Doing Instruction: Instructional Approaches for Western European Studies and Beyond
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WESSWeb > WESS Newsletter > Fall 2008 > Instructional Approaches for Western European Studies and Beyond
by Paula Mae Carns (pcarns@illinois.edu)
Over the last decade academic librarians have witnessed a growing need for library instruction that goes beyond traditional bibliographic sessions aimed at helping users find print articles and books in the physical space of a library. The emergence of the Internet, complex online library tools and expansion of scholarly publishing, particularly into electronic formats, has necessitated new approaches that consider such aspects as search strategies, database design and use, and evaluation of resources. Library instruction is not new to the members of WESS and many librarians in this section of ACRL are responsible for instruction in their libraries. Thus it is somewhat surprising, at least to this author, that instructional practices have not featured more prominently at WESS meetings and WESS Newsletter articles. Instead, collection development and technical services are usually the primary topics. To bring to light the instructional practices amongst WESS members I hosted a session at Annual 2008 with the same name as this essay. The venue for the session was a meeting of the Classical, Medieval and Renaissance Discussion Group. While three of the four presenters drew their examples from one of these time periods, their pedagogical approaches could easily be applied to other eras. In this essay I provide a summary of the session’s four presentations in order, with links to resources. As you will see, each in some way presents a fresh take on library instruction.
Chellammal Vaidyanathan, Librarian for History, Government Information, & International Documents at the University of Miami Libraries, cvaidyan@miami.edu, gave a presentation Teaching Government and International Documents, in which she summarized freely available resources on the Internet (listed below) and reasons for using them. She recommended that subject librarians involved in international study, as most WESS members are, teach critical thinking and evaluation; include government documents in their instructional and reference initiatives, as these touch on issues of global concern and are usually interdisciplinary in nature, as well as current and freely available on the Internet. She also suggested that librarians employ government documents for instructional sessions for specific disciplines, such as history, political science, and international studies. For instance, government documents provide excellent background information on regions and countries; give up-to-date statistical data on a wide range of topics, such as populations, elections and economies; serve as potential primary source materials in themselves; direct students to current hot topics for papers; and expand students’ knowledge about domestic and international affairs. Chella closed her talk by offering ways that librarians can promote the use of government documents to faculty and students, both of whom might be unfamiliar with them. With regards to faculty, she herself publicizes resources through word of mouth, email announcements, and presentations at departmental meetings. For students, she includes them in one-on-one research consultations and class workshops, the latter often in conjunction with other subject librarians. To reach the local community, Chella suggests hosting informative exhibitions, an initiative which she plans to do in the future. Below is a list of the best sites for US and International government documents with a few starting points.
Starting Points
US Government examples
International examples
Chimene Tucker, Librarian for Film & Media Studies, World History at the Davidson Library, University of California Santa Barbara, ctucker@library.ucsb.edu, delivered a presentation Lady Chimene and Medieval Illuminations, a condensed version of an instructional session for a proseminar in medieval social history that she gives at her library for undergraduate students. In this session Chimene takes the students through the entire research process, from selecting a topic to finding appropriate materials. Chimene’s approach is holistic and goes beyond the teaching of library tools to introducing students to the world of scholarly materials and instructing them in savvy search strategies. She encourages students to begin their investigations with library reference materials, as they give brief overviews of a subject (thus allowing students to quickly grasp main points); usually provide bibliography for further reading and research; and can lead to possible topics for papers. Chimene also discusses search strategies with the students, as many of them might not be familiar with using online library tools. For instance, she advises students to use advance search options in the online catalog or databases, as they afford a better range of options, rather than simple search features. To help students in their searching, she explains Boolean logic and terms and how they can expand or limit a search. She also explains the difference between keyword and subject searching, the latter allowing for more precision. After introducing search techniques in general, she demonstrates looking for specific types of scholarly information, beginning with journal articles. For these, she explains the difference between scholarly and popular as well as peer-reviewed and non-reviewed sources, aspects of scholarly publishing often unknown to most undergraduates. To point students in the right direction, she provides a list of selected databases. She also shows them ways of accessing online articles, which are becoming more prevalent in medieval studies, though most are still in print. Chimene continues her presentation with the finding of books and book chapters in the online catalog, a major source for historical inquiry. The Internet can furnish a wealth of scholarly resources and thus Chimene concludes her presentation with tips on identifying and evaluating potential sources through it along with furnishing students with a list of scholarly gateways for medieval studies. To accompany her presentation Chimene created a handout listing resources, plus a form where students can list possible topics, keywords, subject headings and key citations and online guide.
Ramona Romero, Bibliographer for Anthropology, Classics, & Philosophy at Vanderbilt Central Library, ramona.romero@Vanderbilt.Edu, presented the online Oxford Classical Dictionary (OCD) her favorite resource for classical studies, and compared it to Wikipedia, the one students often prefer, in a talk entitled Wikipedia versus The Oxford Classical Dictionary: Which would you choose? Ramona uses her presentation or ideas from it when working with students. Like many librarians, she finds that students usually turn to the online encyclopedia Wikipedia when looking for information on a topic, whether it be a classical one or not, assuming that it is reliable and even scholarly. But is it, she asks? In the first part of her talk Ramona laid out academic uses for Wikipedia. Primarily she sees it as a good starting point for facts and general information, especially for popular culture and current events, though it contains entries for other subjects, such as classical studies. A far better alternative is a subject-specific database, such as the Oxford Classical Dictionary. In the second part of her talk Ramona compared the OCD to Wikipedia with regards to author, bibliography, and source. Using an entry on a classical author she demonstrated that the OCD is scholarly and trustworthy: the author for each entry and their academic affiliation is clearly noted; each entry contains comprehensive bibliography organized by genre (texts, commentary, etc.); and each entry notes it sources. Wikipedia, on the other hand, is anonymously written and thus users have no way of knowing the writer’s identity or their credentials; while some entries offer bibliography for further reading, these are often incomplete and poorly organized; the authors of Wikipedia entries do not always cite their sources. In the last part of her presentation Ramona addressed the nature and use of encyclopedias such as Wikipedia and the OCD in scholarly research. She identified three types of scholarly materials: primary (in the case of classical studies, a work by a classical author); secondary (criticism on a primary source) and tertiary. Wikipedia and OCD are both tertiary sources in that they provide brief, introductory information on a topic. Ramona considers a tertiary source like the foundation of a house; it is a place to begin and the better the foundation, the better the house.
Edward Oetting, History /Political Science Bibliographer at Arizona State University, edding@asu.edu, demonstrated his Libguides for History and Medieval and Renaissance Studies. LibGuides is a Web 2.0 content management and information sharing system designed specifically for libraries by Springshare. More and more libraries are turning to this relatively inexpensive (around $1000 annually) and user-friendly web-based software, for it allows librarians, like Ed, to quickly create a guide with text, links, RSS feeds, videos, widgets and chat boxes. Librarians can generate guides from scratch or borrow entire guides or individual boxes (each guide is made up of boxes whose order is determined by its creator) from librarians around the globe. A particularly useful and time-saving feature is LibGuide’s linked boxes whereby a master box is updated and all subsidiary boxes reflect the change no matter where they appear. Another is its “Post-to-LibGuides” browser plug-in that allows librarians to automatically post a link to a LibGuide from the Internet. Visitors to LibGuide pages can post comments to individual boxes, which guide’s host receives as an email message. Keeping track of the number of visitors to a guide is easy with Springshare’s tracking system. Ed’s LibGuide for history features on its home page boxes for his contact info with picture, ASU library links, ASU online catalog search (widget feature), and a place for recommending a book (comment feature). Subpages are: getting started, article databases, primary sources, course guides, subject guides, webresources, citing sources, tutorials and print resources.
WESSWeb > WESS Newsletter > Fall 2008 > Instructional Approaches for Western European Studies and Beyond
