Monday morning was heaven for me. Erin and Werner gave us a slower presentation on Zotero, and other social media. Very productive day. I learned a few tips which will be added to our RU  LibGuide.
We then had a wonderful time with Kosie who showed us how to load e-Resources publishers on our various devices. It is very exciting to have the apps loaded, and to practice searches using them.

 As you can see, Aliyu, and the rest of the class were riveted to the task. Extremely useful session and will most certainly be put into practice at Rhodes in one way or another.
Once we feel more comfortable with these devices, it is imperative that we introduce workshop sessions around these and our library resources.

JStor on my tablet - using an app.

 This has been a week filled with assignments thus far. We have a Social Media assignment (groups of two) for next Friday. Still busy with the Social Media and Researchers assignment (groups of 5) due for this Friday. Added to this the extra on the spot exercises to practice newly learnt skills. I think I can speak for us all when I say that it is extremely busy, and I am having to make exact notes so as not to become confused which group I am in for which assignment. It is great though, to be in groups with colleagues from other countries and to hear/discuss issues very openly in our groups.

 Tuesday and Wednesday have been wonderful. Led by Dr Erica Cosijn, her team Lisa Thompson, Liesl Ball, and Anita Acon, alternated between theory and practice with Information Literacy, and Information Retrieval. We have explored platforms and databases, and have completed so many interesting and sometimes quite complex searches. Lisa did say that she has never seen a group not go to tea before, nor that she would ever have to say to someone that they must stop their literature searches. But she did.

During lunchtime today, we were given a tour of the UP Merensky Library. Loads of space. Wonderful use of space. Great resources. Their Research Commons is lovely. We have a lot to aim for. The Library is definitely a welcoming space which is testified by the numerous students within the Library.
Group meetings Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday nights have totally exhausted me.
But can't wait for what tomorrow might bring!

The end of our first week!
Social media theory sessions on Friday were interesting, and very informative. Information overload!!!

Prof Cecelia Penzhorn

 Prof Cecelia Penzhorn provided many opportunities to discuss social media. There is still some consensus to be found about Academia and Researchgate amongst colleagues, but the discussions were lively.
I have saved many of the platforms on my Zotero account so that I can look at these when I have more time on my hands to explore.

Koos, Werner and Dr Marlene

Getting acquainted with Google Scholar citations is definitely something to explore. I was surprised to see some our History academics from RU have their Academia profiles. I would like to follow through on all our researchers, and suggest Academia to those who are not yet using it. It seems to me that having profiles on both Academia and ResearchGate is a valuable exercise.

During tea on Friday, I glanced over to other side of the room and was immediately struck my my colleagues in their traditional clothing. Stunning.

Diversity of countries and cultures in Africa is certainly very rich and this is one of the aspects I am enjoying within our programme. I am learning a lot about other African countries, and how they work around infrastructural issues that we all face.

Friday evening dawned. While we were exhausted from the

 demands of the week, we made it to the Illinois Spur. Vuyo and I wanted to eat there because it reminded us of our three weeks together in Champayne-Urbana, Illinois. Waiters did a line dance in the aisles for the diners. Carren is surely enjoying South African culture and activities. Lee joined us much later which led to much laughter. Definitely a good way to end a working week.

Saturday morning saw Social Media Group 3 meet (for 3 hours) to address our weekend assignment. Again lively discussions and coming to a combined consensus is richly rewarding in learning about other experiences, strengths and weaknesses. I was reminded of how fortunate we are to have the CPD opportunity, and that everyone is keen to tackle our group sessions.  We nominated Efua as our scribe, and meet on Tuesday night to
final edit our word document.

Saturday lunch was a new experience for many of us. As South Africans, Vuyo and I have never eaten at Chesa Nyama. Lee took us there, together with Carren (from Tanzania) and Oedema (from Nigeria). We all had braai boxes - pap and relish, chicken and wors. I loved it. Lee showed us the student square entertainment area; we should have something like this at Rhodes.

And the afternoon was spent on working with storing my weeks' readings and areas for exploration into my Zotero account. And compiling my part for Group 3 document. This took me well into the night. It is evident that Sunday will be much the same.

We arrived in Pretoria on Sunday 25th May 2014, filled with anticipation for the wonderful opportunity that i have applied for, and was granted. I am fully aware that I am also representing my institution, Rhodes University. I am very pleased to be participating in this programme with my colleague Vuyo Gontshi.

We met Carren Mushi who is from University of Dodoma which is a public university in central Tanzania. Meeting librarians from other African countries was one of the reasons I was attracted to this programme.
Our 'Setting the Context' discussions on the first day helped in orientating ourselves at University of Pretoria, and get to know the faces (not yet all the names) of fellow participants. Pretty exciting!!!

 Carren and I meeting each other     It was a great surprise to hear
at the Welcome Dinner                   Archie Dick speak about                                                             África Rising'; firstly I heard Archie speak at the Research Libraries Academy in Mont Fleur, and secondly, I have been thinking about how to encourage our own RU research more visible (starting with our RU Repository).

Prof Theo Bothma welcomes participants.

Prof Bothma spoke about technologies and their place in our academic libraries. By placing these technologies in the context of our programme, we are definitely in the right place to learn and discuss issues that are affecting us all in our respective libraries.

At the same time, Prof outlined the details of our Group assignments. I have to say that this has unnerved me because it involves teamwork with colleagues from other countries who have varying experiences, infrastructure and library support. While this is a very exciting prospect,

 it is also a huge task to ensure that all our individual experiences and policies are collated into one report. I am very excited about our Group 4 project title; this feeds directly into a research project I have in mind for my Honours course work with UKZN. Some groups met immediately after the announcement as seen by Group 1 (left picture).

 Soon after tea, we were given a great campus tour led by Nyasha and Amelia. They were very patient with all the photographs and casual stroll throughout the tour. UP is a very beautiful campus, and i found the stories behind the buildings to be quite intriguing.

After the campus tour we moved into a new venue, the training Room. It's a wonderful training facility. The Library, by the way, is a lovely space and one can see students feeling very comfortable in this space.

We were given workshops surrounding FaceBook, the Google Suite (of which this blogger is one), Academia/Researchgate, Twitter, LinkedIn. These are all social media that I am either using on a daily basis, or have experimented with so I found it exciting to learn different features surrounding each of them. I like the idea of the homework for most of these because it allows you time to play with them at home (hotel) which gives you an idea of where you would use it to support the research process at Rhodes.

Training Room Workshops.

Our hotel accommodation is quite comfortable. I have not had any bad experience but listening to colleagues, it has been quite a bit of confusion about apartment self-catering kits (where there have not been enough in stock by the hotel), and that our international students have different cullinary tastes to my own, and the smells in the passage are most distracting!! I have also noticed these same students have been more affected by the delay in stipend payment that the South African students.
So in essence this wraps up the first three days of the programme. In between, there has been the socialising and networking with colleagues on the campus, at tea, and back at the hotel. Our Group 4 held our first meeting last night at the lounge area in the hotel ; this made for a comfortable space for greeting each other, and to discuss our topic as well as the way forward. We meet next Monday to collate our findings!!