Social Bookmarking Discussion #4 Summary
There were several themes that emerged from the discussion on social bookmarking. The one I most identified with was the discussion on using Diigo for bookmarking in research. Bridget mentioned that she thinks it would be a good idea to add a category or a tag that indicates the site is a professional journal or an academic site. Boshra pointed out that the group Diigo for Educators is a good resource and that bookmarks entered by the group might include authentic resources. Andrew added that he is in an education research class and could possibly use Diigo for bookmarking his research resources. All three have great ideas about how to use Diigo in research and I’ve used all of them.
As Bridget described, I have bookmarked web content with the tag names “journal” and “article.” As Boshra described, I have researched Diigo for Educators and plan to finally request an account for the students in my research project. As Andrew described, I currently use Diigo to bookmark many of my research resources for work in instructional design. However, when it comes to my dissertation research, I use Zotero.
Getting Stuff Into Zotero from zotero on Vimeo.
Zotero is a free research tool created by George Mason University’s Center for History and New Media with social networking features similar to Diigo. Here’s the link to my Zotero Library. Zotero, which is a Firefox plugin, extracts bibliographic information when bookmarking books, journal articles, and web content. It can also save entire web pages and also download the web page’s associated PDF documents. The beauty of Zotero is the ability to bookmark citations in Mason’s online library resources, affiliated resources, and other online catalogs and databases. When I bookmark with Zotero, the citation is downloaded to my flash drive, appears in a Firefox browser window frame, and syncs with my online Zotero Library. A Zotero plugin for MS Word inserts citations in many styles, including APA and Chicago, automatically into my documents. I can tag, write notes, and identify related citations for each item. I can also organize my Diigo Library into collections and access them from my flash drive or online. Whenever I make a change, I can sync my bookmarks in both locations. As Boshra stated, I ‘can go to “one site” for my research and references from any computer.’ In addition, I can follow my colleagues’ Zotero bookmarks and join groups. This collaborative feature of Zotero gives me the benefit of sharing peer journals and articles described by Carolyn as well as the reliable access to proven sources described by Andrew.
Both Diigo and Zotero have made my life more organized, allowed me to share my interests with others, and allowed me to learn and grow as an instructional designer and student. When conducting workshops, meeting with faculty/staff members, or presenting to my doctoral committee, I quickly log into my Diigo and Zotero bookmarks to share information.
Before social bookmarking, I had my bookmarks saved locally on several computers without organization as Paul described. I click on tags or lists and share the links with others. The entire group agreed that social bookmarking is a collaborative and interactive way to organize and share bookmarks. Those who hadn’t tried social bookmarking agreed that it was a tool they should learn more about.
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Click on the link below to view my Zotero Features Matrix, which is a make-up assignment to replace last week’s discussion.
Click Here to View My Zotero Features Matrix (PDF)
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6 Responses to 'Social Bookmarking Discussion #4 Summary'
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on March 4th, 2011 at 12:56 am
Katrina,
Zotero looks like are really helpful application for academic research. I’ve always wanted to capture not only the bibliographic information but the full text articles from Masons online library as well. It looks like Zotero will do that and that people all over the country are using it. I could not actually open up any of your articles because I didn’t have the Firefox plugin, but it looked interesting. Thank you for letting me know about this new tool.
on March 4th, 2011 at 5:48 am
Thanks Kathe! I didn’t realize you needed Zotero to view. Free Zotero workshops are available here at Mason. Check the schedule of workshops – http://ittraining.gmu.edu.
on March 5th, 2011 at 12:45 am
Great post Katrina! You beautifully weaved the issues raised in a previous discussion into your summary and provided a new point of view on the topic.
Note: I think it’s clear that Katrina did a Disc #4 summary and the matrix as a Disc #3 make-up activity and posted both to her blog. Very nice and I’m glad you did it on Zotero – it’s an important tool to for others to know about in this context.
on March 5th, 2011 at 2:50 am
Katrina, that sounds like such an excellent tool to use for research and one that I had never heard of before. It seems like it has the ability to make one of the dullest and most tedious parts of research just disappear. I have never liked getting to the end of a paper and having to check and make sure all my sources are correct and in the proper format. If it can help alleviate that pain then I will have to try it for any research I do in the future in which I need sources.