July 16, 2002
We propose to develop an online tutorial to aid upper high school (10-12) and beginning undergraduate students to effectively use the Acterra Environmental Library and other resources for their research in environmental courses. The tutorial will introduce students to resources in the Library and elsewhere, and guide students in evaluating their sources (particularly online sources). The tutorial will be used with the cooperation of course instructors and will be integrated into the students' courses; instructors will assign tutorial before students visit the Library. We intend to measure the success of the tutorial by including quizzes within each module and a post-tutorial evaluation, as well asking instructors to include a tutorial evaluation as part of their own course evaluations.
The tutorial will benefit both our target population and the Library. Students will gain better understanding of our specialized resources and how to research environmental issues - and be better able to produce solid papers and projects. They will also be more likely to use the Library in the future to satisfy academic and personal information needs. Their recommendations to peers and others can increase Library usage. Finally, Library staff will be able to focus on more in-depth questions from users who have completed the tutorial.
The course will be offered online through the Acterra Environmental Library, a small special library affiliated with Acterra: Action for the Earth, and located in Palo Alto, California. The Library has good reference staff and knowledgeable volunteers, but is staffed only during limited hours (the Library is generally open weekdays, as well as evenings by arrangement). Resources focus on local environmental issues as well as more general environmental topics. Holdings include books, journals, videos, an extensive clipping file, environmental impact reports, maps, and pamphlets. Many of the materials cannot be found within a single collection (or at all) elsewhere.
High school (10-12) and beginning college undergraduates are directed to our library in their environmental studies courses because of our uniquely focused collection. Most or all have used their school and public libraries, but few (if any) of these students have ever visited the Acterra Library before and are unfamiliar with its resources. Because we do not yet have a web-accessible OPAC, students need to understand the breadth of the Library's holdings - as well as limitations - before they can use the library effectively.
Most have used the Web, including search engines to gather information for limited academic purposes, as well as recreational or informational needs. Few are likely to be familiar with other environmental resources, some of which may be available from their own institutions or public libraries, as well as less traditional sources, including the Web, government agencies and media archives. Furthermore, we cannot assume users of this age group have sophisticated searching and evaluation skills.
This course is designed to teach upper level high school students and beginning undergraduates to effectively locate environmental resources for class projects and for their own information. In addition, the course provides students basic skills for evaluating resources, particularly those found on the Web.
They need to acquire a mix of practical skills (the mechanics of locating information) and abstract, conceptual skills (evaluation). In order to meet the students' information needs with the maximum flexibility, we would like to provide an online tutorial. The tutorial will:
Introduce the library resources [skills-based learning]
Provide an overview of other sources [skills-based learning]
Provide basic tools for evaluating resources [concept-based learning]
Ultimately, the purpose of this instruction is to help students develop the skills, adaptability, and confidence to find and use information in an academic environment and beyond.
Once students have completed the tutorial, they will be better prepared to research paper topics or other projects using the resources we have to offer. Reference staff will benefit by being able to focus on higher-level questions. To reinforce the lessons presented in the tutorial, handouts will be available online (as PDF files) for printing and also on paper at the reference desk. The tutorial will, of course, be available through the library's own public computers, as well as remotely via the Web.
It should be noted that the tutorial would supplement, not replace, personal instruction by reference staff. Reference staff will still be needed to answer in-depth questions, as well as basic questions from students who didn't understand all the information presented in the tutorial. Reference staff is unlikely to have personal contact with students before they walk in the door (and presumably after they have completed the tutorial); needs assessment could take place with the instructors' help in the form of an experience questionnaire (About Web-Based Instructional Design, n.d.) handed out to students in class. Although the we assume that students will have access to the Web from their schools or from home, we intend to accommodate students who are unable to use the tutorial on a case-by-case basis in the form of personal instruction.
As Litzinger (1993, p. 24) notes the question of meeting the instructional goals is the "most critical question in the instructional design process," and is especially relevant to newly developed programs. We intend answer this query with several approaches.
For immediate evaluation, we intend to provide more immediate evaluation at the end of the on-line tutorial would also be useful, similar to the one provided with the University of Texas' TILT program (1996-2002).
We will work with instructors to include evaluations at then end of the project or course, using the model provided by Jones (1998):
For the first round of courses using the tutorial, we will also gather qualitative data from both our reference staff and from instructors, particularly those who can compare their students' research process and resulting projects with those from previous classes. Feedback from these evaluations will guide changes to the tutorial to make it more effective.
The best online tutorial will only be effective if users are willing to go through all the sections. We assume the users' honesty in answering quizzes and evaluations; users can easily skip sections or move too quickly with an online format. We must rely on the cooperation of instructors to assign and encourage their students to take the tutorial seriously.
The effectiveness of the tutorial may also be limited by a lack of the immediacy found in a face-to-face presentation, including the opportunity to ask questions (both ways) and for the instructor to make changes on the fly if the presentation isn't going well. We also risk losing students' interest we can't accommodate their learning styles (e.g. the kinesthetic learner) or intelligences (e.g. a musically intelligent student who is weaker in analytic reasoning). These shortcomings are only partially addressed by assessment tools such as questionnaires and the ability of students to review material at will.
In designing the tutorial, we will assume a basic level of library and research skills. Although the college students will likely have library research assignments in other courses, the chances are greater that high school students lack these skills. We will encourage instructors to administer an initial skills assessment and to direct weaker students to their own school libraries for basic instruction, but will expect to provide some basic instruction within our own library.
A final limitation is that the tutorial will be designed to provide an introduction rather than an exhaustive survey of resources available to the students; we do not wish to assume unlimited attention spans for our target (or any other) age group. The tutorial must be designed attractively and hold students' interest. Implications include graphics (possibly some animation); presentation that is not heavily text-oriented; engaging content; and opportunities for problem solving or other active learning tasks.
This tutorial benefit both students and instructors. Instructors will able to expect more thorough research on assigned papers.
The primary benefit to students will be more efficient and focused search strategies with less wasted time in locating resources. They will be able to analyze their search needs by making more informed choices in where to seek information. By developing better search strategies, students will gain confidence in their research abilities. The skills they learn in such courses can prepare them for their futures in academia and beyond.
We base this proposed tutorial on the assumption that the more we teach the students about the available resources for their projects, the more sophisticated researchers they will become. This will effectively challenge the reference librarians to provide more in-depth service. Librarians will also be less burdened by time-consuming basic questions, and should get more high-level questions. More importantly, students will become familiar with the unique resources we offer and will be more likely to use the Library in the future. Since this tutorial will be available through the Library's website, we expect visitors may also use the tutorial to explore our holdings and result in increased incidental use by the general public.
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The University of Texas System Digital Library. (1998-2002). TILT -- Texas Information Literacy Tutorial. Retrieved June 19. 2002 from
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