(from the Mental Floss blog: http://www.mentalfloss.com/blogs/archives/11693 )

This video explores the changes in the way we find, store, create, critique, and share information. This video was created as a conversation starter, and works especially well when brainstorming with people about the near future and the skills needed in order to harness, evaluate, and create information effectively.

• with prospective library students, to give a very brief history of the changes in librarian responsibilities,
• with classroom teachers, to show why students need to develop effective information-consumption skills,
• with school administrators and BoE members, to explain why librarians — as information mavens — are still/always needed,
• with… anyone who thinks that kids already know everything about how to ‘find stuff on the interweb.”

Turn strangers into friends.
Turn friends into customers.
And then… do the most important job:
Turn your customers into salespeople.”
—Seth Godin. “Flipping the Funnel” in Small Is the New Big, 2006.
(found via Marylaine Block’s http://marylaine.com/exlibris/xlib306.html )

IOW: you need to support them before they’ll support you.

If you’re at either conference and run into me (literally OR figuratively), please say hello!

In the process, however, we had to pack up her apartment and dispose of whatever wouldn’t fit in the new room.  Here are some lessons I learned from that experience, and plan to apply to my own home:

1. Do not save/stockpile grocery bags and/or plastic containers. They multiply when you are not looking.
2. Label ALL photos, with names, dates, and locations.
3. Weed your closets every year. If you haven’t worn it in a year, get rid of it.
4. Three sets of sheets for each bed is plenty: one in use, one in the laundry, one in the closet.
5. Sample sizes of shampoo, etc., are meant to be used, not hoarded.
6. If it’s broken, get it fixed or throw it out. It won’t self-heal with time.
7. Do not expect charitable organizations to be charitable to you.

 A word to the wise (and weary): stop stockpiling!  You’ll probably never use all that stuff, and it only means more for your kids to have to throw out later on.

Ironically, the video is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License, which must be driving the Disney lawyers nuts, since the Walt Disney Company is extremely protective (to the point of ridiculousness) about allowing anyone (like, say, a library) to use any of their images anywhere (on a program flyer or mural, perhaps) without prior permission and payment. (BTDT, can you tell?)

(found via Gretchen Rubin’s The Happiness Project)

1. Practical: links to useful info and reviews of new resources
2. Philosophical: essays exploring controversial issues and new information technologies
3. Point-of-view: reports of events and happenings in a local library

Examples of those different blog-genres can be found across the biblioblogosphere.
 
School librarians, however, work under very different conditions than public, academic, or corporate librarians.  School librarians are considered educators first, librarians second, and their customer base is a primarlly captive (even occasionally hostage) population in a space that is often co-opted (often on very short notice) for non-library purposes.  
Given those constraints, it’s important to recognize the difference between:

• school librarY blogs, which usually function as a venue for practical and local info, and
• school librarIAN blogs, which are often more philosophical discussions about information literacy and curriculum issues, educational policies and procedures, technology and collection management concerns in the face of limited funding and understanding by administrators, and school politics.

For links to an assortment of school library/librarian blogs, see
http://www.blogwithoutalibrary.net/links/index.php?title=School_libraries
And
http://teacherlibrarianwiki.pbwiki.com/Links%20to%20our%20blogs
 
What are your professional objectives for blogging?
To keep myself current, and to share ideas and issues that tickle my professional and/or personal fancies.
 
How much time do you devote to blogging?

• Keeping up with a wide variety of other professional and special interest blogs via Google Reader: 2 hours per day.
• Managing the AASL blog: 1-2 hours per week
• Maintaining the aliceinfo blog:  varies greatly, but probably averages 3-5 hours per week, depending on what’s happening in my personal life and/or the profession and/or society in general.
  

How does having a professional blog impact your work with students?
N/A, since I’m retired from building-level work.  Now my ‘students’ are adults taking grad courses to prepare for a career in school librarianship, and one of their assignments is to explore the edu/biblioblogosphere for current information and insights.
 
What are the pitfalls for a school librarian to be writing a blog?
Many school librarians can’t even access (much less read) blogs at work, because anything with the word “blog” has been blocked by their district’s filters, so writing a school-based blog may require dealing with all kinds of technological hassles.  School bloggers need to understand that community members may be reading their blog, and thus be circumspect about what they post.
 
How does blogging affect your interaction with nonlibrarian colleagues?
My personal blog reflects my somewhat cynical take on life in general, not just libraries.  It’s just another publication format for sharing my values and reflections of the world around us.
 
What has been the response of your faculty and/or administration to your blog?
N/A:  I’m a free agent these days.  I can — and do — say anything I want.
 
What is the greatest benefit to blogging about school libraries?
Because so many school librarians are running one-person operations, librarY blogs are a fast and flexible way to maintain a virtual presence for your facility.  LibrarIAN blogging combats isolation, offering a way to share ideas and issues with like-minded colleagues without geographic or time constraints.
 
How do you see the evolution of blogging (i.e., the growth of online video) as intersecting with the job of school media professionals?
The Read/Write web is drastically changing the way our world functions.  School librarians are responsible for teaching students how to be effective information consumers and producers. We need to know how to use these new formats and technologies so that we can continue to be effective and vital elements in the educational infrastructure.