The Newsletter of the Learning Round Table of the American Library Association

LearningExchange
December 2014

“School ends, but education doesn’t.”

Volume 31, Number 2

“Help! How Do I Get Off
This Sinking Ship?”
and other trainer tips

Open Access Week
and Graduate College
Workshop

Jennifer Fenton,
Continuing Education and Training Coordinator,
Washington State Library

Stephen Arougheti,
Information Specialist -- Senior,
Arizona State University
The Scholarly Publishing and Academic Research
Coalition (SPARC) sponsors Open Access (OA)
Week each year. In 2014 libraries responded to
the global initiative by creating programming and
training to promote the benefits of Open Access.
Arizona State University (ASU) hosted a series of
events designed to inform the university body on
the elements of OA and the potential it offered for
maximizing research investments and increasing
exposure. To stimulate conversation about the role
of Open Access within scholarly publishing and
encourage usage of ASU’s digital repository, the
library’s Scholarly Communication department
sponsored a series of events throughout the week
for university constituency.

As a trainer, I enjoy incorporating various features
and activities into my trainings. When developing
a training, I reflect on who my audience is and
what their needs will be. I consider the topic and
the best ways to approach the topic.
One of my activities is guided note-taking. Guided
note-taking is deceptively simple. It engages the
visual learners because they see the words on the
screen and/or workbook. The oral learners hear
the words read aloud. They get learning in an
auditory manner. Even the kinesthetic learners get
something out of this because they are writing in
the missing words, giving their hand something to
do which triggers learning and memory.
Other activities that I like to incorporate into my
trainings include small group discussions with a
recorder who uses a flip-chart. This allows those
that learn by doing to write out the notes from the
group who is discussing the topic (good for the
auditory learners) and then the visual learners get
engaged by seeing the conversation reflected on

New

In collaboration with the Office of Graduate
Education, ASU Libraries presented an
informational session for graduate students
demonstrating how OA and digital repositories are
relevant within their own studies and professional
development. Additionally, the workshop focused
on the university’s institutional digital repository
(IDR) and the students’ required submission of
Continued as Ships on Page 4 their theses/dissertations to the IDR. Designed to
publicize the innovative research of ASU faculty
and students, the IDR offers free online access
ideas to share?
worldwide.

Send your articles to the editors at
editor@alalearning.org

Continued as Open Access on Page 4

The LearningExchange is the
official publication of the
Learning Round
Table (LearnRT) of the
American Library Association.
It is distributed free to members
of LearnRT and is published
quarterly in September
December, March, and June.
Editor: Dawn Lowe-Wincentsen
LearnRT Officers
President:
Jennifer Fenton
Vice President:
Caitlin Moen
Secretary:
Colleen Eggett
Treasurer:
Melissa Lattanzi
ALA Staff Liaisons:
Kimberly Redd

P

at Carterette Professional
Development Grant

There’s nothing like attending a library conference or workshop to
spark new interest, excitement and motivation in a library employee.
That’s why Pat Carterette, a former Staff Development specialist, was
always in the forefront of encouraging people to sign up, go…learn
something new!
In her memory and to help further that legacy, the Learning Round
Table of the American Library Association is offering the Pat
Carterette Professional Development Grant. The grant winner will be
awarded up to $1,000 to attend a continuing education event. Monies
can be used to cover registration, travel, lodging or other expenses.

		

Web site:
http://www.ala.org/learnrt

To apply fill out an online application before Dec. 15, 2014. For more
information and the application, see: http://www.ala.org/learnrt/patcarterette-professional-development-grant
The grant award recipient will be announced shortly after ALA
Midwinter Conference in January, 2015.

Subscription rates:
4 issues per year
U.S. and Canada
$25 a year
Outside the U.S. and Canada
$30 a year.
SUBSCRIPTION questions
(e.g. missing issues, address
changes) should be sent to:
Kimberly Redd
ALA/LearnRT
50 E. Huron Street
Chicago, IL 60611
Fax: 312-280-3256
CONTENT questions
should be sent to:
LearningExchange Editor
editor@alalearning.org

Pat Carterette in Portugal (nd)

GENERAL questions about
LearnRT should be sent to:
info@alalearning.org

2

LearningExchange

December 2014

President’s Message
Winter is already hitting us here in the beautiful
Pacific Northwest with our first frosts and chilly
temperatures. ALA Midwinter is actually just
around the corner and I hope many LEARN RT
members will stop by our LEARN RT Executive
Board and Membership Meeting on Saturday,
January 31, 9:00am-12:00pm. As always, the
board meeting is open to anyone interested in
learning more about LEARN RT. However, we’ve
adjusted the format a bit this time and the first hour
will be the general membership meeting followed
by the open Executive Board meeting which will
be 10:00am-12:00pm. We hope to see our LEARN
RT friends at the meeting in Chicago. You’ll
also notice that we now only have one meeting
instead of two separate meetings. ALA has been
re-working their format for both Midwinter
and Annual and encouraged us to consider
consolidating our meetings. This works great for
me as I hope to peek in on other open meetings at
Midwinter.
Thanks for your support of the LEARN
Roundtable, I know that getting involved in
professional organizations has greatly enriched
my career for many years. We have a full slate of
officers running for the 2015-2017 Board and I
encourage you to vote in the upcoming election.
The names will be announced soon. I wish to
extend a personal thank you to each and every
person who volunteered to run for an office.
If you missed the call for office this year, check us
out at Midwinter and Annual and consider running
in 2016. The way time flies, it will be here in the

ALA Midwinter
Learn RT Meeting
Saturday, January 31, 9:00am-12:00pm: LEARN
RT Executive Board and Membership Meeting.
The first hour will be the general membership
meeting and the Executive Board meeting will be
10:00am-12:00pm.
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December 2014

Jennifer Fenton, President, Learning RT

blink of an eye.
Are you already dreaming of warm summer
weather? If so, you may want to turn your thoughts
to ALA Annual in San Francisco. I’ve never been
to San Francisco and am excited that ALA Annual
coincides with the Pride Parade. Because of this
event (lots of people in the streets), we are aiming
to host our programs on non-parade days and
the Executive Board Meeting (open to all) will
be first thing in the morning on Pride Sunday in
San Francisco. Our programming committee is
working hard to plan a great pre-conference and
sessions at ALA Annual. Stay tuned for details.
Thanks for contributing to LEARN RT, we
couldn’t do it without all of our members and
followers. See you at ALA or online at our 2015
meetings (exact schedule TBD.)

Upcoming Online
Meetings
Log-in instructions will be made available closer to the
meeting dates.
Monday, December 1st, 11:00am Pacific Time,
12:00pm Mountain Time, 1:00pm Central Time,
2:00pm Eastern Time
All LEARN RT members and interested members are
welcome to attend these membership meetings.

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Ships Continued from Page 1

Open Access Continued from Page 1

the flip-chart. Reporting out gives another person
an opportunity to participate and use various skills.

Through an open forum, the session endeavored to
teach the advantages of OA and dispel associated
myths. Through engaged dialogue, librarians and
students connected. Common misconceptions
amongst graduate students about posting their
thesis to the university’s IDR involve concerns
of current research being scooped or companies’
disinclination to invest in publishing content
which is otherwise freely available. Discussing
the students’ ability to embargo the thesis and
the university’s IDR as a tool to market both
the scholar and the research were designed to
enlighten and convince the student of the benefits
to posting their research.

Post-its with words and concepts that can be put
up on the wall and moved around is another great
way to engage a variety of learning styles.
Beyond the traditional learning styles, I try to add
in learning elements that connect to the way adult
learners now process information. These elements
include gamification, the flipped classroom, selfdirected learning, learner-centered, mobile and
social media. Not all of these are appropriate for
every training although they are becoming more
popular.
Recently, I presented several programs at
our Washington Library Employees (WALE)
conference. Each one was unique and all three
incorporate different learning styles:
Gadget Menagerie: Learn how various eReaders,
tablets, and other devices work. Discover what
they have in common, how they are different, and
learn basic tips. Explore the Washington State
Gadget Menagerie including Kindles, Nooks,
Galaxy Tablets, iPads, Microsoft Surface, Google
Nexus, and more!
Help! How Do I Get Off This Sinking Ship? In
this interactive workshop, participants learned how
to deal with stress and burn-out and still provide
stellar customer service.
Activities included a participant stress test,
demonstrating and having participants do some
brain gym activities, small and large group
discussions, pair and share, reporting out and live
demos.
Visioning the Futures of Libraries: What do
you think of when you think of a library? What
services are essential in the 21st Century? Are
there other services that libraries should offer?
This session will be a forum for sharing a vision
for the library of the future.
4

Scholarly output by graduate students exceeds
the thesis. Students are publishing peerreviewed papers and presenting at conferences.
A central component of the workshop was to
encourage students to publish their research to
ASU’s IDR. To achieve the goal of increasing
graduate student contributions to ASU’s IDR, the
workshop emphasized the benefits of publishing
to IDR. Amongst the advantages from publishing
research to IDR for students who are beginning
an academic career include: establishing an
accessible online portfolio, archiving research
for preservation, creating a citable URL for a
curriculum vitae, increasing dissemination by
marketing yourself, and establishing professional
credibility.
With many graduate students pursuing careers
in academia and confronting the challenges of
a rapidly evolving business model in scholarly
publishing, it is vital for librarians to assert
themselves and the library as a valuable resource
to navigate its complexities. As the workshop
served to be a resourceful method of outreach
for connecting with a vital constituency of the
university during Open Access Week, discussion
occurred involving the benefit of providing the
session closer to the conclusion of the spring
2015 semester. During which, students will be
graduating and confronting the issue of making
their thesis available online.
LearningExchange

December 2014

Things to See and Places to Eat in Chicago
Colleen Hooks, Features Editor

Chicago Sunset from Hancock Observatory
Photograph by Chris Smith www.flickr.com/photos/cjsmithphotography/5518522177

Looking for something to do during your
downtime at the Midwinter Conference? Listed
in Lonely Planet’s top ten travel destinations for
2014, Chicago has lots of things to see and places
eat!

Chicago Eats

Pizza
One could argue that you can’t go to Chicago
without getting some famous Chicago-style pizza.
While we won’t get into the debate of who has the
best deep dish pizza in Chicago, Gino’s East, Lou
Malnati’s and The Art of Pizza show up often in
the list of contenders.
Portillo’s
If you’re looking for a Chicago dog, look no
further than Portillo’s. This award winning
restaurant started in Chicago as a hotdog cart and
has since expanded across the U.S. They also
offer Italian beef sandwiches, burgers and salads.
The Chicago Diner
This vegan and vegetarian diner has been in
business for over 30 years. The menu offers
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December 2014

something to satisfy just about any craving and
the food will appeal to herbivores and meat eaters
alike. The Chicago Diner’s long list of accolades
can attest to that.
Alinea
Considered to be one of the best restaurants in
America, and a holder of a Michelin 3-star rating,
Alinea is as much of a work of art as it is a dining
experience; Offering a tasting menu of between 18
and 22 courses based on seasonal flavors.
Intelligentsia Coffee
Founded and headquartered in Chicago,
Intelligentsia’s coffees are grown exclusively
for the brand. If you’re looking for a pick-meup, there are 6 Intelligentsia Coffee bars in the
Chicago area.

Chicago Sights

Museums
Chicago is home to many museums, so there is
an option for any interest: The Field Museum
for natural history, The Museum of Science
Continued as Chicago Sights on page 7
5

CE -- A Bigger Picture

The Coalition to Advance Learning in Archives, Libraries and Museums
Shirley Biladeau, Continuing Education Consultant, Idaho Commission for Libraries

A Continuing Education Summit was hosted by IMLS
and OCLC in June 2013 with the aim of jump-starting
coordinated, near-term plans for innovative projects
and partnerships. An outcome of that summit was
a shared understanding of organizational priorities
toward improvement of the impact and sustainability of
continuing education for the field. Further, participants
came away from the event with a clear sense that they
could work in cooperation to more effectively meet
their own organization’s goals while also advancing the
goals of continuing education overall.
This effort resulted in the meeting of the Coalition
to Advance Learning in Archives, Libraries and
Museums, a cross-sector group of key audience
representatives, representatives from organizations
already committed to continuing education nationally,
and individuals making significant contributions to
continuing education in local environments. With
impetus and funding from the Institute of Museum
and Library Services and coordinated by OCLC, the
group met March 27-28, 2014 in Washington D.C. to
consider the challenges and initiate efforts to develop
approaches for future collaboration.
The participants agreed that the purpose of the
Coalition is to work in deliberate coordination across
organizational boundaries to devise and strengthen
sustainable continuing education and professional
programs that will transform the library, museum and
archives workforce in ways that lead to measureable
impact on our nation’s communities.
Key outcomes of this initial meeting were the creation
of three working groups:
• Governance and coalition-building: an essential
component to forging and sustaining collaboration will
be ensuring and codifying agreements on purpose and
directions, building effective internal relationships,
guiding decision-making, and providing common
information for dissemination on the work of the
Coalition;
• Assessing the field: gathering information on the
status of continuing education and professional
development in each of the collaborating fields will

6

ensure solid data for planning, identify existing
programs on which to build, and support effective
development of further joint efforts;
• Developing a prototype: perhaps the most tangible
demonstration of the value of collaborative continuing
education/professional development will be creation of
an education opportunity that quickly and effectively
meets the needs of all cooperating professions in a
common area of much-needed training.
The Coalition to Advance Learning in Archives,
Libraries and Museums invites interested organizations
and individuals to review and comment on its work and
to consider becoming involved in this collaboration.
Current members of the Coalition are:
Susan Benton, Urban Libraries Council
Clara Chu, Association for Library and Information
Science Education
Linda Crowe, Califa
Mary Ellen Davis, Association of College & Research
Libraries
Victoria Garvin, Association of Children’s Museums
Laurie Gemmill Arp, LYRASIS
Wendy Hancock, Association of Science – Technology
Centers
Barb Macikas, Public Library Association
Nancy McGovern, Digital Preservation Management
Workshops
Douglas Newcomb, Special Libraries Association
Mark Puente, Association of Research Libraries
Lawrence Reger, Heritage Preservation
Donna McCrea, Society of American Archivists
Cal Shepard, North Carolina State Library and COSLA
representative
Katherine Skinner, Educopia Institute
Greg Stevens, American Alliance of Museums
Sharon Streams, OCLC
Jennifer Thomas, Virginia Association of Museums
Matthew B. Veatch, Council of State Archivists
Beth Yoke, Young Adult Library Services Association
For more information contact Anna Shelton at
sheltona@oclc.org.

Adapted from: http://www.oclc.org/en-US/news/
releases/2013/201348dublin.html
LearningExchange December 2014

Chicago Sights Continued from Page 5
and Industry, the Shedd Aquarium, the Adler
Planetarium, the DuSable Museum of African
American History, the Peggy Notebaert Nature
Museum, and the Art Institute of Chicago - just to
name a few.
Millennium Park - 201 E Randolph S
Located in the heart of Downtown Chicago,
Millennium Park is a showcase of architecture,
sculpture and landscape design. It’s the home
of Cloud Gate - aka - The Bean, Wrigley Square
and the Millennium Monument, Lurie Garden,
and much more! You can also find the Nichols
Bridgeway in Millennium Park; a bridge that
will take pedestrians over to the Art Institute of
Chicago.
Robie House - 5757 S. Woodlawn Avenue
Created by the famous architect Frank Lloyd
Wright, the Robie House on the University
of Chicago campus is considered to be one of
the most important buildings in the history of
American architecture. There are many other
Frank Lloyd Wright structures located in the Oak
Park as well.
Navy Pier
Located on the coast of Lake Michigan, the Navy
Pier offers visitors many options, including rides
and attractions, shopping and entertainment, as
well as dining options and sightseeing cruises.
Willis Tower - Sky Deck
The tallest building in North America, Willis
Tower (formerly known as the Sears Tower) offers
views that span up to four states. Visitors can take
a look at exhibits and a theater presentation on
their way up to the 103 floor Sky Deck.
360 Chicago
Formerly known as the John Hancock
Observatory, 360 Chicago was voted the best
view in America by Travel and Leisure Magazine.
Visitors can enjoy their view from the cafe on the
94th floor, while daredevils can see Chicago from
a new angle on TILT.
LearningExchange

December 2014

Book Review:

Telling Ain’t Training
Amanda Hovious
Stolovitch, H. D. and Keeps, E. J. (2011). Telling
Ain’t Training (2nd ed.). Alexandria, VA: ASTD.
(ISBN: 1562867016)
If the goal of professional training is for learning
to take place, then those involved in teaching it
must be aware of the fundamental principles of
human learning and how to design instruction that
supports the way people learn. If you find yourself
in the role of trainer, but lack a formal background
in the learning sciences, a good introduction to
effective training is Telling Ain’t Training by
Harold D. Stolovitch and Erica J. Keeps.
Here are key takeaways from the book:
•Training should begin with an explanation of why
it is needed and what the learners will be able to
do with it (i.e. rationale, objectives).
•Learning requires attention.
•Learners have limited memories.
•Learners need opportunities for practice.
• Learners need feedback.
•Training approach should match content, training
goals and learner characteristics.
•Message design is more important than delivery
mode (i.e. face-to-face vs. online).
Telling Ain’t Training was created to serve as a
how-to manual for developing effective training
and instruction based on solid cognitive research.
It includes strategies and models for structuring
effective training, as well as examples of
effective learning activities. It is a must-read for
anyone involved in professional development or
continuing education.
7

Autumn Season Brings Beautiful Days and Lots of
Learning for Montana Librarians
Lauren McMullen, Training and Development Specialist, Montana State Library
Also in October, teacher-librarians learned about
digital projects, intellectual freedom, social
media, and statewide databases in workshops at
the Montana Education Association – Montana
Federation of Teachers (MEA-MFT) Educator’s
Conference in Missoula. Trainings were presented
by Montana Library Association members and
Montana State Library staff members.

Montana Photograph by FunGi_(Trading)
www.flickr.com/photos/v-neck/6145318478

When librarians get together in Montana, there’s
usually some continuing education involved.
That’s especially true in the fall, when we’re
getting ready for the long months of winter to set
in. September and October are very busy training
months!
In September, the Montana State Library
hosted more than 120 public and school library
directors, staff, and trustees at the 14th annual
Fall Workshops in Helena. This two-day event
offered a selection of fifty four hours of continuing
education in Library Administration, Services to
the Public, Collection Management & Technical
Services, and Technology. Librarians also had
plenty of opportunities to meet informally to share
what they learned, exchange best practices, and
help each other out with problem solving and
brainstorming.
The next opportunity came along in October,
at the Montana Library Association Academic
& Special Libraries Division/Public Library
Division (MLA ASLD/PLD) annual retreat at the
lovely Chico Hot Springs Resort and Day Spa in
Emigrant, Montana. Thirty-five librarians attended
interactive workshops on community engagement,
communicating online, professional association
leadership and more.
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Three Library Federations offered training at their
fall meetings this year on library finances and
budgeting (at Golden Plains Federation in Wolf
Point and Sagebrush Federation in Miles City)
and collecting & reporting usage of electronic
resources (Pathfinder Federation in Fort Benton).
The face-to-face training season wrapped up in
early November with a workshop from the Digital
Public Library of America (DPLA) western states
road trip. They made a stop in Helena, where
librarians and museum partners learned the nuts
and bolts of creating digital collections.
For those librarians who were unable to travel,
online learning opportunities were available
from the State Library. The webinars and online
meetings will continue throughout the winter
months so that Montana librarians can continue
learning and meeting with their peers until face-toface opportunities open up again in the spring.
Brand new this year is a statewide contract with
GoToMeeting (GTM) online meeting software
for public libraries that is provided by the
Montana State Library. Each library will have
a 25-seat GTM room to use as they see fit: for
collaborations, trainings, and demonstrations,
with patrons and with each other. In Montana, we
don’t let distance or the weather get in the way of
learning!
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December 2014