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.

Day Four and the fun has continued.

Joan has learned how to deal with us; the unruly group we are! But today it was a great surprise to see our tea and coffee in attractive containers. Thanks Joan.
And then, we were treated to a pizza lunch at the Dept of Information Science in the IT Dept. These unexpected treats are very welcome.

 Erin and Werner discussed cloud services issues with the group. It was a great session; very inciteful. I love using Zotero so was quite excited that were going to be working with it. As it turned out, technology slowed down the whole session and together with the Google Group/DropBox exercise, we skimmed the surface of Zotero, which was quite disappointing. I was hoping to learn more about this software.

 We worked in groups for this session which was useful at first as it gave us a chance to work through things together. However, as one person (Krishni) had to invite the group members to the Group posting in which w had to download the articles, I feel particularly uncomfortable with the fact that the lack of time to complete the exercise, now lies solely with Krishni. In addition, we don't get to do the exercise ourselves.

 Dr Pienaar and Dr Henning presented an afternoon of innovation and ICT in libraries. I can't wait to explore some of the platforms and software they spoke about. The 'balance scorecard' group exercise was interesting, even though we did not complete it on time. It was fun, however, for the group to reach a consensus about MakerSpaces; diverse group dynamics can be very enlightening!
Our team did present a strategy that, given time and the right motivation, can be achieved in our own libraries and countries.

 As someone said today, it was a day filled with wonderful ideas and technologies, but a frustrating one because no one really seemed to have the time to get to grips with any of the technologies and activities. This is a huge pity.