Blog #3: Media Center Websites
While reading "Building Web Sites That Work for Your Media Center", David Warlick suggests that there are many, many things that the creator needs to consider before beginning a Media Center website. Warlick states that one needs to consider the goal, content, format, layout, and design of a website. One of the most important things for a website is that it is scannable and that the visitor can find what they want in a quick and easy way.
North Elementary: Wow! I totally forgot about Symbaloo! I used it in Fulton County and have not used it since. What a great reminder. This website is a great example of how a Media Center website needs to be scannable and easy to use. Right away, I could find whatever I was looking for in any of the grades.
Milton Middle School: This site is really cute. I like how she made it look like a comic book. It is very inviting. Items were extremely easy to find.
Creekside High School: Right off the bat, I was not crazy for this one. It is not scannable like Mr. Warlick stated was so important. It was not inviting or fun to look at. I did not want to take time exploring this site. One word--- boring. I don't doubt that this site has great information, but I didn't want to look at it anymore because it was so bland.
Deerwood Academy: I added my school's library website (http://deerwood.wix.com/ashley). I think Mr. Ashley did a great job of making a very inviting, very easy to use website. He has instructional videos, important links, assignments, e-books, and more! Whenever I am looking for something, I know I can find it quickly and easily here.
A little Q and A...
- What do you see as the top ten do's and don'ts for good web page design? What really ticks you off when you hit a web page -- and what makes you go "I really like this web page"?
- I think one of my main don'ts is boring backgrounds. We want kids to want to explore these pages. We can just a leave dark blue background and white page and expect kids to like it and use it.
- What content should be on a media center's web page? I know what the book says (that the survey said) -- but what do you think? What's really useful and why do you think so?
- I think instructional videos are very important on Media Center websites. Six teachers could come and ask how to use Study Island but if you just put an instructional video on your website, you can answer all of them at once and save yourself some time to make some awesome lessons for other teachers.
- OK, so now we're into Web 2.0, and some consider plain old webpages to be outdated. What do you think? Should we dump the media center web page and make it a blog or a Wiki?
- No. I am not a huge fan of Wikis. In my experience, web pages are far easy to use and navigate than Wikis. I also feel that more personality and design can be put into a website. For instance, it is much easier for me to keep up my website (http://mrsbrittanybarnes.wix.com/1stgrade) than it is to keep up with a Wiki.
Brittany,
ReplyDeleteI agree that webpage designers should avoid using boring backgrounds, but they must also be careful not to use backgrounds that will distract from the information being presented. I personally don’t love websites that don’t have much design involved because I find them boring, but I find the websites that have too much going on in the background too be overwhelming and distracting. I think it’s really important to find a middle ground here so the page is visually interesting, but is not distracting or overwhelming. I think you make a good point about including instructional videos on the media center website. A lot of people don’t remember things that are presented to them in meetings. It’s a great idea to have a video available for them to access whenever they need to in case they need to review something. I also think it could be useful to place instructional handouts on the website with the videos to provide teachers with even more help. I 100 percent agree with you about wikis. I really don’t enjoy using them. It’s not that they are difficult to use, I just think they can be a little boring in terms of design. They kind of limit creativity in page design, at least the ones I have experience with seem to. I know some people really like them, but I think, for my money, I’d rather use a webpage or blog software to create my media center website over a wiki any day.
Brittany, I definitely agree that websites should not be boring to look at, but inviting and colorful. I also agree that you should be able to see what is included on the site by giving it a quick glance.
ReplyDeleteI think you are absolutely right about including instructional videos, both for the students and the teachers and parents. Here is a link to Crabapple Middle School media center website. The media specialist has lots of links and information for the teachers, and also some info for other media specialists!
https://www.sites.google.com/site/cmsinfocenter/
I enjoyed seeing your class webpage, and also your school's media center website. I think it is a great idea for the media specialist to read stories and post them online for the students to listen to at school or at home. I'll bet Mr. Ashley is very popular with the students!
I agree that design is such an important part of drawing (no pun intended) the viewer in. No one pays attention to sloppy or poorly executed website layout. While our main focus should be on the information, we must also focus on how that information is presented. There is an episode of “The Cosby Show” where Bill Cosby says (loosely quoted),” Everyone loves a good steak, but how would you feel eating that same steak off of a trash can lid.” Essentially, the information can be on point and together, but if your presentation is just as together the message is lost.
ReplyDeleteYour school library site is very inviting! One important element is he has included a picture of himself. I think it’s great to present yourself to your website viewers and makes the site feel more personal. Also enjoyed how clean the design felt. Everything is simple and well labeled. Excellent job and very professional.
Brittany,
ReplyDeleteI love that you first started out by stating the important things that a website needs. It does need to be to be scanned quickly and user/reader friendly. This goes hand in hand with the layout of the website. Sometimes creators tend to throw too much into the website because it might be new or fresh, but too much is too much. It overwhelms the reader. If the reader gets frustrated they are not going to want to use the website again or encourage or recommend others to visit the page. I have never heard of Symbaloo. I need to look into that. You brought up a good point about adding instructional videos. This could come in handy when we have to download Camtasia. I could take the time and record myself on the screen making instructional videos.
Media Center websites are a must and need to have easy accessibility and information for a wide audience of students, teachers, and parents. i don't think an informational site should be a wiki but may adding a link to a wiki or a blog to the website would be acceptable and a way to get students involved. I myself like colorful, unique websites but a know a lot of other SLMS and even administrators frown upon overindulging the cute factor. Symbaloo is greatand teachers use it here at a school- using it on a medai center webpage would be great.
ReplyDeleteOur media center webpage is not that inviting and unfortunately lacks interactive measures to get the kids involved. Since it is a advertising tool as well, I really wish we could add more to it and that way our students would want to be more involved in our media center. And instructional videos would be a greater way to get teachers involved!