Elaine Beans presentation 'Bridging the gap between 2nd and 3rd level education' from #asl2015 'Inside out library: collaboration, inspiration, transformation' delivered February 27 2015

1. Bridging the gap
between 2nd and 3rd
level education
a Maynooth University Case
Study
Elaine Bean
The Library
email: elaine.bean@nuim.ie
Tel: 01 708 6445

2. I will discuss
• Why we designed the programme
• How we selected schools
• The content
• How it has progressed
• Going forward

3. Why we designed the programme
• Aware that first year students at third level education face significant
challenges in adapting to a new information environment
• Students are more familiar with rote learning
• Critical thinking or evaluating resources is new for most
• Opens people’s minds to coming to University
• Maynooth University Strategic Plan 2012-2017
“To strengthen its engagement with all stakeholders through sustained partnerships with
enterprises, communities, civil society and public bodies, to build support for the mission
of the university, to serve the needs of society, and to open new opportunities for
research and learning.”

4. Previous involvement with Schools
• Delivered an information literacy programme a number of
years ago to be used in our local school. Aimed at 2nd year
and 5th year students
• 1 double class – once-off training session
• Delivered by two members of staff
• Content needed more than one session, however, teachers
were not in a position to give up class time

5. Designing a programme
• What were others doing?
• Universities were getting involved with schools
• Involvement varied
• Visits to the Library mostly
• What time of year suited us best?
• What school should we approach?
• What contact had Maynooth University
already made with schools – could we tie
in with that?

6. What could we do?
• Designed a working outline including content for
each session and a proposal to present to a school
• Our programme was designed to go out to the
school to deliver the programme
• Designed and delivered by two members of staff

7. Our proposal
• Deliver the programme to transition year students
• In a classroom setting
• Four weeks in the classroom ending with a visit to the Library
• Expose transition year students to the skills and techniques of
information literacy to support them in their future transition to
university or the world of work.
• As such the programme goals include preparing transition year students
for experiences with information use beyond the classroom, towards
continuing education, self-development and lifelong learning.

8. How to select the schools
• Met with Assistant Registrar of Maynooth University to discuss
how to select the school – really valuable meeting
• Tips
• Gave details of schools in the surrounding area
• Alerted us to think about where there was more than one
school in the area – how/should you select one?
• Approaching a school
• Look to meet with the Principal

9. The Content
Session 1:
Preparing for your
Assignment
•Searching V Researching
•Building your search
•Planning
•Top tips
Session 3:
Using and Evaluating
Resources
•Avoiding plagiarism
•Fake website
Session 2:
Accessing Resources &
Social Media
•Searching public library
catalogues
•Journal/books/newspapers
•Location numbers – various
formats of material
•Digital Footprint
•Job screening with social
media
Visit to the Library

10. What works reflected in the feedback forms
• Lots of involvement
• Group and individual work
• Keep examples current
• Be prepared to debate your points

11. Engaging with games/hands on
activities
Boolean Logic – stand up if you have brown
hair, stay up if you have brown hair and blue
eyes, stay standing if you have brown hair,
blue eyes and not wearing a watch
They could visually see searches
change as the search options changed
Avoiding Plagiarism – find current topics or
music they can relate to, have to look it up
themselves and tell you why – discuss in class
Trusting what they find – White house
website, look it up for themselves – CRAAP
checklist, Currency, Reliability, Accuracy,
Authority, Purpose

12. Feedback
• Very positive feedback from teachers and students – as the programme progressed, some
teachers asked to sit in on sessions and said they would use relevant components in their
project work
• Tour of Maynooth University Library and campus very positively received
• Highlighted the University’s role in civic engagement and our role in recruiting students and student
retention.
• Quotes from participants: Very informative and gave me great tips to help with school work. I
thought I knew everything about the internet, but I don't so everything was new, thanks. I
learned new ways of researching today which I will use in the future. Can't wait to go to the
Library. I learned a lot from talking about social media. I think people should talk about it more
often. Introduced to a whole new part of the internet which I really enjoy working with. Thanks
to this training session I will never see social media the same way again.
• Quote from teacher:The course provided very good active learning techniques that students
could take away and apply directly to their own learning.

13. • Who wants to be Information Literate?
• Brought prizes
Information Literate
Evaluating Feedback

14. Visit to the Library
• Very engaged when on
the visit
• Opportunity to put some
of the props us used in
the school in context
• For some they had never
been inside a library or
on a university campus

15. How it has progressed
• One school = four classes of transition year students
• Had to deliver to all (each session required 3 double classes delivered 4 times)
• In March we are starting with another school
• Six classes of transition year students
• Started as four sessions in the classroom – now three
• Keep topics current
• Amend the sessions based on feedback, what is in the news
• Have to fit around transition year programme in the schools and availability
of computer rooms

16. Support material

17. Going forward
• Working with the students didn’t just benefit the
schools, it helped appreciate how students are
learning, what resources they are using
• Initially thought we needed to have more advanced training
for LIST (Library Information Skills Tutorials)
• Can we continue going out to schools?
• Do we take on more or continue with the ones we have
worked with
• Plan to continue working with schools

18. Thank you!
elaine.bean@nuim.ie
Tel: 01-708 6445