Staff Development Day Resource List

Here is the list of resources I compiled for the Staff Development Day knitting class

Online Knitting Resources, and Bricks and Mortar LYS,

ravelry
an online knitting community where you can search for patterns, join groups, add your stash and your projects, keep up with knitting news
A MUST

knitty
an online magazine with free patterns and articles: the extensive pattern archive has a new more powerful search engine

elann
Canadian company with discontinued discounted yarns , books, and free patterns

knitpicks
online store with their own yarns, patterns (free and not), tutorials

KnittingHelp
whether you knit continental style or not this site provides video instruction on demand, tips, as well as free patterns

Lion Brand Yarn
patterns (many are free), their own yarns, and knitting and crochet tutorials

Knitting Pattern Central

lots and lots of free patterns

Online shopping

Flying Fingers

Yarnzilla

Purl

Patternworks

Kaleidoscope

Jimmy Beans Wool

YarnMarket

Local Yarn Shops

What's Needling You Toms River

Wooly Monmouth Red Bank

WoolBearers Mt. Holly

Island Knits Long Beach Island

Blogs

there are so many of these out there--just a few of the ones I like--knitting shops also have blogs I especially like the Purl blog

the purl bee

Yarn Harlot

Sheep in the City

Twisted Knitter

The Blue Blog

not quite ListenNJ

Phew! I was finally able to download and upgrade security for Windows Media Player so that I could download and at least listen to a snippet of The Goose Girl by Shannon Hale. This is a full cast audio production and a marvelous story and the opening had me riveted soo hopefully I can go home and download to my home pc and begin listening? Or shall I just wait until I get my new listening device?
Thanks to my guru for helping me navigate the shoals.You know who you are.

23 Things done

What a tremendous CONNECTOR this was. I had not felt this kind of OCL team spirit and solidarity in a while and that we also learned new skills and challenged ourselves while helping each other was icing on the cake. Personally, I really liked reading staff blogs. I have started using YouTube to enhance my lifelong learning toolbox. I feel less tentative about trying new things even if they have no immediate application. I am definitely feeling the paradigm shift from information professional behaving as a single searcher in the vastness and impersonality of cyberspace to social being relying on social networks and "groups" to help find, combine, evaluate and deliver information.
Web 2.0 is social network building and enhanced web content and apps.

Web 3.0 will be a "semantic-based" web. This new web will be restructured as a language I guess so that the computer can read it and process the information. The computer will be able to perform some of the mundane tasks of information gathering, finding and bundling that is currently done by people.

Hmmm
well I still play with (paper)paper dolls and I use the web to find them, print them, share them and play online with them. I can see that the image of librarians is changing thank goodness and our tools are evolving but we still need books and each other. Thank you OCL Webthings Challenge team. What a great effort for all of us!

ListenupNJ #22

I tried twice on 2 different computers at work and was unsuccessful. I was able to download the initial software but then the computer would not download the audiobook I selected b/c my version of windows media player had not been updated and I did not have the credentials to do so. In the other instance I was unable to download the book because it was in 6 parts and each part took a minimum of 10 minutes to download and this on a computer without speakers! I browsed children's fiction looking for a short picture book but everything I found was already checked out. I love audio books and I am always listening to a book on CD in my car. I still have to get used to the idea that I will soon be an mp3 player owner and that I may just have to get over my aversion to sticking little things in my ear. I would be willing to download the software to my home computer once I get my player.
I love the idea of OCL offering this resource and I think once I get better at using it I can help patrons through the initial frustrating steps.

Thing #21-PeaPodcasts

I journeyed to podcast.com and searched on "gardening" I was unsuccessful in further refining my search by typing in New Jersey or Zone 7 but since there were only 90 or so results I slogged through and selected one called Greenman Radio. I listened for a few minutes. It is a radio mail in show so the voice answered listener's questions. The greenman's voice was a little annoying but the info was good and directions thorough. I then wanted to get a sense of the range of podcasts available on the site b/c I was surprised there weren't more offerings on gardening so I went into podcast.com music folder and found something called Deadpod. These are radio shows (radio station from Columbus MO podcast a week ago)that feature sets from Grateful Dead concerts. The one I listened to was a concert the Dead did
August 29, 1980 at The Spectrum in Philadelphia. Having been a fan NOT a deadhead in the 70's this was music to my ear. This was a pleasure.

I then searched "knitting" and listened to a podcast from "Stash and Burn" wherein an addicted knitter talks herself through a 12 step program. Comforting.

Pod and vodcasting have such tremendous potential as training and teaching tools for OCL.

Like bloglines, I would not go to podcast.com to search for podcasts to subscribe to. If I found podcasts while surfing the Internet I would retrieve them that way.

YouTube glitch--#20

I found that when you set up your blog to post videos from YouTube you lose a certain amount of control--For example, I tried to add tags to the post from the blog side and it messed up the code so that it would not post. Perhaps one needs to edit from the YouTube side before posting.

Pointed Pen Copperplate Calligraphy 08