Concluding Remarks

I'm done? Really? And I'm only a little bit late? Yippee!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Seriously, though, I really appreciated this assignment--especially now that it's done. It forced me to learn things that I most likely never would have heard of without an assignment telling me to learn about it. Technorati? Rollyo? Who knew?! I am so glad that I finished the assignment and was able to add all of these tools to my toolbelt. I even had a lot of fun along the way! If I had to pick two things that I learned that I'm most grateful for learning about (and that I didn't know about before), they would be LibraryThing and Technorati...I think. (It's difficult to choose!)

If I had one thing I would change about the assignment, it would just be a berating get-your-attention yell to myself: DON'T PROCRASTINATE! You'll enjoy this so much more if you can take your time to learn these things. Oh, well. Maybe next time....or the next.... ;)

Wicked Wordle

Podcast Parties

The podcast that I listened to can be found at the following URL:

http://www.hopkintonschools.org/hhs/library/podcasts/Graveyard.mp3

It is kind of a book talk about Neil Gaiman's The Graveyard Book, which in and of itself is great, but this podcast offers so much more! It is part of a series of podcasts a middle school/high school librarian puts out each year to inform her students about books they can vote for as favorites in their state of New Hampshire. What's really cool is that at the beginning of the podcast, the librarian explains the award the books she talks about are competing for, and it's an award that was actually started by students and public schools!

I really enjoyed this podcast for a few reasons. First of all, I think it makes things interesting. Some students could get bored by simply listening to someone talking without any visual stimulation, but this librarian makes it difficult to be bored! There are wonderful sound effects and music, and everyone who talks in the podcast has great animation. I also love the fact that this librarian uses podcasts to get as many people (especially students) in her community involved in the voting for the award as possible. I'll definitely have to check up on her future podcasts!