Thing #9 - Useful Library Blogs and Newsfeeds

After viewing all the search tools, I found I liked Google Blog Search and the Topix.net the best. I disliked Atomic Learning the most because it is a subscription service that costs money to use; however, it might be something I would check into as a service for our school. I plan on discussing this tool with our technology teacher to see if it is something we might be able to subscribe to for our school. It does indicate that you can access the sight with a SBISD password, so they must have it in their district. Perhaps it is also a tool that HISD might consider providing through Library Services.

I felt it was equally easy to find feeds through both Google Blog Search and Topix.net. While playing around in Topix.net, I tried several different searches and one I did was for the Texas Bluebonnet Award. I found a news sight - Newsome.org. - that had an article about a young girl who read all 20 of the 2008 Texas Bluebonnet Award books and posted a review on each book. It included a blog where you could post your comments and congrats to this young lady. That gave me an idea on how I might use something similar through our school web site.

I didn't find any of the recommended sites confusing, I just liked some more than others.

I found the feeds for the Texas Bluebonnet Award, Newbery Award, and Caldecott Award useful. Just for fun, I typed in Tiger Woods and I found it unusual that there were several feeds that had been created over two years ago that still were awaiting approval by Topix.net. I wondered what dictates whether a feed gets approval or not.

I didn't discover any other ways to locate newsfeed during this exercise, but I am aware of how to locate newsfeed after the last few exercises.