Cynthia Alvarado

I'm a librarian and I certainly don't find tags to be a nightmare. It is true that lack of controlled vocabulary can be unwieldy at times, but most groups that work together agree on certain tags for certain types of items. For example, when participating in online conferences, often blog tags for the conference are suggested by the group. I find my tags on Librarything and delicious to be quite useful, even though they aren't Sears or Library of Congress or even ERIC. Sometimes you have to be creative with the search terms to find what you are looking for, but I find other people's tags fascinating.

I have just spent most of the day in meeting about designing curriculum for middle school that integrates wise use of Web 2.0 applications with my traditional teaching of how to do a research paper. It is a paradigm shift and one the administrators in my school district find hard to swallow. It demands they release some control. My job, as a veteran media specialist ,who has done this paradigm shift thing before, seemed to be to remind them that I can still teach the curriculum that they hold dear, using new tools. (I designed a unit on the spot to demonstrate.) I also reminded them that we've done this before when I dragged them kicking and screaming onto the Internet. Now none of them could function without email. Soon, they will learn to use and accept social networking tools, as well.

Greetings! The discussion has become quite informative and engaging already. I'm Cynthia Alvarado, a K-8 media specialist in Dearborn, Michigan. I have been engaged in various social media myself for several years and I am looking for acceptable ways to work it into my district's information literacy curriculum. I'm Cyndi Uriza in SL and I have a page in both MySpace and Facebook.

I'm not sure there is much real separation between public and private in social media spaces like Facebook. I must admit that I use my Facebook account for purposes as diverse as professional learning, getting prayer support for my church's upcoming mission trip and playing fun little tricks on my children, who live out of state. My kids are big fans of the Superpoke and Throw a Frisbee applications. I find that those who I consider my professional friends get drawn into our silliness, because it is great fun, and play is valuable in and of itself. Some how, at least for me, the line between professional and personal is pretty thin in some social spaces. I take the viewpoint that what I put in that space represents me and I don't want to represent myself in ways that would be offensive or damaging to me professionally. I have always taught students that anything posted on the Internet can be viewed by anyone, including your parents, your potential employer and the person you just asked out, so it is important to represent yourself in ways that won't come back to haunt you.

The big positive that I see in asynchronous dialogue, is that unlike f2f, the participants have that extra wait time to formulate their ideas and really express things in ways that clearly represent the intended meaning. I also appreciate the opportunity to ponder the previous communication before responding.