Media Center Web pages! What a great topic!... is what I thought to myself as I looked at my assignment. Then I started reading the articles that were included, and I realized that I had never truly considered the depth and impact of a media center web page. I have always just considered a webpage an “extra” not necessarily an essential element to my program. I mean who has enough time to really create an impressive site, and why would they want to?
I am so glad you asked!
Why have an LMC website?
I completely agree with David Warlick’s statement in his article "Building Web Sites that Work for Your Media Center". The LMC website should be all about functionality and assisting in the day to day operations to help us, as media specialists, do our jobs more effectively. The LMC website should be a place that students, teachers, and parents can find valuable resources and important information. It will allow 24/7 access to resources so that learners can access things no matter if they are at home or somewhere else in the building. It is a source of PR for your program and in this day and age when media programs and specialists are being cut left-and-right there is no such thing as too much PR.
An LMC website also creates a central place to leave resources so that you are not constantly resending, reprinting, and retelling common information.
Nobody wants to waste time creating a site that is not going to be used so here are my top 5 do’s and don’ts.
- Make sure you have relevant information in the form of links, forms, and things learners, teachers, and parents need access to .
- Graphics! Having streamlined information with graphics makes a HUGE difference in the visual appearance of a website. Even if it is just a small icon.
- Keep it fun! Make sure you include some fun and silly stuff to keep learners interested.
- Change things pretty often so that the site doesn’t become stagnant. Keep key resources but make sure there are aspects that you can change and highlight as well as making sure things are kept up-to-date.
- Double and TRIPLE check copyright! As a media specialist we are supposed to be the copyright specialists in our building. There is nothing worse than to go to an LMC website and see blatant copyright violations. Keep it legal! (p.s., spell check helps too).
- Don’t have too much information. Too many links, too many pages, and too many pictures can be overwhelming and make finding the one or two things a learner may be looking for hard to find.
- Don’t worry about doing everything at once. Building a great site can take some time so don’t overwhelm yourself with thinking all the information needs to be up there overnight.
- Don’t take for granted that people are viewing your site. Make sure you keep up with some analytic software. There are free ones that you can attach to your site so that you can see how many people visit, how long they are viewing your site, and if they clicked on any links, forms,etc.
- Don’t link to too many outside sources. Whenever you can ask for the right to reproduce the information, why? Inside of a school’s network, there are firewalls and other protective measures in place to protect our learners, our equipment, and and overall use. Those same links and sites when clicked on outside the school could potentially put our learners and their homes in an unsafe situation.
- Don’t use lots of different type sets, formats, or designs. Certain fonts can be hard to see and read. Journalism experts say that generally you want two fonts. A headline font and a body copy font. If you just have to get fun and funky with your fonts then make that the headline font and keep the body font small.
How to Get Teacher Buy-in:
Teachers want things that make their jobs easier. They want fun and engaging resources that allow them to do their job effectively. I recommend going to their grade and subject level curriculum planning meetings and find them awesome resources before they even realize that they need them! I recommend having links to pathfinders for popular projects and also linking back to their classroom and teacher pages. Make sure you provide access to a variety of different types of resources.
How to get people to Look at your Site:
Feature your URL on EVERYTHING! Bookmarks, posters, flyers at every school event, announcements...you name it, put your website and other social media information on it. Make sure you put valuable information on your site so that people WANT to see your site. Try asking teachers to include the media site on their syllabus and classroom information too. Make sure you have some great resources for parents. Common sense media has a great tool for listing questions that parents can ask about the movies, games, and books their kids might be reading.
Need Some Inspiration?
Try these sites:
Woodstock Middle School, the section marked research created in LibGuides is pretty informative.
This is Inman Middle school in Atlanta GA. There site is chock FULL of information and links that you can use in your own site too. (wish there were more visuals though).
This is the site for Murray Hill Middle School. It’s a ton of great information - but one of those almost too busy sites.
References
Atlanta.k12.ga.us,. (2015). Media Center / Student Research Resources. Retrieved 14 September 2015, from http://www.atlanta.k12.ga.us/Page/8424.
Daringlibrary.edublogs.org,. (2015). The MHMS Daring School Library Blog | Learning. Happens. Here.. Retrieved 14 September 2015, from http://daringlibrary.edublogs.org/
Morguefile.com,. (2015). Morguefile.com free stock photos. Retrieved 14 September 2015, from http://www.morguefile.com/.
Warlick, D. (2005). Building Web Sites That Work for Your Media Center. Knowledge Quest, 33(3), 13-15.
Thanks for the inspiration, seeing the different sites and how they were organized was visually helpful. I also thought the idea about having resources for the teachers before they even thought about them was great. What better way then to offer teachers some help that allows them to take one more thing off their plate. I also liked the idea about having information that links back to their classroom/teacher pages. This ideas shows the collaboration that goes on in a school that sometimes is not see by the parents.
ReplyDeleteI also like the idea of using analytic software to keep up with how much traffic is happening on your site. What a great way to see if things are working or need to be changed.
Thanks for this well-organized informative piece, Christi. It seems like the LMC website is our online presence – and the way it looks is like our online face. Our face needs to be attractive to users so they’ll stick around to get to know us. The website helps us on one hand and helps the school community on the other…it lets us put resources and information all in one place so we don’t need to keep inventing the wheel when it comes to disseminating information; it is a central hub for learning resources of all kinds that the school community can access any time; it is a place to build excitement about reading in general.
ReplyDeleteI appreciate your list of Do’s and Don’ts, especially the reminder about setting an example when it comes to copyright. And I also like your tips on how to get people to look at the site…it can be our best PR friend. But the thing I liked best about your post was how to connect with teachers – maybe because I am currently a classroom teacher. I love it when the media specialist finds and gathers resources for a unit we’re teaching; I like the idea of linking resources back to my class webpage. The media specialist at my school has already done both of those things for me this year, and it makes feel very connected to the media center.
One more thing – thanks for the mention of Common Sense Media – I like their mission statement and guidelines. That website seems like a good one for us to include on a media center website.
I too have always thought of a library media center's webpage as an "extra" and not necessary and essential. If the library media center's webpage is set up correctly, then it can ultimately act as a "virtual assistant" for the media specialist, teachers, students, and parents. It can make all of our jobs easier. It can help make everyone more productive. It gives teachers, students, and parents access to resources all the time, anytime. It can act as an advocate for the media center. I think that it is essential to use the media center's website for more than just the basic information. If it includes resources that the teachers need, then they are more likely to use it. This helps create a more collaborative work relationship between the media specialist and the teachers. Your article was very informative. The addition of the pictures helped catch my eye and made me want to continue reading the information. This is the same type of format that can be used on a library media center's webpage to help hold the reader's attention.
ReplyDeleteI knew it was important for content teachers to have a webpage, but I didn't realize it was even more important for the media center to have it's own page. I loved the list of do's and don'ts and plan to use the list when creating my own media center page. Today the media center is more then just a place to checkout a book. It is a lace to gain useful knowledge and by having a webpage that is up to date will allow parents, teachers, and students access to the media center even when it is physically closed.
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed reading this post! I really loved the do's and don'ts. So many times I get on a LMC website and it usually hasn't been updated in at least a year. there will be events say they are coming up, but they took place two years ago. I hate getting on those websites. Also there seems to be a shortage of fresh fun LMC pages that I've encountered. I coudn't agree more about making it attractive and eye catching without just over doing it and having too much information. We have to fins that happy medium of informative fun page that advertises your LMC while supporting the students, teachers, and parents. I think these websites can be such an amazing bonus to our school and job. It's also a great way to get volunteers. More people are willing to help when they can see pictures of what their donations helped obtain,a picture of them helping with a fundraiser, or just good advertisement that makes them want to experience the media center or lend a helping hand. A couple of times I didn't volunteer at a LMC because I couldn't find any contact information or general information about the LMS and school. Great Blog post!
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