Web 2.0: How to Teach the Public about Social Software

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The digital divide isn’t about the Internet haves and have-nots anymore; instead, it is about who has access to fast broadband connections for streaming media and exposure to content creation tools. The Internet has evolved to become a participatory medium, and libraries, in their role of providing information and resources, may be the only vehicles for citizen’s voices to be heard in the Web 2.0 culture. This workshop will:

  • Empower you to teach the public how to use specific Web 2.0 tools
  • Learn to field challenging questions specific to Web 2.0
  • Develop best practices for designing workshops that address the specific needs of adult learners

Workshop Description: Web 2.0 makes some people nervous; privacy, safety, attribution, authority and standards are major issues. In this all day, hands-on session, we’ll cover fielding challenging questions specific to Web 2.0, and focus on best practices for designing workshops that address the specific needs of adult learners. Group discussion and hands-on exercises will help you develop the skills and handouts to better help your users understand the ins and outs of Web 2.0 concepts and applications.

Preliminary Course Outline

  • Conveying Web 2.0
    • How to explain Web 2.0 concepts
    • Creating helpful handouts
  • Social Bookmarking
    • How to explain the tagging phenomenon
    • Applying tags through applications such as Google Images, Flickr, and del.icio.us
  • Blogs, Wikis and RSS
    • How to explain the subscription and collaborative elements
    • Applying the concepts through applications such as Bloglines, Blogger and PBwiki
  • Social Software
    • How to explain online communities
    • Finding the right community by age, ability, and interests: examining communities such as MySpace, Ning, and Eons

Fee: Thanks to a special LSTA grant award from the California State Library, Infopeople is able to offer this workshop to the California library community free of charge.

Who Should Attend: Anyone from the California library community with an interest in Web 2.0. This FREE course is also appropriate for library business managers, procurement officers, public information officers, systems staff, facilities managers, custodians, and volunteers. As Beth’s friend Bonnie Peirce says, “If you don’t participate in Web 2.0, you will never understand it.”

Prerequisites: This course requires that students be comfortable with basic computer skills, including using a mouse, navigating the web, and basic keyboarding. For help with these basic skills, we recommend the New Computer Users section of the Infopeople Resources Guides, at infopeople.org/resources. Students will be referred to the Infopeople Web 2.0 wiki for background. For students who haven't taken a previous Infopeople Web 2.0 course, catching up using the Infopeople Web 2.0 wiki will be a prerequisite.

Check-in: 8:30 to 9:00 AM Instruction: 9:00 AM to 4:40 PM

Available for contracting: 
No