The speaker for the afternoon general session on Day 2 was Ms. Marlee Matlin, actress and writer. She is well known for her role in the film Children of a Lesser God (1986), but she has had various roles in film and television, including recent appearances in the television drama The West Wing. Ms. Matlin gave a very inspirational and moving speech. She also read an excerpt from her new book, Nobody's Perfect. She opened by saying that she is an actress who happens to be deaf. She told us various stories of her work in Hollywood and how she succeeded in spite of being told her career would be over after Children and the award she won for it. Clearly, she proved the naysayers wrong as she keeps on going. She gave examples of barriers and how to overcome them, but not to trivialize. Her goal is to walk around the barriers. She reminded us that the handicap of deafness is not in the ear; it's in the mind. In the end, "life is about reaching for dreams and never stopping."
We had ample time to ask questions, and various members of the audience asked questions, made observations, or shared their own experiences with a family member or friend who is handicapped in some way. This made for some very moving moments. Overall, this was probably one of the best sessions at the conference.
Wednesday, May 03, 2006
TLA Conference Notes, Day 2: Session on Libraries and Retail
Session title: "Library as Retailer"
Presenter: Kerry Bruce McGeath, Director, Southlake Public Library
I went to this presentation on the advice of our Web Librarian, who if I recall correctly, mentioned he knew the presenter. At any rate, he was confident it would be a good paper, and that was good enough for me to go. It was interesting indeed for what we can learn in libraries and how some principles of retail may work for libraries.
There are three basic components to retail:
PAR=Plan, Act, Review. Retail needs to do this continually. Need to adjust to customer needs. Libraries should do this as well, even if they "don't go out of business" (at least in the way a business would go under if they don't sell well. Libraries can, however, lose their funding when seen as less than valuable, and thus close).
A good salesperson will greet the customer on arrival. They find out what the customer needs. This is what a librarian does (or should be doing) in a reference interview.
Presenter: Kerry Bruce McGeath, Director, Southlake Public Library
I went to this presentation on the advice of our Web Librarian, who if I recall correctly, mentioned he knew the presenter. At any rate, he was confident it would be a good paper, and that was good enough for me to go. It was interesting indeed for what we can learn in libraries and how some principles of retail may work for libraries.
There are three basic components to retail:
- Product: Do you have the right product? Is it well positioned?
- Customer service: How to wait on your customers?
- Marketing: Note that one needs to have the previous two done well before doing this. If you do not take care of the first two, this won't matter.
PAR=Plan, Act, Review. Retail needs to do this continually. Need to adjust to customer needs. Libraries should do this as well, even if they "don't go out of business" (at least in the way a business would go under if they don't sell well. Libraries can, however, lose their funding when seen as less than valuable, and thus close).
A good salesperson will greet the customer on arrival. They find out what the customer needs. This is what a librarian does (or should be doing) in a reference interview.
- Idea: Have everyone in the library be prepared to answer very basic questions. Patrons can't usually tell who is a librarian and who is not. They have a need that needs to be met. Circulation staff are often the first or most prominent contact point in the library. Can see circulation staff as your customer service representatives.
- Idea: Less signs, to get people to interact with the staff. Also, staff should be willing/able/ready to leave the desk (circulation as well as reference).
TLA Conference Notes: Day 2, Contributed Paper on Information Literacy Retention
Title: "Igniting the Passion for Information Literacy: A Retention Program and Study."
Presenter: Scott Lancaster, education librarian, Texas A&M-Commerce and David Rankin, social sciences and GovDocs librarian, Texas A&M-Commerce.
The presenters began their research by looking at work done on the topic at Ohio State on freshmen information literacy knowledge. This was used as a model.
In Fall 2003, the presenters did a pretest and a post-test evaluating the use of databases, OPAC, obtaining an item on reserve. The post-test was to determine if they could indeed use the library resources.
In Fall 2004, they created a different assignment, modifying SearchPath, a tool out of West Michigan University, and TILT. They covered areas of starting an assignment, picking a topic, using the OPAC, finding articles, using the World Wide Web, and citing sources. They also created a bibliography assignment at this time. The task was to build a bibliography out of five sources, print and online sources. The students had to find the items and then put the citations in MLA format. They found that the students were not very happy or successful with this particular assignment. Only about 75% reported a success with the bibliography task.
In Fall 2005, they dropped the bibliography assignment. They created new quiz modules. The topics covered included selecting sources, Boolean operators, focusing on "and" and "or," narrowing a topic, choosing keywords and phrases, and reading a citation. They found, interestingly, that the quiz question on dissecting a citation had a pretty high miss rate, so clearly how to read a citation was something to address. Other things that needed to be addressed included the difference between the OPAC and the databases, the boolean operator "OR."
A problem in information literacy education is finding vocabulary that students understand. In other words, our professional lingo can be a problem (tell me about it). On citations, the presenters suggested moving students towards more use of citation machines (I personally would not rush into this given concerns over accuracy. I have an upcoming article note on citation generators, so readers can learn a bit more).
In terms of logistics, the librarian providing instruction would go to the classroom and provide the pretest. The BI took place shortly after, within a week or so. The post-test was pretty much after the BI.
(Overall, this was an interesting presentation. It gave me some food for thought for possibilities in my setting. I certainly would like to conduct some assessment along these lines for my program.)
Presenter: Scott Lancaster, education librarian, Texas A&M-Commerce and David Rankin, social sciences and GovDocs librarian, Texas A&M-Commerce.
The presenters began their research by looking at work done on the topic at Ohio State on freshmen information literacy knowledge. This was used as a model.
In Fall 2003, the presenters did a pretest and a post-test evaluating the use of databases, OPAC, obtaining an item on reserve. The post-test was to determine if they could indeed use the library resources.
In Fall 2004, they created a different assignment, modifying SearchPath, a tool out of West Michigan University, and TILT. They covered areas of starting an assignment, picking a topic, using the OPAC, finding articles, using the World Wide Web, and citing sources. They also created a bibliography assignment at this time. The task was to build a bibliography out of five sources, print and online sources. The students had to find the items and then put the citations in MLA format. They found that the students were not very happy or successful with this particular assignment. Only about 75% reported a success with the bibliography task.
In Fall 2005, they dropped the bibliography assignment. They created new quiz modules. The topics covered included selecting sources, Boolean operators, focusing on "and" and "or," narrowing a topic, choosing keywords and phrases, and reading a citation. They found, interestingly, that the quiz question on dissecting a citation had a pretty high miss rate, so clearly how to read a citation was something to address. Other things that needed to be addressed included the difference between the OPAC and the databases, the boolean operator "OR."
A problem in information literacy education is finding vocabulary that students understand. In other words, our professional lingo can be a problem (tell me about it). On citations, the presenters suggested moving students towards more use of citation machines (I personally would not rush into this given concerns over accuracy. I have an upcoming article note on citation generators, so readers can learn a bit more).
In terms of logistics, the librarian providing instruction would go to the classroom and provide the pretest. The BI took place shortly after, within a week or so. The post-test was pretty much after the BI.
(Overall, this was an interesting presentation. It gave me some food for thought for possibilities in my setting. I certainly would like to conduct some assessment along these lines for my program.)
TLA Conference Notes: Day 2, Contributed Paper on Information Search Model
Title: "The 'Information Search Process' in Student Learning Teams."
Presenter: William B. Boatman, reference and instruction librarian, University of Houston-Clear Lake.
(For me, this is an interesting topic. Unfortunately, Mr. Boatman was not an engaging presenter with a slow pace and a bit of a monotone in the voice. While I do not like to criticize presenters, when you come across one that is not as good it just takes away from the experience. Additionally, I thought the presentation needed more on how to deal with students working in groups in the library. An audience member made a remark on these students at the Q&A at the end)
Students often work in teams. These teams can create challenges for the Information Search Process (ISP).
See Kuhlthau's work Seeking Meaning (2004) for the stages of the ISP. These include task initiation, topic selection, pre-focus exploration, focus formulation, information collection, search closure, and starting to write. Kuhlthau also notes behavioral attributes of the ISP.
There are various theories of teamwork. Note that professors often assign team tasks. Many of these assignments are problem-based.
Observation from an audience member: Students in a group often come to the library individually, and they then take the information they find back to the group. If the librarians realizes this, he/she can then ask what else the team is doing.
(The presenter did provide a list of references on a handout. As of this writing, it is not available online).
Presenter: William B. Boatman, reference and instruction librarian, University of Houston-Clear Lake.
(For me, this is an interesting topic. Unfortunately, Mr. Boatman was not an engaging presenter with a slow pace and a bit of a monotone in the voice. While I do not like to criticize presenters, when you come across one that is not as good it just takes away from the experience. Additionally, I thought the presentation needed more on how to deal with students working in groups in the library. An audience member made a remark on these students at the Q&A at the end)
Students often work in teams. These teams can create challenges for the Information Search Process (ISP).
See Kuhlthau's work Seeking Meaning (2004) for the stages of the ISP. These include task initiation, topic selection, pre-focus exploration, focus formulation, information collection, search closure, and starting to write. Kuhlthau also notes behavioral attributes of the ISP.
There are various theories of teamwork. Note that professors often assign team tasks. Many of these assignments are problem-based.
Observation from an audience member: Students in a group often come to the library individually, and they then take the information they find back to the group. If the librarians realizes this, he/she can then ask what else the team is doing.
(The presenter did provide a list of references on a handout. As of this writing, it is not available online).
TLA Conference Notes: Day 2, Contributed Paper on Information Literacy Assessment
Title: "Information Literacy Assessment in the Health Sciences."
Presenter: Serge Danielson-Francois, reference librarian, Cy-Fair College
Cy-Fair College's library serves both the academic community as well as the public. So, the academic and public realms are not separate. This applies in general for people share in common a desire to "know stuff."
The librarian implemented pilots for active learning. For instance, a scavenger hunt for finding a specific book as well as demonstrating the use of a book to find an answer. He works with students in the health sciences, such as nurses, so they are using various print reference sources in that area.
For a librarian in this field, it is necessary to read in the field. For instance, reading JAMA (I personally think this idea of reading in your field applies to any subject specialist). The librarian also needs to be able to rethink his/her information seeking strategies and build bridges between books, journals, and other sources. Then a learning community can be created. Be interdisciplinary. For instance, in teaching about medical ethics, draw on other areas besides the usual subjects.
Use things like flash drives to save those large documents on PDF files you might usually print or photocopy (I am thinking this may be something to promote more for our students).
On journal clubs. Tried an online journal club for students in nursing. This type of activity can be academic, but it can also be fun. A sample topic was "freak show medicine."
Overall, this presenter was both enthusiastic and engaging. He says that he did not have medical subject background when he took the job, but he clearly projects that learning the subject to serve the patrons is something possible. He did provide a small handout, which at the moment is not online.
Presenter: Serge Danielson-Francois, reference librarian, Cy-Fair College
Cy-Fair College's library serves both the academic community as well as the public. So, the academic and public realms are not separate. This applies in general for people share in common a desire to "know stuff."
The librarian implemented pilots for active learning. For instance, a scavenger hunt for finding a specific book as well as demonstrating the use of a book to find an answer. He works with students in the health sciences, such as nurses, so they are using various print reference sources in that area.
For a librarian in this field, it is necessary to read in the field. For instance, reading JAMA (I personally think this idea of reading in your field applies to any subject specialist). The librarian also needs to be able to rethink his/her information seeking strategies and build bridges between books, journals, and other sources. Then a learning community can be created. Be interdisciplinary. For instance, in teaching about medical ethics, draw on other areas besides the usual subjects.
Use things like flash drives to save those large documents on PDF files you might usually print or photocopy (I am thinking this may be something to promote more for our students).
On journal clubs. Tried an online journal club for students in nursing. This type of activity can be academic, but it can also be fun. A sample topic was "freak show medicine."
Overall, this presenter was both enthusiastic and engaging. He says that he did not have medical subject background when he took the job, but he clearly projects that learning the subject to serve the patrons is something possible. He did provide a small handout, which at the moment is not online.
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