Schooliblit

Wednesday, June 25, 2003

Retina Scans Are Next
Pupils fingerprinted at school. The children at Kingsmoor Lower School in Flitwick, Bedford, have been fingerprinted to enable them to use the school library, which has had a high-tech makeover. Pupils check out books by placing their thumb on a scanner which determines their identity. The school's librarian can then use data captured in the computer to finger those who do not return their books. From BBC. [LISNews.com]

I love it! Mandarin, when can we use this in our library?
8:39:22 PM [comment []];[]

Cultural Infantilism
Harry Potter and The Meaning of Life. Gary Deane spotted Harry Potter and The Meaning of Life that examines whats behind this Potte-rmania. The author says since it began, Potter-mania has represented a cultural infantilism that only grows as the years go by. It is about what we expect from our kids, our books, our value system, and ourselves. Whatever happens in The Order of the Phoenix, the story of our obsession with Harry Potter is unlikely to have a happy ending. [LISNews.com]

I wanted to say, "Lighten up!" The essay is a fun read, however.
7:11:36 PM [comment []];[]

Managing Subscriptions
Library Group Launches New Subscription Management Tool.

InfoToday reports that:

"The Colorado Alliance of Research Libraries launched GOLD RUSH (http://grweb.coalliance.org), a new tool to help librarians manage subscriptions to electronic resources...

Source: Colorado Alliance of Research Libraries"

[Darci Chapman: InfoMage in Training]

Someone needs to create something like this for the little libraries. No school library can afford this program, but we really need a tool for managing our online databases. When a student or teacher wants a specific article, or wants to search only a specific journal, it's so difficult to tell which database to find it in. This has been bothering me for a couple of years, so maybe I should create the solution myself. Hmmm.
6:45:06 PM [comment []];[]

Down Into Google
From LibraryStuff, via Search Engine Guide, comes a reference to this article. Tips like this could be posted near the computers, added to the daily bulletin, sent out in a weekly library mailing, etc.
8:48:42 AM

[comment []];[]

On Beyond Google
Hotbot Now Offering A Search Toolbar. Hotbot Now Offers A Search "Deskbar". This new tool has been adapted from "Dave's Quick Search Deskbar" and offers a number of shortcuts. For example, from the search window access the Merriam-Webster's Dictionary, get a weather forecast, or find a synonym using Thesaurus.Com. [ResourceShelf]

The above posting from Gary Price led me to his earlier, quite extensive posting from last December on the new and improved Hotbot. I wasn't blogging back then, although I was on his mailing list, and I obviously missed this. I'm going to spend some time looking at the features of Hotbot. It might be a good starting place for our students, if only to reinforce the idea that there are search engines beyond Google out there.

I like the toolbar shortcuts as well. I think that IE is one thing that students can make changes to on their own desktops -- changes that only show up for each individual, not for the next person who logs into that machine. I should probably look into what changes the students CAN make and encourage that kind of individualization.
8:21:49 AM [comment []];[]