Sunday, December 13, 2009

#23 Is this really the end? Or just the beginning ...

The 23 Things has been a great hands-on learning experience. Not only did I learn how to use a variety of online tools, I had fun with each discovery exercise. Some of my favorites, I am still using. I am on Zoho Writer right now, and a colleague and I are already using Zoho to share documents for an upcoming project. The only suggestion that I have is that some of the links for resources to learn more about a particular "thing" are not active. Some of those I would have really liked to explore. Along with Zoho, some of my favorite discoveries were LibraryThing, Rollyo, and the Web 2.0-based articles.

This program has affected my lifelong learning in the sense that I believe to be a great librarian, one must be a consistently active lifelong learner. Whether you are able to gain this knowledge from your employer, or spend your own time to keep your finger on the pulse of technology and how it relates to libraries, lifelong learning is an essential component of library professionals.

Overall, I have a much stronger sense of the power of Internet tools and related technology, and how this can be used to enhance patron services. Technology will be at the forefront of change in libraries; both libraries and technology continue to change in ways that were not possible less than 20 years ago. And it is the 21st century librarian who will decide on how to integrate technology, and take an active role in choosing technological services and educating patrons on how to use them.

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