Friday, August 7, 2009

Thing 22, Nings

Reading through the 7 Things You Need to Know About...Ning my first thought is "Oh, no; another social network site". However, after I got to the seventh point; one of the statements that really struck me is that a Ning could be used as a neutral platform in a school setting rather than encroaching on what students may view as their platform such as MySpace or Facebook. In other words don't try to compete with those networks but start something separate with the same concept of creating community and a venue for communication and collaboration. I liked the scenario that was presented also where students created their Ning around a voting issue, got people to join and in the process learned a lot about the issues regarding the upcoming elections. In the library a Ning could be created to advertise services, present book reviews posted by any member and facillitate book discussions.

I looked at the Texas School Librarian Ning and think that this is a great venue for anyone to connect in provided they actively participate. I noticed in one of the groups that it has been quite some time since it was updated. I have toyed with the idea of joining several times and did not see anything that really leaped out to rope me into joining. I like the idea of bringing Texas School Librarians together because it is more region specific than the Teacher Librarian Ning.

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