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**Train Thyself--You Can’t Afford to Wait for the Next Conference**
//Vitamin PD--Take one a day and blog about it in the morning// Submitted to SLJ for June publication Joyce Valenza and Doug Johnson

//A better tomorrow starts with Today - One-a-Day Vitamin slogan//

//Everyday// we take our vitamins to ensure our bodies grow stronger, to ensure they operate smoothly, to enhance our energy, to compensate for nutritional deficiencies. Taking an entire bottle of vitamins once or twice a year, just doesn't work. We need to consider our professional health in the same way. Health requires a daily investment of effort.

What "professional development" vitamins does a teacher-librarian need to grow strong skills and be able to lead? Doug and Joyce are sitting behind the counter of the friendly PD health food store down the block. And they have good news. Vitamin PD is available free in a variety of flavors and forms. The supply grows continually larger. Even the most exotic supplements are available locally. And they actually work.

Warning: some of you may be tempted to overdose. (We've both done it.) Half an hour a day is all that's required to realize genuine benefits.

Prior to the Internet, and certainly before the impact of Web 2.0, continuing education consisted of reading professional journals; attending occasional library conferences and taking college classes when time and funds were available. These activities are still available and important. But given the pace and magnitude of change, they alone are insufficient to keep most of us current with the happenings in librarianship and information technology. Continuing education options are now available in free, over-the-counter, chewable doses.
 * Rationale for a daily dosage**

Librarianship can be lonely. As the only professional of your sort in the building, sometimes in the district, you likely crave the advice (and sympathy) of those who understand you best, as well as advice for colleagues who are out there moving and shaking. It’s harder to learn alone. It's hard to collaborate alone.

Vitamin PLN, a Vitamin PD derivative is also an essential supplement. Over the past few years, perhaps without knowing it, connected library media specialists have assembled personal learning networks. It’s an important by-product of the Web 2.0 social networking opportunities. We’ve become connected to learning we can access on a daily basis - at times most convenient to the individual. We can regularly read, listen, respond and argue with the wisdom and points of views of colleagues in the world of school, public, academic libraries; technologists; classroom teachers; futurists; and visionaries.

Network creation using the resources we list below is not merely important for our own professional leadership and growth, but is important for us to model and share. Through our own professional connections, we model possibilities for classroom teachers, principals, guidance counselors, and students. We demonstrate the powerful (and social) new ways people build knowledge in the 21st century.

A wide variety of networking resources are available online. Membership is open to everyone. The only cost associated with any of them is time. Some of Joyce and Doug's professionally nutritious supplements include:
 * Resources for continuous learning**


 * Electronic mailing lists (aka listservs) continue to be a valuable means of locating of “primary source” information – human expertise. LM_NET http://www.eduref.org/lm_net/ is decidedly 1.0, it is the granddaddy of such resources. You might also consider reading AASLForum, ISTE SIGMS, WWWEdu, and your own state’s mailing list. A simple query to such lists often results in not just recommended published information, but in shared experiences and wisdom as well. Don’t forget that mailing lists like LM_NET, often archive messages for later retrieval. Recently LM_NET added an wiki //annex//, allowing librarians to share materials that don’t fit within the limits and format restriction s of discussion group threads. http://lmnet.wikispaces.com/


 * Web 2.0 “professional networks” such as Joyce Valenza’s TeacherLibrarian Ning  complement listservs by providing a media-rich forum, gathered blogs, along with a means of sharing photos, videos and other resources with fellow network members. These networks automatically provide members with their own home pages and allow smaller special interests groups to form within the larger network. Aimed at real-people connections among professionals, these operate much like the larger social networking sites Facebook and MySpace. Minnesota's state technology organization has replaced its website and mailing list with a Ning!

Consider joining any of a number of Nings, including those that may move you into the other professional worlds you touch.
 * TeacherLibrarianNing http://teacherlibrarian.ning.om
 * Classroom 2.0 Ning http://classroom20.ning.com
 * Library Youth and Teen Services 2.0 http://libraryyouth.ning.com/
 * Library 2.0 http://library20.ning.com/

You can also use a Ning to create your own professional development for your faculty, your PTA, your high school reunion organizing committee. (Ning offers ad-free sites for when the network is created for students.


 * Blogs and their aural cousins, podcasts, let library media specialists read or hear, react and converse on the latest thinking by leaders in the school library field, as well as leaders in related fields. Information on blogs tends to be timely, short and often opinionated. Pick the ones that are fun to read and you, like us, will become addicted. You can find Doug's personal list of influential blog writers here: <[|http://doug-johnson.squarespace.com/blogsiread/>]. If you have one favorite blogger, examine his or her //blogroll// for leads to related bloggers worth following.

The quickest strategy to manage your reading and keep up with those blogs you love is to subscribe to RSS feeds, to group them together in one spot through an aggregator. Joyce recommends Google Reader <[|http://reader.google.com>], because it is easy to access from an iGoogle  page. She also recommends setting up a whole tab for your iGoogle page for individual library- and tech- or book-related RSS subscriptions. (see image)

Consider becoming a blogger yourself. It's easy (and free) with simple to use tools like Edublogs  or Blogster <[|http://blogster.com]> or Blogspot <[|http://blogspot.com>.]


 * Online tutorials. For a more comprehensive approach to learning about networks, try a focused online tutorial efforts like 23 things. Helene Blowers' Learning 2.0 ([|http://plcmcl2-about.blogspot.com/)] a.k.a 23 Things, is a quick and organized introduction to many things 2.0, check out aimed at public librarians. A number of individual states (including Pennsylvania, Minnesota and Massachusetts) followed the lead of California's tutorial School Library Learning 2.0 [|.] Check with your local library organizations to see if such opportunities are being offered in your area. Choose to learn on your own or join the other library systems and other state organizations in adopting these online professional development programs.
 * Webcasts, presentations and workshops done via an Internet website like GoToMeeting or Elluminate are becoming increasingly popular. Watch your e-mail for announcements of upcoming //webinars//.

Webcasts allow many of us to attend conferences we could never before consider, hear keynoters we've wanted to learn from, with no investment in airfare or conference registration.

Among your learning options are: o Apple Learning Interchange [|] Search for NECC to attend last year's hugely successful conference (and likely this year's) o TED.com [|] Inspired talks by the world's greatest thinkers o Hitchhikr http://hitchhikr.com/ Hitch a remote ride to any current event with this index/portal to conferences o K12 Online Conference Great [|] Edtech speakers archived from this now annual fall conference. o Common Craft Show: Explanations in Plain English [|] Simply amazing instruction on such topics as wikis, RSS feeds, and zombies. o SLJ  offers a series of podcasts on its own homepage, many of them with a PD focus. o EdTechTalk [|] is a portal for attending a variety of conferences, most of them in the evenings. You'll find new dialog all the time. Join the group of your choice or listen to archives. Each show includes live discussion plus a chat. In case you miss one, shows are archived. Doug and Joyce recently participated in a group discussion on a vision of future school libraries.

During the course of a week, you’ll find the following groups hosting guests and discussions: • Women of Web 2 • Teachers Teaching Teachers • 21st Century learning • EdTechWeekly • It’s Elementary


 * Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) such as Second Life  offer a growing number of opportunities to interact and learn with colleagues. Your Second Life avatar can attend a presentation, communicate with fellow professionals in real time, and even build virtual learning resources using this new but powerful information and communication interface. Watch for SIGMS offerings on ISTE Island. AASL is currently building space on ALA Island in the form of information kiosks. Look for in-world programs and events over the coming year.


 * Twitter or microblogging. When Joyce first discovered this microblogging tool she was underimpressed. But as she built her network, as she learned to scan the tweets (little posts of 140 or fewer characters) for professional nuggets, she became hooked. Joyce generally finds one great idea each day. The essential question that drives Twitter is: //What are you doing?// The real trick for success in Twitter, is finding the right folks to follow. Librarians, technology educators, futurists, writers, and great thinks are tweeting. Those experts whose articles you read, whose sessions you attend, whose classes you take or have taken, inside and outside of the school library world, are likely Tweeters. Start with them. Adopt the lists of their followers or those they are following. Simply examine the list of folks they follow or folks who follow them and click on follow to add those folks to your own network. You’ll find that tweeters will share what they had for breakfast, but they will also share their exceptional blog posts, their favorite web-based tools, their live experiences from all over the world as they listen to or present as conference speakers. You can receive and send tweets either on the Web or on your phone.

Please note: Doug thinks Twitter is only minimally less annoying than a root canal and has yet to derive any good from it. Different strokes.


 * Live-blogging and virtual conference attendance. An increasing number of conferences as using technology that allows those who can’t attend physically to be there virtually. An increasing number of attendees post up the content of presentations in real time to their blogs or conference portals. Some sessions are recorded and then shared as audio or visual files after the conference ends. UStream is fast becoming the strategy for streaming presentations live.


 * Shared slideshows and instructional videos. Increasingly conference and workshop presenters share their best stuff. Slideshare [|] is one of the largest archives. Search by topic or search presenter's name. Many of the shows are downloadable. You will not only learn about the content of relevant presentations, you'll also see examples of good and bad slide design. TeacherTube [|] is becoming a major portal for teacher- and student-made educational videos. It's a great starting place for seeking video relating to professional development, as well as video relating to curriculum. It's also a fine source for tech how-to-do-it films.

These are just a few of the growing number of //continuous learning// opportunities the Internet is making available to those of us engaged in the rapidly evolving field of school librarianship.


 * Finding the time: how actually make this happen**

Most readers by now are asking themselves where they find the time for learning these tools and establishing their own Personal Learning Network. A great question. Our advice is to make it //chewable.// To take conservative doses.

> //… there was enormous teamwork involved to ensure that everyone made the time to learn … People just spelled each other off during working hours to make sure everyone got some time to learn – just 15 minutes. Some professionals made the commitment to do the coursework at home … Some people set aside 15 minutes from every lunch hour. Some people tied it to their morning exercise and scheduled it. Some filled little quiet moments in the day...// > Most of us find the time to accomplish those tasks that are most important to us. Make attending to your Personal Learning Community a scheduled, regular activity everyday.
 * **Commit to just 15 minutes everyday.** Stephen Abrams in “15 Minutes a Day: A Personal Learning Management Strategy” (//Information Outlook//, Feb. 2007) observed how one organization’s staff found the time to complete the 23 Thing course mentioned above:
 * **Take it one tool at a time.** Most of us are overwhelmed when looking at a list of tools like the one we've just presented above. Don't try to do it all at once. Pick one or two tools and try them for a few weeks or months. As their use becomes regular, even second nature, try a new resource. Just eat that elephant one bite at a time! And remember that not every resource fits every individual's learning preferences.
 * **One in, one out theory.** Doug keeps the number of blogs he follows manageable by always deleting a feed whenever he adds a new one. Too many of us continue to add more things to our lives without every stopping to seriously consider the things we might chose to let go. This is never an easy task, but it is an important one.
 * **Form a genuine community.** The thing about social networking is that, well it's social. Getting to know individuals and groups is a great way to stay committed and involved. Have conversations with the people you find interesting and knowledgeable. Most are flattered to be asked for help or advice. One of the real pleasures of Web 2.0 communications is that the line between personal and professional gets blurred. We get to know each other as individuals with real lives, not just people with similar jobs.
 * **Give back.** The interactivity of PLNs is what give them their real value. If you are only a "lurker" on discussion lists, blogs or Nings, you are only getting half the value of the experience. Discuss, suggest, rant, praise, and question. It's all part of the daily PD experience.


 * To your (professional) health**

Librarianship should be about leadership and leadership involves developing sharable knowledge and a big picture vision. You cannot lead your school community, you cannot guide others in new and emerging information and communication landscapes in you are not yourself a continual learner.

Vitamins PD and PLN are not snake oil. They are critical to our growth. The are even more critical at this time of change, as we redefine what it looks like to be a librarian in a world of continual shifts in the information and communication landscapes. In some ways, we need to present our own medicine shows, to share our most effective tonics and cures with the larger school community.