Games and Gaming #37

1) I read both the New York Times article and the Shifted librarian article.

2) I did the reference game on the Carnegie Mellon University Libraries' website. It was harder than I expected because it took awhile to figure out what I was supposed to do. In the meantime, the patrons were fuming, and some of them stomped out before I could help them. It was fun to play.

3) I do agree that games belong in a library if a library system chooses to go that route. Since so many public libraries have them, I do think it will continue to grow and evolve. It is a good way to bring young people in the library, and perhaps some of them will also discover the joy of reading books.

Games and Gaming #38: Console Gaming

1) I only played PacMan during college and I enjoyed it then. The only advantage I have over someone who never played was that I knew how the game worked.

2) I do not know which of the 3 gaming systems listed would be the best for the library. I would have to research it more.

I think these games can be a boost to learning, but they can also be a detriment to learning if they are used in excess.

I think most of our young people (and many of our adults!) are here for the computers, both for gaming and for social websites like MySpace. When the Internet goes down, the library becomes fairly empty.

Games and Gaming #36: The Wide World of Online Role Playing

1) I went through about half of the tutorial for Runescape. This took me much longer than 15 minutes. It was easy to get around, but somewhat frustrating. I kept burning the shrimp, and could not figure out how to do it without burning it. When I finally cooked it properly, I didn't know what I did right. I chopped down numerous trees in my efforts. It was funny to see all the newbies running right through each other, standing in the fire, etc. It was hard to remember those characters represented real people doing the same thing I was doing...trying to make my way in this new game world.

It was educational when it got to the bronze/copper part.

2) My character had about shoulder length brown hair, a green blouse, black pants and brown boots.

#35 Games and Gaming

I spent time using FreeRice and WordSplay. It was easy to kill 15 minutes! Both were enjoyable and I very much like the idea behind the FreeRice game. I found WordSplay to be the more frustrating of the two because I couldn't get words longer than 4 letters and the clock was ticking.....

FreeRice helps build vocabulary and WordSplay builds dexterity and quickness as well as the ability to unscramble letters and think of different combinations of words.

Maps #31: Have Map, Will Travel

States I Have Visited


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Using Google Maps was easy. It took me awhile to get the map embedded in my blog, but I finally did it. I can see a lot of uses for using the placement marks in Google Maps. It could be used in business, in travel, in genealogy, and many other ways.

Week 10: #23 Is This Really the End?

There were so many fun and interesting aspects to the program that it is hard to name favorites, but I guess I would say I liked learning how to create and post on a blog, and I enjoyed learning about Flickr and Library Thing. I feel that I will use the knowledge to help patrons when they are in the library and I will also revisit some of these for my own personal use. I need to practice what I have learned in order to retain it.

It has been wonderful to have the opportunity to spend work time learning about new technologies. Many thanks to those who worked so hard to bring the program together and maintain it during the duration of the 10 weeks. Excellent job!!!

Week 9: #22 Downloadable Media

I had downloaded a couple of samples of audiobooks and music when we first got the MP3 players for the branch, but I had to fumble with it this time to remember how to do it. I was able to check out an audio book and to listen to it on the computer, but I never was able to download the book. I watched the tutorial after the fact and now I believe I know what I was doing wrong.

The main difference I see between HCPL's audio holdings and the holdings of the free sites is that the latter have to be in the public domain.