I decided to use Newsvibe as my blog reader, because I felt like it was the most organized for my needs. When you first log in to Newsvibe, your home page has all of the unread article from your favorite blogs right there for you to read. If you do not want to see all unread article, but only articles from a specific blog, then you can click that blog on the left side, and only articles from the desired blog will be listed. Instead of having to visit each blog that you read individually, you can see all of the article from all of the blogs in one place.
To subscribe to a blog on Newsvibe, you simply click "subscribe" at the top and a drop down menu comes down that asks for the blog's URL and what folder you want it sorted in. Simple as that, that blog's articles will now appear in your news feed. Folders make it easy to organize your blogs into topics, so that if you only want to see blog article about library displays, then you can click on that folder and only articles from those blogs will appear.
Once you click on an article that you are interested in reading, you can read it straight from Newsvibe, or it gives you an option to go to the original blog. Clicking that option will open a new tab in yor browser and open that specific blog article in the blog that it was written. You can also mark an article as read or unread if needed.
Preference in Newsvibe are easy to locate and easy to use, and options include creating folders for organization, display preferences, marking as read and unread, and more. There is also a list of keyboard shortcuts under your options to help make using the site easier.
With all of this being said, I now have an organized way to read all of the great blogs that I found while working on this assignment. Here are 5 of my favorite blogs and why:
#1: Great Kid Books: http://greatkidbooks.blogspot.com/
This blog is written by Mary Ann Scheuer, a school librarian, and she writes about childrens books for children ages 4-14. She reviews books and tells what they are about, her opinions, and what ages they are for. This is a great blog for teachers and parents to check out and stay up to date on good reading for their students or children. I followed this blog, because I always want to know which books are new and which are useful to me as an educator.
#2: Library Displays: http://schoollibrarydisplays.blogspot.com/
This blog is written by Elaine Pearson, a college librarian, who posts creative and easy ideas for school library displays. The main goal for her blog is for her and fellow librarians to share ideas on how to promote books that are currently in their collections. I followed this blog, because I am sure as a librarian there will be many times that I don't understand why certain books aren't circulating. Knowing how to promote and display these books will help me get my whole collection into the hands of the students.
#3: Mighty Little Librarian: http://www.mightylittlelibrarian.com/
This is a blog written by a middle school librarian in Louisiana. I like her blog, because I feel she is very transparent. She shares about what she is doing in her library as she posts...changing the layout of the library, "ditching Dewey" and relabeling all of her books, fun activities she does with her classes, etc. She also shares helpful information for other librarians, such as great apps to download, how to virtualize your library, tech tools, signage, a sample survey to give to students, etc. I think as a new librarian, it will be helpful to follow what other librarians are doing and take their advice and suggestions.
#4: The Adventures of Library Girl: http://www.librarygirl.net/
This is an excellent blog written by Jennifer LaGarde. She travels the country and helps teachers, administrators, and librarians learns how to best utilize the library as a learning tool for all students. I decided to follow this blog, because she cares about the career I have chosen and gives great insight into making my library the best learning environment that I possible can! She shares about making the library your own, making it impactful for students, learning how to be a leader in your school, etc. I think this blog will be very encouraging and helpful to me as a school librarian.
#5: The Busy Librarian: http://www.busylibrarian.com/
This blog is written by a male librarian at an elementary school in Maryland. He blogs about book reviews, author and illustrator visits,technology tools, award winning books, book trailers, etc. He writes about all things library, and I want to follow this blog because he is a wonderful librarian at the grade levels where I want to be a wonderful librarian. I think a key to become a successful librarian is taking advice and following in the footsteps of other successful librarians. This blog should give me great ideas for making my library a great place for students to learn and fall in love with books!
Although none of the blogs I listed here were Tumblr accounts, I did look into Tunblr, and I think it could be an awesome tool for librarians. Tumblr in more visually based than text based, so librarians can use this tool as attention grabbers for students. Many students are moving away from facebook and even Instagram, and some are moving to Tumblr. Having a Tunblr account for yout school library and posting pictures, video trailers, book quotes, etc. could be a great way to get students engaged in the library and want to know more about the books that they see. I did not create my own Tumblr for this assignment, but I hope to some day!
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