Edublog Awards Voting is Open:
Celebrating & Paying it Forward

Central Library Interior #2photo © 2007 Darren Stone | more info (via: Wylio)A Year in Review
What an amazing & astonishing year it has been for our PLN (that's you, too dear reader!), Geek Tribe, & Librarians! So many of our tribe have been recognized by the Edublog Award Nominations for our achievements in the last year - it's astonishing! This posting is an unashamed and repentant thank you & celebration of what we ALL have done in the last year. Fakey false-modesty is NOT how I roll.
I'm flippin psyched!

WARNING: I use !!!'s & say YAY & AWEsome a LOT
To all those who are looking at this blog because it was nominated - Hi! How you doin? I use these !!!!!'s and AWEsome a lot....or as Bob Edwards of NPR recently said of me after an interview that I "speak almost entirely in exclamation points." Heh heh heh Like Elaine Bennis in Seinfeld - yeah...I own it.

"There’s an 'embarrassment of riches' in the education blogosphere!" - Larry Ferlazzo

Edublog Award Voting Ends December 14th
Please take the time to review the shortlisted nominations & vote. You can see who I nominated at My Nominations For The Edublog Awards 2010.

I value the Edublog awards because it is a crowdsourced recognition from your peers, a chance to pay it forward to those who have inspired you in the past year, & great way to stuff my Google reader with wonderful new voices!

I am gobsmacked, honored, & thrilled to my toes to have been nominated by my peers - more about that at below...Ahem! Trying to be cool here....

"We are stronger when we share!"
- Seth Godin via Joyce Valenza

I was SO honored to be nominated in the Best Library/Librarian Blog category (thank you to Shelly Terrell and all of you who nominated me!), but the really important thing about these awards is that they provide an opportunity for everybody to learn about great blogs and other resources out there that can be helpful to our teaching. Last year my blog was named Library Tech Musings...and then in April I made the huge jump and re-named it The Daring Librarian blog. It was a dare to myself - to brand myself, yes...but mostly as a reminder that I - we - as educators, must always be DARING to give our all...to take daring chances...daring to the fight filters, the naysayers, & negative forces, for our most important customers...our Students!

I am SO
NOT Cool!
As always I wish I could be all diddy cool, rico suave, & smooth about these nominations - but that's just not how I roll. I can't! I'm jumpin up & down, going SQUEE! out loud (gave poor Bruno the Rottie at left quite a start) and on the phone with my Mom right away!


I'd Be Honored to Have Your Vote!

To be nominated for the Best Librarian/Library blog with the likes of my mentor Joyce Valenza and Buffy J. Hamilton & the rest of the Geek Tribe is staggeringly AWEsome & amazing to me! I'd be honored to have your vote!

To have the Daring Librarian blog nominated for Best educational use of video / visual gobsmacked me! Sure, I've uploaded some videos to my YouTube channel...Yes, I use pics wherever I can.... I guess my pathological Photoshop addiction is paying off in a different kinda way! Or maybe it was for my growing collection of Comic Tutorials At-A-Glance - whichever...Thank you! I'd be honored to have your vote!

To have the MHMS Tech Wiki nominated for Best educational wiki That wiki has been recently re-named and reclaimed just flipping blew me away! (Confession: BIG MISTAKE or why you shouldn't register wikis under your school name but your own or your brand!) So after nearly 5 years I just re-named it the Daring Librarian's Steam Powered MHM Tech Wiki in a Digitally Shifted World (whew!) Like What the What!? That's SO AWEsome! Thank you, thank you, thank you!!! That's the sandbox i started in '06 for my school & teachers when it comes to everyday technology PD! As always, take, use, share! I'd be honored to have your vote!

Team Nominations that I'm connected to and feel passionate about & hope to win you over, too!

The TL Virtual Cafe
Best educational webinar series: The TL Virtual Cafe was created by Joyce Valenza & the Geek Tribe and is committed to creating FREE transformative conversations about teacher-librarians, educational technology, and collaborative connections to facilitate meaningful and lifelong learning skills. These conversations occur during FREE Webinars utilizing Elluminate generously donated by Learn Central and Steve Hargadon.
Hi! I'm the Julie McCoy (LoveBoatReference, Score!) of the TL Virtual Cafe. After Joyce created it, found us a home thanks to Steve, I volunteered to help manage & run it. It's been fun!
But this amazing endeavor is really a group effort. We've had amazing speakers donate their time & talents and we've had hundreds of participants show up! All the past webinars are archived so If you want to go re-live one feel free! Please consider voting for the TL Virtual Cafe for Best educational webinar series. Thank you! We'd be honored to have your vote!

Please Vote for the Best educational use of a virtual world - ISTE SIGMS Virtual Playground
Best educational use of a virtual world: ISTE- SIGMS 21st Century Playground in Second Life - Talented builder Linda Dougherty (aka Eleanor Anderton- SL) created a Victorian virtual playground in second life for ISTE10 that was detailed, informative, and beautiful. She even created a collectors ISTE-SIGMS garden clock as a giveaway!. It was also just really cool..(full disclosure, I helped a little with this - donating furniture, creating a ISTE Tophat giveaway, and my giant Telescope - but the main builder was the amazing Linda) Thank you! We'd be honored to have your vote!

Congratulations to everyone and let's embrace & welcome our new voices and recruit new Geek Tribe members! And no matter who wins the Edublog awards -- really, we all win!

"A rising tide lifts all boats!"- JFK via Joyce Valenza

Central Library Interior #2photo © 2007 Darren Stone | more info (via: Wylio)Ooooh! Tech Tip! The graphic at the very top of this posting was from Wylio: a Creative Commons Image site where you can search for images, re-size and align them, and get the instant Attribution code all in ONE EASY STEP! or as they say it: "Wylio is the original, defacto, extra crunchy, all-in-one picture finder and re-sizer made specifically for bloggers. We are the quickest way for you to get a photo into your next blog post." Sweet!

Thank you dear readers! You are my Geek Tribe, you are my PLN, you are why I get excited to share things...and you are why we are all moving forward in this digitally shifted world - and I truly do appreciate you...and no, I'm not sucking up for votes! Srsly! [grins] but dayum...sure sounded like it, huh? LOL #LoveFest

Comments

  1. Matthew C. WinnerDecember 5, 2010 at 9:02 PM

    We would love you no matter what the motive, Gwyneth... but here is a chance to give praise where it is evident and overdue. Whether a source of inspiration, a challenge to view things from a new perspective, or a breath of fresh life and focus into an overwhelming and exciting world... you, my friend, know how to spin it and know how to speak it.

    Lots of love (and, of course, hopes for votes along with)!

    ReplyDelete
  2. @GwynethJones - The Daring LibrarianDecember 5, 2010 at 9:43 PM

    Awww Matthew...you just made my night! Thank you dear!...and I'm so happy you're part of my PLN, Geek Tribe, and school district!!!! I get to SEE you - not as often as I would like! but still without a plane ride! YAY!
    Love ya, too!
    ~Gwynnie

    ReplyDelete
  3. Barbara GoganDecember 6, 2010 at 7:47 AM

    As a brand-new librarian assistant who is trying to bring lots of cool 2.0 tools to our elementary school, THANKS!--I've learned so much from your blog and it's FUN!

    Links like The Maccabeats--I don't get that at any other library blog!

    ReplyDelete
  4. @GwynethJones - The Daring LibrarianDecember 6, 2010 at 1:21 PM

    Thank you Barbara! It's important to me to bring learning, fun, & libraries together! I'm so happy to hear that you are enjoying it! YAY!
    Cheers!
    ~Gwyneth

    ReplyDelete
  5. LynnDecember 6, 2010 at 7:36 PM

    Someauntie in PA is still readin' and lovin' your blog (and YOU), too! You are my hero, darlin'!!! Srsly!!! ;o)
    xoxoxo!!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Makerspace for Little or Nothing

Image
Makerspace for Little or Nothing You don't have to spend thousands of dollars to start a Makerspace area. You don't have to have a designated room or rip out bookcases. You can even have a Makerspace on a cart! When we have testing in our Library, I put all our Makerspace stuff on an AV cart and roll it into our server room.  This post evolved from a previous post called Makerspace Starter Kit Updated where I had some of these idea, but I felt that it deserved it's own expanded post. You can take baby steps into the Maker Movement.  I've been saying that for 7 years or so....long before I blogged about it, I tried it out. Yeah, sometimes I try things on the sly to see if they are blogworthy for you! Now....having said that..... WARNING: Controversial Opinion Ahead.  I'm not 100% sold, even after 7 years of talking about the Maker Movement, that it's something that's here to stay and not just a fad. Even though I've (without knowing it!)...
Keep reading

Makerspace Starter Kit Updated

Image
Three years ago I shared my Makerspace Starter Kit with you or what I was buying to boost our Makerspace area using four empty Library study carrels that no longer held desktop Macs.  That post has consistently been one of the most viewed posts every week for years and years - with more than 83 THOUSAND views, gee whiz! (Crazy, right?) So, I thought maybe it was time to update it!*  Since then, I've had some major Makerspace successes and a couple dismal (and expensive) Makerspace failures!  So, here's the latest for ya'll with the good, the bad, and the bloody awful! Our MHMS Makerspace How it works: Kids can come in before the 1st period late bell rings, during lunch, or when they've finished their work in class to explore, craft, and create in the Library Media Center. It's not a "class" or an organized offering. It's a free form optional offering of constructivist learning and creativity! It's not as big as some and it hasn't tak...
Keep reading

Curating the Happy for Your Future Self

Image
Teacher Tip #112 Teacher Self-Care:  Create a Happy Folder In my School Library Media office desk I had a manilla folder where I carefully tucked all the hand written notes from kiddos & parents to read on a rainy day. I also SHAMELESSLY would first tape them to my office door (let the other teachers internally writhe with envy!)  Nah, really just to keep me motivated and also show the kiddos I appreciated their heartfelt little notes!  But.....before I tucked it away tenderly or taped it to my door, I took a picture of it and uploaded it to Flickr. A digital Happy Folder that pays back dividends of warm fuzzies and motivations for your future self.  Because, let's not kid ourselves, being an educator right now is HARD.  Start this habit NOW.  Don't be like me and wait 10 or 15 years. OK, some of that was because cell phones and digital cameras weren't as handy and as ubiquitous back then. But do your future self a favor, there will be days w...
Keep reading