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.
This learning session, led by a librarian, is for first-year community college students in an academic library setting. The intention of this session is to scaffold onto existing research writing skills acquired in previous education, as well as use of popular video sharing platforms to obtain information, like TikTok. Informative videos produced by everyday people are a growing form of intellectual connection between all audiences and scholarly sources based on relatability, as well as visibility of marginalized issues larger news organizations do not address.
The SIFT* & PICK approach to evaluating sources adapts and builds on Mike Caulfield's SIFT method to help students select quality sources by practicing:
This lesson actively engages learners in the process of evaluating an information source using the SIFT technique, designed by Mike Caufield. The approach uses lateral reading techniques and the lesson encourages learners to apply and reflect on the technique as it pertains to a specific information need.
The Penn State Berks Privacy Workshop Series focuses on privacy issues for students in the past, present, and future. The Privacy Workshop spotlights privacy practices and concerns in the current moment; Digital Leadership explores future implications of past and current digital behaviors; Digital Shred provides tools to evaluate
Developed in order to move students away from an outdated checklist approach to evaluating online content, we developed this tutorial to teach students how to read laterally and think critically. This tutorial consists of several small chunks of microlearning activities including an assignment. Students can complete as much or as little as they feel they need.
How can we facilitate first-year student engagement with critical Framework concepts, especially in a one-shot class? This active learning activity is designed to teach source evaluation in a 50-minute class. The activity, which incorporates elements of problem-based learning and uses a flipped classroom approach, was added to our institution’s first-year experience course.
The Penn State Berks Privacy Workshop Series focuses on privacy issues for students in the past, present, and future. The Privacy Workshop spotlights privacy practices and concerns in the current moment; Digital Leadership explores future implications of past and current digital behaviors;
The Penn State Berks Privacy Workshop Series focuses on privacy issues for students in the past, present, and future. The Privacy Workshop spotlights privacy practices and concerns in the current moment; Digital Leadership explores future implications of past and current digital behaviors; Digital Shred provides tools to eval
This lesson on journal prestige could be taught by itself, as part of a series on scholarly communication, or as a small part of a larger lesson on information prestige.
This is an activity to get students to think critically about the sources and information presented in a Wikipedia article.
This lesson on the nature and cost of scholarly publishing could be taught by
itself, or as part of a series on scholarly communication, or as a small part of a larger lesson on
information privilege.
In post-session feedback, first-year students frequently express anxiety over how to physically navigate the library to find a book on the shelf. This is a simple, pre-session activity to help students try this out before class, so that they can discuss with their librarian any challenges they faced in attempting to complete the task. With the help of the course instructor, students are asked to find a book on their research topic (or course topic) and bring it to class.
This is an activity that helps students develop an interdisciplinary search strategy in stages. Students define their topic, brainstorm questions related to their topic area, and connect these questions to the disciplines and experts where they might find more research and information. Students learn how to identify search tools & information sources based on their questions using the library’s website.
In this activity, students review correct in-text citations for a particular format, then practice writing their own examples. These examples are submitted anonymously via a google form, allowing for the collective and collaborative review.
This activity helps students collectively practice summarizing, paraphrasing and quoting. To begin, students have a conversation as a class on any topic of their choosing. The instructor transcribes the conversation and then as a group, the class examines the conversation and write summaries, paraphrases and quotes.
Students learn about innovation, the distribution of innovation across the country, and what can be patented. Working in groups, they examine patents and consider the changes the patents brought. They then use a mapping program and interpret data from that map to consider how local resources promote innovation.
