LSC 614-Advanced Reference

Sara B. Metcalfe

Chapter 3 - Bibliographic Instruction

Designing a Bibliographic Instruction Program for a Small Academic Library

Bibliographic Instruction programs have become an integral part of most academic libraries. If a library can establish an effective and successful bibliographic program, they not only draw the students into the library and make them more aware of the resources available to them, but often through word of mouth, the faculty members as well. Faculty endorsement is crucial to academic libraries, as it ensures moral and financial support by higher administration.

Environmental Assessment

The first step in designing a successful Bibliographic Instruction program is discovering your environment; the size of the student body, demographics of the students, and number of faculty members. All of these factors play a big part in the way the program is constructed.

The institution we will be studying has a student population of approximately 150-200 women and 20 faculty members. The majority of the women are over 30, work full-time jobs and/or have families. For many of them, this is their first time attending college. Because of their hectic schedules, classes are held in the evenings and on the weekends.

The library itself is overseen by one librarian and consists of over 40,000 volumes, 750 recordings, videos, audio cassettes and CDs, as well as subscriptions to 135 periodicals. The strengths of the collection are in Women's Studies, Legal Studies and Literature. There are Ten PCs which are available for word processing, internet access, the online public access catalog, and a variety of citation and full text databases.

Needs Assessment

Once the librarian has determined who the bibliographic instruction program is geared towards, they need to discover who their audience is and what their needs are. One of the first steps the assessor should take is to sit in on classes to see how the instructors structure their classes. With an institution this small, it is easy to pick a few core classes. The benefit of attending classes is making the students aware of the resources (especially online), and that the library is there to help them. It is also an opportunity to informally discuss with the students what their needs are. As far as faculty concerns, asking to be included in the agenda of a faculty meeting and discussing with them their perceptions of library instruction is a great way to discover how they see the integration of the library, and library based programs into their classes. This is also a great way to improve public relations between students, faculty and the library.

Because the students have other lives outside of school, their main concern is being able to utilize the facilities and materials when it is convenient for them. Asking students to complete surveys of their needs, expectations and background is another way for the librarian to understand what the population of the school wants and needs. The librarian may also want to conduct an independent survey in the library, keeping track of how many patrons access the library and at what time of day.

Assessing the Library’s resources

In order to construct a successful Bibliographic Instruction program, the librarian needs to ensure that the necessary resources are available. One of the key resources in today’s libraries are computers, however, this is only the case if they are well maintained and reliable. As many of the resources available to students are online, a computer lab is one of the best ways for teaching Bibliographic Instruction as it gives the students the chance to learn hands on. An online tutorial that students can complete once they have had “in person” instruction allows them to learn the finer points of researching and using the library.

Integrating a Bibliographic Instruction class into the curriculum

Integrating bibliographic instruction into a core class or classes within the institutions curriculum, or making bibliographic instruction a prerequisite is successful way to ensure that the students become familiar with the library and its resources.

Instructional Method

The method used for instruction depends on the knowledge of the student. Some students may have had experience using library resources and computers, while others may not. Sharing the control of the instruction between the instructor and students, using semi-direct instruction, is one of the best ways to ensure that all students move at their own speed. The instructor structures the class and lectures the students, then allows them to ask questions, work on their own, etc.

Follow up Evaluation

It is important to do follow up evaluations to determine the programs success and improve on upon it. This can be done either with a survey, or a test. The librarian needs to determine whether the rate at which the course taught was sufficient, whether the students were able to take what they learned and apply it to their own research,

Instructor Education

It is very important for the library instructor to stay up to date on the latest developments in bibliographic instruction. One way to accomplish this is to join LIRT (Library Instruction Roundtable), a roundtable of the American Library Association advocating library education and informing librarians of the latest trends and resources. The Association of College and Research Libraries sponsors the Institute of Information Literacy, offering support to those librarians involved in academic support by preparing them to become effective teachers through workshops and conferences. Attending conferences, educational workshops, and networking with other librarians developing bibliographic instruction programs allows librarians to interact and discuss issues face-to-face.