Number 1 http://socialtimes.com/ Social Times

I discovered this website over the summer and it has become my all time favorite website.  It has all kinds of different information that is pertinent to our field.  It gives quality info about all things digital. It has information about new technology that is coming out, new websites, old websites, any current news going on in the world of technolgy. This website helps me to stay on top of many different areas of my  job and gives me the knowledge to competently speak on current issues in our field.

In edition to all of this useful information, it also has a very cool web video section.  Every week the editor puts together viral youtube clips on Monday, Wednesday and Friday.  Whenever I am stuck trying to find something to post on my library system’s teen Facebook page, I just go to this section and find a funny video to post – total lifesaver!

Number 2- www.teenreads.com Teen Reads

This is a great source for checking out new (and old) YA titles.  This site offers reviews of newly released or soon to be released YA books.  It has booklists and resources for starting a teen book club. It has author interviews- some are podcasts, some are written.  I’ve also seen video book reviews on this site.  You can sign up for their monthly newsletter so you don’t have to remember to check it all the time. There’s also fun stuff- like polls and all kinds of different giveaways ( I enter every month and haven’t won anything yet.  I still keep trying- it’s gotta be my turn sooner or later, right?).

Number 3- www.etsy.com Etsy

I’m going to assume most childrens and YA people know about Etsy.  It’s a website where people sell handmade crafts and crafting supplies.  Don’t judge it yet- there are REALLY nice things on Etsy. If you’ve heard of it and have been meaning to check it out, today is the day.  When I’m totally stuck on what to do for a teen program, I check out Etsy. There are all kinds of different craft categories and I just start browsing through for inspiration. Some of the things they sell are really cheap. ( I also just found out about www.regretsy.com  – crazy stuff found on etsy and similar sites- funny stuff:)

Number 4- http://www.the4yablog.com/ 4YA

I decided to just go ahead and keep with the craft theme and mention the 4YA blog here. One of my co-workers had this site up one day when I came to take my turn at the desk. HELLO- it’s awesome!  It has all kinds of great ideas for YA librarians to use from program ideas and crafts,plus useful information about things like new gaming systems and video game reviews.  It has a focus on outreach oppurtunities.

Number 5- http://www.webjunction.org/1 Webjunction

Do you need to brush up on your reader’s advisory?  Want some tips on how to deal with unhappy patrons?  Tyring to figure out what ereader is the best for your library system?  Have no fear, webjunction is here.  The website has fantastic FREE webinars for library workers.  I have listened to three or four different webinars  at this point and they are all put on by experienced professionals.  The information given has been very useful and applicable, not ideas that just sound great in theory but do not work in reality.  All library workers should b eusing this site so we can continue our own life long education.

Number 6- prezi.com Prezi

So, this is a relatively new site for me and I am not very experienced with it, but it is too cool not to share.  I learned about it in a session at the Virginia Library Association conference this October.  It is the new way to do powerpoint, except it is so much cooler than powerpoint.  It twists and turns, zooms in and out, makes charts, adds photos, adds websites, everything that powerpoint does, only cooler, faster and easier.  You can save all of your prezis to a flash drive, so if you are somewhere without Internet access, you are still good to go.  You can have a free account or you can pay a yearly fee to have more memory.  Rather than me try to explain the coolness to you, click the link below:

http://prezi.com/ftv9hvziwqi2/coca-cola-company/

Number 7 – http://graphicnovelreporter.com/ Graphic Novel Reporter

This website is a treasure trove for those of you who are graphic novel novices (like myself). I’m sure those of you who are pros can find it helpful as well.  I know a little about graphic novels and have read manga and am actually starting a teen anime club at my library next weekend.  For the past few years I have ordered the graphic novels for my building.  So, I guess maybe I’m somewhere between novice and pro.

This site is run by the same group as Teen Reads and has many of the same features. The feature I liked best was the reviews.  They are broken down into age and genre categories and are in alphabectical order with a search box to type in a particular title.  It has reliable resources, such as book lists and manga terms.  It has an accompanying blog.  You can also sign up to recieve the weekly newsletter.  I was so excited to find this website.

Number 8 – yahoo.com Yahoo

Okay, so I know this is a search engine, not a webpage, but still.  But the way I use Yahoo is much more like a website than a search engine. I actually perfer to use Google as a search engine.  I use Yahoo just about every day to keep up with world news.  Now, not every story they feature in their rotator is of interest to me, but I at least read the headlines.  I also like to see what’s trending and why.  This helps me to stay current with teens and adults instead of looking like a complete dolt when it comes to current events.

Number 9 – urbandictionary.com Urban Dictionary

Ever see an acroynym on Facebook and been clueless?  Ever heard a teen use an expression and had no idea what they were talking about?  This is the website for you.  I don’t have very many websites favorited on my iPhone, but this is one I do.  There are very few occassions when the term I want to find is not on this site.  There are some very strong expressions found at this website, so you might want to keep this one adults only.

Number 10 – youtube.com YouTube

Like Yahoo, I know it’s not a top secret site you have never heard of, but it is really a great place to go when you work with teens.  I have used Youtube videos in many teen programs, for many different reasons.  For instance, I have used it as a resource for digital storytelling and I have used it for pure entertainment in programs.  When you share one of your favorite videos with a teen, they will watch and want to show you one of their favorites and you can go on like this for a really long time.  And how cool do you look when they are talking about a viral video and you can join in on the conversation?  If you’re not a Youtube junkie, you’ll be surprised at how long you can stay on the site.

There you have it!  Hope you found something useful and don’t forget to list your favs in the comments.

In the research proposal, Dr. Vardell poses these questions and ideas:

“Where do we begin in selecting poetry that children will like? No one has yet considered the impact of the new format of the poetry application or ‘app.’ It seems logical to hypothesize that access to this new innovation might have a positive impact on young people’s attitudes toward the poetry content, but it has not been investigated. In addition, this raises the question about whether poetry in print format will suffer as a result. Does new technology trump old books? The proposed project will attempt to address these questions.”

Dr. Vardell notes that although this small study focuses exclusively on poetry, this look at the impact of apps on student attitudes and the relationship to book reading offers wider applications that interest professionals and researchers in libraries and literacy.

Sylvia Vardell is Professor in the School of Library and Information Studies at Texas Woman’s University, where she teaches graduate courses in children’s and young adult literature.

The YALSA/VOYA Frances Henne Research Grant offers seed money to research that supports the YALSA Research Agenda.  Applications for the 2013 grant are due on December 1, 2012.  For more information, please see http://www.ala.org/yalsa/awardsandgrants/franceshenne .

• High school students in Tucson, Arizona, are outraged that the school board has chosen to eliminate its Mexican American Studies courses in the wake of extremist politics and laws that will deny funding to the Tucson Unified School District if it continues to offer the curriculum. In protest, many students walked out on Thursday and marched to TUSD headquarters, where their pleas were largely ignored. Even if you’re not a librarian in Arizona, you can use this timely piece of news to plan programming or encourage discussion and study of students’ rights, the history of educational policy, or the study of history itself, as well as to highlight relevant books in your YA and greater library collections, like Sarah Jamila Stevenson’s The Latte Rebellion or Paolo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed.
• It’s probably not much of a stretch to get your male patrons interested in books on sports, nor to encourage them to get out and play sports themselves. If you’re looking for an angle to get in with your more physical activity-reluctant patrons, male or female, turn them on to new interviews and research published in the latest issues of Latina and Shape, which cite a multitude of benefits (aside from the normal ones, like long, healthy life) for people who engage in competitive sports. Girls who play sports are more likely to have better body images and to avoid teen pregnancy, and researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign found that athletes are more skilled at balancing mental activities and multitasking than those who don’t play sports. Between looking pretty and doing well at school, there’s a benefit for everyone. Letting your teens know about this should make your sports and fitness books get off the shelves a little easier.
  Colón, Suzan. “Love It, Dream It, Live It.” Latina, 16:4, 2012. 20-22.
  “On the Ball.” Shape, 31:5, 2012. 19.
• New research suggests that certain combinations of weight and race lead to unhealthy sexual activity, multiple and older partners for teen girls, and lower rates of condom use. This study also sheds light on other social costs of obesity, like lower rates of college acceptance. The research found that these costs are especially high for non-Hispanic white females, for whom obesity is especially seen as socially limiting, whereas larger bodies are more culturally accepted in the African American community. However, while this eliminates some social stigmas, it also serves to diminish young black females’ tendency to seek out medical attention or lifestyle changes to combat what could still be dangerous weight levels. This extensive article details the specific dangers in sexual and physical lifestyle and habits that obese females of black and white races experience and is worth a read if your community struggles with weight issues. Knowing what specific types of populations you serve, take a look at the article to see what resources regarding sexual and physical health you may need to update.
  Leech, Tamara G.J. and Janice Johnson Dias. “Risky Sexual Behavior: A Race-specific Social Consequence of Obesity.” Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 41:1, 2012. 41-52.
• If services like Pandora and Spotify have made it easier for everyone to enjoy and find out about new music anywhere they are, it has also made listening to music a much more solitary, singular activity. No more. Facebook is launching a “Listen With” app that allows users to listen to whatever a friend is listening to, essentially allowing users not only to be their own DJ but to turn their friends on to their favorites and new finds as well. Maybe you can get your patrons to follow your station? If not, use this as a way to tune in to what they’re already listening to, and become a fan of one of your patrons’ playlists.
• How’s this for a creepy art project? In a move that sounds like it’s straight out of the show “Bones,” an MFA student decided to take Victorian-era skulls and re-visualize their faces and lives for an art project. This link to an interview with the student should prove not only to be endlessly fascinating, but also a jumping-off point for creative programming in a library or school. Tie the project into your collection by highlighting books that use found objects as the basis for creative work, like Ransom Riggs’ Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children, various works of poetry by Walter Dean Myers, or PostSecret books.
• Finally, in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Day, and the forthcoming Black History Month, here is an article from The Root on some of the forgotten parts of King’s message. If you are tired of the same old displays, this should give you inspiration to shake things up.

Until next month! As always, if you have suggestions or questions, please leave a comment here.



]]> http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/2012/01/16/january-research-roundup/feed/ 0 http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/2012/01/09/yalsavoya-frances-henne-research-grant-recipient-announcement-at-midwinter/ http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/2012/01/09/yalsavoya-frances-henne-research-grant-recipient-announcement-at-midwinter/#comments Tue, 10 Jan 2012 03:11:35 +0000 Frances Henne Committee http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/?p=16933 The applications are in!  The YALSA/VOYA Frances Henne Research Grant applications have been submitted, and the review committee is currently reading the innovative research ideas of this year’s pool of grant proposals.

We are looking forward to announcing the 2012 recipient at the ALA Midwinter Meeting.  You are invited to join us for the official announcement during the “YALSA Research Forum: What’s Next for YA?” event on Friday, January 20, to be held from 1:30 PM-3:30 PM, Dallas Convention Center, Room D225.  As part of the Research Forum, we will announce the winning grant proposal and tell you how to apply for the 2013 Henne Research Grant.

We will also share the news of the 2012 recipient during the “YALSA Trends in YA Presentation” on Saturday, January 21, to be held from 4:00-5:30PM, in the Dallas Convention Center, Room C141. This event will feature a paper presentation from Jeanie Austin called “Critical Issues in Juvenile Detention Center Libraries.” The paper will explore the tensions present in juvenile detention center library services (such as institutional limitations and access to technologies) and how youth and librarians can and do navigate these tensions within the library setting.

For more information on these programs, please go to http://wikis.ala.org/yalsa/index.php/YALSA_at_ALA%27s_2012_Midwinter_Meeting.  We hope that you can join us for one of these YALSA events at Midwinter, and we look forward to celebrating this year’s Frances Henne Research Grant recipient with you in Dallas!



]]> http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/2012/01/09/yalsavoya-frances-henne-research-grant-recipient-announcement-at-midwinter/feed/ 0 http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/2011/12/05/research-roundup-2/ http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/2011/12/05/research-roundup-2/#comments Mon, 05 Dec 2011 15:18:01 +0000 Hannah Gómez http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/?p=16119 I’m back with another month’s worth of interesting research and writing on scholarly and popular topics related to teen culture, literacy, and library services. I’ve decided to expand from just summarizing research to also linking you to fascinating articles, blog posts, or other more easily-accessed tidbits that might spark meaningful conversation, programming, or reference/advisory transactions. As always, if you have a topic you’d like to know about, or if there’s a journal you miss having access to, comment here and I’ll do some digging for you.
• The Lilith blog, an online supplement to the Jewish feminist magazine, reports on a “freedom ride” in Jerusalem protesting the ultra-Orthodox custom of requiring women to board and sit in the rear of the public bus only. Sound familiar? If you’re looking for a way to allow your diverse patrons to connect with each other, try bringing this up as a topic and talking about the similarities with the freedom rides in the American South.
• As gaming and social entrepreneurship cross paths, researchers are proposing gaming as a supplement to education. Some schools are totally sacking textbooks in favor of computer and online games, which foster constant learning and readjustment of skills, as well as insert trivia and tidbits of information (how did 90s kids learn what cholera and dysentery were? Probably from playing Oregon Trail) into gaming. Those not so sold on the idea point out that games must be designed to be addictive if kids are going to choose the educational ones over Halo, but that the point should be to encourage learning, not addictive, mindless playing. It’s an interesting thought, to be sure, and it’s something libraries with collection development dollars should consider.
  Cohen, Aaron M. “The Gamification of Education.” The Futurist, 45:5, 2011. 16-17.
• Korean researchers have discovered the physics of writing, and why and how different sized pens and different types of paper yield different blots and lines. Ever wonder why you can write on paper but not on, say, glass? It’s because glass doesn’t have pores, so it can’t draw the ink out of the pen. The full research will be published in an academic journal, but PhysicsWorld did a great writeup.
• You probably knew this, but teens in rural communities often lack access and education regarding healthy behaviors, from nutrition to sexual health. But it may be surprising that one of the biggest differences between rural and urban teens is their approach to substance use and safety, from drunk driving to alcohol poisoning. While usage of cigarettes and alcohol is around 32% of teens from both rural and urban communities, those in rural communities reported higher rates of depression, motor vehicle accidents, and overweight or obesity. If your library serves a rural community, are you working with public health organizations to offer programming and resources on health behaviors?
  Curtis, Alexa C. et al. “Rural Adolescent Health: The Importance of Prevention Services in the Rural Community.” The Journal of Rural Health, 27: 60–71.
• Librarians, teachers and counselors often advertise their areas, classrooms, and offices as “safe spaces” where LGBT students can congregate, discuss, or just hang out without having to feel ashamed, embarrassed, or threatened by their sexual identity or orientation. But does designating these safe spaces serve to put more of a wedge between those who identify as LGBT and those who don’t? Catherine O. Fox and Tracy E. Ore suggest that, while these safe spaces are commendable, they might also diminish other differences that people have, such as race and gender, and also might advocate sexual identity as the primary mode of identification, rather than, say, race or gender, or even something as simple as gamer or punk. Not all members of the LGBT community have the same experiences, as even being LGBT is coupled with other facets of identity, and when safe spaces promote sexual identity above all other forms of identity, queer people of color or from different classes may feel as if they are actually unsafe spaces to be. This paper on oppression with/without privilege is worth a thoughtful read. How do you approach these issues in your library?
  Fox, Catherine O. and Tracy E. Ore. “(Un)covering Normalized Gender and Race Subjectivities in LGBT ‘Safe Spaces.’” Feminist Studies, 36:3, 2010. 629-649.

Which of these topics are new to you?



]]> http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/2011/12/05/research-roundup-2/feed/ 0 http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/2011/11/28/call-for-papers-library-research-round-table/ http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/2011/11/28/call-for-papers-library-research-round-table/#comments Mon, 28 Nov 2011 15:02:51 +0000 Hannah Gómez http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/?p=16117 Here’s another thing to get you geared up for ALA’s Annual Conference in Anaheim this June. The Library Research Round Table is looking for presentation proposals related to three areas of library research. Abstracts must be submitted by December 20, 2011, and notification of acceptance will be sent in late February, 2012. Accepted proposals will be presented at the ALA Annual from June 21-26. If you have recent or in-progress research relating to users, problem solving, or innovation, consider submitting.

LRRT defines their three categories as this:

• Research to Understand Users: Issues and Approaches – How do people go about using libraries? If your study addresses the hows and whys of patron usage, it’ll fit here.
• Research into Practical Problem Solving in Libraries – If you have been investigating a specific challenge or problem, your research or case study will fit into this category.
• Research: Creativity and Innovation – If your study looks at how librarians approach information and reference queries, or if it proposes innovative ways of doing research or solving problems, it will fit here.

Papers will be chosen based on their topic and its relevance to library science, creativity of methodology, and ability to fill a research gap or build on existing studies. You do not have to be a member of LRRT to submit a proposal, and students are welcome to submit as well.

If you have questions or would like full information on submission guidelines, contact the chair of LRRT, John M. Budd, at buddj@missouri.edu. Again, proposals are due by December 20, 2011.



]]> http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/2011/11/28/call-for-papers-library-research-round-table/feed/ 0 http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/2011/11/22/curation-isnt-just-for-museums/ http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/2011/11/22/curation-isnt-just-for-museums/#comments Tue, 22 Nov 2011 15:03:46 +0000 Linda W Braun http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/?p=16241 A couple of weeks ago YALSABlog readers may have noticed that the weekly Tweets of the Week had a new format. A few days after that revision there was a Blog post that used Storify (The tool also used for the Tweets of the Week) to highlight findings in a new Pew Internet and American Life report on teens and social networking. Some may wonder, “what’s going on here?” Well, what’s going on is that curation has come to the YALSABlog and curation is probably something that you are or will be thinking about for the work you do with teens.

There has been a lot of buzz about curation over the past several months. What people are talking about when they buzz about content curation is the organization of information, usually using web-based tools, on a particular topic. For example, Storify enables users to search a variety of sources, including Twitter, YouTube, Google, and Facebook, to uncover and organize topic content. With Storify it’s possible to integrate text in-between curated resources to provide context and flow to the curated content. For example, the Storify below is all about the Austin Teen Book Festival.



Storify isn’t the only curation game in town. Scoop.it is another popular tool for organizing content on a particular topic. With Scoop.it the focus isn’t on telling a story but more on gathering resources on a topic in order to display them visually. When an item is added to a Scoop.it a portion of that content is displayed and Scoop.it curators can annotate items in order to focus on specific aspects of a resource. You can see an example of a Scoop.it I’ve started on resources that help teen librarians to be successful curators.

You can organize the resources on a Scoop.it page by moving content from place to place. For example, I’ve organized the curation and teen librarians Scoop.it with content related to curation tools on the top left and information about libraries and curation and about best practices in content curation in the bottom left and the right column.

Along with Storify and Scoop.it there are several other curation tools including Pearltrees (which was a YALSA app of the week a few weeks ago) LiveBinders, LibGuides, and BagTheWeb. As a librarian working with teens it’s possible that each of these tools will come in handy at different times in the work that you do. It all depends on the needs and interest of the teens and the community. For example, Storify is perfect for adding context to content as its curated. Scoop.it is perfect for gathering and annotating resources on a topic. Pearltrees is good for showing connections between content in the form of a mindmap.

As I’ve been thinking about content curation and teen library services it’s been clear that we’ve always curated content for those we serve. However, in the world of the web and social media curation takes on new and exciting forms. Current content curation tools make it possible to collaborate on curation. It’s alsop possible to inform teens about resources in ways that are interesting and appealing. Some curation tools make it possible to embed lists into blog posts, Facebook pages, and so on. That’s definitely better than the paper pathfinder that a teen in the past needed to pick up at the library, or even better than the resource list that is only available on a specific page of the library website.

These tools also make updating and adding content easy to accomplish. If a resource is no longer useful to the teens you work with, or has been superseded by something else, quickly delete it with just a few clicks. Something new to add? Use the bookmarklet available to quickly add it to the curated resource you are working on.

Then there are the possibilities for teens. Think about the ways in which teens can gather and organize information of personal or educational interest. Imagine a teen is working on a project about a current event topic. He or she can start a Scoop.it to collect and write about the resources they will use in their project. Or, imagine a teen is putting together a presentation for an assignment, he or she can put together that presentation in Storify. (Some of my favorite examples of what one can do with Storify are from journalism professor Kelly Fincham.) Think too about the fact that when a teen collects and embeds using one of these content curation tools, the original source is always available. It puts a whole new spin on citing, intellectual property, and permission gathering.

Are you using content curation in your library with and for teens? Let Blog readers know about it in the comments.



]]> http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/2011/11/22/curation-isnt-just-for-museums/feed/ 0 http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/2011/11/12/teens-social-networking-whats-the-latest/ http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/2011/11/12/teens-social-networking-whats-the-latest/#comments Sat, 12 Nov 2011 18:11:53 +0000 Linda W Braun http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/?p=15906 A few days ago the Pew Internet and American Life Project released their latest report on teens and social networking. The document is filled with up-to-date data that anyone working with teens will want to take a look at in order to better understand teen use of and engagement in online social environments. The Pew report also provides a look into the role adults play in the lives of teens who are a part of the social networking world.

Check out the Storify created that captures some of the ideas presented in the report and what people are saying about it via the web and social media.





]]> http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/2011/11/12/teens-social-networking-whats-the-latest/feed/ 0 http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/2011/11/07/research-roundup/ http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/2011/11/07/research-roundup/#comments Mon, 07 Nov 2011 15:00:36 +0000 Hannah Gómez http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/?p=15207 Miss hiding out in your university library? Tired of only reading library publications? Want to know what other scholars are doing? Once a month I’ll do the browsing for you and let you know what’s going on in the world of pop culture, sociology, literature, pedagogy, and more. If it seems relevant to libraries or young adult services, you’ll find it here. When possible, I’ll also offer some insights or suggestions on application for libraries or librarians. Revel in being a student again!
• Contexts Discoveries, a sociology blog, says that Facebook isn’t just a tool for social interaction, but it’s a tool for sociologists to study how students create their physical social networks. With our world getting more technological every moment, it’s good to know how your patrons view their social roles and responsibilities.
• David Darts describes how artists and art teachers have combined social justice education with art education and created street art projects that didn’t just bring art to the public but also brought the streets to the public’s eye. Posing as panhandlers, street artists, and shoppers, students “performed” the streets after a series of activities in the classroom and out including field research, interviews, and journal reflections. This “performance art pedagogy” incorporated visual art, acting, and social research and made the students more aware of street life and culture, in both its positive and negative aspects. Take a look at the community surrounding your library, and think about your teen patron base–would this be an activity for them? And would it be an eye opening one, or a validating one? How can you approach the sensitive subject of homelessness, the sex trade, poverty, and social exclusion in a way that’s meaningful for your community?
  Darts, David. “Invisible Culture: Taking Art Education to the Streets.” Art Education, 64:5, 2011. 49-53.
• There is a lot of talk in libraries about how best to serve the “underserved,” the “low-achieving,” the “at-risk,” and rightfully so. But what about serving and supporting the needs of gifted and creative young people? Two articles in the spring issue of Gifted Child Today address these issues. One looks at legislative and legal concerns with regard to advocating for gifted programs, while the second focuses on how teachers (but also librarians!) can foster creativity and opportunities for growth for gifted and creative teens. Citing research into the personalities, histories, and work of creative individuals like Picasso, the articles stress the need for dedication to gifted teens as well, who make up about 20% of high school dropouts. Are you supporting innovation in your library programming? And do you know the laws and educational programs in place (or not) in your state?
  Fletcher, Tina Sue. “Creative thinking in schools: finding the ‘just right’ challenge for students.” Gifted Child Today, 34:2, 2011.
  Christopher, Mary M., V. Dianne Fowler, and Kyle Wiskow. “Active advocacy: working together for appropriate services for gifted learners.” Gifted Child Today, 34:2, 2011.
• Pull up your favorite search engine and type in one of these terms: “Pro-ana,” “Pro-mia,” or “thinspiration.” What you’ll find, as researchers did in The American Journal of Public Health, is hundreds of websites promoting eating disorders. Yes, promoting, not providing support for recovery. In a study of 220 pro-eating disorder websites, researchers found interactive web spaces where members could share tips for weight loss, calorie counting, and purging. With galleries of “thinspiration” (thin celebrities and models), creative expression forums (poetry about how great it is to be bulimic), these websites are alluring and dangerous, especially to youth. Studies have shown that repeated viewing of information leads to emulation. If you have a peer support or discussion group at your branch, bring this up. Or consider adding to your collection (or displaying) materials that offer other views than those found on pro-ana websites, or even the subliminal messaging in most mainstream magazines. Offer periodicals that provide safe, healthy information on exercise and diet, display cookbooks, and make sure teens have access to popular science books on nutrition, fitness, and body image.
  Borzekowski, Dina L.G. et al. “e-Ana and e-Mia: A Content Analysis of Pro-Eating Disorder Websites.” American Journal of Public Health, 100:8, 2010. 1526-1534.
• Shocking news: more people watch more television each year, especially reality shows. Even more shocking: reality shows influence both the behavior and buying patterns of teenagers. Okay, not so surprising. But this is when it gets really dystopian-YA-novel on us: in The Journal of Advertising Research, a study attempted to understand the social behaviors that influence the watching of reality television and identification with the shows’ “protagonists” among teens. In their findings, they discovered that teens with a high interest in popularity and physical attractiveness are more likely to watch reality television, especially shows that deal with those characteristics, like American Idol or Keeping Up With the Kardashians. The researchers offered tips on how to exploit these findings in order to schedule programming, but librarians would do well to take a look at these correlations and how they might relate to the interactions of different social groups who use the library, as well as how this might impact programming.
  Patino, Anthony et al. “The Appeal of Reality Television for Teen and Pre-Teen Audiences: The Power of ‘Connectedness’ and Psychodemographics.” Journal of Advertising Research, 51:1, 2011. 288-297.

What do you think? Which topics here are a surprise, and which are old hat? If you have any suggestions of specific articles, journals, or topics you’d like to see me cover in a future Research Roundup, comment here and I’ll be sure to take a look.



]]> http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/2011/11/07/research-roundup/feed/ 0 http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/2011/11/05/texts-and-teen-writing-skills/ http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/2011/11/05/texts-and-teen-writing-skills/#comments Sat, 05 Nov 2011 19:49:45 +0000 Jessica Fessler http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/?p=15645 Google texts and teen writing skills and you will get many articles on how texting negatively effects teen’s formal writing skills, all loaded with quotes from teachers about how they have seen the negative impact texting has on these skills.

The most interesting article I found was in the New York Times , printed in 2002 . The arguments made almost ten years ago are still the sames ones you will read about over and over in any article/blog/web forum today. Basically, that the shorthand teens use in text messaging is detrimental to their writing and can be found in written assignments, much to the frustration of their teachers.

But, if you dig a little deeper and read the whole article, you’ll find a different viewpoint about teens and texting. This is the viewpoint I would like to represent. You can find short little blog posts like this, http://edoptions.com/blog/?p=23, that point out that teachers have been complaining about informal language seeping its way into formal language for a very long time. Remember how upset people where when email became a primary source of communication as opposed to letter writing. Teachers and elders thought this was an abomination and that teens would never learn how to write properly.

Who remembers ebonics? (That’s right, I was a teen in the 90′s;-) OMG (had to throw it in) I thought people where going to come to fist fights over that issue- should it become an official language or not? If you’re too young to remember this debate look it up in wikipedia.

Speaking of, isn’t wikipedia itself a current debate in the formal writing process? I tell patrons, adults, teens and college students, that wikipedia is a great jumping point for starting research. I explain that anyone can go on and post something on a wikipedia entry, so this is not a good source to use in a research paper, but that it is an excellent place to start research. I bet some of you are cringing and some of you are nodding your heads.

In my humble opinion, I think teens are reading and writing WAY more than I ever did as a teen. Even though the writing in texts are not essay worthy, hardly any of the writing I do is essay worthy. I mean, come on, I wouldn’t dare turn this post in for a class, but I could easily turn the ideas into a very nice research paper. I put and the occassional in professional emails on a daily basis. I was taught, in grad school, that this are used to display your tone in writing (this was taught especially in regards to online reference services). I believe that getting teens reading and writing in any way possible is a good thing. How many of you used formal English in the notes you passed back and forth in class in grade school? How many of you made up coded language or words, so that if your note was intercepted it would be hard to decipher?

I believe that this is a current debate and in years to come someone will be telling their younger colleagues to look it up in wikipedia (whatever the current source will be).



]]> http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/2011/11/05/texts-and-teen-writing-skills/feed/ 1