E&O Professional Development

Spring 2012
Assessment

Journal Club - Instructional Assessment
April 10 from 10 to 11am
Location: Berry 183
Article TBA

Getting Your Hands Dirty with Instructional Assessment
Tue, May 1 from 10 to 11:30am
Location: DCAL

You teach what you think is the perfect Library Instruction Session, and then wonder: "Did the students really learn what I hoped they would?"

In this workshop you will have the opportunity to apply instructional assessment tools to actual class scenarios. Then, discuss and revise class/assignment examples with colleagues and explore which instructional techniques may work best. This workshop will be light on theory and heavy on real-world application.

What do students really know about Library resources? Are they using them? The View from Saint Anselm College and Keene State College
Thu, May 17
10 to 11:00am – Presentations by Jeff Waller, Saint Anselm and Kathy Halverson, Keene State. Location: DCAL
11:15am to 12:15pm – Open discussion with Jeff, Kathy, and Dartmouth College Library staff. Location: Treasure Room

Join us May 17 for presentations on two information literacy assessment projects in New Hampshire. At Saint Anselm, teaching faculty and librarians sat side by side and together evaluated how well first-year and senior students demonstrated information literacy in their research papers. For the past four years Keene State has used the Standardized Assessment of Information Literacy Skills (SAILS) test to assess the information literacy skills of all entering freshmen and in 2011 of students in their junior year. To share these experiences, Dartmouth College Library is pleased to welcome Jeff Waller, Head of Reference and Instruction Services at Saint Anselm College's Geisel Library, and Kathy Halverson, Assistant Dean/Head of Public Services at Keene State College's Mason Library. After the presentations there will be an open discussion with Jeff and Kathy about common issues at Saint Anselm, Keene State, and Dartmouth College Libraries.

Winter 2012
Outreach and Assessment

Mark your calendars! This spring, E&O has three events planned around the themes of outreach and assessment. We're planning fun activities and thoughtful discussions to help you learn how to get your message out quickly and clearly and how to gauge the success of your teaching.

One-Minute Outreach: A Roundtable Practice Session

Two offerings--attend whichever session works best for you. Advance registration is encouraged, but not required.

Thursday February 9th from 9-10am in DCAL - register here

Thursday February 9th 2:00-3:00pm in Berry 183 - register here

You're waiting to cross Wheelock Street. You're standing in line at the Co-op. You run into one of your faculty. The light's about to change, your groceries are almost bagged, you have less than a minute to plant the seeds for a collaborative relationship.

Throughout our professional lives, many of us at the Library need to have a "sidewalk talk," "checkout chat," or an "elevator pitch": a succinct description of a project or activity that you can present in one minute or less. For the purposes of this workshop, we will focus on clearly communicating to your constituents what you do to support teaching, learning, and research.

This session will lead you through several activities meant to develop, compose, and polish the "sidewalk talk," as well as practice in presenting the talk to supportive colleagues.

Journal Club

Thursday March 8 from 12-1pm, Berry 183

"Information Literacy in a World That's Too Big to Know | Peer-to-Peer Review" by Barbara Fister in Library Journal

Are Students Learning What You're Teaching?

Thursday March 15 from 1:30-3pm, Berry 183

What do students know before they enter your class? During? After? Join a panel of your peers as they discuss tools and techniques they are currently using to plan, conduct, and measure the success of library instruction. Attendees will have the opportunity to share techniques and learn from each other.

Spring 2011
Seeing is Believing: Teaching with Online Tutorials

Mark your calendars! This spring, E&O has three events planned around the theme of online tutorials. We will explore best practices, determine what works (and doesn't) in online tutorials, and learn the why, when, where, and how of effective online tutorial creation. We look forward to seeing you at the events described below!

Journal Club
Thursday April 7th from 12:00-1:00pm, Berry 183

Come discuss the article "Learning for All: Teaching Students, Faculty and Staff with Screencasting." This readable article includes both a literature review of screencasting by libraries and practical advice for screencasting based on the experience of an instruction, systems and technical services librarian.

The article is linked here: http://tinyurl.com/4sb3x5p

Discussion notes:

Keep screencasts short and focused on a single task.
Don't let perfection get in the way of posting screencasts.
Most of us questioned the importance of captioning our screencasts (recommended in the article); audio narration seems to be the expected standard (thanks to youtube), and it can be harder to watch what's happening in the screencast while reading the captions.
Advantages to posting on YouTube (an interface that everyone understands and can be displayed on the iPad and other devices that don't use flash); centralized space.
Need to create a Dartmouth College Library YouTube account or E&O account where we can all upload screencasts in a single channel.
Need for a single web page for the public where all screencasts can be found.
Placing screencasts at point-of-need whenever possible.

From Mario Bros to Research Skills: A Critique of Online Tutorials
Thursday May 5th, 1:00-2:00pm, Berry 183

Are you interested in developing or using online tutorials? Come participate in a critique session where we will look at several short, online instructional tutorials from outside the library world. Our discussion will concentrate on identifying qualities that make online tutorials successful with a focus on how they address their specific audiences.

Discussion notes:

We watched and discussed these online tutorials:

Jay Satterfield led a discussion about each video, asking about each one "what is the most important thing?", "what is unimportant?", "does the video (creator) know its audience?", and "does the video successfully speak to its audience?" While all the workshop participants liked and disliked a range of things in each video, we did seem to agree on a few best practices for online tutorials:

Focus on one simple thing in the tutorial, not a complex or multi-step process. Library tutorials often feature long and/or complex processes. We should try to break those processes into smaller chunks, creating a series of short videos rather than one long video.
Production quality is not terribly important if the video is effective. Effectively delivered content is more important to viewers than is a glossy video. Alton Brown manages to do both in his onion video, but the knitting video and the first Mario Brothers video are examples of very-useful videos with low/average production quality.
Know your audience, and speak to your audience.
It's often helpful to do a quick demo at the start and a quick review at the end (with the emphasis on quick!) This fits in with the frequently cited advice "Tell them what you're going to tell them. Tell them. Tell them what you told them."

Extending the reach of instruction: Getting started with creating online tutorials
Tuesday, May 17, 12:30pm - 2:00pm, Starr Instructional Center (Jones)

Thinking about making an online tutorial? Well, we have the in-person tutorial you need. Join Amanda Albright and JoAnn Gonzalez-Major from Dartmouth Computing Services and Susan Simon of Jones Media Center to learn about the why, when, where, and how of effective online tutorial creation. This combined discussion and hands-on workshop will provide background and techniques to allow you to engage and instruct your target audience online.

Sign-up at: https://library.dartmouth.edu/classes/request/classsignup.php?MAIN_CLASS_ID=13190

*E&O chose this term's topic based on your feedback, in particular the information provided in the annual teaching statements. Email Laura Barrett to let her know what else you'd like us to offer.

*****Past Programming*****

Winter 2011
Professional Development: Conferences, publications, and presentations

This winter, E&O has three events planned around the theme of professional development. We want to help you explore opportunities to share the great work you’re doing, and to learn from your local and national colleagues. We look forward to seeing you at the events described below!

Conference Sampler Brownbag Lunch
Wednesday Jan. 19, noon-1pm in the Treasure Room. Bring your lunch!

Would you like to expand your horizons by attending a new conference? Do you want to hear what your colleagues learned at conferences they attended? Susan Simon, Joshua Shaw, Sarah Scully, Noah Lowenstein, and Cindy Tobery each will tell you about a conference they attended, share what they learned, and answer your questions. We’ll also share a new conference sampler webpage.

Effective Presentation Proposals/Publishing in the Library Literature: Tips to Get You Started
Monday, Feb. 7 from 10-11 in Berry 183

Are you interested in presenting at a conference or publishing in the library literature, but want guidance on how to get started? Our panel will advice you on how to get started: picking a topic, choosing a conference or publication, and writing an effective proposal. Panel presenters include Eliz Kirk, Ann Perbohner, Laura Braunstein and Pamela Bagley.

Journal Club: Conference Proposals
Thursday March 3, noon- 1pm in Berry 183.

Did our Feb. 7th panel discussion inspire you to present at a conference? Join us for a unique journal club, in which our DCL colleagues' successful conference presentation proposals will be our reading material. We will read several proposals (and the related calls for papers from the conferences) and talk about elements of successful proposals. If time allows, we can workshop proposals that you might be preparing.

*E&O chose this term’s topic based on your feedback, in particular the information provided in the annual teaching statements. Email Laura Barrett to let her know what else you’d like us to offer.