Sunday, January 4, 2015

Thing 22: Create A Resource Guide

This was a fun assignment to end my winter break with!  That said, I fear I may have missed part of the point here.  The assignment overview alluded to the fact that we all in the Library trade tend to make lots of resource guides for our patrons - and I am certainly no exception to that assumption.  However, I am an exception, I guess, in my adamant unwillingness to make curating resource lists a full-time side job.  I absolutely refuse to upload apps to my tablet to add more material and update existing material "on the go" because I frankly already do enough gratis work from home just to stay caught up with the nuts and bolts of my supposedly "part-time" library job.  I hope you don't think this makes me a bad person.  I just have to draw the line somewhere - and here it is.

That said, let me first talk about some of the resource lists I already create.  I maintain an up-to-date web site for my library and all of my classes, with pages designed for students, teachers, administrators, and parents.  Embedded on various pages of my site are a variety of resource lists - including updated class syllabi, resource guides for specific library research projects, general reference resource links for use at home and in school, Common Core resources, etc. Here's my web site if you're interested.  I also rely heavily on NoodleTools in my teaching, and likewise, I always embed resource lists in the projects my students are working on, so they can have easy access to the materials they need right there with no further tabs than are necessary.  Finally, I love making pathfinders in OPALS, my online catalog, that I can populate with links, resources, and documents.  And lastly, I always keep my web links in OPALS updated, too, so students can get to our databases and other resources from one centralized location.  Check Out My Catalog. 

And that right there is the key to my stubborn refusal to subject my poor overloaded students, faculty, and administrators to any more Resource Guides than are absolutely necessary.  As the professional literature indicates, we librarians make all kinds of FABULOUS resource lists and guides, but the plain truth is that hardly anyone ever really uses them outside of structured assignments and lessons (Barbara Stripling, "Inquiry Through the Eyes of Classroom Teachers").  And I have personally found that students, teachers, administrators, and parents alike all appreciate having information streamlined for them - meaning less is more - WAY more.  It is much better to put your information in one location whenever possible.  It makes things less confusing and easier both for the user and administrator - in my opinion anyway.

So for the sake of this assignment, I did follow the steps and I did go ahead and create one more resource guide.  My administrator had asked me to put something together for February's Black History Celebration.  Ordinarily, I would have posted my resource list in one of the locations described above - either my webpage or OPALS, but instead, I went ahead and joined Diigo and compiled my sources there, and just linked the page to my usual locations.  I like Diigo a lot and thought it was very easy to use, and I like how participants in the group can all share ideas and post information as a collective.  I can see that is a drawback to my existing resource guides on my web site and in OPALS.  Despite that, though, I still would prefer to compile my resources in fewer locations to make access easier for my audience.

But here it is - Ms. Fecura's Guide to Resources for Black History Month ~ enjoy!

My Resource Guide.



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