Transliterate Nation

What do I call this group?

Cecilia — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 18:15:15 +0000

As an almost newly minted YA librarian I made a real mistake today. I was helping out in a program called “Lest we forget” a WW1 history program for grade 10′s and was called upon by my colleagues to showcase our mobile app and website. When I got to the website part I said, “we have developed a teen site” to which I got some snickering. So as not to be embarrassed again I need to know what exactly as a group do you want to be called? I know teen is out so how do you want to be referred to or how do other librarians reference the high school crowd?

The Lexicographer’s Dilemma

Cecilia — Tue, 22 Feb 2011 18:01:39 +0000

I am not an English major nor a person claiming to even be engaged in such matters as English correctness however, I loved this book. Jack Lynch’s, The Lexicographer’s Dilemma, gives the history of why our language is so screwed up and why it is so difficult to master. For someone who has struggled with proper English their entire life I felt justified in my convictions that English is a mess and finally understood how it became that way. For those that are fans of English it gives historical highlights of great achievements in the language from the development of Oxford English and Webster’s dictionaries to grammarians Priestly, Lowth and Murray to Carlin’s profanity busting antics. If your intrigued with understanding the meanings of mobile vulgus, caesar shift or swive or if you just confused about written English like me you may want take a gander at this title. You may also want to throw your hat into the descriptivist or prescriptivist camp, either way, clarity and precision are guaranteed.

Google tips and tricks

Cecilia — Tue, 28 Dec 2010 03:04:03 +0000

I am in the middle of reading Douglas C. Merrill’s, “Getting Organized in the Google Era” and after reading chapter 6 , how to master the art of search I felt compelled to post some of his tips. For those of you who may not know Douglas Merrill, he was the CIO at Google until 2008 and holds a PhD in cognitive science from Princeton. Dyslexia has forced him to discover many successful strategies to filter information which he shares readily throughout the book. What I find the most refreshing about the tech savy Merrill is his stance that technology is a tool and it is up to us to figure out when it is best to use it and when it is not. As we become ever more connected these are words to remember and live by.

Google Shortcuts (you’ll have to read the book for the others)

1) Using a ~ before a word tells Google to look for web pages containing the word and others like it; think of it as a synonyms search

2)Exclude terms with a - (minus); for example “digital camera”-Nikon

3) Search a particular site in Google using site: ; for example “paris hotels” site:nytimes.com

4) Look for a particular filetype on the web; for example “personal budget” filetype:xls also works for pdf, doc and ppt

5) Use IN for conversions; for example 100 euros in dollars or 1 mile in km

6) Use time, weather, define as keywords; for example time paris will give you the current time in Paris, likewise weather paris will give you the weather forecast for Paris. Typing define tempo in a Google search will give you the definition for tempo.

7) My favorite shortcut is finding movie show times; type in Google movie name and your postal code to get local show times; for example harry potter and the deathly hallows L0R 2H3 will bring up the show times at the SilverCity in Burlington, ON.

Leadership

Cecilia — Mon, 20 Dec 2010 15:07:56 +0000

I apologize as it has been a while since my last post. I am now a recently minted “librarian” from UWO and although the piece of paper is behind me the journey is still ahead, securing a librarian position. For those of you that are in between high school and college/university, university and grad school or out of school looking to secure a job we are all in this journey together.

Lately where I work, there has been a lot of talk around leadership. A couple of my colleagues have gone off to leadership summits which they have found very beneficial to their career. So naturally, I decided I needed to explore the subject further; the following ‘advice’ is a compilation of what I have recently read and would like to share with you:

Know thy self. This involves personal discoveries and skills assessment. How do you learn? What is your personal style? Where do your strengths lie? What are some of your challenges? There are numerous tests to determine this; Myers Briggs, Strengthfinder 2.0, True Colours and personal and friend observations can be helpful. Play to your strengths and work on your challenges.
Set some specific goals. Douglas Merrill in Getting organized in the Google Era, chapter 4 provides some guidance on how to do this. I have also seen Gail Vaz Oxalade do this on her numerous shows. Develop a specific goal for yourself with a plan that has time lines with the steps on how you are going to achieve your goal. Identify any constraints or barriers that will hinder you and come up with strategies to overcome them. Visualize yourself achieving this goal (this is what athletes do!)
Anyone has the ability to lead as long as someone will follow. Everyone has at least one skill that someone else in your organization does not; with the right supports anyone can lead a successful project. Lead something that you are passionate about and your passion will become contagious. Share your knowledge, that is the key. As Kitty Pope puts it best on her blog, A true test of a leader is leadership in difficult times.
Find leaders in your field and examine the skills that make them exceptional leaders then work on developing those skills. I recently had to do this and it was very insightful as it gave me direction on what skills I have still to develop. Moreover, ask one of those leaders you admire to mentor you; you won’t know until you ask.
Ask for feedback on each job interview you go on. This will also give you great insight into what skills you still need to develop and work on to land your dream job. Recently I found out that I lacked committee, financial and supervisory experience necessary to progress with my goal. Ask yourself how you can develop these and search for opportunities to do so. The more experiences you have the more you can draw upon those in interviews.
Network. Join professional organizations in your field, volunteer on committees, get to know others that do the same work as you. You never know where your friends/colleagues will lead you. Which reminds me don’t burn bridges; if you commit to something follow through on it. People count on you when you commit whether your a student or a professional.

Remember, we can not all be Gandhi, Suzuki, Gates or even the Dali Lama but we can all stand up for something we believe passionately about and lead to make a difference, however small or large that may be.

Ferocious Reader

Cecilia — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 16:52:39 +0000

A couple of weeks ago I served a ferocious teen reader who loved novels with issues. What did I give to her you may be asking yourself? Here is a sample:

Chains by Laurie Halse Anderson

Monster by Walter Dean Myers

Little Brother by Cory Doctorow

Heaven Shop by Deborah Ellis

A couple weeks later, she came back for Cut by Patricia McCormick and asked if I had any more suggestions because she loved all the books I had given her :)

Know I want to know what would you have suggested? What are your favorite issue novels?

Do you know someone with Alzheimer’s?

Cecilia — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 15:48:36 +0000

Still Alice, by Lisa Genova is a must read if you know anyone who has Alzheimer’s. The story is about a Harvard cognitive psychology professor Alice Howland who discovers she has early onset Alzheimer’s disease and chronicles her deterioration as it progresses. Lisa’s descriptions of the progression are thought provoking as you relate what Alice is going through to your loved one that has the disease. The book gave me a better perspective and compassion for what people with this disease go through and I hope it does the same for you. Even if you do not know anyone with Alzheimer’s it is still worth picking up and reading about.

This is suitable for older teens and you will find it in the adult section.

YA Program, Show Off Your Flicks

Cecilia — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 18:36:16 +0000

Posting the YA teen created film contest program

Digital Booktalk

Cecilia — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 04:00:49 +0000

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IByALx6A_w8

YALSA Blog

Cecilia — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 23:00:18 +0000

There is a lot of information for those interested in serving young adults on the YALSA blog. From research to reports, podcasts to professional development and everything in between there is a wealth of information on this site. I learned about smoking smarties, libraries 3.0, teen insight on sterotypes (courtesy of Blip.tv) and best iphone apps for teens. Controversies on teens and twittering, using images in assignments and what programs will actually draw teens into the library, these are all discussed in this blog. Did I find this site useful, yes! Did it surprise me with its content, yes! Will I continue to monitor it, yes!

The only cavet I would mention to the authors of the blog is not to include the same post in too many categories, other than that it is definately worth the on going read.

VOYA (Voice of Youth Advocates)

Cecilia — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 14:29:24 +0000

I just picked up the June 2009 issue and I was pleasantly surprised to find out that Rosemary Honnold is the new editor-in-chief. In her editorial, Rosemary comments that this journal provides “practical information and greater ideas to aspire to” so I was quite surprised that more than half of the journal is devoted to reviews. There are 41 pgs of reviews compared to 37 pgs devoted to articles. The articles in this issue were quite interesting and cover YA specific areas of RA, author discussions, technology, IL, spaces and publishing trends.

A new feature, peer reviewed research, appears on the online site http://www.voya.com, along with web only content and a digital version of the journal. Rosemary promises the implementation of electronic guides (one topic guides) online with “the goal of offering the small or multitasking librarian professional resources they can acquire quickly, use easily as needed and afford despite tight budgets.”

This resource targets specifically YA new materials, research, new technologies and advocacy. It would be useful for challenges and due to its specificity makes it a valuable tool for the Young Adult librarian.