Library instruction design is guided by educational philosophy and instructional design principles. Library instruction programs are created for various purposes. Common goals, content to teach, and a variety of teaching forms are outlined. The importance of preparation and assessment is discussed.
educational philosophy; design principles; purposes; goals; lifelong learning; information resources survey; outcomes; assessment
The philosophy of library instruction is a reflection of several things, including the mission and vision of the institution in general, and the mission and vision of the library in particular.
Perhaps one of the most popular teaching philosophies in library instruction is the student-centered, or learner-centered, philosophy. It may be called the user-centered philosophy in public libraries and in libraries other than academic, since they support different organizational missions. No matter what term it is used, it seems particularly apt, because in truth the profession of librarian is rooted in service. The library user is our customer. To borrow a popular saying from the business world, ‘the customer is our god.’ Naturally, ‘Most librarians tend to support a humanist/constructivist philosophy since their approach to service is to satisfy their clientele’s needs and interests.’1
Another notable educational philosophy in library instruction is the call for integrated learning. It arises from the drive to eliminate the gap between library and classroom, and make a connection between learning and applying library research skills. Library instruction programs work better when incorporated into general education curricula because in this way students can practice information-seeking skills while doing their course work, i.e. learning and benefiting from library research skills at the same time.
The information literacy movement has a powerful influence in the world of libraries, especially in terms of the teaching philosophy. As a result, a library’s mission is not only to help students do well in their college studies but also to link to its vision more closely, that is, to influence students’ life well beyond college, to motivate and educate lifelong learners as well as active citizens. Accordingly, ‘learning strategies rather than memorization of facts should be emphasized during college years.’2
With this mission, library instruction is extending its repertoire to IL-related areas. For example, in addition to teaching academic reference database search, the library may offer workshops on how to find reliable and free Internet sources, or how to search and evaluate open access (OA) journals on the web, so that students can utilize the learned skills after college when they may no longer have the same access to fee-based reference databases but can search the Internet and OA sources for needed information for either further studies or personal research interests.
Workplace readiness also becomes an important issue. One of the problems that college graduates face in the real world is that they have no teachers and professors to ask for guidance anymore. In college years, learning and being taught made up their whole life. Surely, most employers offer training programs for new employees, but that is only a fractional part of a college graduate’s corporate life. From now on, they have to learn many things, if not everything, on their own. Therefore, educating and motivating college students to become independent lifelong learners should be one of the primary goals of higher education, and library instructional programs should reflect this vision. We often ask how well high school graduates are prepared for college-level studies. Now we ought to ask ourselves how well college graduates are prepared for the workplace.3
Library instruction programs are created for various purposes and with various goals. The main goals of all library instruction programs are to (1) assist the institution in accomplishing its mission, (2) help students and faculty in study and research, (3) encourage all users of the community to utilize library information resources, and (4) educate and motivate lifelong independent learners and active citizens who can not only survive but also do well in the information age. [See Table 2.1 on p.22]
Table 2.1
General purposes and appropriate instructional forms
Although an ordinary academic library is open to all legitimate users, e.g. local residents, the focus is chiefly on students. If we use time as a measurement, there are goals of two terms, the short term and the long term. Among short-term goals, library instruction programs are intended to help students do coursework by introducing the information resources and physical layout of their home library, and teaching students how to use the resources and utilize the facilities. These programs may include, but are not limited to, the categories shown in Table 2.2. (p. 23).
Table 2.2
Content to teach for short-term goals
Among the long-term goals, library instruction programs, with the concept of information literacy in mind, are intended to teach students to be lifelong independent learners by emphasizing information-seeking methods and analytical skills. These may include, but are not limited to, the categories listed in Table 2.3 (p. 24).
Table 2.3
Content to teach for long-term goals
It must be stated that short-term and long-term goals should not be disconnected; they are more or less integrated, depending on the purpose and time frame of the program. In fact, they can supplement and enhance each other in many library instruction programs.
Because one institution is different from another and every library has its own uniqueness, there is no absolute universal model in designing library instruction programs. However, there exist generally accepted program design principles that can be applied to individual libraries with necessary modifications to meet special goals and local needs.
Business in a typical academic library is a mixture of service and teaching. The majority of the users are also learners. The user should be the focus of attention. Therefore, all library instruction programs should be designed to aid the user. Commonly used design principles may include, but are not limited to, the following.
Table 2.4
Principle | Task |
Creating a user-friendly learning environment | To make the user feel welcomed and relaxed |
Helping user fulfill current tasks successfully | To figure out what exactly the user wants and needs |
Encouraging active learning habits | To stimulate the user’s imagination and creativity |
Promoting critical thinking | To teach research methods and analytical skills |
Emphasizing learning strategies and methodologies for long-term benefits | To train lifelong independent learners |
A library instructional program design involves several stages. First, origination: it may come from the librarian’s initiative or from requests by parties outside the library. In the case of the former it may relate to promotion of services or information sources or thematic workshops. It is a reflection of proactive librarianship. If the latter, it may come from the classroom teaching faculty of another department, the college administration, or individual users. After the need is raised the second stage is to investigate the background of both the topic and the audience. The tasks are to identify what is to be covered, e.g. what is in the library assignment or a syllabus? At what level of research ability is the targeted audience, e.g. freshman or graduate? The third stage is an information resources survey, to see what relevant sources are available at your library. [See the Preparation section in this chapter on the information resources survey for detail.] The fourth stage is to create a lesson plan accordingly. Subjects under consideration may include time restriction, scope and depth of the topic, suitable search techniques, and hands-on exercises. Handouts and / or PowerPoint slides may be produced to aid users. The fifth stage takes place after the program has completed, but is no less important. This is when you collect feedback data from audience, co-sponsors, and colleagues. You may fine tune or modify your program design based upon their responses and comments for future instruction.4
There are many forms of library instructional activities. The following list contains those most commonly used in academic libraries. It is, however, by no means an exhaustive list.
Typically offered to newcomers to the institution, e.g. the freshman class, library orientation and the library tour are the first step in introducing the world of library in general and information about the library, physical and virtual, in particular. It is also an opportunity for the library to promote its resources and services. The first impression is so important that it will influence the usage of the library’s resources and services in coming years. Another type of library orientation is designed for a specific target group, such as a class in a major. In this case, the orientation focuses on relevant information resources and subject sources for research in depth.
Perhaps the most frequently used instructional form in academic libraries is our daily service at the reference desk. Reference work is always linked to instructional activity, although the teaching involvement may be of various degrees, compared with BI classes. A reference librarian’s duty is not only to help users to find needed information through effective reference interviews, but also to teach them the ways of finding information. It is a one-on-one teaching and learning interaction between a librarian, the ‘teacher,’ and a user, the ‘student.’ How well this two-way communication goes decides the quality of reference service. A good reference librarian should be a good teacher who knows how to transfer knowledge to the user. A good reference librarian should also be a good listener who knows how to figure out the real question the user has. Unlike other types of libraries, e.g. corporate business libraries, where the librarian finds information upon request and hands it in before the deadline or as soon as possible, an academic library carries the mission of education. In the course of reference service, teaching and learning should take place.
Greater in length and deeper in content, research consultation is usually requested by faculty, graduate students, and upper level undergraduate students. It will be helpful if the librarian obtains the research topic beforehand. A thorough interview is crucial, as it will determine the nature and scope of a suitable session plan. In this role, the librarian acts as an adviser and recommends information sources as well as making constructive suggestions to the client. It is not, however, a frequently used instructional form, mainly because of the shortage of library personnel that most libraries experience. Therefore, an appointment seems to be necessary.
Tailored to the special needs of a class, a one-shot workshop typically lasts 45 to 60 minutes and is usually mission-specific. For example, a workshop can be devoted fully to writing and citing styles. In such case, the lecture outline might look like this:
1. Introduction and basics of major styles, e.g. APA, MLA, and Chicago.
2. Rules to follow, e.g. besides what is in the manual, consistency is the most important thing of which to remind the class.
3. Utilization of online bibliographic tools, e.g. RefWorks.
4. Useful web sources, e.g. the Purdue Online Writing Lab <http://owl.english.purdue.edu/>.
It is one of the most commonly used non-credit-bearing library instructional forms in academic libraries. Many academic departments ask the library for collaborative teaching, and in some cases the library assignment is created by the course instructor in an effort to connect course contents with library resources. The instructional librarian’s job, therefore, is to present to the class the most relevant sources available at the library, as well as information search techniques. Because of its task-focused nature, the best practice in program design is the result of an effective communication and, most important, collaboration between the instructional librarian and the classroom professor.5
Common in general education curricula, a library research requirement appears in many course syllabi. Some classroom teachers create an actual library assignment with specific goals and invite a librarian to give a lecture on how to use the library resources to do the assignment, while some let the librarian decide a proper lesson plan by simply stating in their syllabi, for example, ‘at the end of the semester students will have learned how to access and utilize library resources, online and offline, to gather information for [name of the class assignment].’ The above-mentioned library assignments are each, basically speaking, a solo creation, either of the classroom teacher or the librarian.
A recent approach featuring ‘embedded librarianship’ has the aim of creating a partnership between the course instructor and the instructional librarian for a dual teaching activity, typically for a semester-long engagement. A frequently quoted definition describes an embedded librarian as ‘“an integral part to the whole,” based on the geological definition of an embedded element.’6 A librarian relocates from library to classroom, physical or virtual, and uses his or her expertise in library science to help students understand library systems, information-seeking procedures, and information searching techniques, and at the same time, introduce information resources and services available at the library. The major difference between this and the traditional academic library service is that embedded librarianship moves from library-centric to learner-centric, with a main emphasis on teaching and education, rather than service.
This is the systematic nature of the effort to teach something, including the organization and structure of library materials and principles or search strategies relating to the library resources. BI is offered to help users understand standard library systems so that they will be able to locate and utilize information more effectively. The usual contents may include terminology in library science, catalogs and indexes, interpretation of citations, general and specialized reference sources, citing styles, research methods, information-seeking principles, and search strategies and techniques. Once a hot term, BI has been sometimes replaced by IL since the rise of information literacy. Some may say IL includes BI, but the fact is that the two are different things, for BI is an instructional form, whereas IL is more of a general concept.
A theme-based lecture focuses on a specific topic, such as ‘Using the Internet for research,’ ‘An overview of online public access catalogs,’ ‘An introduction to RefWorks and other online bibliographic tools,’ etc. Lectures of this kind are usually initiated by the library in an effort to promote the most current information sources and literature resources for a subject area through the library’s subscriptions, or to introduce a current hot topic in a field of study and its related information resources.
Some graduate seminars feature a librarian invited to give a bibliographic instruction session, e.g. ‘music bibliography,’ so that students will get a deeper understanding of a library system and learn different ways of making a comprehensive literature search. Students will also gather more advanced research skills than they have at undergraduate level.
Pioneered by R.C. Davis of the University of Michigan in 1881, library courses for credit have found their place in some institutions, where they are normally taught by the library faculty, usually as elective courses carrying from 1 to 4 credits per course. A library’s credit-bearing course proposal should be evaluated and approved by the institution’s curriculum committee. The course syllabus should clearly state its learning objectives and goals. Common approaches in course design may be BI-concentrated, examining the organization and structure of library materials; or subject-oriented, in support of a given major; or on principles of information retrieval, online database search techniques; or on any major topic related to library and information studies. Unlike a one-shot workshop, a credit-bearing library course represents a long-term teaching and learning opportunity, thereby allowing the designer to use a systematic and comprehensive method to build the course. An even longer program, for which there are many courses and total credits may vary, is library science (or the more popular term ‘information studies’) as a minor. For example, Baruch College of the City University of New York offers a minor in Information Studies, which is designed and taught by the William and Anita Newman Library faculty.7 The program is created to ‘prepare students for successful participation in the emerging information society of the 21st century. Students develop skills in identifying information needs, retrieving information effectively and efficiently, evaluating information, creating information products, and understanding the social, economic, political, and ethical aspects of information.’ To fulfill the requirements of a minor in information studies the student will take two core courses, a high-level capstone course, and additional courses, recommended but not required. In general, there are two main purposes in designing a minor in library and information science: (1) to lay foundations for future information and library science studies as a major at graduate level; and (2) to supplement and enhance any given major with information literacy and advanced research skills that are related to library and information science.
In the VHS era, libraries created videotapes to aid users in understanding library systems, collections and how to use a library. Now such instructional products can be put out online. Not only that, the creation of the World Wide Web provides numerous possibilities for library educators to offer library instruction programs on an enormous platform. Libraries are starting to provide a reference service via electronic mail and virtual chat rooms, posting webcast lectures and workshops, and offering virtual tours and online tutorials on their websites.8 In recent years, helped by Web 2.0 applications,9 some library instruction online programs have moved from one-way, user-passive, static HTML web pages to two-way, interactive, open communication, and more dynamic web platforms on which participants in an instructional program are able to ask questions and get answers from the instructor in real time. The web-based seminar (Webinar) and the Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) are good examples of the utilization of Web 2.0 tools.
Someone may be very familiar with his or her favorite information sources, but no one would claim to have mastered all information sources. It is simply beyond an individual’s capacity. Therefore, to improve our services to students a thorough preparation for library instruction classes is of high importance. As an imperfect comparison: when one starts on a research project, the first step is usually a literature search or a literature review to see what has been done previously; likewise, when we start designing a library instruction program, we should run an information resources survey, a kind of due diligence investigation, to see what is available at our own library, physical and virtual, for a given topic or a subject. It cannot be emphasized enough how essential an information resources survey is, for the following three reasons.
■ First, it gives the instructor confidence. No one wants to teach a class without a well-prepared lesson plan.
■ Second, information sources, especially electronic databases, change constantly. What was good last semester may not be valid in this semester, what wasn’t there yesterday may appear today, and often an unfamiliar user interface suddenly shows up on a familiar database without notice—and that may cause panic.
■ Third, the librarian’s preparation can help a course instructor improve his or her library assignment with more up-to-date information, for example, news of a recent subscription to a new database. More than often, library assignments are designed by classroom teachers rather than by librarians. Professors create library assignments according to specific courses, subject matter, literature sources, learning objectives, and expected outcomes. Because classroom teachers have mastered library resources at different levels, the quality of the library assignment may vary. Ideally, the librarian is given an opportunity to assist the professor in the design process. Subject liaison librarians play an important role here. Some libraries create guidelines or tips to aid classroom teachers in designing library research assignments for their courses. For example, York College Library offers such a workshop as part of the Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning (CETL) program. A librarian creates an informative guide for classroom teachers to consult with. [See Appendix 1: Ten Tips for a Better Research / Library Assignment].
A library instruction program without relevant outcomes is not a good program. We must keep the user’s learning objectives and expected outcomes in mind when we design a program, and we should ask ourselves after the conclusion of the program: have we reached our goals? Since library instructional programs of all sorts are related to information literacy, ACRL’s Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education may serve as a top-level guide.10
Each type of library instruction has its specific goals, and accordingly, should have its own set of outcomes. On the other hand, there are some common grounds. The following list may represent general and logical expected outcomes.
After the course the student will be able to
■ use advanced skills in information literacy
■ apply library research skills to any course
■ search, retrieve, evaluate, and store information efficiently
Ideally, a library instruction program design should include an outcomes management strategic plan, which outlines a set of activities for the planning, executing, managing, and realizing of the desired outcomes from initiatives and objectives. The strategic plan serves as a useful guide to improve the quality of ongoing programs. The outcomes management strategic plan may be supported by assessment tools. Popular assessment tools in practice include the questionnaire and the opinion survey. But the most accurate reflection of learning outcomes is perhaps derived through knowledge testing in the form of a quiz or an examination.11