Lunging and Leaping

This week in Staff Development saw me start looking at how we can make the Mini-Lunges Inservice Training sessions work. Earlier this year, the champions who were part of the 21 Lunges program thought that a way to get more staff interested and involved in Web 2.0 was to run Mini Lunges ISTs on key concepts or tools that were the most relevant, or got positive feedback from those who did the original online program. Considered were Blogs, RSS, Social Bookmarking, Professional Networking, Social Video, Polls and Photos, along with something new, Library Thing. Each of the champions put their name against those things they felt they could develop and deliver into a session across library sites.

I’ve been asked to manage the “project” and develop a basic lesson plan structure that all of the sessions should follow, ensuring there is enough explanation and hands-on time and it is simplistic enough not to be overwhelming for staff. I have to ensure that the champions and some other staff are (still) interested in leading these sessions and I am planning to set up a meeting time to start the ball rolling soon. The aim is to have at least three sessions developed and ready to go by the end of the year.

I am really enjoying my time in SD, the work is different, the atmosphere is different and I always feel satisfied that I have done a good day’s work.

On the Conference front, Robyn and I have decided to set aside some time as of this week to start writing our paper. Our desired half a day though has already been “shot down” for this week, because we are so tight with rostering at work. I have to say I am a bit worried about getting this all done by 14th August with everything that is happening around us, but I’m trying not to think these thoughts too much. It’s such a good opportunity for Robyn and I and I want to do it well and be proud of our effort. We’ll have to knuckle down.

I’ve started doing a database/internet search on reverse mentoring and it sounds like it is a relatively new concept, mainly in the corporate world, with younger workers helping the more experienced with their IT skills. We may be breaking new ground by thinking of it in terms of libraries and Web 2.0. Interesting.

All in all, things are going well at work, but the last couple of weeks I’ve realised something isn’t quite right though... I’ll keep you informed.