Thing 15: Web Presence

Happy Mother's Day to all the Mom's out there!

I found this to be a very interesting topic because it is an area I've been looking to develop on my school library's website.  For the learning activity I decided to examine my current website and develop a plan for improvement.  I am embarrassed to say that my current website is very simple - I have my mission statement, my library catalog link, search page link and an old shelfari bookshelf that I added several years ago.  The library page is part of our school's website but each of the librarians have the ability to maintain the content individually.  Unfortunately, there never seems to be enough time to work on this because I have been concentrating on developing my curriculum and updating my book collection.  My goal is to really focus on this during the upcoming summer months so that it will be ready for the 2016/17 school year.

I looked at several of the school websites and I liked the idea of including a blog link/window on the main page.  Up until this year I had a blog for the students to discuss their books and I think it would be great to include something like that to get the kids talking about what they read.  It would also be a good place to keep parents/students up to date with current events.  The website from Bay Farm Elementary School (http://bayfarm.alamedausd.ca.schoolloop.com/cms/page_view?d=x&piid=&vpid=1228578949304) was very nice if a little cluttered for what I want.  I liked the slideshow of what the kids are working on - of course it's an area where we must make sure to stay on top of the no picture list on file in the main office.  For me, I would like to show finished projects, kids hands while they are working and the two clubs that I work with after school. I would also like to create a spot for patrons to request items from ILL outside of the Destiny catalog and to suggest the purchase of new titles.  I read through the 7 Best Practices for Creating a User Friendly Website and Developing your library website - both of which had a lot of great ideas to focus on.

In grad school we focused on websites and it's nice to see that our professor's lessons reflected the same ideas presented here - limit the amount of information on the page and organize it logically.  The part I'm missing is the adding current content and it is really important that I work on this year.  My first step will be to contact our technology team to see if there is any type of guide that I can use to learn how to update my page and add potential areas for a blog and pictures.  After doing that I'll create the new page and then ask several of my teachers to take a look at the page to "test" it to make sure it is user friendly.  This will also encourage them to become more familiar with the page and all of the resources that are linked to the pages.  I will also ask some students - probably my daughters and their friends to experiment with the page as well.  If all goes well it should be up and running in September.  It would also be beneficial to work with my fellow librarians to see what they are doing on their pages and collaborate on ways to improve all of the pages to keep them current.

During the lesson I really focused on the blogging tools as a way to post news and updates.  Since our school maintains a school based website I am really not that interested in reinventing the wheel by creating another website.  I did however look at all of the schools listed and enjoyed seeing what other schools are doing.

I also explored the Google Sites area but did not spend too much time on is due to the fact that we are not a Google Apps for Education School.  LibGuides was interesting as well but I do not have the budget at this time to add this.  I will contact my SLS office as suggested to see if we have access to it from them.

The portfolio section was very interesting because we just had a conversation about advocacy at a department meeting.  Due to the current financial situations in most schools we as librarians are often thought of when personnel cuts are considered.  Using a portfolio could be a very good way to share what we do to the community at large - to show them that we do more than checking out books.  I will be sharing this with my colleagues at our next meeting.

I also looked at Smore - this was terrific! I started creating a newsletter for my student's families in Word this year and printing it off to send home.  I like this tool because it looks so much easier to maintain and it has a lot of cool templates.  I also would like to add a link to my new and improved website keeping these on file so parents could check them for information.

In exploring this topic I am really convinced that it is extremely important to create a web presence not only for our library but also for ourselves.  We need to advocate for the program and in some cases our jobs to show all of the wonderful work we do.  We have to let the "outside" world know that libraries are need to be a part of our schools - all grade levels and that we need to have a certified librarian in there to teach our students.  I have recently heard from several people that they are surprised by what we do in library class these days - they only remember being read books and taking out books each class.  As a profession we need to let everyone know what we do and how it is beneficial for each student to be in a school with a certified librarian.  Creating and linking a professional portfolio to a school website reinforces that we are professionals - not just the "keeper of the books."