Reflection on my 27 Things experience

I'm feeling ambitious, so I will attempt to answer all the suggested questions....

How has this program assisted or affected your lifelong learning goals?

My lifelong learning goal is to, uh...continue learning throughout my life. How's that for circular redundancy? Seriously, I do get bored unless I'm constantly learning new things (in moderation), and I was thrilled to be able to become more familiar with 2.0 tools through this program.

What were your favorite Learning 2.0 discoveries or exercises?

I liked exploring the online document tools--those seemed the most obviously useful for school as well as perhaps the workplace, and something practical to point out to patrons.

I also liked embedding a YouTube video in my blog.

I just appreciated the approach of this program--to get a taste of the variety of tools, and simply expand our awareness. It's much less intimidating when we are encouraged to take little steps and play around with things so that they're in the back of our minds.

Did anything surprise you?

I'm not sure what the official count is, but I thought that more staff would participate in this program because it's such a great opportunity...I mean, there's the mp3 player and all, but being able to discover technology that may be of use, and just plain FUN...why would one pass on that? Puzzled I am.

Was there enough help available when you needed it?

Yes, I had enthusiastic advocates at my workplace, and of course the Learning 2.0 team was ultra quick in responding to any Q's or other general issues.

What could we do differently to improve upon this program’s format or concept?

Maybe highlight more of the library applications of the tools we explored...although the team did a good job in connecting where apps exist.

Also make the blog posts a little briefer, split them up because sometimes I felt overwhelmed by all the text to read and the links to click and stuff to do.

But it was fantastic overall, and I liked how the teaching was delivered in the formats we were exploring (blog, podcast, etc.).

Would you like to see similar training opportunities as new library-relevant technologies emerge?

YES oh yes oh yes! I think it's important for all staff to be encouraged to keep learning, and to have a general pulse of what's going on in the tech world. Let's not fall prey to technolust, but let's also be known for being more savvy than scared or ignorant!

And, last one, if you could go back in time and tell yourself to either participate in the program or skip it, what would you do?

Do it...and persuade more co-workers to get involved too!