Buffy Hamilton – The Unquiet Librarian

How do libraries cultivate participatory literacy to disrupt what Paulo Freire calls the “banking” system of education?

Key Questions and Comments:

There were some technical issues during this session, which resulted in a truncated video recording. Below is a guide to the content of the video:

• (00:01 – 4:15) Introductions of Hangout Participants
• (04:16 – 06:30) Mr. Preston’s class and Howard discuss how multi-tasking affects learning
• (06:31 – 08:40) Buffy introduces herself
• (08:41 – 11:00) Highlights from “Libraries as Communally Constructed Sites of Participatory Culture” (click to access the Slideshare deck)
• (11:01 – 16:22) Buffy closes out her thoughts on libraries as sites of participatory culture and poses a question to the Hangout
• (16:23 – 17:02) Addressing the observation that the evolution of library spaces is exciting, yet potentially frustrating
• (17:03 – 17:54) The importance of student input in helping libraries evolve
• (18:05 – 20:33) Question from Dr. Preston’s class: “What [does] the future of libraries look like, considering the rapid growth of reading technologies such as the Kindle and the iPad?”
• (20:34 – 23:24) Question from Dr. Preston’s class: “A recently retired teacher here wanted to change education by starting his own charter school in our town, but other teachers didn’t really want to help him out with this and kind of shunned him…What do you think caused that, and why do [teachers] do the bare minimum?”
• (23:25 – 26:37) How to help get other school staff and administration involved
• (26:38 – 29:09) Reflection from Dr. Preston’s class

View the Conversation
During the broadcast, the conversation also took place on Twitter using the hashtag #connectedlearning.

Guests for this webinar included:

• Buffy Hamilton: Buffy Hamilton is a high school librarian and teacher at The Unquiet Library in Canton, Georgia, who is passionate about creating meaningful learning experiences for students and teachers, especially through technology integration.
• Alison Hicks
• Colm Linanne
• David Preston’s high school classes
• Heather Hersey
• Howard Rheingold

Resources for this webinar:

• Interest-based learning posts on DMLcentral
• Scientific American piece on Starcraft and multitasking/’brain training’
• Howard’s May 2010 interview with Buffy
• Buffy’s personal blog
• Libraries as Communally Constructed Sites of Participatory Culture (Buffy’s slideshare deck for this session)
• All of Buffy’s Slideshare decks
• Henry Jenkins’ white paper on Confronting the Challenges of Participatory Culture (PDF)
• DS106: Digital Storytelling
• “A Tech-Happy Professor Reboots After Hearing His Teaching Advice Isn’t Working”
  • Buffy’s response to this Chronicle piece
• The Atlas of New Librarianship