Embed Size (px)
Citation preview
Slide 1
In Bed…Oops, We Mean
EMBED with RDC LibrariansMichelle Edwards Thomson & Kristine Plastow
Alberta Library Conference
April 2009
After struggling to deliver information literacy instruction within the limited confines of 50 and 80 minute one-time sessions, in the fall of 2007 Red Deer College librarians decided to pilot a new approach to information literacy at our institution. We developed a continuum solution that creates opportunities for students to explore research more fully by engaging subject faculty in a variety of creative collaborations that extend information literacy throughout the curriculum.
Slide 2
Red Deer College
I’d like to give you a bit of background on RDC – to give you a picture of what it is like if you are not familiar with it. For those of you who are a bit more familiar, this info can help you place where your institution would fit if you are thinking of trying different things with your info lit program.
RDC opened in 1964.
We are a comprehensive community college – we offer a little bit of everything program-wise. There are 75 programs offering certificate (pharmacy technician, educational assistant, health care aide), diploma (business admin, legal assistant, practical nurse), collaborative degrees (BScN, BEd from UA; BA from UC; BMgmt from AU), applied degrees (Motion Picture Arts) and trades and technology training.
The majority of our students are in University Transfer (UT) programs (35%), with trades being the next highest (25%), followed by diplomas (18%) and then certificates (12.5%).
Almost ¾ of our students are ages 18 to 24; majority are female (56%).
With most of the programming offered at the college, the curriculum is pretty set – either by the UT institution or by the nature of the program itself – diploma and certificate programs are quite restrictive.
Slide 3
Red Deer College Library
We call the Library the largest classroom on campus; we moved in 2002.
We call ourselves the largest classroom on campus to acknowledge all the learning that takes place outside of the classroom – a lot of it takes place in the library.
It is an active, energy-filled place with a hum of activity in the air.
Last year we had a little bit over 500,000 visits in person and a little bit under 500,000 visits to our website.
The last two weeks of term this year we had 3,500 visits a day.
We answered somewhere in the neighbourhood of 28,000 questions last year at our service desks – in person and virtually.
Slide 4
Information Literacy at RDC
When Kristine first started at RDC there were two librarians who made up the library instruction team and we did a lot of orientations to the library. Every so often we would do a more focused class about an actual assignment, but that was the exception not the rule.
As the College grew, we hired more librarians, our information literacy program grew, and our classes focused less and less on orientations and more on assignment-based teaching.
Over the past two years we have been piloting a new instructional model.
In the Fall of 2007 we started partnering with faculty members to try a new approach to information literacy instruction. Instead of bringing the students to the library for a one-hour research workshop, the faculty members and the librarians are working together in a variety of ways to provide students with ongoing opportunities for feedback and instruction on their developing information literacy skills.
Slide 5
Instructional Continuum
The instructional continuum came about as part of a larger IL program design process, and was created as a visual, marketing tool for faculty, and for us when we’re working with faculty.
We have done some presentation-style marketing to faculty with this, and it’s on our website, but it’s used more in consultations with faculty either one-on-one or as a department as part of a problem-solving conversation.
Gives us a starting point when we’re having conversations about what is possible.
Ideally, a program would take advantage of a variety of these options part of curriculum embedding and design we’ll get to this.
None of the solutions on the continuum are revolutionary – most of you are probably doing some, if not all, of these options – we found formalizing it is what’s helped to move things forward at our institution.
This is by no means all there is to our info lit program – this just describes the instruction piece.
Slide 6
Single Information Literacy Workshop
These are the traditional one-shots that most of you are likely familiar with – we haven’t done away with them, but we’ve modified them. No more “library orientations” and no more “everything you need to know about research in 50 minutes”.
Focused session limited to 1-2 learning outcomes.
Allow us to teach in a more active way – less lecture and demo and more student exploration.
E.g. BIOL 217 where students are learning to use article databases to find research articles, APA sessions.
When booking, we sit down with instructor and start by asking “what do you want your students to be able to do?” – then we look at what we can realistically teach them to do in the time allotted.
Students have to be working toward an assignment where they’ll use the skills within the context of the rest of the class.
Ideal if instructor wants to focus on one skill or resource.
Slide 7
3-Pack Information Literacy Classes
If instructor wants too much content for a single workshop, we try to move them to this option.
In-depth coverage of 1-2 learning outcomes or survey of 4-6 learning outcomes.
We suggest 2-3 sessions, can be more if appropriate. They can be one after another, or spaced out throughout the semester.
E.g. NURS 280 (students come for three sessions: one on using CINAHL, one on evaluating information, and one on APA), APA and Plagiarism sessions (first session focused entirely on plagiarism, second on citation).
Learning to keep these focused, and timed according to where students are in their research process.
Provides students with more opportunity to ask questions without feeling dumb.
Still generally focused around a single assignment.
Slide 8
Embedded Information Literacy
Speaking here about being embedded in a course, not embedded in the curriculum (see it used both ways in the literature) – we’ll get to the curriculum stuff later.
Involvement at this level really varies from class to class, according to instructor need and librarian availability.
Key difference here is that librarian is often considered one of the instructors of the class, and participates in creating and marking relevant assignments.
Students form an ongoing relationship with “their” librarian.
Allows students to get feedback on research process as well as product.
Started using a pre-test at this level to guide our teaching.
E.g. ZOOL 342 (students worked on a presentation, met with librarian outside of class to work on search journal and annotated bibliography; librarian marked search journal and annotated bib, helped mark presentation), NURS 396 (students worked on lit review as part of research methods course; librarian taught in class a couple of times, met with students outside of class, helped mark search journal assignment).
If instructor is interested in this as an option, requires a lot more lead-time because of the extra planning involved, both on the part of the individual librarian and when considering workload as a whole.
This option really starting to grow through word of mouth.
Slide 9
Co-Teaching Information Literacy
Librarian is involved with course through entire semester.
Works only with a strong partnership between librarian and subject instructor.
Involvement with course will vary according to the course, instructor, and librarian.
Librarian creates and grades assignments in conjunction with the subject instructor.
E.g. BIOL 201, ENGL 090 online (in both of these instances, the librarian is an instructor of record for the course, participates in course and assignment design, teaching, and grading).
Learning importance of integration with the subject – it doesn’t work if the students see the class divided into “content” time and “library” time.
Slide 10
Information Literacy Credit Course
Don’t have an example of this for info lit yet, but all of our computer literacy courses fall under this category (this will make sense when I talk about Info Fluency a little later).
Looking at a variety of options here in terms of design important that the course be discipline-specific and designed in conjunction with the individual program.
May never be the right choice for a lot of programs for a variety of reasons, including transferability of credits, and that’s okay.
Looking at creating a media literacy course, as there’s a gap here at our College currently.
Slide 11
Next Steps: Information Fluency
Information Fluency is a combination of information literacy, computer literacy, technology literacy, visual literacy, and media literacy.
A couple of years ago the Computer Learning department became part of the library. They’re responsible for teaching credit computer literacy courses at the College.
Information Fluency is the concept that is allowing us to integrate what Computer Learning does instructionally with what the Library does instructionally, and also go beyond that to do new things.
We are looking at developing a media literacy credit course next year.
We are also taking the focused one-shot model from information literacy and applying it to some of the content in our computer literacy courses (PowerPoint one-shots, Word one-shots, that kind of thing). They are starting at the other end of the instructional continuum from where we did, and we’re meeting somewhere in the middle.
Slide 12
Next Steps: 2010
2010
Curriculum Development
Faculty Support and Workshops
LibguidesAssessment
Program Development
Work over the next year will be focusing on a number of different areas:
Curriculum development – trying to be more strategic about where and how we spend our resources, working with programs as a whole to embed information literacy throughout the curriculum using a variety of different options from the continuum as well as other tools – e.g. Education, Nursing.
Faculty support and workshops – we offer help with assignment design and are doing a PD workshop on this with the Center for Teaching and Learning. We also support faculty on an ad-hoc basis and are looking to build up online resources for faculty.
Libguides! – For teaching and specific class support, for resource guides for both students and faculty.
Assessment – need to start assessing success of program and student learning at all stages of the continuum.
Program Development – written plan to support budget requests, guide our work.
