Good Old Goodreads

A lot of what we all post here on Tech Talk is our exciting finds and current news, which is great! But I found myself thinking the other day how much I appreciate an "old" tool--Goodreads.

Goodreads, if it's new to you, is a site that allows you to keep track of books, to see what your friends (and strangers) are reading, and to read and write reviews. One of the things that I think makes it so successful and such a valuable tool is that there's so many different ways that you can use it.

You can just keep track of the books you've read, or list all the books you'd like to read, or list all the books you own as well. You can "tag" or create "shelves" for your books--sort them by subject in any way you want. You can keep track of when you read a book, who recommended it to you, and what you thought about it. You can keep your notes private, or write a review that the whole world can see. It's up to you!

It's flexible enough that I've used it in different ways over the four years that I've had an account. (Find my picture books here and my other books here.) Here's some of the ways it has helped me do my job better!

• When I was still doing some adult readers' advisory, I would read book reviews and add interesting titles that I knew I was never going to have time to read myself--but were good to recommend to others. This was especially great for genres that I don't read a lot of.
• When I know I've read something but can't remember the title or author, the "cover view" option is a super quick way to nudge my memory and scan dozens (or hundreds!) of book possibilities quickly.
• When my daughters read a book that they love and want me to read, I add it to my lists, so I can remember the titles, but also so I can recommend tried-and-true titles to other kids. 
• I love the "to-read" category! I used to have so many paper lists and Word docs floating around with all the titles that sounded good. Now I have all those ideas in one place. I know I'll never get to all of them, but when I'm in the mood for a certain type of book, I have a lot of good ideas at my fingertips! 
• I've used Goodreads to keep track of various reading challenges that I've participated in.
• I have one account just for picture books, and one for everything else I read. I decided to keep them separate because there so MANY picture books I want to keep track of that I didn't want to have to sort through them when I was looking for other types of titles. Also, having a separate account means I can tag and categorize picture books differently, and more easily, than I could if they were all mixed together with my other books. 
• I keep track of the books I use in storytime.
• All year long I make notes of great illustrations, so when Alyson and I are ready to start compiling our Caldecott Hopeful list, I haven't forgotten any of the great books from the beginning of the year.
• Sometimes patrons want to find a picture book that has a particular illustration style or uses a certain media--I have trouble finding lists for that online, so I started tagging the picture books I read by media, creating my own resource for this question. 
• When I can't make up my mind about a title, I use GoodReads to access a lot of other people's opinions and reviews all at once! It gives me an overview of reactions to test my reactions against, and hone my own opinion. 
• I use GoodReads to see what other children's librarians around the country are reading and enjoying. It's a great way to find out about titles that we don't have here at ALD.

So finding new tech tools is great, but finding a new tool that works so well it turns into an "old" tool--that's fabulous! What are your "old" tech tools that help you do your job?