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Library Instruction Session Options: Follow Up Library Sessions for First Year Inquiry

This guide goes over various types of library instruction sessions that librarians can offer you and your students.

Welcome

This guide provides brief examples of possible instruction sessions that FYI professors can request after their students have completed the online instructional tutorials in Canvas. In addition to these suggested topics, we can also devise customized instruction sessions that suit the needs of you and your students. Although these sessions are designed with FYI students in mind, these sessions are also available to faculty members and their students in any discipline offered at FPU. 

To request an instruction session, please contact Reference and Instruction Librarian Cam McDermid either via email or at extension 4149.  

In order for your students to get the most out of a library instruction session, please try to adhere to the following recommendations

  • Please submit your request at least one week in advance to ensure the availability of a librarian, access to the library instruction room, and time to plan and prepare the session.
  • Please submit a copy of your syllabus/class schedule and assignment at the time of your request. We use these materials to plan the session and ensure we are teaching at the most effective time.
  • Please schedule your session during a research assignment.  Students should be introduced to the assignment before the session.  Studies have shown that students are the most when library instruction is needed to help students complete a specific assignment.

The Credibility Continuum

For this session, librarians use active active learning techniques to teach students about the credibility of sources of information that they are likely to encounter. Librarians bring to class a group of sources including pieces of physical materials from the library as well as URLs. Librarians also work with faculty members to create a set of questions that they can pose to students to help them think critically about the sources. In class, students are asked to identify the sources using the credibility continuum, a research guide created by Franklin Pierce University Librarians, and the CRAAP test, an acronym which stands for:

  • Currency
  • Relevancy
  • Accuracy
  • Authority
  • Point of View/Perspective

Refresher and Workshop

For this session, the librarian begins with a brief refresher on how to search the catalog and databases. During the remaining class time, students are to search for sources for their research project with the librarian and instructor available to assist.  This session works best if professors give students a goal of leaving class with a specific number of sources.

In Depth Database Session

For this session librarians use game-based active learning techniques (usually Kahoot or Poll Everywhere) to help students more fully explore search techniques that will enable them to find relevant articles for their research. Topics covered may include:

  • Boolean operators (and/or/not)
  • Limiters
  • Subject terms vs keyword terms
  • Phrase searching with quotations
  • Truncation

Database and Research Guide Selection

For this session, librarians use active learning techniques to teach students how to use the library's website to select appropriate sources for their research. This session introduces students to subject specific databases and research guides that can more effectively help them find necessary sources. For example, students in a Media and Technology themed FYI class, may want to explore the Communication and Mass Media Complete database in addition to the general database Academic Search Complete. This session will give students the tools to identify and explore more specific library resources.