This document discusses an online graduate library research methods class taught by a reference librarian, including typical students, integrating publication of student work, benefits to students, and outcomes from enabling publication. Instruction is delivered entirely online and includes videos, discussions, and worksheets to guide students through research, evaluation, writing, and potentially publishing their annotated bibliographies. The goal is to provide students practical research experience that can benefit their programs of study and careers.

1. Howard Carrier
Reference Librarian, Odum Library
Valdosta State University, Valdosta, Georgia, USA.
LILAC 27th March 2013

2.  ITED 7900 “Library Research Methods for Online Students” 3.0
credit hour graduate class taught by a Reference Librarian.
 Class delivered entirely online during 7 week summer semester via
“BlazeVIEW” (Valdosta State University’s VLE)
 Currently Blackboard Vista 8
 Transitioning to Desire2Learn
 Typical student attributes for this class
 Postgraduate education students
▪ Majority enrolled in a Master’s programme (M.Ed. Or Ed.S.)
▪ Minority of students are doctoral candidates (Ed.D).
▪ Many students are professional educators
▪ Non-education students tend to be criminal justice or public policy students

3.  Typical student attributes for this class
▪ First experience of post-graduate study
▪ Returning to university education

4.  Enabling publication of student work
produced for this class:
 Marketing the idea of seeking publication to
students
 Information literacy instruction
 Integrating writing into the ongoing delivery and
assessment of the course

5. Image source: Wikimedia Commons
 Benefits to students:
 A publication to include on a CV
 Dissemination of high-quality work, in which
much time and effort has been invested

6. Image source: Wikimedia Commons
 Benefits to students:
 Work which may contribute to a resultant dissertation or
thesis
 Student work is “research led” as per ACRL Information
Literacy Competency Standards
 Students can “opt out” of publication without penalty (at
least for this class)

7. Image source: Wikimedia Commons
 Benefits to students:
 While quantitative and qualitative research methodologies
are extensively taught at a graduate level, literature
searching may not be taught to the same extent
 Do not assume that undergraduate studies have prepared
you to research a graduate level literature review

8.  Simple evaluation of current skills

9.  The pitfalls of lazy or uncertain searching (a
primary source example)
 What document may be found using the following
citation?
O.C.G.A. § 17-4-20 (2012)

10.  Encouraging students to make an Annotated
Bibliography assignment meaningful to their
wider program of study
 Formulating a research question
 Subsequent instruction in: searching; evaluating;
writing; citing

11.  Instruction provided by:
 Screen-capture videos created in Camtasia and
uploaded to VLE as mp4 files
 Asynchronous discussion boards
 Synchronous chats

12.  Ongoing worksheets throughout the class:
 Allow students practice in searching, critiquing
sources, and writing
 Provide feedback to students
 Enable students to work effectively towards a
final Annotated Bibliography of publishable
quality within the short, 7 week timeframe

13.  Some examples…
 ERIC documents / Gov docs

14.  A trial run

15.  Outcomes (based upon two semesters)
 Approximately 75% of students agreed to
publication
 85% of papers submitted, where a willingness to
publish had been indicated by the student, were
of sufficient quality to be published in a collated
bibliography
 Unwillingness to publish is not an good indicator
of weak students or poor quality work

16.  Outcomes (based upon two semesters)
 An interesting “side-effect”
 Potentially publishing work in an institutional
repository sparked student interest in searching
within repositories and related resources (for
example: openDOAR)

17.  Ongoing qualitative research (beyond simple
student feedback)

18.  ACRL Information Literacy Standards for Higher
Education
http://www.ala.org/acrl/standards/informationliteracycom
petency
 Central Michigan University Research Readiness Self-
Assessment http://rrsa.cmich.edu/
 openDOAR http://www.opendoar.org/
 INLS 843 Seminar in Public Libraries (taught by Professor
Ron Berguist, SILS, UNC Chapel Hill)
http://sils.unc.edu/courses

19.  Howard S. Carrier
Odum Library, Valdosta State University,
Valdosta, GA 31698
Tel: (+001) 229-245-3744
Email: hscarrier@valdosta.edu