tuesday august 21, 2007acs fall national meeting partnering with the libraries chemical information...

Tuesday August 21, 2007ACS Fall National Meeting

Partnering with the Libraries

Chemical information instruction for a large freshmen core chemistry course

Angie Locknar, Instruction Coordinator, Engineering and Science Libraries, MITProf. Donald R. Sadoway, John F. Elliott Professor of Materials Chemistry, MIT Kanak Kshetri, MIT undergraduate student


Outline

Our challenges How the collaboration began 3.093: Information Exploration – Becoming a

Savvy Scholar Next Steps


Our Challenge: the Libraries perspective How to reach a vast majority of first year

undergraduates? How to do this without burdening staff? How to impart transferable skills, not specific

to a discipline? How to do this without taking away from the

already established subject specialist responsibilities?


3.091: Introduction to Solid State Chemistry A required chemistry course, part of the core

curriculum Taken by over half the incoming freshmen

Enrollment around 500 students Most students will NOT be chemists

Lecture plus recitations Homework problems, graded quizzes, final

exams No laboratory work


How the collaboration began

It all started with a research consultation… Library involvement in 3.091: Introduction to

Solid State Chemistry in Fall 2005: 17 librarians in 27 recitation sections

How to provide the same level of instruction to a large number of students and have it be meaningful?


Integrating information literacy Applied for internal funding for “excellence in

education”, granted in January 2006 Modify assignments in 3.091 to incorporate

information use Create online tutorials or modules to be

viewed by the students on their timeline Use students to help create the content Not just for chemistry, setting the foundation

for information seeking skills


How will we do all of this?

How do we use student input effectively? What do we think freshmen need to learn?

What do they know already? What do they THINK they know already?

Do we have to incorporate this into 3.091 in Fall 2006?


What developed

Discussions about scalability, impact THIS IS AN EXPERIMENT!

3 credit course to learn more about the students, their habits, and their needs

Run it in parallel to 3.091 to mimic integration in the course

Approved by Committee on the Undergraduate Program (CUP)


3.093 – Information Exploration: Becoming a Savvy Scholar The course:

Lecture Tutorials Tutorial review Assignments Research Logs

Sample 1 Sample 2


3.093 – Information Exploration: Becoming a Savvy Scholar Assessment and Feedback

Assignments, tutorial feedback, research log Card sorting exercise Course evaluations Pre/post self-confidence survey


3.093 Self-AssessmentConfidence Level

1 2 3 4 5

Use Google or another searchengine to find materials quickly

and efficiently

Use online library catalogs tofind materials quickly and

efficiently

Use article databases such asInfoTrac, ProQuest, or Web of

Science to find materialsquickly and efficiently

Use MIT's library web page toaccess the materials you need

Use call numbers to find books(and other materials) on library

shelves

Understand when to cite others'contributions to your research

1 - Not Confident to 5 - Very Confident

Pre-3.093

Post-3.093



1 2 3 4 5

Understand how to cite others' contributions to your research

Recognize the parts of a citation

Understand the different types of information that can be found inencyclopedias, handbooks, journals, books, or other types of

materials

Know the difference between the major Boolean operators (And,Or, Not) and how to use them correctly

Use EndNote, RefWorks (or some other software) for managingreferences and citations

Understand the difference between primary and secondarysources


Pre-3.093

Post-3.093



1 2 3 4 5

Understand the scientificpublication cycle

Understand the meaning ofplagiarism

Know how to contact librarystaff for assistance

Critically evaluate informationthat you find, regardless of thesource (print, electronic, video,

etc.)

Know which MIT Library to useto do research on a particular

topic

Know how to access both printand online library resources (e.g., books, journals, and fulltext articles and databases)


Pre-3.093

Post-3.093


Student feedback

“Actual assignments for which we must physically visit libraries and for good search queries are essential.”

“I’m confident that this material will make the rest of my research at MIT much easier”

“The content wasn’t incredibly fascinating but is necessary to perform high quality scholarly research.”

“Thank you. I learned a great deal in this class, and I hope that everyone can have access to these resources.”


Survey of 3.093 students – May 2007 5 of 12 students responded 5/5 took at least 1 course that required some

library research (Communication Intensive) 4/5 used skills from 3.093 “I’m only recently discovering how useful the

class was, now that I have begun to use vera/barton more regularly to review current research in my field for my UROP and other projects.”


Fall 2007 Create, modify, update tutorial modules Work with course TA’s and students to modify

assignments in 3.091 Sample question

In 1995 Mario J. Molina and F. Sherwood Rowland were awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for “their work in atmospheric chemistry, particularly concerning the formation and decomposition of ozone.”1. Cite the published article (not meeting abstract) in which they announced this

discovery to the world. Format: MLA or ACS 2. What is the earliest article cited by the authors?3. How many times has this article been cited by others?4. When was this article first cited by someone affiliated with MIT?

Determine assessment methods Pre/post tests? Assignments Is this method a scalable way to reach students? If yes, can we

also provide this in other Chemistry classes?


Questions?


Links of interest

OpenCourseWare page 3.093: Information Exploration: Becoming a Savvy

Scholar (Fall 2006) 3.091: Introduction to Solid State Chemistry (Fall

2004)

Angie Locknar, [email protected]

tuesday august 21, 2007acs fall national meeting partnering with the libraries chemical information...

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