Rudaí23 thing#11: Reflective practice

The reflective practice for this week is perhaps particularly relevant to me. As I’m writing this, Rudaí 23 has finished and I’m still not even halfway through. I’m came late to the course, and this definitely had an impact on viewing some of the things as being relevant (like catching up on live tweeting events or participating in online broadcasts with all the other bloggers). I also seemed to coincide my engagement with Rudaí 23 with other ‘career development’ things like learning Irish. The points about time management in the reflective practice definitely apply here!

My biggest issue, however, is with the specifics of blogging. For a while there, I had a fair few posts in the ‘draft’ phase, while I tweaked them, looked at how others were approaching the same material, and even spent some ill-advised time looking for the perfect photo accompaniment for the particular blog post. I have been a sporadic user of blogging over the last decade or so, and whenever it comes to the more public types of blogs, I hesitate. I need to remind myself of the point that Siobhan mentioned in the Rudaí 23 post that not everybody is reading my blog. That is both heartening and disheartening.

Let’s hope this post doesn’t stay in blog purgatory for too long.

Rudaí23 thing#6: A librarian gets all reflective

I think I'll probably always be behind on my Rudaí 23 tasks, so taking a break to go away on holidays probably wasn't the best idea (for completing Rudaí 23, but a great idea in nearly every other aspect).

Having said that, having time to reflect is probably the perfect thing to do at this stage. I can look back over the tasks that I've done, and have a look at how other people have been doing their blogs. Checking out other people's blogs (both those that are doing the Rudaí 23 as well as other librarian related blogs) is very interesting (although it does remind me constantly of how far advanced they all are. Of course, by 'far advanced' I mean actually keeping up with the time frame). It's interesting that despite Rudaí 23's name, this project isn't just an Irish thing: there are so many involved from the UK. It's great reading about their experiences, as well as seeing how the 'differences' they experience sometimes aren't all that different from what librarians in Ireland experience.

A great blog was Anaglow's talking about the radical conferences she was attending. It's a reminder of the difficulties that some in the library world in the UK are experiencing, but also about the radicalism which seems more prevalent there than it is in Ireland. 

I also came across a very interesting entry (in a very interesting blog) that made me question my use of images and that murky (or perhaps not so murky) area of copyright. I won't go into that in too much detail (as I am aware from peeking ahead that it's one of the tasks further down the list) but it is an example of how easy it is to overlook an important aspect of your job because social media is different, right? That brings me on to another blog which deserves praise because of how well written it is, but also its attention to detail in referencing everything that needs to be referenced. 

I'm also seeing a few blogs by people that I went to library school with and haven't seen in a while. It's a reminder that Rudaí 23 isn't just about improving your own abilities but about connecting with people in the library world, whether it's people you haven't seen in a while or people that you've never met before.

Reflection is something that is probably best enjoyed by those who have been keeping up to date with their tasks, so with that in mind, off I go to research my next post. Looking ahead, it looks like things are going to get a little more 'complicated' but also more interesting!