The sun has taken its leave of us, but I must say that as a first time visitor, I’m enjoying seeing Seattle in both rainy and sunny weather. Saturday was another full day, though I’ve felt less pressured than at some other conferences, because I know that much that can be re-visited later on the virtual conference site.

I camped out in the Cyber Zed Shed for a good portion of the day where there were several widget-related presentations (Sprout, Library Subject Guide Widgets, Online Info Lit Tool) that focused on portability, flexibility, and customization. In my opinion, this is definitely where libraries are headed.

I also attended a panel session, Mapping Your Path to the Mountaintop: Planning Where You Want To Be In Your Career which was moderated by Steven Bell. It was informative and inspiring and included input from the audience too. If you missed this one, I highly recommend that you check out the recorded version.

I had dinner at Dragonfish (tasty!) before grabbing a shuttle back to SeaTac for my flight out Saturday night. I will leave Seattle with a lot to think about. And really, the conference is not over, because there are several things I missed or want to review on the virtual conference site. I hoping some of the conversations will continue too.

Session Description:
There is a lot of talk about information literacy, but librarians usually interpret that to mean critical thinking about articles, books, and web pages. But what about data? What skills should reference and social science librarians be expected to have with understanding and interpreting data? We will review core statistical concepts and sources for demographic, economic, and general social science data. We’ll end with a game of jeopardy to see what you learned!

Benefits/Objectives:

• Attendees will be able to better analyze and interpret questions involving statistics.
• Attendees will be familiar with some of the core statistical sources for demographics, economics, and general social science.
• Attendees will learn about methods of teaching statistical concepts in an engaging and interactive manner.

Presenters:
Steve Cramer, UNC Greensboro, Greensboro, NC, United States
Lydia Leovic Towery, Public Library of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County, Charlotte, NC, United States

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Session Description:
Research guides have been part of the librarian’s arsenal for decades. Migrating from print to online, these widely-used tools have changed drastically from their earliest incarnations. But many questions about these guides and their effectiveness have persisted over time. Librarians at two academic libraries will tell how they use LibGuides, a research guide management system, together with student feedback, to answer those questions and move research guides into the era of Library 2.0 and beyond.

Benefits/Objectives:

• Gain an understanding of the evolution of subject guides and how they are changing to meet the needs of today’s students
• Learn how to critically examine the limitations and opportunities of both LibGuides and the technology you use for your own subject guides
• Become familiar with various usability testing techniques and what they can tell us in order to assess and improve your own guides

Presenters:
Laura Harris, Grand Valley State University, Allendale, MI, United States
Maura Seale, Georgetown University, Washington, DC, United States
Ken Liss, Boston College, Chestnut Hill, MA, United States
Emily Frigo, Grand Valley State University, Grand Rapids, MI, United States

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Session Description:
Faced with large scale instruction demands, librarians are turning to technology to maximize staff resources and extend the impact of instruction. In this session, participants will learn how to translate classroom instructional content into learning objects in order to make learning available to multiple users on the go. The panelists will engage the audience in a series of presentations, demonstrations, interactive tasks, and discussion in order to learn how to create effective learning objects.

Benefits/Objectives:

• Participants will identify common core learning objectives in order to pinpoint topics for learning object development.
• Participants will use a mindmapping tool in order to learn how to storyboard a learning object.
• Participants will identify and discuss the challenges in large scale information literacy instruction in order to propose solutions to help them overcome the barriers.

Presenters:
Judith Arnold, Wayne State University, Detroit, MI, United States
Veronica Bielat, Wayne State University, Detroit, MI, United States

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Session Description:
User-Centered Design is a methodology whose theme is that the human user is central to the design of a product or service. The qualitative and quantitative techniques used to gather information about users are important tools for librarians to better understand and serve their constituents. In this workshop, participants are introduced to User-Centered Design concepts, and engage in a set of fast-paced, structured exercises to give them experience in first hand data collection and discussion.
Benefits/Objectives:

• Understand the fundamental concepts of User-Centered Design in order to be familiar with this methodology and how it can be used in a library setting;

• Practice several concrete data collection techniques (qualitative and quantitative) in order to gain first-hand experience as both subject and investigator
• Consider the application of User-Centered techniques in order to improve understanding of library users from a personal as well as an organizational point of view

Presenters:
Erika Rogers, ChezVous Technology, Los Osos, CA, United States

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Session Description:
Got a great idea for a digital project, but just don’t know how to get started? This session introduces both novices and experts to action planning for digital projects with a particular emphasis on integrating emerging social networking technologies such as blogs, mash-ups, and widgets into digital projects. Participants will understand the differences between emerging technologies, follow an action-planning process for digital projects, and gain confidence to turn a great idea into an actionable project.

Benefits/Objectives:

• Participants will learn the difference between emerging technologies (widgets) and their uses
• Participants will learn how to follow an action-planning process to turn ideas into actionable goals and objectives
• Participants will gain the confidence to plan a digital project that integrates emerging social networking technologies and tools

Presenters:
Ira Revels, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, United States

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Session Description:
This workshop will help librarians establish solid instructional structures for incorporating multimedia technology into classroom activities, projects, and information literacy curricula. While addressing various elements that impact and influence the effective integration of multimedia in the classroom, attendees will apply what they are learning through a variety of active learning exercises and walk away with the beginning stages of an activity, project, or assignment.

Benefits/Objectives:

• Identify various types of multimedia technologies in order to better assess appropriate technologies for use in the learning environment.
• Implement effective instructional principles in order to create sound instructional activities and projects for students.
• Develop a scaffold for instructional activities and projects in order to address potential barriers that hinder effective instruction.

Presenters:
Jennifer Sharkey, Purdue University Libraries, West Lafayette, IN, United States
Catherine Fraser Riehle, Purdue University Libraries, West Lafayette, IN, United States

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Session Description:
The Knowledge Base and Related Tools (KBART) project is a joint UKSG/NISO undertaking, designed to define best practices for transferring data among and between participants in the e-resource supply chain, including librarians, publishers, ERAMS vendors, aggregators, and consortia. This session will present the project’s work, and highlight its benefits to library patrons. In addition, the presenter, a born- and bred-Seattleite, will provide his recommendations for the best sites worth visiting while in Seattle.

Benefits/Objectives:

• Learn about and understand a recently-completed best-practices project for data transfer
• Apply tools to improve the accuracy of metadata from content providers
• Learn the REAL best coffee shops in Seattle; find the best ways to see the best parts of the city

Presenters:
Peter McCracken, Serials Solutions, Seattle, WA, United States

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DYNAMIC SCREEN CAPTURE - KBART: Improving Access to Electronic Resources; plus, Finding the Hidden Side of Seattle

Dynamic screen capture directions: Click on the name of the file and then save the zip file to your computer. Once the file is saved, unzip it and click on the QuickTime file to play.

Session Description:
“”Post-literacy”" is the phrase used to capture the possibility of rich human communication that exceeds (and hence replaces) visible language (writing and reading) as the dominant means of for understanding and exchange of ideas. Post-literacy, as explored in this presentation, is not a decline from literacy into some new dark age but rather the beginning of a transformational capacity as yet unimagined. Not for the faint of heart.

Benefits/Objectives:

• Understanding ourselves better as literate beings
• Speculating on the future of human communication
• Exploring a new and exciting and perhaps dangerous idea

Presenters:
Michael Ridley, University of Guelph, Guelph, ON, Canada

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Session Description:
The Program discusses the experience of creating unique online collections, learning CONTENTdm digital collection management software and its applications. The presentation will provide examples of the existing collections online with demonstration of the metadata schemes and thesaurus instruments by the collection creators. The attendees will hear about first hand experiences in application of digital technologies and discover new opportunities for broader digitization of their own libraries information resources.

Benefits/Objectives:
1:) Become acquainted with the main features and characteristics of the digital collections software as one of the emerging modes of the information delivery.

2:) Acquire knowledge about implementation of new digitization concepts for organizing, management, presentation and delivery of information in online collections.

3:) Evaluate the possibilities of using content management tools for development of online collections of the attendees library resources.

Presenters:
Jennifer Lafleur, University of North Texas, College of Information, Library Science & Technologies, Denton, TX, United States
Elena Vassilieva, College of Information, Library Science and Technologies, University of North Texas, Denton, TX, United States

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