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School library websites: a loose research translation

July 1, 2007
Things kinda converged for me as I took my brisk walk this morning.

• I was thinking hard about how to add value to my presentation for the upcoming November Learning Conference.
• I was distressed over the fact that so much of my Web work, especially the lessons I created over the past 10 years, looks so 1.0.
• I was thinking about how I really should go back to the research I just completed for my dissertation and share it in some way.  (The academic article just doesn't seem to want to write itself this week.)  I wanted to make sure the taxonomies that resulted could be easily used by practitioners.

So I thought a little harder and walked a little faster and the solution came to me.  And like so many of my solutions these days, this one also took wiki form.

I decided to revise my slightly moldy WebQuest on school library websites and incorporate my research taxonimies. 

My content analysis study examined 10 effective school library websites with the goal of creating descriptive taxonomies for practice.  A Delphi panel helped by selecting 10 sample secondary sites for study and by developing two preliminary taxonomies:

• one looked at site features or content--the "what" of school library websites
• one looked at site characteristics--the "how" of school library websites

The new WebQuest incorporates the taxonomies and the research, and it can be very easily adapted as together we discover new models of effective practice in a shifting landscape, and as we discover important features that didn't make the original taxonomies.

This is rough work.  Please join me in developing and finessing a useful tool for professional development.

Posted by Joyce Valenza Ph.D on July 1, 2007 | Comments (0)