesday, Dec 3 2008

PART 1!

 

A few people have asked me about my experiences at the National Digital Forum (NDF) 2008 Conference in Auckland. I had a fantastic time; the conference was incredibly interesting, motivating and practical. There was so much information and so many useful titbits that I’m not really able to present it to you all in one go. So you’ll have to stay tuned for part 2, 3, 4…..! I will put links and other references in the text, but just email me if you want to know more.

 

The NDF: 

The NDF is a coalition of New Zealand government departments, galleries, libraries, archives and museums with the aim of “working together to enhance electronic access to New Zealand’s culture and heritage.” The focus is on the need to collaborate, co-operate and share knowledge and expertise between the different institutions and organisations, so that we can build a strong national platform and produce quality collections of digital cultural heritage.

 The event: 

Owen G. Glenn Building

The theme for this year’s conference was ‘Creating value in a digital New Zealand’.  The conference was held over a two day period in the enormous Owen G. Glenn Building at the University of Auckland and was attended by over 250 attendees from a wide range of organisations. There were internationally renowned speakers and workshops, forums and demonstrations where presenters and attendees reported back on everything from small community projects to significant National and international initiatives.

 

The content:

 

Let’s start with The Commons on Flickr

 

“The key goals of The Commons on Flickr are to firstly show you hidden treasures in the world’s public photography archives, and secondly to show how your input and knowledge can help make these collections even richer”

 

http://www.flickr.com/commons

 

The first keynote speaker was George Oates, the Senior Program Manager at Flickr and a world renowned web designer.  George’s presentation was fantastic; she started with the ‘genesis’ of Flickr and how and why it has grown to have over 30 million members in just five years. George talked about the Flickr Commons and how institutions such as the Library of Congress are using the Commons to distribute and add value to their digital collections.

 

There were a couple of concepts in George’s speech that were particularly interesting to me. Specifically that we need to “lose control”, to put aside some of our traditional duties and way of doing things and ‘release’ your collections to the viewer. It’s okay to put a digital image or information on a platform like Flickr, with metadata which is incomplete, or which might be inaccurate. Time is limited, staffing is limited, money is limited, you can’t do everything, but your community (be it local or international) will do it for you.

 

On online communities like Flickr viewers can correct the inaccuracies; they can contribute by adding tags, names, dates, locations, context, they can translate the information into another language, they can share it with a friend, they can add their own stories and their personal responses to an image, they can mix it and mash it up to create new works.  In contributing they add value to your collections and broaden the collective knowledge of your community.

 

 

National Library NZ on The Commons

 

The National Library is the first New Zealand institution to join The Commons on Flickr, following the lead of overseas institutions such as The Library of Congress. The aim of putting these collections on Flickr is to “expose the treasures held in these collections, and show how people’s input and knowledge can make these collections even richer”. So have a look, have a play, make a comment:

 

http://www.flickr.com/photos/nationallibrarynz_commons

 

                                                             Louise

2 Responses »