Skyscrapers as cultural phenomena- arrival in Chicago

my airplane landing in Sarasota, Florida prior to boarding

The big day is finally here….I kissed my husband and busy Eoin boy at the SRQ airport curb and  flew off to  Chicago Midway @11.21am, Sunsay, July 12th, 2009……With the one hour time difference. I landed  @ 1pm local time.  It was a fairly pleasant flight, allowing me to get through another YA novel, Dear Julia by Amy Zemser.  The only complaint I have was the foul language of the two  teens seated behind me……language which I will not replicate in this posting.  My other gripe is the use of the phraseology ” were you at?”  When did it become acceptable in modern day society to end a sentence in a preposition?  Any how, that is another matter for another day…..

The University  Center is very easy to locate,   the orange line  of the elevated

Chicago Public Library's Owl Gargoyles

train ( commonly known as the “L”) from Midway airport to ….get this…the LIBRARY….yes,  if there was ever a signal of  good karma in this world, this would be it. The University Center, the place where many of my fellow NEH   grant recipients are staying is kitty corner to the main branch of the Chicago Public library.   More about this build latter this week.  from a quick cursory look, I love the  simplicity of the outside terracotta cladding,  though the roof line sits on a series of glass planes.  Each corner is anchored with a  copper oxidized  gargoyle….which look like perching owls…very Hedwig/Harry Potter in theme, though I am sure that is a coincidence.

View of Downtown Chicago, from the "L"

After dumping my luggage in my room,  one of four  private rooms in a quad apartment, I marched off to the Santa Fe building, home of the Chicago Architecture Foundation (CAF) for our 3pm  meeting. The Santa fe building , on Michigan Ave is very historic in itself,  housing   a number of famous architects, including the  company which designed the Dubai Tower….more about this later on in the week. The CAF is locate  across the street from the Art Institute of Art and the water front park.  We are right downtown in the middle of everything.

After a quiet meet and greet,   we  listened to an opening lecture  delivered by Greg Dreicer, an architectural conservator. Today’s theme is “Skyscrapers as cultural phenomena”.   Mr. Dreicer  challenged us to  question how we see skyscrapers, to look at invention, context and construction of the buildings before us.   Skyscrapers tell us about us….how people live, work and play. He defines skyscrapers not by a definitive height or number of stories, but as a tall building, with a skeleton and self supporting walls. Buildings are always  changing, : interior design and materials and lay out; accommodating new technologies.

While architecture is a large field of study, we will be looking primarily at skyscrapers build between 1880 to 1920 as a historical building used in a commercial fashion.

From there, our group walked over to  the Fisher building on   State Street South, next to the library.  We read Carl Sandburg’s famous Skyscraper poem, written when he lived  about 40 blocks away from were we stood.  Presumably the Fisher build gave Sandburg inspiration as the it was constructed in the late 1880s  and was in place when he lived in the town at the time.

Currently, the Fisher building has been converted from a commercial building to a residential  condo complex.  Yet, the exterior remains attractive and intriguing. As a brownish orange terracotta cladding,  a number of animals, mythical dragons, frogs, sea shells can be found in the exterior decorative sculpture near the  door frames, the bay window frames and  under the roof line.

Sear's Tower from the sidewalk

From there, we walked to the Sears tower,  know known as the Willis tower to  travel to the 103 floor.  This tower , build in the early 1970s, was once the tallest building in the  world. Housing  the Sear’s Roebuck corporations head quarters, after  16 years,  sold their building for 1 billion dollars and moved to the outskirts of  Chicago, Hoffman Estates.  This move was an attempt to increase efficiency in a company struggling during the mid 80s recession.

While I do not relish in experience high places, I was a tad nervous about  reaching the 103 floor.  A quick elevator ride  was pleasant, yet crowded during the  busy summer tourist season.  I will admit to being fearful of  heights,   though felt  a tad bit sway-ish.  I even  was able to look out on the glass platforms, which had been opened only two weeks prior.  The weather was sunny and clear, 75 degrees. Thus a clear  view of the city and its  buildings and the lake beyond stretch for miles from our windows  of the 103 floor.  Some days, it is possible to  have a clear view to 500 miles away.

By 8pm, we were dismissed to go for supper.  Many other participants made dinner plans, I , tired, choose to go back to my room, grab a bite to take back to my room to begin this blog. And to sleep amongst the skyscrapers.

 

Everywhere is here? ….the digital library

What is a library when ‘everywhere is here’?

What is the role of the public library  when digital inforamtion is so readily accessiable  everywhere. How should traditional spaces of information change for a digital world?  Could the future of the library be an urban information bar?

as suggested by Rosie Sasso

 

Web 2.0: why should I embrace this?

Why  should teachers and librarians bother to become involved in social networking outlets?

Technologies and trends come and go. (Any one remember BETA video?) We are invested  learning new things, and we’ve outlived  what turned out to be transitional technologies and in many cases  passing fads.

So why should educators who work with children jump on the electronic  bandwagon now by establishing accounts with  Facebook, Wikis, Blogging, YouTube, Twitter, Second Life,  Vodpod,  and so on?  If they are the current  fad, won’t it be over soon and moved on to something else?

Most likely. This is the nature of  automated technology, the newest thing, often is outdated within 6 months.   Certainly, in the case of specific communities and software applications. However,  we should get involved nonetheless.

In a David Letterman style,  below are five top reasons for getting involved (invested?)  in current tech trends . perhaps it will amount to only learning the basics about it and then only trying it once.

5.   It is helpful to  build your confidence to learn something new and experiment.  Feed off of your own success!

4. Some of these fads are likely to “stick” in one way or another.  Or at the very  least elements of what we have learned today will live on in new incarnations tommorrow. When that happens, we’ll be ready to integrate these   elements more effectively because we’re already familiar with them.

3. You will build a knowledge base and transferable skills to be used when the next “thing” comes around.  It will be much easier to learn a completely new technology  when it  arrives  if you already have a skill set developed  and in place to use another interface. (Reiterating  point # 5 …build confidence.)

2. You can engage in intelligent conversations with other  professionals about the trends in the  fields of education and information management.

and most importantly…..

1. Ideas often come from unexpected places… and people. The “next big thing” in your library or school  just might be born out of your involvement in what are otherwise passing trends.

From an April 2007  Wiredbiz web article, Tim O’Reilly: Web 2.0 is about controlling data:

At the heart of the discussion is this quote from Tim O’Reilly:One of the big changes at the heart of web 2.0 is the shift from the creation of software artifacts, which is what the PC revolution was about, to the creation of software services. These are services that ultimately, if they are successful, will require competencies of operation, of scale, and the like.

O’reilly also speaks about 2.0 as being about the control of data, not the interfaces,  by saying:

We’re still trying to move people toward really understanding what that new world looks like. I don’t think a lot of people are there. A lot of people still think, “Oh, it’s about social networking. It’s about blogging. It’s about wikis.” I think it’s about the data that’s created by those mechanisms, and the businesses that that data will make possible.

This is the challenge for librarians and educator  libraries to attempt to adapt to a 2.0 world.

When we talk about the challenges of implementing this current technology labelled Web 2.0 ,then consideration needs to be given to what we are really struggling to deal with. Is it the emergence of new technologies  or is it really the uses  to which the technologies are put and the way we define, use, and control information?

Something to ponder on.

 

Badgemaker

As of late, I have been toying with various Web 2.0 tools. So many diverse services
http://bighugelabs.com is a service offering photo reproduction among other services.
The badges are very cool.

 

Social media to use in libraries and classrooms

Web 2.0 tools, or more commonly know as social media can increase  the quality of library/information media  teachings.  I am approaching this article  as a means to better deliver information  during reference questions in a library setting, though  these tools do have an application within the classroom setting.  The intention  of this blog is to better  illustrate the possibilities to our  classroom teachers.  Faculty members throughout the country are  quickly  recognising the  use of these tools to convey information and enhance our students’   understanding of the curriculum being taught.

Below is a list of social media elements  which better explain how we can incorporate these tools in our libraries ( and for teachers in the classrooms) to better deliver information to our students.

1. Promoting Content

Social media tools bring traffic, and they connect with users who aren’t physically able or necessarily willing to come into the library. We already do a lot of passive web advertising on library home pages, and of course some form of virtual reference services is available almost everywhere. We also talk a lot in library school about reaching users, but so often social media doesn’t even make the discussion–being considered by so many as trivial or merely concerned with the banal updates of someone eating a sandwich. But I leave it to you to discern the difference:

Not helpful. But:

If you can cut the noise and spend the time constructing a useful and relevant network of users with whom to share your library’s content (and, as is the case here, reviews of your library’s work), the benefit to your users is palpable. It’s time to start discussing how to effectively using social media, instead of assuming everyone on Twitter has nothing more to offer than THE_REAL_SHAQ.

2. Interviewing

The concept of the journalist’s interview perhaps translates most directly to librarianship into the reference transaction. We are already here as I mentioned briefly above. Services like Ask a Librarian ( a project of the Florida Electronic Library), here in Florida, exist all over North America and being knowledgeable about the social media tools that make a service like that possible is absolutely necessary. Meebo is common and easy enough to figure out on one’s own, perhaps, but what about the many other channels through which reference could take place? Skype, for instance? If one of the challenges of the virtual reference interview is missing out on non-verbal cues from patrons, then what is stopping the library from implementing webcam reference? A unique, personal touch is always good for business.

3. News Gathering and Research

Hello. This seems like a no-brainer, but the challenge I always hear is how can a social media tool like Twitter or Delicious possibly be good for real research? The key to leveraging social media for quality information retrieval is identifying a network of positive and valuable information sharers, not one filled with the noise and minutiae of everyday life. For me, Twitter can be just as powerful an information gathering tool as the most robust RSS feed, but it requires maintenance and diligence to find the right people to listen to. The point is this: diligent and educated use of social media, just as in proprietary database research, can yield fruitful and valuable results.

4. Crowdsourcing

Gaining your users’ perspectives on your initiative can often make or break the success of that program in your library. Social media tools provide unprecedented ways to interact with a large user base with very little effort. Once you have established an online community, be it on Facebook or Twitter or Ning or wherever else your users are, it is not only useful to you, but fun and engaging for them, to be included in the programming process.

5. Publishing with Social Tools

Publishing in the library community is perhaps most often encountered in the academic library community, but this is an applicable point to the field in general as well. As open access publishing gains steam, and the free availability of quality, peer-reviewed articles grows, it will become increasingly important to share these sources via social media, if only to offset that signal-to-noise ratio that we so often lament in our Twitter community. Pushing your openly accessible research out through social media only provides further benefit to those who are following your web presence.

6. Blog and Website Integration

So often I come across library websites that have blogs and even Twitter feeds, but don’t integrate the content into the page thereby forcing users to add another click to see the content. Couple that with yet another two or three to subscribe to the RSS, and we are looking at several unnecessary steps between your patrons and your live content. Learning to integrate social or syndicated content into websites is extremely valuable and there are a number of free tools out there, like feed2js, that will help you to do exactly that. Often times, social media services themselves will even offer pre-made widgets (Facebook and Twitter both do this, for example) that you can place on your home page.

7. Building Community and Rich Content

For me, this point goes beyond the simple signal-to-noise ratio. Community has long been an essential part of the library’s function, and it only follows that your library should be doing everything it can to encourage the growth of its user base, both physical and virtual. And rich content? By providing social media tools and the opportunity for your users to provide commentary and feedback on library programming and services–especially if those comments are acknowledged or even acted upon–is an easy and unbelievably effective way to increase appreciation and support for your organization.

8. Personal Brand

The ability to create an online identity for anything, be it for yourself or your library, provides a way for your users to easily identify and connect with you. Personalization of your web presence is a great thing, and the increased inclusivity it brings is a great boon to prospective employee or library setting.

9. Ethics

There comes a point at which we all have to decide whether we are broadcasting our personal brand, or our professional one, and it is of the utmost importance to encourage all users to access library services, not just those who perceive that they have similar facebook interests.

Encouraging social media use in the library can often feel like pulling teeth because of the intensity of privacy concerns that are at the forefront of many librarian’s thoughts. I represent myself and can be proud of the things that I support on facebook (like Alec Baldwin’s genius on 30 Rock), but I am also aware of what message this sends, and how it might need to change if this were a professional or organizational profile. This is yet another reason why educating  students on responsible and effective social media use is so important. Without an understanding of how to separate personal and professional or public and private identities online, it is far too easy to end up excluding or alienating users that normally could have found a home in your library’s online community. Social media is too exposed, and too exposing, to ignore in our education any longer.

10. Experiment, Experiment, Experiment

This final point is something that I feel is grossly underlooked in our education as librarians today. There are a number of people who are experimenting with social media, but not necessarily due to much encouragement from employers, faculty or practicing librarians. Personal interest can indeed take you far in the world of free social media tools, but having the go-ahead from management can be appreciated.

So: the tools are out there and so are our future users, but it is time to talk about them, together, meaningfully to increase our working knowledge and be able finally to start understanding the benefits of social media in the fields of libraries and education.

as found on http://blog.danielhooker.com/2009/06/23/10-ways-library-schools-should-be-teaching-social-media/

Thank you D. Hooker for your inspiring content.

 

Schwarzenegger: Digital textbooks can save money, improve learning

On June 9, 2009, California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger wrote an op-ed piece for the San Jose Mercury News

“Today, our kids get their information from the internet, downloaded onto their iPods,

and in Twitter feeds to their cell phones. A world of up-to-date information fits easily

into their pockets and onto their computer screens,”

In a move to cut money from a cash strapped state budget,   Schwarzenegger outlines why he has proposed that California schools move to digital textbooks and explore open curriculum resources. These are moves which  are viewed as both saving money as well as promoting in e technologies to stimulate learning in classrooms. Technologies to better meet  student’s aceptable of new technologies.

Gov.  Schwarzenegger cites  California as the home state of software giants, bioscience research pioneers, and first-class university systems.  ”We must do everything we can to untie educators’ hands and free up dollars so that schools can do more with fewer resources.” Digital text books, use of Kindles DX devices,  offer a alternative to  costly traditional textbooks,  as well as preparing  students for the technological demands of the future.

as cited from eSchool news website, Wed June 10, 2009

http://www.eschoolnews.com/news/around-the-web/index.cfm?i=59152

 

One Media Librarian’s Tribute to Micheal Jackson

While his sad death is taking over the media a bit too much,  I do admire this librarian’s  ingenuity  to honor Micheal Jackson.

No, you will not catch me in a repeat perforamance.

 

Kindle as a textbook

Amazon's new Kindle DX. which can hold 3,500 books

The new Kindle DX, Amazon Inc’s  electronic reading device will be released on five American campuses during the Fall of 2009, when students will substitute their textbooks for the Kindle’s new, larger screen that will allow users to highlight, take notes, and scour school libraries.

The Kindle DX will feature  a 9.7-inch screen, compared to the 6-inch screen on the original Kindle as well as a built-in QWERTY keyboard for note taking. The handheld reader will let customers read magazines, newspapers, and textbooks complete with images and graphics. Users also can read PDF files on the Kindle DX–a selling point for faculty members whose courses regularly assign class readings on PDF files.

Officials at colleges and universities that will use the new Kindle device will  track how the Kindle DX affects learning.

“Is this the watershed device of electronic text readers we’ve

been waiting for?” asked Marty Ringle,

chief technology officer at Reed College in Portland, Ore.,

which will give Kindles to students in three courses next fall.

“Or is it a just another evolutionary step on the way to that

revolutionary device? We’ll see if it’s a viable alternative to print media.

“The Kindle DX holds enormous potential to influence the way students learn,”

said Barbara R. Snyder, president of Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland,

another Kindle DX pilot school. “We look forward to seeing how the device affects

the participation of both students and faculty in the educational experience.”

Participating universities are Case Western,  Reed College , Pace University, Arizona State University, and the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business as the first campuses to distribute Kindle DX to students in August when they return for the fall semester.

The Kindle DX–which retails at $489–can store 3,500 books, 2,000 more than its predecessor. There are more than 275,000 electronic books available in Amazon’s Kindle library. Readers also will be able to access international newspapers and magazines and more than 1,500 blogs.

Textbook industry experts said Kindle’s book library would have to grow before educators recommended it over traditional options.

Users can buy books in the Kindle library for as little as $10 apiece, and newspaper subscriptions on Kindle are significantly cheaper. Widespread use of the Kindle DX as a replacement for traditional textbooks could save the average student hundreds, perhaps thousands, of dollars every year. A 2005 Government Accountability Office report showed that the average student at a four-year college spent $900 per year on textbooks.

Reported on May 6th, 2009 As found on http://www.eschoolnews.com/news/top-news/index.cfm?i=58654

cited from Dennis Carter’s article

 

My guilty pleasure … my cook bookshelf

Like many people, I try to read for pleasure during the summer months.  As professional hazard,  I am addicted to books and read and  basically how literacy has become a lifelong learning tool.   Through the many books which pass through my hands, I have travelled to many places and eras in history via my imagination. As a result, I tend to borrow  books from either the local library, or the library in which I am working it at that point in my life.     Could you imagine  what my house would look like it I actually purchased the many books  I read?  My home would be a real life version of Sarah Stewart’s The Library! Yikes!

As I am enjoying Julie and Julia, I find myself scanning my personal book shelf….which is located in my kitchen.  While I purchase very few books  for my own personal ownership,  I do succumb to purchasing cookbooks.  Many wonderful Christmas gifts sit on these shelves calling to me when my busy schedule permits. A number of my students have kindly given me book shoppe gift cards  at Christmas time.  The purchase resulting from these gift cards  are normally cook books.   So many great books have travelled with me over the years, during my many moves motivates by employment and marriage.  While I cannot claim to be on par with Martha Stewart, Bonnie Stern, James Barber,  Julia Child’s, nor Julie Powell, I do find enjoyment in the kitchen when creating a dish.  So many great books which have enhanced our Christmas celebrations.  The Joy of Cooking’s Christmas Cookie book can fall open on the counter to  the gingerbread recipe. (I swear by this recipe… always successful!). The lemon curd bar recipe provides a lovely light zing  option to   the popular chocolate flavorings of the season.

My stay in the state of Vermont has brought a profound appreciation for the quality of King Arthur  Flour company’s flour as well as its award winning cookbooks.  I proudly own the King Arthur Flour Baker’s Companion (2003), The King Arthur Flour Cookie Companion (2004) and the King Arthur Flour Whole Grain Baking (2006). This  company has been around since1790 and produces a both a find quality of flour as well as trustworthy cookbook.

And most importantly, one cookbook on my shelf hold a position of reverence.   Another flour company (with yet another medieval theme) sponsored cookbook The Robin Hood Flour Cook book. While I can remember my mother cooking from this book, I am honored to possess my Grandmother Rivier’s copy of this very book. In Canada, it was a popular manual to cooking for many home makers in the the 50s through to the 70s. So many recipes,  which are not fashionable by today’s nutritional standards,  it is an artifact of my childhood.  Many pages are gritty under my fingers  as I feel flour, egg yolk stains  and other stray kitchen counter ingredients.  All bring back memories  of my childhood, booking with my Grandmother, recipes which taught me  how to measure properly, how to not over beat an egg, how  to cook.

M.F. K. Fisher

As food commentary novels, M.F.K.  Fisher’s The Art of Eating,  How to cook a wolf and Gastronomical Me document Fisher’s  food experiences in France. Much like Child’s, Fisher was an American living in Paris.  Fisher’s writings depict food as not only a personal taste but as a social and emotional force within life. These volumes exist on my shelf as that they transport me to another time and place, where food is viewed a not a means to sustain life, but as an enhancement of one’ s life experiences.

My eyes also stop scanning my cookbook shelf at the Rose Levy Beranbaum series: The Cake Bible (1993), The Pie and Pastry Bible ( 1998)  and more recently , the award winning Bread Bible (2003). Ms. Beranbaum’s first book, The Cake Bible makes for an interesting read.  While it is a cook book, it came about  as part of her Master’s Degree in Home Economics —- wrote her master’s thesis on the effects of sifting on the quality of yellow cake..   As a kitchen chemist extraordinaire , the author  includes lengthy discussions on ingredients and equipment and concludes with a special section on the chemistry of cake baking. I will  confess that my autographed copy of The Pie and Pastry Bible comes off the shelf as a confirmation that , yes, indeed, I can make the need pastry to  fashion my Christmas tourtiere pies. ( Or ‘torture pies’, as my non French Canadian husband calls them). Pastry making is a skill which has eluded me.

In this regard, I can relate to Julie  Powell, author of Julie and Julia .  Her desire to create is great, a motivation to connect to the cookbook author by recreating their recipes.  The journey in which to learn is never perfect, though is a learning process neither the less.  Culinary failures are  still positive learning experiences about cooking as well as herself. Cooking has always given me  a comfort of place. .. of being in my kitchen, of creating, sometimes successfully, other times not.  Much like Julie Powell, I have learned much about myself  though the journey of cooking in my kitchen.  And my cook book shelf is a testament to this journey.

 

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