This workshop provides an introduction to creating infographics using Piktochart and includes advice on selecting a design, incorporating data, and structuring a story.

Entering students all take MGT101 – Business Management Practice. Creation of a business plan for a unique product or service is the major project for this course. This Library assignment uses a workshop format to give student groups in Management 101 the task of exploring, evaluating, and reviewing a particular resource important in the business plan research process. Groups are provided a work sheet that presents a set of tasks and 'deliverables' which form the basis of a presentation during which they teach their peers how to use the resource, as well as the strengths and weaknesses of that resource. Active engagement exploring new databases and resources helps students acquire skills necessary for successful completion of course assignments. Including students in the teaching process promotes this engagement, and often results in a more successful transfer of knowledge and skills to all students. Librarians and professors may chime in at the close of each presentation to underscore points made by student evaluators, or further those presentations by providing additional strategies or pathways to uncover needed information of benefit to all students as they work to develop their business plans.

This activity asks students to work in groups to evaluate Internet sources to meet a research need. Students will use their available wireless devices, smartphones, tablets, computers, or laptops to retrieve the URLs provided to them. Working together, students will ask evaluation questions, guided by a CRAAP handout (attached) or instructor. Then, groups will share their findings with the class. o Students are grouped (3-4 students per group, number of groups in total is irrelevant what it important is the size of the group remains very small). o Each group is handed a scenario card – a 3x5 index card with a URL, beneath the URL is a topic/ question for research. Each student should also receive an Internet evaluation handout with the CRAAP criteria for evaluation on it. (These cards will be created by the instructor. They are recommended to be realistic, likely research questions/ topics for their course and the URLs should be likely search results. Results should vary between acceptable, recommended sources and not recommended sources.) o Students should be given a short time to review - 3-5 mins. Instructor should stress how quickly students can move through a website to capture information such as publication dates and check source links. o At the end of the review period, each group will have a spokesperson make their case to which the class can engage with questions as to the criteria. This activity can be repeated multiple times. It is highly adaptable and reusable.

This is a short, engaging activity suitable for learners of all levels. In it, students evaluate web sources that are provided by an instructor using the acronym CRAAP (currency, relevance, accuracy, authority, and purpose). Students work together in groups and explore evaluation processes aloud, with guidance from the CRAAP cards and the instructor. This is an adaptation of various evaluating sources activities available in LIS literature and professional resources. This activity is ideally implemented as a kind of collaborative game moderated by the instructor. It is highly adaptable. o Students are grouped into 5 groups - one for each criterion of CRAAP. Each group will receive a CRAAP card or 3x5 index card with evaluation questions pertaining to Currency, Relevance, Accuracy, Authority, and Purpose – different for each table. o A source will be shared with the class on the projector. These sources will include scholarly articles, websites (blogs and orgs), and reference entries. It is essential that the instructor select sources that are relevant to their students (either by course, subject, or level) and that would be likely results on a student Internet search for a research topic/ question. o Each group will evaluate the source aloud on the single criterion they’ve been assigned. If it “passes,” then the source gets asked the next question. If it “fails,” the source is dismissed. o This activity can be repeated with various websites or web sources.

This annotated bibliography assignment has five different versions for five different groups of disciplines: arts, humanities, social analysis (social sciences), life and physical sciences, and quantitative reasoning. Each is meant to give students a way to identify and explore the key types of scholarly sources in those disciplinary categories; for example, to understand what is meant by a primary source in each category. The titles of these disciplinary categories are specific to the General Education Seminar categories at my institution, as are the titles of the research guides suggested in the assignment. It could be used as a precursor to a research paper or as a standalone assignment.

Students create an entry in the Fremont Wiki - http://localwiki.net/fremont. Students incorporate information literacy concepts, have hands-on experience conducting research, and create actual content on the Internet [while also learning how easy it is for anyone to change that content]. It could also be a great chance to get students into local museums and archives.

Syllabus and five assignments within a two-credit live course at undergraduate level. See "Relevant Links" section for access to all assignments. Assignments include a rubric.

A general worksheet for students to find key sources in selected databases for their assignments in Communication Studies.

In this sequence of activities, students will learn how to identify scholarly sources using three pronged test: 1) Is the source written by a researcher or academic 2) Is the source published in a scholarly book or peer reviewed journal, and 3) Does the source have an extensive bibliography. They will then be asked to find one scholarly book and one scholarly article on a general topic.

Learning Activities

Scholarly source pre-test

• Description of activity: Students will complete a three-five question true/false pretest. Each question will present the student with a source and ask them if the source is scholarly (true/false).
• Learning goal: Students will understand what they do and do not know about identifying scholarly sources. The pretest also works as an assessment strategy as well as a strategy for retention of the material.

Short lecture/discussion

• Description of activity: Instructor will lead students in a discussion about the elements that all scholarly sources have. This will lead to the list of the three-pronged test: 1) Is the source written by a researcher or academic 2) Is the source published in a scholarly book or peer reviewed journal, and 3) Does the source have an extensive bibliography. The instructor is leading the discussion should be creating a list on the board. This discussion should also include a specific mention that credible sources and academic sources are not always the same. A source can be credible without being scholarly and scholarly sources have been known to be not credible.
• Learning goal: Students will be able to apply the three pronged test to decide is a source is scholarly or not.
• Assessment: At the end of the discussion the Instructor will present students with a blog written by an academic that discusses a research project they worked on and includes a short list of cited reference at the end. The instructor will ask the class to vote on whether or not it is a scholarly source.

Find two scholarly sources

• Description of activity: Instructor will present students with a general topic (e.g. student debt) and ask them to find one scholarly book or book chapter and one scholarly article on the topic using whatever search tool they want (this can be done in pairs or groups of three). When they have found the sources, they will complete a Google form similar to this: http://libguides.lmu.edu/RHET1000/task (including asking what they used to find the sources – Google, Discovery layer, etc.). When the students are finished, the Instructor will project the results of the Google form and look at the search tools used by the students. If the students are overwhelming using Google or JSTOR, the instructor will discuss more useful places to find sources. Then the Instructor will randomly select some of the books and article the students found and ask they group how they identified them as scholarly.
• Learning goal: Students will be able to find scholarly books and articles.
• Assessment: At the end of the semester, librarian will collect final papers and assess the student bibliographies looking for evidence of scholarly sources. 

Students interview their professor(s) and ask them to describe how they do research, how research gets disseminated in their discipline, etc. Each student can ask one question below. This assignment can be useful as a “first day of class” activity for a First Year Seminar. Novice researchers are introduced to scholarly discourse and discipline-specific approaches to producing knowledge by experts.