Learn how to create free information portals and visual subject guides for your library, yourself, and your patrons using Netvibes for Lyrasis, April 2012. Bonus content : Symbaloo. Learn more at http://theunquietlibrary.libguides.com/ple101

1. Good Vibrations for Learning
and Information Literacy
with Netvibes
Buffy Hamilton, Instructor
April 2012

2. Agenda
• Introductions
• Learning objectives
• Why Netvibes and Real World Applications
• How Tos
• Create and explore time
• Bonus : Symbaloo as an Alternative Information
Dashboard

3. Using this software
• Microphone • Text chat
• Raising your hand • Feedback
• Green / Red X • Audio
• Laughing / Clapping • Full Screen
• Stepping out
• Exiting

4. Show Us Where You Are!
On the
toolbar, click
on the yellow
star, then
click on your
location!

5. Introductions
• Who you are
• Where you work
• Your role in
programming at your
workplace
CC image via http://www.flickr.com/photos/quinnanya/4464205726/sizes/l/in/photostream/

6. Learning Objectives for Today
• Create a public and private page in Netvibes
• Customize themes and layouts in Netvibes
• Utilize the RSS tool in Netvibes for adding RSS
feeds from online information sources.
• Add custom HTML widgets and pre-made
“essential” widgets to a Netvibes page.

7. Today’s Resource Page
http://theunquietlibrary.libguides.com/ple101

8. How do you currently manage your
information streams?
CC image via
http://www.flickr.com/photos/verbeeldingskr8/3638834128/sizes/o/in/photostream/

9. Personal Learning Environments
and Information Dashboards
PLEs refer to student-designed learning approaches that
encompass different types of content — videos, apps, games,
social media tools, and more — chosen by a student to match his
or her personal learning style and pace. Despite the use of the
word “environment” in the name, the notion of a collection or a
physical or online space is somewhat irrelevant to a PLE. The goal
is for students to have more control over how they learn, and for
teachers to set expectations that their students will be more
engaged in understanding and applying their learning strategies.
From the Horizon Report 2011 K12

10. Personal Learning Environments
and Information Dashboards

11. “Infotention for Crap Detection”

12. Netvibes

13. Why Netvibes?
• Free version offers flexibility and
customization
• Gentle learning curve
• Public page can be shared with anyone
• Private pages perfect for a personal home
page

14. Netvibes: Dashboard Everything
http://vimeo.com/28778534

15. How I Got Started
• I needed a way to publish my personal
dashboard
• I needed a dynamic way to create interesting
subject guides (prior to our LibGuides
purchase)
• I needed a tool for my students to create their
own PLEs and to build their own research
guides

16. Applying it for Use with Students
http://bit.ly/99Nibd

24. Additional Examples from Other
Libraries

29. Timeout for Exploration: Carousel
Tour of Sample Netvibes Pages
Check out the home page of
http://www.theunquietlibrary.libguides.com/ple101
and explore the boxes with links to sample Netvibes
pages.
CC image via http://www.flickr.com/photos/stephaniekac/3550747547/

30. Getting Started

34. To Register…
• You need a valid email that you can access
• You will need to click on the verification link
sent to your email in order to activate your
account. You should do this as soon as you
complete registration.
• You may need to enable images from Netvibes
in your email in order for the activation link to
work.

36. Netvibes: Let’s Register

37. Default Page is Private

38. Default Page is Private

39. Activating Your Public Page

40. Activating Your Public Page

41. Activating Your Public Page

42. Editing Your Page Tabbed Page
Layout or Adding a Tab

43. Sharing Your Page Tabbed Page
Layout

44. Sharing Your Page Tabbed Page
Layout

45. Arranging Your Tabbed Page
Layout: Deleting a Tab

46. Arranging Your Page Tabbed Page
Layout

47. Giving a Page a Title

48. Customize Your Dashboard

49. Customize Your Dashboard

50. Netvibes: Let’s Create a Private Page,
Give it a Title, and Customize the Look
and Layout

51. Adding Content

52. Adding Content

53. Browse Categories

56. Editing or Deleting a Content
Widget
Delete the
widget
Edit the settings
of the widget

58. Netvibes: Let’s add a Widget from
Browsing the Categories

59. Essential Widgets

65. My Favorite “Essential” Widgets
• Webnote
• To Do list
• Image widget
• Web page
• HTML editor (for more advanced editing plus
any text you need to add to the widget)
• HTML
• Link module

66. What You Might Embed with
HMTL Widgets
• Database widgets (students will need the
code ahead of time)
• Copyright friendly images from Flickr (Flickr
provides embed code if you click on “share”
over the photo)
• Videos

67. What You Might Embed with
HMTL Widgets
• Social bookmarking widget (Diigo, Scoop.it)
• Badge for a Wikispaces wiki
• Book widget
• Original content (VoiceThread, Animoto
video, Glogster, products uploaded to
SlideShare)

68. Netvibes: Let’s add an Essential Widget
of Your Choosing

69. Add a RSS feed

70. RSS Feeds
rss=real simple
syndication, a
web feed or
stream format
designed to
deliver content
CC image via http://www.flickr.com/photos/dullhunk/3541653049/sizes/o/

71. RSS Feeds
 Databases
 News sources
 Blogs
 Websites
 Online journals/magazine
publications
 Photo streams
 Forums, Social Networks

72. RSS Feeds

73. RSS Feeds: Add a Google News
Search

74. RSS Feeds

75. RSS Feeds

76. RSS Feeds

77. RSS Feeds

78. RSS Feeds

79. RSS Feeds
Most websites and
online publications now
provide a menu of
specific RSS feeds for
free

83. RSS Feeds: Add a Google News
Search

84. RSS Feeds: Add a Google News
Search

85. RSS Feeds: Add a Google News
Search

86. RSS Feeds: Add a Google News
Search

87. Ideas for RSS Feeds
• Blogs from experts on the topic
• Saved search in Academic Search Complete
(database)
• SIRS Researcher
• Authoritative websites (example: Veterans
History Project at Library of Congress)

88. Ideas for RSS Feeds
• Learning Blogs of Classmates
• Class Agenda Blog
• RSS feed of a library LibGuides page
• YouTube Channel RSS feed (an authoritative
channel on a topic)
• A Google News search

89. Netvibes: Let’s add a RSS feed

90. Search for Content

93. Add This/Share This Social
Bookmarking

94. Bookmarking from a Database

95. Bookmarking from a Database

96. Explore and Play Time

97. Symbaloo

111. symbaloo

112. symbaloo

113. symbaloo

114. symbaloo

115. Bookmarking from a Database

116. Comparing Netvibes and Symbaloo
for a PLE
http://bit.ly/dYNc9i

117. Questions/Reflections/Ideas?

118. Thank You for Attending!
Questions?
• Professional
Development
• 1.800.999.8558
• Web: lyrasis.org
Email: buffy.hamilton@gmail.com