Unpacking History with Omeka
Pia Andrews Conservatory | Sat 23 Jan 2:25 p.m.–2:45 p.m.
Presented by
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Molly is a Librarian at the State Library of WA. Her professional interests include eLearning, Open Data, the use of Open Source Software in GLAM organisations and inclusive approaches to Digital Literacy. Previously she has worked as a trainer at a large ISP and as a research scientist in molecular biology labs. In her precious little spare time she knits and spins.
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Tricia McKenzie is and Education Officer at the State Library of WA where she facilitates collection-focused and information literacy workshops for students from Kindergarten to Year 12. She presents teacher professional learning at a local level, and at State and National conferences.
Tricia is an experienced primary and secondary school teacher who has taught extensively in both Australia and in the UK. She has had lead teacher roles in both continents and has a passion for making History exciting and resources accessible for all.
Abstract
During lockdown, staff at the State Library of Western Australia worked on a novel suite of educational resources using the open source platform Omeka which was designed with GLAM organisations in mind. These resources were designed to align with the WA curriculum, to highlight collection materials and to extend the services that the State Library provides to schools in WA.
Putting together sites of this nature can be very time consuming from a research perspective, so in many cases we re-used content from pre-existing websites made by previous staff at the State Library of WA. These websites have a wealth of valuable information, but the design and interface was old and unattractive. Rebuilding them on Omeka gave us a chance to update them and provide better metadata, tighter links to our catalogue, include content from Trove and innovative interactive elements such as a timeline. We will talk about the process of building these sites and how we used information and resources provided by others in the GLAM community. We would like to give a view under the hood and show how Omeka is quite friendly even for less technical users and can be used to enhance the online offerings of GLAM organisations of all sizes.
During lockdown, staff at the State Library of Western Australia worked on a novel suite of educational resources using the open source platform Omeka which was designed with GLAM organisations in mind. These resources were designed to align with the WA curriculum, to highlight collection materials and to extend the services that the State Library provides to schools in WA. Putting together sites of this nature can be very time consuming from a research perspective, so in many cases we re-used content from pre-existing websites made by previous staff at the State Library of WA. These websites have a wealth of valuable information, but the design and interface was old and unattractive. Rebuilding them on Omeka gave us a chance to update them and provide better metadata, tighter links to our catalogue, include content from Trove and innovative interactive elements such as a timeline. We will talk about the process of building these sites and how we used information and resources provided by others in the GLAM community. We would like to give a view under the hood and show how Omeka is quite friendly even for less technical users and can be used to enhance the online offerings of GLAM organisations of all sizes.