Google+ and the Hangout feature

When Google+ came out I got quite excited and thought that I might use it instead of Facebook. In particular I thought the Hangout feature might be a really good way of communicating with students - even a group of them at once. Well, I have only a few friends on Google+ and have largely forgotten about it and them..... As for Hangout it's too late now as my students are mostly doing exams. I've missed the boat. Phil Bradley has done several posts here  and here  on Google+ Hangout so that has reminded me of my failure. I wonder if anyone out there has used it for Information Literacy in any way?

LILAC 2012 part 1

This year our annual UK Information Literacy Conference LILAC was in Glasgow. Having been to Glasgow (the former 2nd city of the Empire) twice for conferences already, I knew that this would be a cracker and so it proved. Over 120 of the 350 delegates were international : a great sign of the success of this Conference.
The keynotes Megan Oakleaf (Syracuse University), Lord Puttnam, and Tara Brabazon (University of Ontario, Institute of Technolgy) were all inspiring and so all totally different in style. I shall not attempt to summarise in deatil, but just offer a few comments and try to give  the flavour.

Megan Oakleaf 
believes that we can show evidence of our library impact on studemt learning., correlate library interactions with other student success measures, and define the library's role in achieving strategic institutional goals.

How do we show our value?

What can we do differently?

Could we impact with students before they start?

Here is link to a free version of an article by Megan Oakleaf: "Are They Learning? Are We? Learning Outcomes and the Academic Library." The Library Quarterly, 81 (1), 61-82. http://www.meganoakleaf.info/aretheylearningoakleaf.pdf

Lord David Puttnam
spoke brilliantly (no powerpoints). I remember particularly :

The Far East are well ahead.streaming of video. This  can be done easily seamlessly in education and distance learning.

Voice recognition is going to big.The iPad 3 has voice recognition instilled.

Keyboards will be  less important in future. T

Oracy needs to be in the teachers ' curriculum.This means kids will need to  be better speakers, orators. Importance of social skills.

Compare a surgeon and teacher of 1912 operating now....The surgeon could not begin to cope  but the teacher would ......

If we are just using digital technologies to deliver the  same curriculum then its a waste of possibilities which are there. 

We need to learn about student ways of operating.

 Librarians are part of this imaginative change.

Teachers and librarians are the infantry for change!

Education can provide the means to survive, and provide social security and health systems required.

But our assessment processes are way way behind.

Librarians have a brand issue. It is like a millstone round our neck. The public doesn't understand our role. We are seen as custodians.....treasure keepers.

Companies have the same problems. 

But Dame Lynne Brindley  has succeeded brilliantly with the British Library.

Tara Brabazon

Using some Powerpoints, sound and her usual flambouyant acting style...

She spoke of the need for a Digital Detox. 

Google is like the McDonalds of information management.

We dont put words into Google that we dont know and we are too easily satisfied.

(As I have said so many times : they dont know what they dont know : or with incoming students they often think they do know how to search)

She suggests digital dieting which in practical terms could mean :

Pushing students away from Google toward Google Scholar (YES!!!!)

Reduce their speed pf search by putting in intellectua; obstacles like asking for annotated bibilograhphies.

Reduce use of textbooks.

Improve and widen their vocabulary.

Help them to know what they dont know by using the curriculum. 

More about LILAC in next post.

Google chief's fears for Generation Facebook

The Independent carried an article this week based on comments by Eric Schmidt, chief executive of Google.

"I don't believe society understands what happens when everything is available, knowable and recorded by everyone all the time," he told the Wall Street Journal. "I mean we really have to think about these things as a society."

The weirdest thing he came out was " a stark warning over the amount of personal data people leave on the internet and suggested that many of them will be forced one day to change their names in order to escape their cyber past."
Bet the Passport Office and ID Card development staff are not too keen on this...

Ever wondered how Google searches?

Dan Nosovich has come up with an interesting infograph of how Google maybe works based on clues. He says "Google search really is amazing, and it's even more amazing that this entire flowchart (which is just a basic overlook) all happens in milliseconds."

Out Google Your Students!

Here is a short presentation given by Dean Giustini recently to some education students at University of British Columbia. Contains some really good ideas

Out Google Your Students 2010

View more presentations from Dean Giustini.

and this great handout useful to help us use Google for more than a search engine!

Google 2.0 For Librarians

View more documents from Dean Giustini.

Google Search Tricks and more

I'm always on the look out for ways of helping students to get the best out of Google. I came across this rather whizzy tool by Tony Vincent using software called Prezi. I like it.

Google Search Tricks on Prezi

Researchers of Tomorrow (who use Google)

Here is the summary report about the interim findings of the first year of the Researchers of Tomorrow (British Library/JISC) study. A survey went out earlier this year and over 6500 doctoral students replied. Here is are some findings:

• Time pressures are a significant constraint for most respondents, both full-time and part‐time.

• More Generation Y than older scholars are likely to be working from officespace, laboratory or studio in their own institution, rather than working from their own home.
  

• • About half of the respondents have been usefully trained in, for instance, finding and using subject‐based bibliographical and journal resources, andfinding research resources beyond their own institution.
  

• Far fewer respondents, however, have received any training in using more advanced technology‐based research resources and tools such as research methods, finding and using online datasets or working in virtualresearch environments.
  

• Only a small proportion of respondents in any age group say they use ‘emergent technology’ (e.g. Web 2.0 applications) in their research, although those that do generally find it valuable.

• In a snapshot of information‐seeking and research activity, the majority of doctoral students were looking for text‐based and secondary, published research resources, rather than primary research resources (e.g. data to analyse or original manuscript sources).
  

• Google and Google Scholar are dominant as the main source used by doctoral students of all ages to find the information they require.

It's an important report and well worth following up. I was disappointed to see the low use of Web 2.0. Here is an opening for librarians to assist - showing that Web 2.0 can assist with result retrieval and saving time.

Al and Pete's Search Tips

Finally got round to putting three videos I made here with my friend and colleague Alan Bullimore here at University of Bedfordshire on YouTube, with the help of our Learning Technology department.

They are all short and are intended to get students to contrast journals with magazines ; Google with databases ; and newspaper tabloids with broadsheets. Very happy for anyone to use if they feel the urge!
Maybe we should make some more one day but right now I'm going on vacation very soon!

Google Scholar and Wikipedia as pre-search

Found out about this post via Twitter! Dean Giustini, the health librarian from UBC, Vancouver, posted in his blog The Search Principle :

"Use pre-search tools to orient yourself, to browse, ask questions and get acquainted with topics. Who are the leading authors in a given field? What articles are seminal? Pre-search as a concept is also applicable to Wikipedia. Think of mother Google this way (i.e. presearch) as well."

Dean is an expert on Google Scholar so I think this short post is worth a glance.

Googling not green?

The Sunday Times January 11, 2009

Revealed: the environmental impact of Google searches
Physicist Alex Wissner-Gross says that performing two Google searches uses up as much energy as boiling the kettle for a cup of tea

"John Buckley, managing director of carbonfootprint.com, a British environmental consultancy, puts the CO2 emissions of a Google search at between 1g and 10g, depending on whether you have to start your PC or not. Simply running a PC generates between 40g and 80g per hour, he says. of CO2 Chris Goodall, author of Ten Technologies to Save the Planet, estimates the carbon emissions of a Google search at 7g to 10g (assuming 15 minutes’ computer use).

Nicholas Carr, author of The Big Switch, Rewiring the World, has calculated that maintaining a character (known as an avatar) in the Second Life virtual reality game, requires 1,752 kilowatt hours of electricity per year. That is almost as much used by the average Brazilian.

"

http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/article5489134.ece

Using Google My Maps

Mikael Jacobsen writes in the Library Journal (16/10/08) "Librarians use online mapping services such as Google Maps, MapQuest, Yahoo Maps and others to check traffic conditions, find local businesses, and provide directions. However, few libraries are using one of Google Maps most outstanding applications, My Maps, for the creation of enhanced and interactive multimedia maps. My Maps is a simple and free means of adding valuable content to any library web site." Article tells about innovative uses of My Maps at Franklin County Public Library.

Thre is also an interesting screencast tutorial.

Is Hakia the answer?

The search engine Hakia has been around a few years but only now has it become developed enough for serious consideration. It claims to be the Semantic search engine dedicated to quality.
"Today's search engines bring popular results via statistical ranking methods. Popular results are not always quality results, and the searchers suffer in many ways ranging from wasted search time to using misleading information."
Results on Hakia are based on sentence analysis rather than keywords (e.g. Google). You can enter a question, phrase or keywords.
On Sept.22, 2008 – Hakia put out "an open call to librarians and information professionals to participate in a new program to unlock credible and free Web resources to Web searchers.
Librarians and information professionals can suggest URLs leading to the most credible Websites on a given topic. Hakia will process the sites with its proprietary QDEX (Query Detection and Extraction) technology and make them available to Web searchers in credibility-stamped search results. Each month hakia will give away thank-you prizes, ranging from a book donation to two conference grants, to participants. "

Haven't had time to try it out much, but initial impression is that it's an interesting alternative to Google, especially as accoona has just folded. Could it be used with students on topics getting them to search Google and hakia and comparing their results? Maybe I'll try that.

Walk with Google Maps

Recently I had a week in Dorset walking : hot, beautiful, but 6 miles in Dorset feel like 14 miles anywhere else, because it's up and down and twisty. Now I shall be able to take advantage of Google Maps latest beta : walking directions. I've had a quick look for my own town and it works pretty well. This could be nifty for getting students round our convoluted campuses one day : especially when they manage to make this available on the new iPhone. It'll come...

Is Google making us stupid?

Nicholas Carr begins his thought-provoking article by reminding us of the touching scene in Stanley Kubrick's file "2001" where HAL (the super computer) is gradually unplugged by the hero, and blurts "Dave, my mind is going, I can feel it. I can feel it".
Is something of the same happening to us today? Have we forgotten how to read? We know for instance from the CIBER report, that students power browse (and so do I).
The article is a good read, but teachers of reading (and librarians) will know that there has always been different types of reading (e.g. skimming). As they say "we need more research" to convince us that the Google generation not only doesn't read but can't read. Comments???