This year, I’ve really felt the weight of information overload. How about you? The Twitter feed that gets 30 new posts before I’ve finished reading the last 30, the never-empty Google Reader, and my daily battle to beat back my email inbox to fewer than 150 before bedtime, only to find it full again the next day.

And good luck remembering stuff.

I tend to say stuff like, “I read somewhere that there was a study showing that many folks skip the bottom 1/4 of the screen when they read on an e-reader,” and I have no idea where I read it. NO IDEA.

I’m starting to think that Sisyphus had it easy. All he had to do is roll that rock all day. He didn’t even have to read, much less remember, anything he wrote.

Then there’s this survey saying that “information rage” is hitting the workplace because others, like me (and remember, I work in an INFORMATION SCHOOL) are also feeling information overload:

Information Rage Coming Soon To an Office Near You - Slashdot via kwout

We’re even shifting the focus of one of our required courses to focus on information overload and the work that many disciplines are doing to mediate / counteract / re-balance / change / document it.

Now, Ann Blair, a Harvard researcher, says that maybe information overload isn’t anything new. Maybe it’s historical.

Here she is in the Chronicle of Higher Education:

Information Overload, Then and Now - The Chronicle Review - The Chronicle of Higher Education via kwout

And here again in a similar article in the Boston Globe:

Information overload, the early years - The Boston Globe via kwout

Both times, Blair points out that librarians, with their controlled vocabulary and consistent organizational methodologies, helped bring order to chaos. They’re long articles but worth a read.

And it has me thinking about how many librarians continue to “show their worth” by showering students, parents, and faculty with an ever-burgeoning set of Web tools. Do you like that browser? We can show you six more! Fond of that online photo editor? We’ve got 20 more just like it!

I wonder if, at times, we put novelty too far ahead on the priority list. Is “one more” always what our students need? I’m not convinced that many of our faculty can handle “one more” with everything else that is on their plate. (Oh my word, has anyone calculated the amount of stress or manhours that Common Core Standards implementation is going to add to teachers’ plates in 44 states in the next 18 months? Does my calculator even go that high?) Or is it that we need to be putting more of our collection development skills to work to narrow the field? To curate the options and abundance and, instead, focus on “best of”?

It strikes me that the librarians I admire most are the ones who commit themselves to finding robust, multi-use tools and then to really helping students move toward having mastery of those tools. They may look at dozens of tools before narrowing in on a handful of amazing workhorses. Tool Of The Week is too stressful for most folks. And the time it takes each time we introduce a new tool to students means they are spending more time with the requisite play time, the “huh, I didn’t know that would happen” time then really digging into learning transferable skills and content..

Perhaps it’s like antique stores. Ever been in the junky ones that have stuff stacked to the rafters? Sure, you might be able to find a deal in there, but in the meantime, you’re worried that if you sneeze, a sideboard will tumble over and konk you on the head. Whereas the finest antique stores put out only the finest items and arrange them artfully, with plenty of space so you can admire each item. (OK, I still worry that I’ll sneeze, but not that I will end up in an ambulance.)

Well, suddenly I am finding myself in need of a Kleenex, so I’ll close this post.

From my friend and colleague Laura Warren-Gross:

AASL is currently accepting nominations for the 2011 Best Websites
list. Do you have a “cutting edge” website that works well for you as a 21st century tool? Or maybe you have a tried and true site that has not had much attention?

Why not nominate it for AASL’s best Websites for Teaching and Learning for 2011? Just fill in the online form on the AASL website. Let us in on your great idea; it could be one of the best websites of 2011, according to AASL.

Please send it by November 20th.

Thanks for your input!

Laura Warren-Gross, Librarian
Maple Street Magnet School
Kalamazoo, Michigan

School librarians spend a lot of time taking screenshots for tech tutorials. You take the screen shot, paste it into a an editing program, then draw arrows or make notes on it.

Not bad, especially on a Mac, which automatically saves your screenshot as a PNG image file, as opposed to a Windows machine, where it saves it on your clipboard and you have to paste it into an application. But it still requires the second step of importing that image into an editing program and, possibly, re-exporting it as a new image.

But Keisa Williams on Twitter shared an even better idea. If you’re a Chrome user (the Google browser available for Mac or PC for free), you can add an extension called Awesome Screenshot. It’ll capture the whole screen or an area of you choice, then open up a simple image editor so that you can circle, point arrows, or add text annotations.

This could be a great tool for accelerating the pace at which you can create the documentation that supports students and staffs. (In some situations, you might also be able to have student aides do this work for you.) Not to mention that Chrome, in my experience, is faster than Firefox or Internet Explorer.

Here’s a sample screenshot of Keisa’s Tweet:

Speaking of Keisa, she’ll be one of the presenters at tomorrow’s free TL Cafe Webinar on creating indispensable libraries.

And not only that, but she has an article in the upcoming (November) issue of School Library Monthly entitled “School Librarians: Getting Qualified for the 21st-Century School Library.” Something to look forward to!