Universal Class

I'm excited about the library's new online classes!

Check it out! http://www.dbrl.org/reference/universalclass
Below is a copy of the announcement for the public.

Through the library’s website, library cardholders now have free access to
over 540 online continuing education courses with real instructors through
a service called UniversalClass.

You can take courses in exercise and fitness, entrepreneurship, arts and
music, home and garden care, cooking, computers and technology, health and
medicine, homeschooling, job assistance, law and legal, parenting and
family, pet and animal care… plus hundreds more. With real instructors
guiding the learning, engaging video-based lessons, a collaborative
learning environment, graded lesson tests, certificates of achievement and
Continuing Education Units available for selected courses, you enjoy an
engaging and measurable learning experience that helps you master and
document your educational goals.

Why has it taken us so long to see this?

Via: Medical Billing And Coding

KD Easley - a local author

Where the Dreams End by kd easley

Kd Easley lives in Fulton, Missouri. This is her first published mystery. Another mystery novel, Murder at Timber Bridge, came out this year. I like the way she is able to weave romance and humor into a compelling thriller that keeps you guessing. Brocs Harley, the black sheep of a wealthy family, is a repo man with a degree in Criminal Justice and a background in grand theft and B&E. When his brother, the golden boy who claims all his father's love, is murdered, Brocs is the prime suspect.

You can read excerpts and find out more about Kadi at http://www.kdwrites.com/

GottaBook: Who Reads Your Manuscript -- a poem for writers (and editors)

GottaBook: Who Reads Your Manuscript -- a poem for writers (and editors): "Who Reads Your Manuscript
By
Gregory K.

Editors were born to read:
They chose their jobs for love, not greed.
Editors are short on time,
And truly they don’t ALL hate rhyme.
Editors have pets, get wed.
Sometimes they stay home sick in bed.
Editors eat writers, true...
But otherwise, they’re just like you!"

Why don't I write?

Here's a poem by Gregory K. over at GottaBook that explains it all.

REASONS WHY I DON’T WRITE
by
Gregory K.

Errands
Cooking
Cleaning up

Nothing
In my
Coffee cup

Snail mail
E-mail
Blogging, too

Crosswords
Comics
Sudoku

Phone calls
Lunches
Fear of debt

Daydreams
Nap times
Internet

Laundry
Sunsets
Batting cage

“Research”
iTunes
Empty page

30 Poets - 30 days

Jacqueline Woodson, Walter Dean Myers, and Kathi Appelt are just some of the writers who’ll take part in 30 Poets/30 Days, a celebration of children's poetry during National Poetry Month.

Every day in April, author Gregory K. Pincus’s GottaBook blog and Twitter site will feature a previously unpublished poem by a different poet—and it’s completely free and open 24/7.

Pincus says last year’s inaugural 30 Poets/30 Days was such a huge success, with thousands of people reading poems and schools and education sites participating in the event. “I received wonderful e-mails from teachers and librarians who used the poems as a launching pad to teach poetry or feature different poets,” he says.

Other participants include Alan Katz, whose humorous rhyming books such as Oops (S & S 2008) are hugely entertaining for kids, and Charles R. Smith Jr, the photographer behind My People (Atheneum, 2009), the 2010 winner of the Coretta Scott King Award for Illustrations.

“Poetry to me is life, because words are life. The Tao Te Ching says that if we want to be pure of spirit, we must be pure of speech,” Smith says. “When I write poetry, I am looking to get to the truth through words. My mantra is ‘waste no words’ so I can honestly say that my career has been built one word at a time.”

All poems from last yea are available online, including “I Dreamt I Saw a Dinosaur,” submitted by Mary Ann Hoberman, the Poetry Foundation's current Children's Poet Laureate and a recipient of the NCTE Award for Excellence in Poetry for Children. )

National Poetry Month sponsored by the Academy of American Poets, which began the event in 1996. More activities can be found at www.Kidlitosphere.com

Social Networking & Online Videos

The last unit of our NetTrek staff training was all about social networking. I've used this type of site for a long time. The first sites I used were especially for writers, but the basic concept was the same. Some sites were simply forums, ongoing conversations among strangers who gradually became online friends. Other sites encouraged members to make personal pages and post stories or poems for others to read and critique. I still find these site to be the most useful and relevant to my life and interests.

Facebook is great for making contact with old friends you've lost touch with over the years. I have almost 100 FB friends and many are people I went to high school with 45 years ago. It's also a good way to keep in touch with relatives you don't see often. One unexpected benefit has been the ability to get to know professional acquaintances a little better. However, FB can easily become a compulsive time-waster with all its games, surveys, and vapid chitchat. I log in very seldom these days.

LinkedIn is supposed to be the way professional people network. I have several contacts there, but I think it would be more useful for younger people who may be interested in career advancement.

Twitter is another site that *can* be a timewaster. It is useful to be able to choose the people you follow and I've found some great links on tweets. The best thing about Twitter is the timeliness. If some is happening RIGHT NOW and you want to find out the details before CNN does - just log in to Twitter and search.

Online Videos and Podcasts: these are most useful when you're trying to learn how to do something. NO amount of words can replace having someone show you, step-by-step exactly how to get a job done. I've used online videos to learn new software many times. Humorous videos are fun and it is NEVER a waste of time to have a good laugh.