NELIG Blog

Facebook & Library Instruction, or The Changed Nature of Facebook

Amanda Izenstark — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 20:12:27 +0000

When Facebook debuted all those many years ago – back when it was open to just .edu addresses and before it had status updates and ads and games and timelines – I joined it* to provide another point of contact for students at my institution, and make it easier for them to find me. I was teaching (and still am teaching) a 3-credit information literacy course, and with all the enthusiasm for it and the potential it had, I jumped on board. I told students, “Feel free to friend me on Facebook – and don’t worry, I won’t stalk you.” Many friended me.

Over the years since, there have been some pretty obvious changes, and it’s now a great place to market the library and its services, to share important news of outages and construction, and create a sense of community. (But be careful not to go too far – there’s the whole “creepy treehouse” phenomenon.)

Now that Timelines will be rolled out for all, and now that many of us have given up our expectations of privacy and an experience free from data mining, how are you using Facebook to provide instruction – or research support – for your students? Are you using it at all? Do you have tips to share with others? Please post them in the comments!

Amanda Izenstark
University of Rhode Island

*Disclaimer: I deleted my account in October. Aside from discovering that I was compulsively checking it from my phone when I was waiting in line somewhere, I really haven’t missed it.

Call for Proposals, NELIG Annual Program

loneill — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 19:33:46 +0000

The New England Library Instruction Group (NELIG), an interest group of ACRL New England, is requesting speaker proposals for its annual conference “Connecting to Research through People and Process” to be held at Mount Wachusett Community College, in Gardner MA on Friday, June 1, 2012.

This year’s program will explore how instruction librarians can collaborate with others on campus to help students through the research process.

Some of the aspects we could explore include:

Collaborations with any members of your campus (faculty, students, staff, etc.)
Innovative information literacy programs that enhance individualized learning experience and engage the student in the process of active research
Methods of teaching the research process in both reference services and instruction
Assessment models that leverage collaborative opportunities.
Assessment of the student research experience
Use of technology to facilitate holistic learning
Instruction programs that include understanding the research process as a learning outcome

Any other topics that address how to incorporate collaborations to further students’ connection to the research process in teaching and learning information literacy are welcome.

Each speaker should plan on speaking 30-35 minutes with an additional 10-15 minutes for question and discussion.

The total time allotted for each presentation is a maximum of 45 minutes. We are looking for individual, group, or panel presentations by librarians and/or their collaborative colleagues. NELIG encourages librarians with any amount of experience to submit a proposal. Please do not feel shy about submitting a proposal, even if you have never presented before. NELIG is dedicated to providing opportunities for librarians to learn practical ideas from one another. Please feel free to email if you have any questions about presenting.

If you are interested in presenting a session or a panel, please submit the following online form by February 27, 2012: Call for Proposals: 2012 NELIG Annual Program. Questions should be directed to: acrlnelig@gmail.com.

Institute for the Future Report, “Future Work Skills 2020″

Amanda Izenstark — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 16:40:36 +0000

As I was wrapping up the semester grading semester projects and looking back on the numbers from our first-year instruction program, I heard about the report from the Institute for the Future entitled “Future Work Skills 2020.”

What I appreciate about the report is its focus on skills, as laid out on their site:

Many studies have tried to predict specific job categories and labor requirements. Consistently over the years, however, it has been shown that such predictions are difficult and many of the past predictions have been proven wrong. Rather than focusing on future jobs, this report looks at future work skills—proficiencies and abilities required across different jobs and work settings.

Many of the ten skills outlined can be linked to ACRL’s Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education. Below are a few of their skills and definitions, taken verbatim from the report on pages 8-12, and linked to the ACRL standards:

Sense-Making – ability to determine the deeper meaning or significance of what is being expressed (Standard 3)
Novel & Adaptive Thinking – proficiency at thinking and coming up with solutions and responses beyond that which is rote or rule based (Standard 4)
New-Media Literacy – ability to critically assess and develop content that uses new media forms, and to leverage these media for persuasive communication (Standards 3 and 5)
Cognitive Load Management – ability to discriminate and filter information for importance, and to understand how to maximize cognitive functioning using a variety of tools and techniques (Standards 2 and 3)

Having the luxury of teaching a three-credit course means I am able to design exercises and assignments that help students build these skills, but I don’t think a full course is required to do many of these things. Instead, a collaboration with faculty could make many of these things happen in one-shots and in short series of classes.

Ask students to delve into the credentials of the author of the source they’ve found – understanding how information has originated gives insight into the meaning and intention of the information.

Teach students – and require them to use – a variety of search tools beyond Google, the catalog, and databases. How about specialized search engines? Combine this with the requirement to investigate credentials, and even the most stalwart of Google users starts moving beyond that first page of results.

I might suggest that the tenth skill, Virtual Collaboration, can be learned in the course of information literacy instruction as well. For example, URI, students’ email is through Google Apps for Education. Despite the link to Google Documents at the top of the window, many students haven’t discovered the ability to author documents and presentations as groups. After a brief orientation, however, they’re off and running, and are thrilled to see their classmates’ edits in real time. Compiling and sharing a group bibliography with links becomes simple. (This could be modified to be done in a learning management system if yours supports simultaneous editing of group documents.)

Did you read the report? What was your reaction? And do you have techniques you use to help students develop these skills that you can share?

Amanda Izenstark
University of Rhode Island

Winter Meeting @ University of Vermont

Melinda — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 13:55:28 +0000

For more information from the meeting visit the NELIG website.

Presentation 1

Bubble Over: Filter Bubbles, Internet Personalization, and You, Sarah Faye Cohen, Andy Burkhardt, Michele Melia (Champlain College)

This presentation simulates an instruction session with the Concepts of Self Class for 1st semester freshman. This instruction session is the first in-class experience freshmen have with librarians. The goal of the presentation is to alter students’ perception of librarians and the work they can do with students.Using Poll Everywhere students respond to the questions:

Where do you like to get information? Answer options: Web, People, TV, other
How do you search? Answer options: Google, Bing, Library, Other

Class discussion follows each question.

Students watch this video: Eli Pariser: Beware online “filter bubbles.”

Following the video, students respond to the written questions listed below.

Take a moment to reflect on Eli Praiser’s TED Talk about filter bubbles:

What is your initial gut reaction?
Were you surprised to learn about filter bubbles
How do filter bubbles affect you?
Does this change your perception of Google?
Do you think you have a balanced information diet?

These are just a few idea starters-don’t be limited to them. Write your reaction, your questions, your thoughts.

Class discussion of the questions and video follows.

The class concludes with the message, “Question everything.”

Presentation 2

Fake Hemmingway: Paraphrasing for Non-Native Speakers, Nikki Krysak (Norwich University)

I introduce foreign language students to real-life plagiarism through art, music, fashion, and literature. We view passages from the 2006 Kaavya Viswanathan book, How Opal Metha Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life, and compare them with nearly identical passages from original authors. Students then work in groups to come up with acceptable paraphrases to exercise their translation skills and creativity.

This presentation simulates a class for international students. The goal of the class is to explore plagiarism and to practice paraphrasing as a way to avoid plagiarism.Students look at side-by-side images and consider whether 1 image is plagiarism of other image. Images include:

Robert Dixon, True Daisy (1984) and Damien Hurst’s Valium (2000)
“Linsell” scarf designed by Gosta Olofsson (late 1950s) and Marc Jacobs “Mountain Bandanna” (2007)
Gucci (Spring/Summer 2011) and Yves St. Laurent (1985)
Jennifer’s Body promotional poster and True Blood promotional poster

Students are introduced to author Kaavya Viswanathan and her novel How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life. This novel allegedly plagiarizes Megan McCafferty’s novels Sloppy Firsts and Second Helpings. Students examine side-by-side passages from Viswanathan’s and McCafferty’s novels available on Wikpedia. Students practice paraphrasing by writing alternative versions of McCaffery’s passages in pairs and then share their paraphrases with the class.

Students are referred to The Online Writing Lab as a resource.

Presentation 3

Understanding plagiarism through case studies, Rachel Pusateri (Green Mountain College)

This presentation simulates a class for first-semester freshman. Goals for the class include identifying behaviors where plagiarism can occur and identifying when citations are needed.Students are given a small piece of paper and are asked to circle yes or no in response to the question, “Have you ever committed plagiarism?”

Definitions from the Oxford English Dictionary of plagiarize and plagiarism are displayed on a screen. Students form groups by counting off 1-5. Each group receives a written description of a hypothetical situation and is responsible for determining whether plagiarism occurred in the hypothetical situation based on the definitions of plagiarism provided. After groups have had a few minutes to discuss the cases, a representative from each group reads the hypothetical situation to the class and explains why the group believes/does not believe that plagiarism occurred in the class.

Following the hypothetical cases of plagiarism, students stay in the groups they have formed. Each group is then given a news article to read that describes a case of plagiarism. Each group is responsible for determining the following points and presenting this information to the class.

How did the plagiarism occur?
How could the plagiarism have been avoided?
What were the consequences that resulted from the plagiarism?

News articles discussed in groups:

Bombardieri, Marcella. “Harvard Said to Revoke Admission.” Boston Globe 12 July
2003. Proquest Research Library. Web. 11August 2011.
Burress, Charles. “The wrong stuff/Was historian sinister or sloppy?” San Francisco
Chronicle 9 March 2002. Proquest Research Library. Web. 11 August 2011.
“Publisher Decides to Recall Novel by Harvard Student.” New York Times 28 April 2006.
Proquest Research Library. Web. 1 August 2011.
Sampson, Zinie. “Students accused of plagiarism expelled from ship.” The Associated
Press State and Local Wire 8 August 2008. Lexis-Nexis. Web. 1 December 2011.
Walker, Marcus, and Patrick McGroarty. “World News: German Minister Quits Over
Scandal— Fallout from Thesis Plagiarism Prompts Popular Defense Chief’s Departure, in a Blow to Chancellor.” Wall Street Journal 2 March 2011. Proquest Research Library. Web. 1 August 2011.

Winter Meeting @ Tufts University

Melinda — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 19:42:32 +0000

For additional information and handouts from the meeting, visit the NELIG website.

Welcome & Introductions

NELIG Secretary-Elect Kathrine Aydelott (Phillips Academy) welcomed the group and introduced our host, Laurie Sabol.

Presentation 1

Beyond the One Shot: Excerpts from a Faculty Information Literacy Collaborative, Karla Fribley & Christina Dent (Emerson College)

In May 2010 and May 2011, Emerson librarians partnered with their Teaching and Learning center to run a 3-day, 16-member faculty workshop called the “Information Literacy Collaborative” (ILC), which was funded by a Davis Foundation Grant. Goals for the workshop focused on increasing faculty understanding of information literacy, creating information literacy-based learning outcomes, and designing information literacy-based assignments.

Karla and Christina walked us through 2 activities—one that involved a skit to help participants understand the importance of clear learning objectives, and the other to get them thinking about how to scaffold steps into a research assignment. The group will reconvene this year to discuss changes in student work.

Presentation 2

Parsing the Sexy Title: Looking Beyond the Academic Colon to the Core of the Article, Catherine Fahey (Salem State University)
Handout

Searching a database for “a scholarly peer-reviewed article about madness in Hamlet” doesn’t work, because scholars write papers called “‘Noises,/Sounds, and Sweet Airs’: The Burden of Shakespeare’s Tempest” or “The ‘Tree of Life’ and the King’s Arboreal Bodies in Shakespeare’s Cymbeline” and traditional keywords such as “love” and “war” are less useful when searching topics in the Humanities.

Catherine demonstrated how to parse article titles to extract their meaning by identifying nouns and using Google and Wikipedia to discover the quotations and allusions . Geared toward a mid/upper level English class, this exercise can be adapted to any upper- level discipline specific information literacy class.

Presentation 3

Effective Research Strategies for Academic Assignments, Stacy Schwartz (Worcester Polytechnic Institute)

Stacy demonstrated Simmons’ use of a series of video tutorials accompanied by a Zoomerang survey small-group assignment that together are used to provide research instruction to 20 sections of a first-year multidisciplinary core course (80 minutes, 20 students each).

Presentation 4

Google vs. The Library: Transitioning Your (Re)Search, Zachary Newell (Salem State University)
LibGuide

Zachary detailed part of a series of sessions he offers on the Ethics of Information that explores creative ways to engage students to think about larger issues around information and its impact on their lives. This segment focused on effective ways to get first-year Speech Communication students to think about the way they access and use information, including video clips and discussions about politics, Google and Google searches, and “Filter Bubbles.”

“Open Mic”

Our time was used informally to share lesson plans and ask the presenters follow-up questions.

Winter Meeting @ Keene State College

Melinda — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 19:14:40 +0000

For more information and to access materials and handouts, visit the NELIG website.

Welcome & Introductions

Elizabeth Dollinger welcomed everyone, introduced herself as 2011-2012 co-chair of NELIG. Best part of NELIG is members – thanked the “teachers” for today. New format today, so please let us know your thoughts. NELIG is always looking for places to hold programs and presenters, so please answer the call when it comes. Italicized areas of the notes indicate teaching portion of the presentations.

Presentation 1

Why Are We Here?: Using the Socratic Method to Enhance Student Learning, Laura Braunstein (Dartmouth College)

How can we use the Socratic Method, an ancient active learning practice, to help students learn to use the library? This session will explore the Socratic Method as a teaching method that enhances student learning. Attendees will gain an understanding of the structured questioning of the Socratic Method and will develop approaches to using this method in their own teaching.

This lesson is done with very new first-year students. Imagine yourself in a first year writing class during the 1st or 2nd week of the semester. You may have had high school experience with databases, in an honors program, or you may have NO experience with research. Writing classes at Dartmouth are interdisciplinary and viewed as a place to initiate 1st year students into the academic community. Laura launched into a conversation with us, the librarians, acting as her students.

The following is the thread of the conversation…each topic was posed as a question to the students, not a lecture from the librarian. Laura also handed out a “script,” but it’s clear that the success of this lesson relies on librarian’s ability to pursue whatever contributions students offer.

What do you use for research?
What’s good about it?
Google & Wikipedia? What don’t you like about these?
Domain names and pros & cons of each.
Who are authors/publishers.
Using other peoples’ materials.
What are your professors using for research?
Books, journals, each other…where are they getting the info? THE LIBRARY.
What are the differences between the library and Google & Wikipedia?
The library is complicated, overwhelming…so why do Professors use the library?
What are professors doing when not teaching classes?
Writing articles…who is reading these articles?
Why? Professors want to keep learning.
What’s the connection between student learning, professors learning, professors writing?
You have been here a couple of weeks, what are the differences between high school assignments and college assignments?
What do you notice? Professors asking you to create your own learning…one way is through research papers…join the Academic conversation.
Professors are moving knowledge forward in their fields, not just teaching (HS teachers teaching, coaching, etc). Professors engage in the academic conversation.
Writing a research paper is like listening in on the academic conversation. You use the library to listen in on the conversation and maybe interject a comment or two. Eventually you put together your own perspective.
How is the material in library different from material on Google?
In print, organized, “better” – why better?
Written by prof…why trust professors? They’re experts…special, more reliable material…WHY?
Professors read other professors’ work providing validity checks. how do they do this? Editors, friends/peers – introduce “peer-review”…describe how professor submits articles/papers to journals, editors concerned mostly with “does the research move knowledge forward” and “is research conducted in manner of our discipline.” Editors are not as concerned with accuracy, validity.
When you write a research paper, you’re invited into this “network of knowledge.” Your work here means more in wider network than just getting a grade for this class.

Laura moved on to introduce library website and invited the students to follow along “if that’s the way you learn” or to just watch. Think about the way YOU learn and decide if you want to follow or watch. First, let’s look at what Google offers us.

What’s going on? Your professor wants you to look into current events: Occupy Wallstreet. Google the topic and look at the results.
News, Organizations. Highlight the domain name – org.; Click on the site – what’s this? What’s here?
Occupy Wall Street website: Is this more reliable than the news?
Does anybody know a word that describes when someone is trying to convince you? Bias – everything on internet has an agenda.
Go back to search results and notice the advertisements, Wikipedia, Facebook , WSJ, Twitter, etc.
Official site, news, social networking, media, all on first page. Are these academic?
Has anyone heard of a primary source? What is it? What makes it primary? 1st–hand knowledge of event. So in our age of social media – Twitter – can be a primary source.
So what’s available at the library?
This is a search opportunity that is different from Google. Look at home page. Decide what type of resource I want…Library more organized & more complicated. Google doesn’t ask you to think before you search whereas the library wants you to be more conscious.
Library resources – books. Do I want to look for a book on Occupy Wallstreet? No…how long does it take to put out a book? BUT, connect Occupy Wall Street to American History, e.g. political movements.
So what can I find in the library that’s closer to the moment? Newspaper article; the library can search multiple newspapers at once.
This can be complicated. Search all article databases at once. Type in search…EBSCO search results.
So now you’ve moved from the library website to a subscription database (results page). ASE brought to us by EBSCO. Know that you’re still in the library because of branding.
SO could you get to this on free web? Why or why not? Subscription…everything on Internet is not free. There are pay walls. For example, some newspapers allow a couple of free views, but then ask you to pay for further articles. The library provides ongoing free access (paid by your tuition). You might be able to locate on Google search, but you’ll have to pay.
Go find a book – 10 minutes, check it out and bring it back.

Q&A

Q. What do you do when students don’t respond when you ask a question?

A. Definitely the hardest thing. Some suggestions include:

Collaborating with faculty; they sometimes help out.
Just call on people (“what do you think, purple shirt?”).
Make questions more specific: depending on when in semester the session is…Start with what they know and take them to where they need to be.
Put the question in terms of own experiences, e.g. researching a trip to Florida for spring break (instead of making it academic).
Reward for answering questions, e.g. chocolate.
Adapt. Instead of asking for verbal responses to a question, ask the students to write down their answers. Then have the students swap papers and present their peers’ answers.
Institutional culture matters. Dartmouth students want to show off knowledge. Some schools’ students expect to be put on the spot.
Philosophies of pedagogy have changed. Socratic method intended to make students uncomfortable, however librarians don’t have luxury to alienate.
Use humor to validate. No sarcasm.

General Comments

The Socratic method is a diagnostic method to identify where students are and then move them to where you want them to be. “You’re being initiated into academic conversation” might not being making an impact on students right now, but eventually they’ll remember.
Be aware of the developmental stage of students. this doesn’t mean we shouldn’t challenge them and tell them they’re scholars/part of academic conversation.
Echo the conversation that faculty/deans are saying.

Presentation 2

“Speed Databasing”: Making Lasting Connections in 10 Minutes or Less, Rachel Blair Vogt and Carolyn Gamtso (UNH Manchester)

Inspired by the speed dating phenomenon, our lesson gives students a chance to experience relevant resources which they “get to know” by researching during class. When the bell rings, students move to the next station. This lesson allows students a personalized in-context and hands-on research session in a short amount of time. The librarian serves as a guide and facilitates topic exploration and reflection.

Carolyn & Rachel introduced themselves and provided context for the assignment. UNH Manchester is an urban, commuter campus (non-residential); a small community with small classes. The librarians have good relationships with faculty, and faculty are always in class when librarians the present. UNHM has a small library with 3 instruction librarians teaching 120+ classes per year.

The lesson is a revamp of the “typical” first year writing session. They felt they were doing too much lecture and wanted their session to be learner-centered with less talking by librarians. The librarians act more as “guides on the side.” The lesson is inquiry based with students working on questions they already have. It is hands-on, in-context, and relevant to an assignment at hand.

They designed a lesson around an argument paper, which required in all 1st year writing classes. The library instruction class time is a workshop in which students actually find resources. The librarians work with faculty before class to make sure the students have their topics before the session.

“How can schools reduce online bullying by students” is the topic for the demonstration lesson. Rachel & Carolyn started by asking us to go to the library guide for this class/lesson: http://libraryguides.unh.edu/NELIG. They walked around to make sure we were all there, and also distributed signs to each pair of students, indicating database names: CQ Research, Catalog, and Academic Search Elite. Students also receive a USB labeled “UNH-Manchester Library” that they will keep after the session.

Has everyone been to the library before?

Does everyone have the argument paper assignment? You will be researching your topic to support your side and then find research to support other side as well.

Today we’re going to look for sources and you will LEAVE today with sources.

(Everybody on computer and at library guide.) Think of the online guide as a springboard for research in class. It will be here all semester. You might want to bookmark the page. It’s also linked from Blackboard. You may use it all semester to get into library resources.

We are going to workshop your topics today. To begin we will generate a list of keywords because the library’s resources are easier to search when you have keywords.

Carolyn handed out generating keywords worksheet as Rachel explained what we’re doing. On a white board the topic was written across the top. Rachel walked the class through the worksheet to identify keywords/concepts and brainstorm synonyms for keywords. Carolyn wrote the keywords on the white board. Look how many search terms we have now! We went from 4 words in our original topic to 12-15 words to use in searching.

They introduced various databases: CQ Researcher, Catalog, and ASC . Each student/pair of students was assigned a database to search.

Starting from the Libguide, here’s how to navigate to your assigned database: CQ, Catalog, Academic Search Complete. Who has heard of speed dating?

They explained the concept of speed dating and getting to know a person in 8 minutes. We’re going to do Speed Databasing. Each group will have 8 minutes to find information within each database. At 4 minutes, save what you’ve found to USB( distributed by librarian). The USB is yours to keep. Then work for 4 more minutes, save, take your USB to next station.

The bell is used to start the 8 minutes and indicate a 4 minute warning, as well as time to move to next station. Librarians circulate to see how students are doing and provide one-on-one instruction. The students explore the databases on their own and try to figure out what information is available to them.

After everyone has rotated through 3 stations they ask:

Did everyone find something they can use?
Did anyone have trouble or find sources more difficult to use?
What kind of difficulties did you have? How did you handle the problem? Librarian helped. Sometimes article itself not available. Anyone else have this happen?
What did you do? Try “full-text” link? Explain what’s happening and the option of ILL.
How long is ILL? Can be very fast, goes all over world.

At the end of the class they ask the students to go back to the online guide, and click on “Rate this instruction.”

Q&A

Q. How long is session?

A. 90 min. (condensed to 30 for NELIG). The session usually includes a discussion of peer-review and what a journal is. Therefore there is less confusion when they get to searching in the databases.

Q. How long do they usually have at each station?

A. 7-10 minutes. It’s quick on purpose.

Q. Is there any grumpiness on the part of the student regarding the bell and transitions?

A. The kinesthetics of moving around is valauable, but they have also had the students stay at one station if it’s preferred by the professor or students themselves.

Q. Does it waste time to move?

A. It does take up time to have students move from one station to another. However, saving to a USB prevents losing the searches when moving between stations. It depends upon the audience and logistics of the space as to whether moving is recommended.

Q. Do the students feel rushed?

A. After 10 minutes they are usually ready to leave, but sometimes they wish they could have stayed longer. The idea is to introduce them to multiple resources and encourage them to save their results.

Q. Is the session usually co-taught by two librarians?

A. No, but often the librarian is assisted by a research mentor. At UNH Manchester, class-linked writing tutors (students) are hired by the Center for Academic Enrichment as writing tutors. In the research mentor program, Carolyn teaches them library skills. They are trained to recognize when research help is needed, and how to get students started doing research. The class-linked research mentor circulates with the librarian during the lesson.

General Comments

They have also done speed databasing with upper level courses. It works as a good activity for introducing students to new databases.
They can do up to 5 databases with the 5th station as a discipline specific database.
They don’t always call it “speed databasing” as students may not know what speed databasing is and are not always into the name of the activity.
The first part of the lesson depends upon the faculty’s requests. It can include a worksheet for finding keywords, creating strings, keyword grid, boolean operators, etc.
The layout of the room that they typically use at UNH-Manchester is long and narrow with 3 to 4 computers per side of room. It is easy for the librarian to move around.

Presentation 3

Digging deeper: Finding Information in the WWW, Melinda Malik (Merrimack College)

In 2011, Melinda collaborated with a computer science faculty member to develop an interesting and engaging lesson plan on advanced web searching using a fictional research scenario on the Titanic. In class, students engage in the discovery of information in both the visible and invisible web in order to fully understand where information lives online and how to find it. Attendees will be introduced to the complete lesson plan and participate in a dialog of where information lives in the visible and invisible web.

Melinda explained that this is the 2nd version of this lesson developed in collaboration with a faculty member, revised from last year, and centered around a Titanic-themed scenario. Generally, the class meets twice a week, with 50 minutes lecture followed by 50 minutes lab. The lesson itself covers two class sessions, but the 50 minute lecture felt too long. So she chunked the lecture session into smaller activities including clicker quizzes, hands on assignments, and videos.

Melinda just taught this last week. The Introduction to IT course is a Gen Ed class for non-majors, including freshmen through seniors. The library session is at the end of the semester. She and the faculty member chose Titanic as the topic and used videos in order to spark student interest in advanced web searching.

She began by introducing the agenda for the week (Melinda in both class sessions).

Day One – Introduce the difference between the visible and invisible web, and evaluating. Answer the question, where does info “live?”
Day Two – Discuss how search engine works and advanced search techniquesIndentify Information Need – fictional scenario – Xtranormal Video – daily news outlet: Tyrone needs to do a story, friend Sara found box of Titanic documents in aunt’s attic.

She introduced the roles of the fictional players: Tyrone & Sara as journalists; Charles & Marguerite as research experts (4 characters in XtraNormal videos). The students’ role was that of research assistant for Tyrone. They were to come up with sources that he can use for a story.

An XtraNormal video introduced the story of Tyrone & Sara and the Titanic documents, followed by an activity where the students look at actual documents and come up with news story ideas for Tyrone. The students are then asked:

What do you already know about topic?
What have you learned?
What else do you NEED to know (this is the info they need to find during the week-long lesson)?

The students then watched a second video about where information lives. The XtraNormal video featured Charles & Marguerite explaining the difference between the visible and invisible web. As the video plays, Melinda takes notes of key themes on the white board next to the video screen.

After video, Melinda recaps highlights.

We’ve just learned that there are 300-400 billion pages on the web, but Google only finds ¼ of the information. What about the rest of the stuff? How do we get there?

Melinda then leads discussion about where info lives using a clicker quiz. Students are prompted to pick what they think is the best answer, not necessarily the only answer (visible web, invisible web, or both).

You need to find newspaper articles reporting the Titanic disaster from 1912. Where do these articles live?
You need to find a scholarly journal article on social class in the Edwardian era and the Titanic. Where does this article live?

The discussion included the following:

How information is moved to the web. Is a for-profit enterprise going to make information freely available? Why can some of it be found freely available? Things are posted illegally all the time . . . also, sometimes you locate existence of a source via Google, but you need to pay for access.
Open Access. Some scholars in some disciplines are publishing scholarly information on the free web. So depending on the field, you may find scholarly/academic articles on visible web.
Google Scholar. Where is Google Scholar searching, the visible or invisible web? It’s a little bit of both. (Melinda highlighted the intersection on the pie-chart on the white board.) Sometimes you can get access to visible web articles through Google Scholar. An author may have wanted to share their work freely or someone may have posted articles illegally. Also, Google searches publishers website. Publishing companies are more than happy to make that information available. However, once you find out an article exists you have to pay for it to access the full text. BUT, Google Scholar NOT searching all of the invisible web. Keep in mind that the visible web includes everything on company or organization intranets. For example, Google Scholar doesn’t search Blackboard, or confidential information such as medical records, or information that’s a paywall.
Why would a journalist want to use a scholarly article for research? Especially with the Titanic as topic, online sites could be just fan sites.

This section of the lesson also includes to questions on finding primary sources and statistics online.

General Comments

Regarding assessment, the professor requires the students to complete an in-class lab for each session as well as a weekly homework assignment. Melinda had already reviewed the students in-class labs for the week and discovered that in future iterations of the lesson, she and the professor will need to focus more on how to evaluate sources as the sources they students chose in class were not great. They will ask the students for feedback about this lesson as they did not seem to appreciate the humor in the XtraNormal videos.

Presentation 4

Comparing Reference Sources: A Side-by-Side Approach, Kara Young (Keene State College)

Keene State College was recently the recipient of a new collaborative student work space featuring mini white boards and tables with built-in screens that enhance the ability of groups to share their work. This session makes use of these features to help groups identify the characteristics of and differences between library-owned and freely-available reference sources.

For her presentation, Kara brought the group to a new instruction space in the stacks at Mason Library. The space is open, airy, and separated from the stacks and seating area by dividers. It includes a projector, screen, and white board. The students sit at tables arranged around the periphery of the space. Each table has space for 4-6 students, and 4 laptops (or students can use their own) with ability to connect to a docking station in the center. The docking station allows the laptop screen to be projected onto one of two side-by-side screens at one end of the table. Students can then project two different websites onto two different screens, and are able to make side-by-side comparisons as a group. Each table also has a “huddle board” next to it, a white board on a stand for making notes the whole group can see.

Kara explained that she likes teaching with technology, and this lesson is one she uses with a required Introduction to Research and Writing class, usually taken by freshmen & sophomores. (Integrated studies instead of Gen Ed at Keene State). Librarians go to the ITW class twice a semester where students learn to find and evaluate information. The lesson Kara presented is the one used in the first visit, generally in early September. The goal is to find and evaluate websites, compare & contrast two resources, and develop criteria for what makes each resource good or bad. The two resources to be compared are Wikipedia and Credo Reference.

Kara started the lesson by welcoming us to the library.

What we’re doing today is exploring broadly to see what’s out there. Does anybody have a topic yet for your research project? No? That’s actually perfect because pre-research is important. Today we’re going to FIND, READ, and EVALUATE what’s found on the Internet.

Your topic may come from a class assignment, or a life experience. What do YOU use the web for? Entertainment, shopping, Facebook. Let’s talk about shopping. Do you bargain-hunt online? How do you do it?

Are there any other examples of using the internet for personal research, of finding information and using it to make decision in your non-academic life? How do you decide whether to trust the info you’ve found online?

Today, we’re going to use tools you know – Google, Wikipedia, to search for information. Everyone open a web browser & go to the url that’s written here on the white board. http://libguides.keene.edu/nelig (Kara projected the screen to model where we should be clicking.) This guide will be here for you all semester. Now, click on Background Resources and let’s find Credo Reference.

Working in your group, decide who’s laptop will project to the screen. One screen should display the Credo Reference page and one screen should show the Wikipedia search. Now, search the same topic on both screens and compare the results. You can search whatever topic you like.

On the huddle board next to your table, make lists of the what you like and don’t like about each resource (Credo & Wikipedia). The librarian circulates as the students search.

At the end, Kara asks the students to reporting back with each group presenting their list of pros and cons of the resources. She then facilitates a discussion of why/how you know if sources are good – get at the real differences between resources – tone, authority, subscription. The groups conclusion was that Credo is convenient like Wikipedia, but unlike Wikipedia the information is reliable.

What do you think of Credo? Will you try it?

Premise of the lesson is to familiarize students with what reference sources are, using the root word “refer.” Also the lesson gets the students to think about keywords and types of resources. It’s natural for students to use Wikipedia, why not teach them to use it well, appropriately.

Wrap-up

Elizabeth concluded the day by thanking all teachers and “students”, asking everyone to respond the upcoming request for feedback (on e-mail) and inviting all to NELIG Annual at Mt. Watchusett in June.

Winter Meeting at Western New England University

Melinda — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 14:09:39 +0000

Presentation 1: Gathering Background Info – Credo v. Wikipedia, Jennifer Ditkoff from Keene State College presented a lesson that she and other librarians from Keene conduct with students in freshmen writing intensive courses who are working on their final 20 page paper. She does this activity with them to help them work through their topics before they do concept mapping and database searching. This exercise asks students to compare a variety of reference sources and to use those sources to gather background information on their topics. For this exercise, attendees used Credo and Wikipedia, writing down the main concepts and key terms that they found in each source. When working with students, Jennifer emphasizes that research is a recursive process and that gathering background information is an important stage in that process.

Presentation 2: Finding What you Need: Choosing your Own Adventures in Library Research, Laura Robinson Hanlan from Worcester Polytechnic Institute started off by talking about two of the biggest challenges in research: figuring out what questions to answer and figuring out where to go for the answers. She developed this exercise for students in WPI’s Great Problem Seminar, a 2-term course taken during freshmen year. In this course, students work in teams of three to four to research real world problems and investigate engineering solutions to these problems. When students attend this session, they already have background knowledge about their topics and they have learned about the library’s resources in a previous session. This session would normally take 65 minutes so Laura modified the lesson for a 30 minute presentation. During this session students work in their teams to:

1) come up with an elevator pitch for their topics, providing a short description of the topic that could be understood by people who don’ t have background knowledge of the topic.

2) choose a research question related to their topic.

3) think of what who (researchers, governmental organizations, companies, etc.) might produce the information needed to answer the research question.

4) think of keywords and synonyms.

5) start searching for sources using an appropriate database for this research question.

6) choose one source to focus on. From there, students look for leads based on reference lists and forward citations, as well as experts and organizations and keywords written about in the article.

After each of these steps, the whole class is brought into a discussion about their research. Laura developed this exercise to try to get students to slow down the pace of their research a bit, giving them time to think about who might produce information on their topic, to develop thoughtful keywords, and to find higher quality sources.

Presentation 3: Build Your Research Foundation: Every Great Project Begins with a Plan, Joy Hansen of Middlesex Community College presented a lesson that she does with students in English 101. This course is a fundamental research skill-building course, but librarians are only able to visit these classes once a semester. In the past, Joy had a posted a worksheet online for students to use in their research. However, few students had used the worksheet on their own. Since students often struggle with developing a thesis statement and search strategy, Joy expanded the worksheet and started bringing it into library instruction sessions.

The worksheet begins by asking students to describe the assignment and the assignment requirements. This is an important piece to start with since students sometimes inadvertently depart from the original assignment. Next, students write down their topic idea. (By the time of their library instruction session, English 101 students have already chosen their topics and have had their professor approve the topic.) The worksheet has guided questions, helping students come up with a research question and generate keywords. Middlesex Community College has the Points of View Reference Center database and students are directed there to look articles on both sides of their topics. Students also use the bibliographies in Points of View to find other sources they may want to check out later. After using Points of View, students are directed to search Academic Search Premier for terms from the list of keywords they have made.

By answering the questions on their worksheets, students leave their sessions with something tangible and they’ve developed an effective research plan by the end of their instruction session. Students are also encouraged to share their sheet when meeting with professor or a librarian.

Presentation 4: Mind Mapping Software: Improving the Student Research Process through Inspiration©, Joshua Becker from Western New England University demonstrated a lesson where students use Inspiration© software to create mind maps, or concept maps, during library instruction sessions. At Western New England University, mind mapping has been used most often in library instruction sessions for freshman composition classes, but this exercise could be helpful for students of all levels.

Joshua began by going over different types of mind maps. For this lesson, we each chose a topic from an assigned list and then we all practiced with the most common type of mind map, a spider shape with sub-topics branching out from a central theme. Joshua encourages students to brainstorm and think quickly while making their maps; they should not worry about whether they will use all of the terms in their final papers. While making their maps, students think of different keywords and make connections between different ideas. The process encourages students to think more deeply about their topics which they will eventually develop into an essay for their class. Western New England’s instruction room has two projectors and the instructor can choose a student’s computer workstation to project at the front of the room, allowing students to evaluate their peers’ mind maps.

There are a variety of online tools for creating mind maps, but Inspiration© allows users to generate an outline from the map. This option works well for certain learning styles.

Open Mic Discussion:
After the presentations, there was time for open discussion. There was discussion about what different schools are doing for assessment. Some librarians use Google Docs during sessions, having students fill in responses to different questions. There was also discussion about how to teach a class when the students do not have any research assignment to go along with the library instruction session. One suggestion was to use interesting topics as examples, such as looking for information about “Life on Mars.” Librarians also talked about the work they are doing with students in subject-specific courses.

Winter Meeting @ Providence College

Melinda — Wed, 07 Dec 2011 15:59:48 +0000

For more information about the meeting, visit the NELIG website.

Presentation 1:

Scene: Fairfield Edition: Orienting First-Year Students to the Library Using Interactive, Multimedia Game Play, Laura Weber & Jessica McCullough, Fairfield University. Workshop attendees were divided into 3 teams and played a library version of the game Scene It. Each team watched a short animated video of Fairfield students using the library. After the video, the team had to answer a question about how to use the library, the answer of which was given somewhere in the video. There was also a group round where all 3 teams played against each other. In addition, teams also answered Wheel of Fortune style questions and Word Jumble Questions based on the short animated videos of Fairfield students using the library.

Library Scene: Fairfield Edition is used with all of the freshman writing classes at Fairfield University and has been a huge success. They can be seen on this website: http://faculty.fairfield.edu/mediacenter/library/scene/index.html . The videos were made in collaboration with Fairfield University’s Media/IT department. The types of software used include: Apple Motion, Final Cut Pro, Photoshop, Pro Tools, Dreamweaver, and Flash. For more information contact: Jessica McCullough (jmccullough@fairfield.edu) or Laura Weber (lweber@fairfield.edu)

Presentation 2:

The Power of Video: Creating a rapport in the classroom that extends throughout a semester, Kari Mofford, UMass Dartmouth
Kari designed a long video called “Library Dreams” for English 101 students to watch before they come in for library instruction. The plot of the video is students have nightmares about doing research papers and using the library. In the dream sequences, librarians and library aides show the students how to successfully use the library. Kari also created minute videos with faculty which are mini library tutorials. These videos focus on a particular faculty’s area of personal interest, like training service dogs, and then work in ways in which the library can be used to further that faculty person’s knowledge of their area of interest (like using Interlibrary Loan to order articles on training service dogs).
Handout

Presentation 3:

Mastering Music Searching, Erica Charis, Berklee College of Music
Erica demonstrated her drop in sessions for faculty and students about how to use advanced search features in the Berklee Library Catalog. Erica uses prezi to make her presentation dynamic. The drop in sessions specifically focus on the challenges of how music artists and musical works are listed in the library catalog. In the case of music artists, sometimes they are the main artist (or author) – but other times they are contributors, such as songwriters or producers. Also, it can be challenging to find artists who use professional aliases, like Sean Combs. Regarding titles, challenges included works known by various titles, generic titles, and titles that use “text speak.”

Open Mic Discussion:
After the presentations, there was a short discussion on how workshop attendees are using videos in library instruction. Librarians use Camtasia, Captivate, and Panopto to create tutorial videos and screencasts.

NELIG Winter Meeting Registration

loneill — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 15:43:34 +0000

We have 5 locations for the Winter Meeting on the morning of December 2, each with a great lineup of speakers. Please follow the links below for details for each site.

Keene State College, Keene, NH
Providence College, Providence, RI
Tufts University, Medford, MA
University of Vermont, Burlington, VT
Western New England University, Springfield, MA

Please register at http://goo.gl/SFMGS.
Directions and parking information will be sent to registrants the week before of the program.

Please email us at acrlnelig@gmail.com if you have any questions.

NELIG Winter Meeting

loneill — Sat, 08 Oct 2011 19:21:32 +0000

Instruction Swap!

Morning of Friday, December 2

Often when we are at NELIG events, we hear our colleagues discussing innovative activities they have done with classes at their school. Sometimes we might even watch a great conference presentation where a librarian describes an activity he or she has done with classes, but we don’t actually get to see our colleagues “in action.” The December NELIG Meeting will be a great opportunity to watch some of your creative colleagues present a lesson as they would to a class. At each location several librarians will conduct activities that they run, or are planning to run, in their classes. Those of us in the audience will act as their college students. Through this experience we will be reminded of what it is like to be sitting in the seat of the student and learn new teaching techniques and exercises from each other.

Each presenter will have approximately 30 minutes to provide an introduction to the lesson and then to present the lesson to the classroom of librarians.

As has been done in the past, the NELIG Winter meeting will have several locations around New England. There will be five sites:

Keene State College, Keene, NH
Providence College, Providence, RI
Tufts University, Medford, MA
University of Vermont, Burlington, VT
Western New England University, Springfield, MA

If you would like to present at one of the December Meetings, please fill out this form and email it to acrlnelig@gmail.com by October 28.

Please read over the site descriptions to make sure that the site where you’d like to present has the technology and resources that you need for your activity. If your activity will require hand-outs or supplies (such as paper and pens), please bring those items with you to the meeting.

Please email us at acrlnelig@gmail.com if you have any questions about presenting.

If you would like to attend a December meeting as a non-presenter, we will be sending out an email with registration information in several weeks.

We are excited about this event and we look forward to learning from our NELIG colleagues!