CPD23 Thing #5 Reflective Practice

When I did this last I got so much out of it, I started a diary which kept me on top of my world and contributed to a lot of my success last year, but as time passed I wrote in my book less and kept track of less, I still made lists but noted less of my thoughts and reflections. It is a practise, and to do it you must 'practice' it, I shall be revisiting this again this year and I hope to make myself a weekly reflective list and that way I don't have to keep it all up to date which proved the problem last time, and I still round up my work long and short term.
Reflecting on my current position I am much happier than I was, I now feel I am doing professional work at all levels and while I have 'quiet' days I am still adding to my over all success even by doing less sometimes to take a break, can allow my mind time to process and sort what I am doing.
I learnt so much doing all the different aspects of the CPD23 last year that I am redoing all of it to finish as I find my views and needs are changing. As a self driven tool CPD23 allows me to work at my own pace and to organise my own time. I have the notes form last year to look ahead and to plan, and I have the current drive to help support and prod me to keep going. I am more aware of myself and my place in the wider profession from it and now feel like I can contribute to debate and discussion despite being geographically far flung, and based in education and public sectors.
When I thought back over the last year I felt my most dynamic had been when doing the CPD23 so as I needed to finish it I would redo the whole event. this was my first reflective practise and from that I am revisiting so much, and reimplementing the reflective round up but as a once a week event :-).
To sum up, I got alot out of CPD23, and redoing it and will redo the best ideas form last time with a view to continueing.

Thing #4 for CPD23

I know I am ahead but I am redoing a lot of these so I am trying to get ahead as I will be missing ones later on due to holidays and other events, I am revisiting Thing #4 and have found it very interesting.

Twitter was a new and scary thing for me, I had made and lost an account before so wasn't sure I wanted to commit to joining Twitter, also on the back of my brand thoughts I wasn't sure I wanted to be me! which was an odder thought. I joined twitter as @bibliosuk which is an odd email name made from biblios and UK some people knew it but I had set it up as an alias years ago so shows the sender as Severus Snape! I have grown fond of this email and now use it for most things personal and as my twitter world is me, both professional and silly I chose it as my name. I have now been tweeting for a year just about, and have tweeted just shy of 2000 tweets, I hope most of them make some sense!
Through twitter I have found new friends and got back in regular touch with old ones but the use I have found best for it is the CPD possibilities, I now know what is new in my world, who is cutting edge and can keep up with trends and ideas, I now bring things to my colleagues that they havent seen yet and can talk with confidence on new ideas in libraries! Nothing can make that any less important, I feel like a valuable librarian again! Thanks you CPD23 and thank you twitter!

RSS had me stumped for months, I did as asked and followed some nice new blogs and didn't see how this cumbersome clunky system could be so good! I stuck with it and suddenly realised I could draw them into one screen, and even just see new ones! I could streamline it with home feeds and suddenly it made sense. The way you use it is up to you! (I know its not the life altering but it made so much better sense.) I now check my feeds every day or so, from home or work (in my break of course) and find it is fun an easy, but you do need to keep at it.

Storify looks fab, much more fun than pushnote though not as relevant possibly but as with push note when I try to use it I get the 'you do not have the right browser' comment and I cant change work's machine and need home to mirror it to keep all my work easily transferable. I am having fun in Pinterest though and have set up folders for loads of things including the new build that is happening, I doubt I shall get much input but I can dream and that is what pinterest allows you to do!

Personal Brand CPD23 Thing #3

I need to look at my personal brand again, I remember being shocked when I did this last time. I have an unusual name and the first page that came up was all about me. Some I was proud of some I had forgotten but a few I didn't know about and had to go and firefight some not so fun things. One of the drawbacks to being in school is Rate My Teacher .com which is driven by disgruntled pupils, I mean who goes on the site when they have had an okay or good class or term? while the ones who think that the whole thing was bad! They feature heavily with loads of negative comments on whoever they score with a few positive being the 'younger' and more savvy teachers encouraging it.
The first page also has a lost Twitter account, I don't know why it is higher than my current one (shrugs) I must get it and put the two together! I also have two Facebook accounts which I must also put together, the moral of this is I must remember the passwords better ;-). When I do the same search for images I find hat Google has mixed me in with Ryan Peat, who ever the poor lad is, and he now appears between me and my library pictures :-) but the first is still mainly me.
A few notes on my brand before I finish, I took a while to decide on what would be my brand, I decided that it would have to be me, the network librarian, the mum of 3 teens, the craft nut, The keeper of three cats. It would reflect all of me, so professional, but not fully, smart but hints of fun. I don't mind my managers knowing my thoughts as I wouldn't put up any thoughts that could be problems, so I shouldn't knee jerk post (well not often) I don't have a theme yet but that is ongoing. (Yes a year on and its still ongoing)
Due to being part of a new company we don't have business cards and can't get any made with the strictly controlled logo. I am hoping this changes and I can get some done otherwise I shall get some new ones done soon just for me hence the ongoing theme issues.

Thing #2 New links

After sending out my last post I then went and wandered round the other new posts for CPD23, I read a few and commented here and there as well as subscribing. I hope to make and keep a few good Friends again this year, as the last one was great for finding other 'lost souls' in the 'modern' world.

CPD23 2012 Thing #1

Oh Look It must be nearly summer again, its time for CPD23! :-) yes I am being facetious, I did all but the last two or three things last time and didn't end them as I didn't want the experience to end! Well I'm back and I shall be doing them all again, Why I may hear you ask! Well I didn't finish but have found that my first thoughts on things have changed, so I am redoing them in order and will be blogging them as I do with my current thoughts and experiences and I hope that they will help new CPD'ers and will help me get them sorted in my head!
Thing#1 is of course the Blog Post, since last year I have made more use of this and am happy that it is a reasonable reflection of my own world.