Community of Online Research Assignments

The 5-Minute Reference Check: Verify Citations Before Submission

A 5-minute, method-first activity: students verify three references from their own draft bibliography before submitting - resolving DOIs and searching exact titles - then classify each as found-and-matches, found-but-differs, or not-found, and correct entries from the real record. Motivated by the rise of fabricated ("hallucinated") citations that look perfectly formatted yet point at nothing. Teaching point: "not found" does not automatically mean "fabricated".

Research Wizards

The most powerful wizards have gathered to battle one another.  Only one will win.  Wizards must use reliable sources to research incantations for the battle, or their spells will fizzle.  Truly wise wizards must learn to tell the difference. 

Voter Workshop

Two librarians at NKU developed an Informed Voting workshop to help students navigate information during the 2024 election season. Attendees were provided a worksheet to learn about the candidates/issues on their ballot and dig into one issue/race to investigate during the workshop.

Thinking critically about knowledge organization

This is part of an introductory first-year class to the university where students are introduced to the library and asked to think critically about how information is organized using the framework of critical cataloging. After watching a short video on the idea of classification and its problems with fixing identity categories, students analyze and categorize selected book from the collection, and then reflect on how knowledge is organized and their choices as authors.

Introduction to Critical Appraisal for Medical Students

In this session, first year medical students in their second semester of study are introduced to the concept of critical appraisal. During the first hour, students will receive an introductory lecture on critical appraisal and the CASP checklist tool. During the second hour, students will be provided with discussion questions and an article on labor induction versus expectant management in low-risk nulliparous women. Students will review the article and answer the discussion questions in their small groups with their small group facilitators.

Pharmacy: Aspects of Patient Care Literature Searching

The first in a series of six courses, students focus on the Pharmacists’ Patient Care Plan involving prescription medications, patient history and more complex patient cases with an emphasis on culture humility. This one-shot is intended to help solidfy the lessons taught in previous classes I have with the students (such as Boolean and library services) and allow them to explore the needs of searching for traditional, complementary, and alternative medicine.

Advanced Avoiding Plagiarism

This lesson was created to help further discuss issues surrounding plagiarism after a quick introduction at orientation. It was created for pharmacy PhD students but I do believe it could be useful for many learner types. A large focus on this lesson was why it is important not to plagiarize with emphasis on oppression through traditional citation and review practices. Inspiration and/or content obtained from: Conner-Gaten, Aisha. "Politics of Citation Discussion Activity." CORA (Community of Online Research Assignments), 2020.

Health Disparities and Literacy for Future Health Care Providers

This lesson was given to a health career academy that consists of high school and undergraduate students. The students have a strong interest in careers in the health sciences but have yet to start their education through health sciences programs. The point of the session was to understand how disparities and health literacy intersect and will be important factors in the work they do as learners and providers and to empower the students to use their cultural wealth and voices to make change. I am attaching the slides with notes (which acted as my lesson plan for this session).

Annotated Bibliographies: Shining a Light on Source Evaluation with the BEAM Method

Annotated bibliographies have become a popular assignment in college courses and a way to scaffold research papers. Gathering a bibliography before turning in a completed research project allows students to focus on searching strategically and get feedback on the sources they obtained. Annotating that bibliography requires them to think critically about the sources they choose and their relationship to the research at hand.

Evaluating Online Sources with Lateral Reading

This is a lateral reading 75 minute long lesson plan and worksheet assignment that introduces online source evaluation to undergraduate students, preferably first years. Lateral reading involves researching the content of a source as one reads it and this technique is popular with online fact checkers and journalists.  The lesson plan calls for instructors to demonstrate lateral reading live (or via recording if asynchronous) using resources found on Google.

Intro to Evaluating Resources

This video was put together to offer health sciences students a brief introduction to critically thinking about their resources in order to evaluate how appropriate they are for use in their work. It was important that the learners understand the complexities of using specific resources and why it is important to always critically evaluate materials. This includes a discussion of critiques of gatekeeping surrounding peer review, how damaging and discriminatory research can still get published, and how to ask crucial questions to subvert dominant narratives.

“Green Means Go Ahead and Cite That”: A Citation Activity for Undergraduate Engineering Students

This assessment asks undergraduate engineering students to review, rate, and explain their decisions relating to the credibility of information resources and information containers. Students are asked to review various resources as well as containers. After reviewing, students assign each resource or container with one of three ratings: green (always credible), yellow (potentially credible with further investigation), or red (never credible). Last, students explain their decision in relation to each resource or container.