Carl Sagan's Cosmos - The Presistence of Memory

Nerds, Personal Skills and Team Work

Upon considering what I have to say about personal skills and teamwork in the context of online learning for the MLIS degree my first thought was "yes, this program will be challenging, but it also speaks to my inner nerd!" I consider myself to be a bit of a nerd and by that I mean that I love learning, I am curious and I am unafraid to admit so. Seeing learning new skills in the context of nerdishness helps me feel more comfortable with the program. Using online tools and technology is definitely new to me, as it also appears to be for quite a few us. I have chosen not to dwell too much on my own technophobia and instead to try my best to become versed in these tools in order to make absorbing the more interesting aspects of this program easier. I love to make a schedule and plan to do my best to stick to what I have laid out for myself in terms of time-management. Obviously, it is one thing to schedule a few hours of homework and another to actually do it. I like to use rewards as a way to motivate myself, self-motivation being one of the skills discussed in our readings as important to online learning. In progressing through the semester I hope to be able to find ways to balance my workload with the things in my life that inspire me and keep me whole.

On the topic of teamwork, I actually enjoyed listening to Dr. Haycock's presentation and found much of what he presented relevant to a variety of situations. I liked his acknowledgment that there are people whose insight is often overlooked in a more traditional "horizontal" team, his example being the driver of the Bookmobile who overhears conversations about specific likes and dislikes among patrons. Yet in a "vertical" team there would be room for this insight because it would be made up of members with different perspectives all joining to tackle the same problem. A strong team leader who moves the team through phases of team development and deals constructively with conflict seems of utmost importance as well. And clearly, a positive attitude and an eagerness to learn is crucial. I think my attitude towards group learning is actually pretty positive. I have never had any real nightmarish experiences with group work. If anything, maybe my studies in the past did not afford me a whole lot of opportunities to take team work seriously. On that note, I don't really look at online teamwork as if it were a "monster" at all. I am sincerely interested in engaging with other students and faculty so that I can improve my own effectiveness within teams.

Back to School

Greetings to my fellow LIBR 203 classmates! This blog is going to serve as a way to string together my ideas and thoughts, wherever they may come from. Much like the way we go from site to site on the web, or follow a certain author onto other authors, etc...I like the idea of seeing where random ideas can take me.

Color and Print

I've been thinking a lot lately about vintage prints and textiles. My eyes are drawn to them, gobbling them up. They are evocative and memorable in a really tangible way. Maybe it's a favorite blanket, or pillowcase...perhaps a sweater? I can still visualize the drab, yellow floral wallpaper of my parent's old bedroom. Long gone, its insane ugliness luckily captured for posterity in photographs. It's possible I may have stared too hard at it, wedged up close during a particularly intense game of indoor hide-and-seek. Still, there was something comforting about it. And I often find that certain prints and patterns have a hypnotic effect on me. I can look at them over and over and still find something interesting there.

Viva Almodovar!

Ahhhh Pedro Almodovar...Where do you get your wallpaper!? This is a still from the film All About My Mother. I was totally distracted by the amazing wallpaper throughout the whole thing.

http://www.clubcultura.com/clubcine/clubcineastas/almodovar/eng/homeeng.htm