Thing 15: Library 2.0 What Does It Mean?

Library 2.0 - It's many things to many people. What does it mean to you? What does it mean for school libraries?

Library 2.0 is the Read/Write Web, using the Internet not just as a collection of resources searchable by engine, but as a place where the collective intelligence can congregate, create, and share. Not only are the library walls down, but the state and country borders are down. Many of the blogs and videos I've accessed while playing are as likely to come from Australia, England, Canada and other English-speakers as they are to be from USA.

Rather than merely absorbing information, Library 2.0 teaches students to think, to analyze, to synthesize and create information using products and processes on the Web 2.0. We've come an amazingly long way from when using technology meant programming a Logo turtle or playing Oregon Trail. We don't buy tech programs on CD anymore--it's all available online.

Rick Anderson's description of the Three Icebergs that threaten our profession's ship and our own library boats has given me much to think about, and some ideas I've yet to work out. It's so easy to charge us with abandoning the print collection to build access to "everything", create services that don't need training, and humbly admit we don't have a monopoly on information so we should supply access to it in every digital way possible. But doing all that? It's not just the training and effort needed by the librarian, but the financing, enlightenment, and buy-in of those in education who have more say over libraries than the librarian that works in them.

The article on Librarian 2.0 is particularly frustrating. It describes what seems like an information superhero who is unfettered by minuscule budgets, supported by agile tech departments, consulted by savvy patrons, and understands, uses, and even spots trends ahead of others. I will need a Second Life to do all that and still function in the real world I live in at school.

As a digital immigrant, I feel like these charges take a team, and the team seems to be possible by using the socially networked tools themselves. However, school districts move slowly and economically, effectively blocking many of the Librarian 2.0 traits that we are urged to develop. Learning all the tech tools is similar to the difficulties of learning the intricacies and irrational rules of English as one not born into the language, but an English that changes constantly.

Bottom line: For schools and their libraries, 2.0 offers exciting possibilities to get kids thinking, get them engaged, get them creating. However, are both organizations nimble enough to take advantage of the tools? Is it possible for librarians and teachers to stay trained, stay current, stay proactive when the tools are blocked? The future of learning is a rosy one, but the traditional educational burdens of underfunding and slowness to change are exacerbated by the acceleration of tech change and the ability of learners to get what they need and want without the educational system.