The Library Skills Workbook
Ms Margaret Emery
University of Adelaide Library
The Library has assisted all first year students at the University by the use of a number of discipline-based self-paced Library Skills Workbooks since 1989. In 1998, about 2,000 first year students completed Library Skills Workbooks in a number of disciplines. During 1998 the Library initiated a project to test a web-based Library Skills Tutorial with a group of first year students.
An online Library Skills Tutorial for Science was developed using WebCT software, and 440 first year Science students completed this tutorial in Semester 1, 1999. The tutorial was designed as an active learning program with questions to be completed online, giving the students immediate feedback. As the tutorial was web-based, students could access it and complete most of it from computer labs on campus, or from home as well as from within the Library. The basic principles of information retrieval taught by the tutorial are applicable to all disciplines, but the examples, questions and emphasis are relevant to science students.
During 1999, the Library entered the second phase of the project, to develop further tutorials, for Humanities and Social Sciences, Health Sciences and Economics. These will be available to first year students in 2000. The aim is to provide the foundation which prepares students to make life long use of information sources and systems.
The development of the Library Skills Workbooks was encouraged by a University Teaching Development Grant in 1989, and the conversion to an online environment has been aided by a grant from the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Education) in 1999.
Information about access to the tutorials will be available from the Library's web site:
<www.library.adelaide.edu.au>and further information about the project is available at: <http://online.adelaide.edu.au/LearnIT.nsf/URLs/Learning_library_skills>
Contact
Ms Margaret Emery can be contacted on:
Tel: +61 8 8303 3630
Fax: +61 8 8303 4369
E-mail: margaret.emery@adelaide.edu.au (inactive 16/5/07)
Last updated 02/02/00
