Revisiting digital badges, 2016 edition

After a Twitter convo about what's going on with badging initiatives and recently reading an article about badging in libraries that I (+ noted by some others) don't agree with, it feels like time for an update on my thoughts about badging.

When I first started thinking about badges and using badges, they seemed to help solve the problem of so many requests for library instruction, but without having the resources to physically be embedded in each class. I first designed and implemented badging into the one-credit course we used to have for information literacy. It was fully online and part of the coursework included tutorials and other online work. I created badges for our initial pilot that required instructor feedback and more conversation between instructor and student for badges to be earned (rather than automated earning through multiple choice, etc.). This pilot was very successful. Students enjoyed earning badges, saying it helped them organize what they were learning and that it provided more... closure perhaps... than just doing a tutorial or reading something and moving on. Since this course was geared toward freshmen, the badges added a student success component to help them think more about how to study and how to move through a course.

When we moved into the Fall semester pilot (still in 2013), when enrollment for this course gets to be the largest (over 100), we had to revise the badges and make them all mostly automated so that our GA could actually get through all of them plus her regular grading and instruction work for this course. Although students were still positive for the most part about the badges, it didn't feel as successful, to me at least, from an instructor standpoint. This could wind up being a discussion instead about class size, but I think both aspects played a role in my impression.

During this time, I thought since the info lit outcomes for our general education program weren't as strong (and mandatory?) as they needed to be, and that perhaps embedding badging options into gen ed courses would help usher in more info lit instruction, but where librarians wouldn't need to be coming in to do one-shots. We just don't have the resources for those anymore, and as Instruction Coordinator, I will firmly say I don't feel they are beneficial pedagogically to our instruction goals here at the UofA (we are phasing them out, #nomoreoneshots).

I wrote about my presentation to gen ed faculty here and also included student feedback from the pilots. Faculty were positive and it was a possibility to make this work. With a new online college established (UA Online), we also considered embedding badges in these programs since badges might work better with fully online courses. We also considered badges for the Writing Program at the beginning of this academic year. But just popping in automated badges in various spots of the curriculum (without greater collaboration with faculty, potentially) would essentially be the same thing as a one-shot, just virtually. This would be more physically possible, but not be so beneficial pedagogically. After bouncing around and evaluating what might work best instruction-wise, and based on the needs of these programs and departments, we reverted back to thinking about badges as a student success tool. So we have ultimately landed on collaborating with the College of Letters, Arts, & Sciences (CLAS) to use badges in their student success course for undecided students. We are working with our GA and ARL CEP Fellow to have them create and design these badges, and there will be 4 available to students in this program to introduce them to research.

This brings up the discussion also then of using badges with the Framework versus the Standards. I was able to design badges, that required instructor feedback and communication (not automated), to teach students about scholarship as conversation, research as iterative, and other frames. It was totally possible. But when we needed to shift badges to automated for our large pilot (and CLAS has over 1,000 students), this isn't really possible. And it has nothing to do with what is better, the Framework or the Standards--I do like the Framework better, FYI--but pedagogically, instructor feedback and interaction with students is going to be more effective and have a greater impact (that's my opinion, at least).

I do think badges are great for student success purposes and for engagement. Badges contribute to how a one might want to project their identity. After discussions on campus about badging stemming from the pilot I did, badges are being used in a large-scale student engagement initiative that's essentially related to AAC&U High Impact Practices. I think this is a great way for students to track what more holistic experiences they are having on campus and can help them conceptualize what they've done. When it comes to classroom instruction or information literacy initiatives, I think the use of badges gets more tricky and a number of factors need to be considered. And I prefer more fluidity in instructional design and collaborations with faculty that badges anchoring curriculum can't provide.

Now, one of those factors that always seems to pop up when badges are discussed is employer needs and employer impressions of students' value as future workers. I recently wrote about the state of higher education and info lit instruction in the winter 2015 issue of Communications in Information Literacy: A Pedagogy of Inquiry, so you can get more context on where I'm coming from with that article. My entire perspective of badges since I first became interested was about improving pedagogy, badges as instructional design, and trying to give students more autonomy over how they might want to represent themselves and their learning. If the badges and the learning piqued employers' interest and helped students get jobs after graduating, that's great, but should not be the sole purpose of badging (or education!). This is one of the main problems I have with a recent article about badges for employers in the Jan 2016 issue of C&RL. The use of "critical information literacy" in the title is a bit misleading, but regardless, critical (as in essential, according to this article's use of the word) anything for instruction shouldn't hinge on what employers say they need. This post is already getting quite long, so do read my CIL article if you'd like more on that. As others had pointed out to me, some of the other problems with the article include: lack of citations to librarians who have already published and presented on badge-related topics (and the citation of my work is incorrect--we saw my article is the only one cited of librarians who have researched this, and is also described strangely, plus my name isn't even included in the citation); it's confusing why HR reps and not even hiring managers were interviewed; and why this particular methodology was chosen.

I'm writing this quickly before I do an ACRL webinar soon (to talk about our use of the Framework and how we are phasing out one-shots... which I would love to write more about sometime in the future), but I knew if I didn't make this post now I might not have time again for awhile. Here's hoping there aren't any glaring errors. And hoping more that this post was useful to those of you asking about what I've learned about badging and how we're using them here at the University of Arizona.

Expertise and educators: Teachers make a difference

If you care about teaching, stop what you're doing and read Joshua Beatty's CAPAL 2015 paper, "Reading Freire for first world librarians." I had seen others tweeting about how great this paper was but hadn't had a chance to read it until now.

I can't really even count the amount of exclamation points I wrote all over my printed-out copy. There are a lot! We talk about a few things regarding critical pedagogy that have had me feeling conflicted. I wasn't sure how to put my uncertainty into words. Conversations regarding teacher authority, students-as-teachers, and borderline disdain for outcomes have had me feeling like "hmmm no" but not entirely sure how to express my hesitation clearly. And when I say "we," I mean librarians, teachers, and higher ed faculty who engage in discourse about critical pedagogy, but also sometimes those more informal discussions in our #critlib chats. And this is certainly not uncommon, a hashtag to talk about umbrella topics does not automatically imply there is monolithic agreement and a shared politics/approach/philosophy. This is why these conversations are great, because it's a safe space to talk about these things. I just haven't been able to fully articulate my disagreement about these issues until reading this paper.

So without repeating everything he says, essentially, the point is that first world librarians have been interpreting Freire incorrectly. Most of us--myself included--have only read Pedagogy of the Oppressed, which was written with a very specific time period and population in mind and does not apply to Western classrooms (especially in the U.S. education system). Beatty points out how "Freire believed that North American teachers had conflated the concept of authority with the concept of authoritarianism. For Freire, the difference was essential. Authoritarianism was opposed to the existence of freedom, and is illegitimate. Authority, in contrast, was not opposed to freedom, but necessary to it" (p. 6).

The teacher's authority comes from their knowledge of the subject matter; but as Beatty explains, Freire realized in our misreading of his work that in rejecting authoritarianism, we wind up rejecting the teacher's authority... the thing that is actually needed for reaching freedom. And when we reject the teacher's authority and focus on this idea of teacher as just a guide or facilitator and not an expert with authority, we are actually causing harm to both the students and the teacher.

How this causes harm to students: Teacher authority is thinly veiled behind this idea of a classroom of shared power, which is just not in existence. Problem-posing in truth would be to acknowledge the authority of the teacher, to discuss it and be aware of it, instead of pretending it doesn't exist or making it seem like it can go away. I have never fully abdicated my authority as a teacher when I am doing instruction, feeling that I would come across as insincere. I wrote a blog post previously about TMI and student retention, and how trying to appear as if on the same level as your students is not helpful to teaching. I had included a couple YouTube clip examples in the post that have seemed to disappear, but this one can illustrate the idea here from Kids in the Hall, He's Hip. He's Cool. He's 45! The dad is trying to act like his authority is invisible by being "cool" and imposing no limitations on his son. He "doesn't care" about restrictions such as curfew and even goes to offer his son a joint with his cool man stance on the couch armrest. But the son clearly sees through this facade, not taking his dad seriously, as if he's a joke (well, he literally is):

This is obviously an exaggerated example, but I think it is disingenuous to frame a classroom as hey we're all the same, teacher, students.... even though I have the authority to grade. Also, there really are right and wrong answers in a number of cases. Dialogue is important, though. Facilitating is also important, but not at the expense of denying the expertise of being a teacher.

How this causes harm to teachers: I have written about the identity of librarians, the identity of librarians specifically as educators, and presented on how incorporating critical pedagogy into information literacy education can help transform our image. What Beatty is saying in his paper ties directly to this issue inherent in women's work and female-dominated professions having an expectation for service work and caregiving. Caregiving and warmth is essential to a degree in successful teaching, as we recognize the human component necessary for learning (affect), but positioning teachers--and librarian teachers, a double-whammy--as simply guides or facilitators or helpers, we are reinforcing a renunciation of authority, respect, and the need for individuals (mostly women) in these roles. We can have authority without being authoritarians. We can be experts and strategic educators who use learning outcomes (especially as formative assessment) while also working with students to realize their own knowledge and interests via dialogue and bigger picture learning.

I have found somewhat of a clash between educational psychology / instructional design principles and critical pedagogy when considering design, outcomes, and the role of the educator. I was so glad to read Beatty's paper to help me realize exactly where I felt uncomfortable with this conflict and why it existed. He talks about a lot of other great things like the idea of neutrality, the importance of collaboration with faculty, and neoliberalism + educational technology... you should really read.

And so, if anyone really can be a facilitator or a guide or a helper, then who needs us? Freire's notion of laissez-faire education would be realized. Teachers make a difference, and we can use our authority to help students learn. 

Starting with the WHY: #ccourses Unit 1

The first activity for #ccourses is looking at the why of why we teach. As Mike Wesch says on the #ccourses site:

We usually start by addressing the “What” question first. We have a course title or subject area and we begin populating our syllabus with the “whats” to be learned. Or, we peruse textbooks looking for the text that we think best covers the field. If we have time, we address the “How” question by considering how we can best teach the material. We sharpen our teaching technique, seek out better examples for the more difficult concepts, compile photos and videos to improve our presentations, and seek other ways to get the students engaged with the material. We may jump to incorporate the latest tools and techniques, whether it is social or interactive media or a new technique like a flipped classroom.  Our syllabus, teaching materials, and educational technology in order, we rush into the semester, rarely asking, “Why?”

As a librarian teaching library research skills / information literacy (IL), my first inclination would be to say that I'm motivated to teach students because IL prepares individuals to become active members in a participatory democracy, questioning the status quo, and knowing how to find and use quality information.

This grounding also prepares students to become creators and critics of knowledge, rather than just consumers. I think this latter point especially resonates with me. IL can pair with any discipline to help students find their voice within their chosen area of interest. I also find this near and dear personally from growing up reading, making, and distributing zines, DIY music, and cultural/community events. I felt my personal interests brought me into Freire's notion of "critical consciousness," and once I discovered the library on my own as an undergrad, I finally started to become interested in my courses because I could see how my learning was applying to my life.

Prior to that awakening, I was a disconnected and uninterested student through most of high school and most of college as an undergrad. I dropped out for awhile at one point, planning to never go back. When I did go back to school, I was just going through the motions until about my last year when I started to become energized about learning. I think this strongly affects my perspective on teaching and learning as an educator now.

In my current position, I am the faculty librarian liaison to retention* efforts across campus, so I am always reflecting back on my experiences and how that might apply to current students considering dropping out. Though, as a fairly privileged white, middle class, cisgender and hetero lady, my experiences definitely do not translate to many on campus. However, I feel like I at least have more awareness of issues surrounding retention. So in my work with these groups, my why especially leads me to think about helping students feel connected on campus, on feeling like they can get access to knowledge and information in the library that affects their lives on a personal level and that they can tie that into their studies.

Really excited about what's to come with #ccourses, taking this approach to instruction is so important.

*And of course retention does not mean only students who don't want to be in school. Students who are affected by circumstances out of their control make staying in college difficult, as well as students who might be high achievers who feel disconnected or disappointed and would want to transfer. "Retention" can apply to all types of students with varying circumstances and needs.

#connectedcourse intro post

I signed up to take an open online course through Connected Courses on active co-learning in higher ed that starts next month. As part of getting set up to do the work in the course, which I'll be using my blog for, I needed to create a first post using the hashtag, so here we go!

Instructional design for librarians

image via edtechdojo.com

Instructional design (ID) is an important component of good instruction to understand, but because most librarians (myself included) were not trained in this in library school or afterward, it is something that we should catch up on to close the gap in our knowledge and skills. ID helps an instructor connect learning goals/outcomes with instructional practices and assessment in order to create a learning experience that could be more efficient and effective for learners. I'm sure most would agree that initial instruction experiences for librarians are trial-by-fire. 

ALA invited me to teach a course on an instruction-related topic for these reasons and so I thought instructional design would a good way to cover principles for both face-to-face and online teaching in any type of library. I asked Erica DeFrain to join me in teaching since she has some serious skills, as well as degrees in Instructional Design and (finishing up) her PhD in Educational Psychology. If this interests you, more information follows!

Instructional Design Essentials - with ALA

Course Instructors: Nicole Pagowsky & Erica DeFrain
September 15 - October 15, 2014

This four week, online course will allow you to work at your own pace while receiving feedback on projects and having conversations with your instructors and coursemates. Upon completion of the course you’ll have a fully developed lesson plan that includes pedagogically sound instructional strategies and a meaningful assessment plan.

What you will get out of this course:

• How to use an instructional design (ID) model to create your own teaching, while being critical of the limitations of ID
  
• How to leverage learning theories and knowledge of student motivation to create more compelling instruction
• How to integrate assessment holistically into your curriculum, lesson, or learning object so that you can help students reflect on their own progress, while you reflect on your teaching
  
• How to critically select and position technology within your instruction to enhance student learning
• How to develop an awareness for critical pedagogical practices to create inclusive classroom atmospheres or learning objects
    

Erica is fancy - here is her instructor bio if you aren't familiar with her work:

Erica DeFrain is a librarian with over ten years of professional experience developing and designing instruction. In April of 2014 she joined the Research and Instructional Services department at the University of Nebraska - Lincoln as an Assistant Professor and Social Sciences Librarian. A doctoral candidate in Educational Psychology, she has an MLIS and MS in Educational Technology from the University of Arizona. A huge fan of the Guide on the Side, one of her Guides was featured as an ACRL PRIMO Site of the Month in April.

Nicole Pagowsky is a Research & Learning Librarian at the University of Arizona, and is the liaison for online learning, student retention and success initiatives, general education, and the College of Architecture and Planning. Both her MLIS and MS in Instructional Design & Technology degrees are from the University of Arizona. Nicole's research focuses on game-based learning, student motivation, and critical pedagogy. 

Hope anyone interested will join us, feel free to contact either Erica or myself if you have questions.

Grading and assessment, water and oil?

As I've been getting ready for ACRL Immersion 2013 Program Track (I leave in 1 week!), I've been finishing up a lot of readings on assessment. I've actually been really glad to read these articles, because as I've better solidified my notion of assessment through applying it to the instruction I am doing, I am finding my ideas are aligning with what I am reading.

The pattern I am finding in these readings is that assessment needs to be more holistic; assessment should be a method for students to learn rather than a focus on evaluation; and assessment should provide ongoing, meaningful feedback for students to practice instead of being judged.

We are wrapping up the summer semester with the badges pilot, and Purdue Passport incorporates assessment within earning a badge. Typically, a badge is given after a skill has been achieved, where assessment is more evaluative and judgmental rather than to provide feedback for improvement. This clashes with how I would prefer to teach and use the badges, so I've been using the feedback/assessment mechanism in Passport differently than it might be intended.

This is good because I think students are getting more out of the class, but also poses some conflicts:

1. If badges being awarded are not based on more rigid judgement of skill acquisition, how valuable are they?
2. On this note, how interoperable are they? Can their qualities be translated or compared to other institutions or libraries offering similar badges if desired evidence isn't as clearly enforced?

Because this is a credit class, grades need to be tied to student work. For this, the badges are essentially pass/fail. You either earn the badge or you don't. If a student is late in finishing badge work an exception is made to give them half off, but this is the only partial credit awarded. There are pros and cons to this as well:

Pros: Students can take risks in their responses and have less fear of failure (this positive aspect is rooted in game mechanics); I can focus more on the quality of my feedback rather than what level of good or bad the student's work falls into

Cons: How is good student work differentiated from bad work? Particularly if bad work is due to sloppiness or disinterest. Shouldn't a student who submitted excellent work (or evidence) for a badge be awarded the badge, where less stellar work would not be awarded the badge? Isn't the purpose of awarding badges to demonstrate that a skill was successfully acquired?

I have such mixed feelings on this. But one feature of Passport is to allow students a re-do. I use this often for sloppy work. I will leave feedback explaining exactly what I'm looking for and give the student a second chance (next semester I will be sharing specific rubrics for each badge with students so they have an even better concept of what level of understanding is desired). 

I am not a stickler on lower-level concepts like formatting a citation perfectly or memorizing exact steps on how to find an article when you only have a citation (these are specific assessments in the class to address more basic skills within learning outcomes). If a student has most of a citation right but forgets to italicize the journal title for MLA style, it's really just busy work for them to make them re-do it or for me to take points off. I leave feedback letting them know they mostly got it and to remember to double check these things for formal papers; and then I give them all the points. I love Barbara Fister's 2013 LOEX Keynote (in fact, my team read it as part of our strategic planning for the new fiscal year). I agree so strongly with her whole presentation, and using a specific example here, "very rarely outside of school are citations needed." I care way more about if students are able to understand what the purpose of a citation is and to incorporate this into their new understanding of "research as conversation" than about styles and how to format.

One assigned article that has been part of this class for a long time is a CQ Researcher article on cheating: why students cheat and how they cheat. It's interesting to see what students agree with in their reflections and a number do say that when a student doesn't feel course material has real application in their lives (or when an instructor provides little to no meaningful feedback), a student has no motivation or investment to put in quality work, and so cheating is easy. Focusing less on grades and more on understanding and a conversation between the students and us as instructors creates a richer experience for all. Their reflections resonate well with what we're doing in the course to make it apply to their lives, to attain better work from them, and in turn to provide more meaningful, continuous feedback. This also allows for continuous improvement on our end; the crux of assessment. 

Library mystery as outreach and instruction

We do outreach to the community, particularly over the summer, and tomorrow we will have high school students visiting the library for a summer workshop on research skills. Since it's more of a summer camp and these are younger students, we wanted to make sure they would have some fun and be engaged... so we are using murder mysteries as our hands-on activity after a short instruction session to prepare the students for detective work.

I think the mystery I created is fun and it works; I'm sure it would be much better if I had more background in game design (working on that), but this at least will hit all the learning outcomes in a cohesive way:

1. Students will understand how databases work, and what the difference is between library databases and Google.
2. Students will be able to construct a basic search using synonyms for a broader search strategy.
3. Students will be able to locate a book using the library catalog.
4. Students will be able to evaluate websites using the CRAAP test.
5. Students will be able to use information appropriately by citing sources in APA style.

Assessment will be done by seeing if they solve the mystery, and since they have to write down answers along the way, we can see some of their search process to get a sense of how much they learned during the instruction portion of the session.

The mystery takes them through using different types of resources in the library, including (hopefully) getting value and comfort in asking a librarian for help. In the end, they wind up in Special Collections where they are spending the afternoon, and will solve the case at the end of the day. We decided to tie our instruction to Special Collections so the students get a more holistic picture of the research process.

I am sure I will notice some snags along the way as this is the first time we are doing this, so I hope to do a follow up post about what went wrong and what could be improved. This would be a great way to gamify orientations to the library for UA freshmen, especially for the smaller student success courses, and could then be tied to retention efforts.

See the mystery with answer key here.
(The narrative makes more sense and is more engaging if you read the full mystery here, below is a synopsis.)

The students start off with information that Wilbur Wildcat (the UA mascot) has been found in the library by one of the exhibits. They need to use the library website to figure out which one and where; they are given a clue that the exhibit features two types of music that were influential in Tucson's culture.

Here they get information the police have collected as well as stats from the medical examiner. They find out Wilbur died from exsiccion, which when they are prompted to look up in Stedman's Medical Dictionary from our health subject guide, they realize that this is actually a synonym for dehydration. From that, they are given a riddle to figure out that a five-letter word for a liquid that can cure dehydration is water. They then need to search the library catalog for a book about water and border issues. Once they find a particular book, they need to go to the stacks to get their next clue.

In this next clue, the students realize an important fact was left off the police report: the suspect left a copy of the Oxford English Dictionary at the scene of the crime, open to the page on aliens. Since the physical copy is locked up at police headquarters, they can luckily search the OED online through the library. They must write down the first use of the term alien in science fiction to realize that the suspect is extra-terrestrial. With this info, they then go to the reference desk and are required to ask a librarian for help in locating an article on UFO sightings in Arizona in the last 50 years. Once they find an article, they must write down the citation in APA style; if the librarian approves that the citation is correct, s/he will hand the team their next clue.

Going to the police with the hypothesis that the killer is an alien would probably get the detectives laughed at, so it is suggested in the next clue to get background information first. A great place to start for background info is CQ Researcher. They must look up UFOs in this database and click on the most recent entry (which, unfortunately, is 1996). They are prompted to read about the University of Arizona professor, James E McDonald, who was a pro-UFO meteorologist. He happened to collect dirt samples from UFO sightings, which are housed in Special Collections (I think this is awesome). They locate his name in CQ Researcher, then must search the catalog to find any works by him as an author in the stacks. They will find the McDonald papers which are housed in Special Collections, along with the dirt, and it is there they will apprehend the killer... who in fact isn't really a killer since the medical examiner made a small mistake in pronouncing Wilbur dead: he was simply in a coma from dehydration and just needs to drink some water (keeping it PG).

I'm excited to see how this goes, and how well my portion of the mystery ties into what Special Collections will be covering. More next time...

Using zines as an introduction to library research

I've used my zine lesson plan with 5 humanities classes now and posted the information (including handouts) to my portfolio. This is at an urban community college with many typically under-served students that may have low literacy skills and are pretty brand new to research and libraries.


The purpose from the instructor's perspective is to offer another option for the students to complete a final project; this arts appreciation class is one of the first courses a new student might take at this college. From the librarian's perspective, this is a way to introduce students to how publishing works, give them an opportunity for informal research and creativity. By allowing students to choose any topic relating to art that is of interest to them, it takes some of the pressure off potentially intimidating library resources being explored for the first time. This also falls under critical instruction by talking about whose voices get heard in which platforms and why. Who gets published in a magazine or journal, of course, differs from who might publish a blog or zine.


Many of our students are not familiar with zines, nor blogs. One of their other options for an assignment is to create an autobiographical entry in a blog, so I introduce that mini-lesson first and we talk about what blogs are and how they have evolved (most students have never had their own).

After getting an introduction to electronic self-publishing, I introduce zines but only minimally; I don't want to impose my view of zines before the students get a chance to form their own opinions. I break them up into groups and give each 1 zine, 1 magazine, and a Venn diagram worksheet to compare those items and blogs. After explaining how a Venn diagram works, I allow about 10 minutes for groupwork. After they compare and contrast, we discuss as a class and will look at things like appearance, cost, required knowledge/background, subjects covered, credibility, and publishing processes for differentiation. An interesting point that Jenna Freedman discusses in Zines Are Not Blogs is the digital divide. Students will say that blogs are free as opposed to zines and magazines, but that's not necessarily the case. One must have computer and internet access to read a blog, as well as at least *some* computer literacy to create a blog. If there is not a school or library nearby, an individual would be required to pay for computer/internet at home, and that is not free. This is an interesting perspective on where zines and blogs differ; there are people who believe zines are dead and why make a zine when you could just make a blog, but there are still people out there who don't have access to the tools required to read/create the electronic version of self-publishing.

After the discussion, I explain they will be making a mini-zine (1 piece of paper turned into an 8 page zine). They can choose any topic (as I mention above) as long as it relates somehow to the arts. It can be any style they want: typed, drawn, comic, collage, handwritten; they just need to include at least 2 sources in a citation from any library database. I demonstrate how to use one of our most user-friendly databases (Student Research Center) and then show them how to cite a source in the citation management software our library uses, NoodleTools.

I tell the students if they are going to make a zine, it's only fair if I make one too, in exchange (I am looking to collect student zines after grading to display in the library). After using sample search terms for yarn bombing (knit graffiti), I show them my final product so they can get a sense of the assignment from start to finish.

This has been a successful IL session so far and I am in the process of collecting zines from Fall semester and will be getting more from Winter term students! You can have access to learning objectives, the lesson plan, and handouts from my portfolio.

Trial by fire

Yesterday wound up being my first foray into library instruction. An instructor accidentally mixed up the times given for bringing his class in, so shortly before they would be arriving, my supervisor approached me at the reference desk with, "Guess what... you will be teaching today!" She was already scheduled to teach a class in the classroom, so I had to cover the other class on the computers by the entrance area. Part of my position is instruction, but it wasn't going to be for about another month until I would start.

Nothing like trial by fire as a few colleagues had mentioned to me later on. I had a slight case of terror, but at least previously sat in on a few of my supervisor's instruction sessions to be somewhat familiar with the material. I also figured there was no point in being nervous, because I didn't really have time. I was given the handouts the students get and was able to use those as my lesson plan; they also would serve as visuals since I didn't have the use of a computer/projector.

We went over what I would cover, and I was able to do a very quick run through until the class came in. I definitely had the jitters at first while passing out the handouts, but I think it was one of those things only you notice. As Olivia Mitchell said in regards to anxiety in public speaking,

Just like we don’t see the energetic paddling as a swan glides across the water, you don’t look as nervous as you feel.

Overall, I would say it went well. One of the biggest challenges was going at a pace that would keep the students who had already done similar exercises for other classes engaged, while also not going so fast that the students having more trouble would fall behind. I did end exactly on time, which was great, but I could tell about a third of the class was bored. I did find out later that a lot of that class was from our early college, so I had many high school students on the fast track. That helped me feel a little better about hearing a giggle or two, and I'm sure once I have more practice that wouldn't phase me.

Using analogies, such as going to different databases is like going to different stores when shopping, seemed to help the students who were struggling more to understand better. I would have liked to use more examples like that, but was more focused on getting across the correct information first.

Working in more humor is another goal I have for next time. I did see via the information literacy instruction discussion list (I believe) that someone is working on collecting information about using humor in library instruction, so I'd like to see the results of that when they are available. What I did do that my supervisor suggested was review how to get to the appropriate databases when the students would not be in the library: the scenario of being at home, waking up in the middle of the night, and just being so excited to do some research, what would you do to get to where we just went?

I think these improvements will come in time, but I am keeping notes of what I did well and what I'd like to work on so I can see progress as I teach more classes.

Static vs. dynamic tutorials

Recently, I created a tutorial for work to teach high school students completing undergraduate-level internships how to use the communicative features of the University of Arizona's course management software, D2L. It was quickly decided it would be necessary to show them these features earlier in the week, so my task was to have the tutorial published a day or so later, with me only working 5 hrs per day. I was definitely up for the challenge and excited to learn some new software, but first, I had to choose what to use. There seems to be a lot of talk about Camtasia and Captivate, and although I did want to base my choice on positive reviews of colleagues, I also did not want the tutorial to be a video. I could be wrong in assuming from skimming that both of those programs work in that way (remember, I had limited time), but nonetheless, I went on a search for something different that allowed for creating a static tutorial. Instead of just taking screen shots and then painting on, I opted to download and give Wink a try.

Before I explain why I both liked and did not like Wink, I do want to mention why I wanted a static tutorial instead of a dynamic one. I realize a video or changing features can be more interactive and maybe more exciting, but for people to learn something with a defined set of steps that don't have room for interpretation or creativity (how to send a classmate a page or how to get to your student profile), versus a lot of options for experimentation (searching databases or using Dreamweaver, for example), I think a static presentation is the best. People of course learn in different styles, but following a step by step set of instructions accompanied by non-changing visuals seems to be the easiest to follow, especially if the students would be copying the activities exactly as they go. Rather than pausing and rewinding a video to see where was clicked a few times, it would be more cognitively efficient to look at a screen with things pointed at or circled and the steps taken listed.

So, my opinion of Wink. First it's only for Windows and Linux, just to mention, and it took a couple tries to get the hang of it. The instructions aren't the greatest, and I had to watch the video tutorial more than once before I had a flow going. As mentioned, I opted to create a static tutorial, so how it worked was really just me navigating and then pressing the designated screen capture button. What made Wink stand out from the default screen capture/mark up program on the computer I was using, however, was how clean the add-ons looked and how simple they were to tack onto the shots once learning how all the features worked. It was then easy to export it to HTML or PDF. But, where it got tricky was figuring out how to make the file accessible. The PDF was nowhere near as good of quality as the HTML (it looked great printed, though), so I wanted to make sure to only post the HTML. From reading the instructions that come with Wink, I was under the impression that once you export to HTML, it is a standalone file that does not need to be uploaded to a web site to work, that it could just be opened directly into a browser. How wrong I was. After searching the Wink discussion boards, I realized I did in fact need to upload the file to the server, as well as the flash file and accompanying PNG images. Then, I had to go through the HTML and make sure each page of the tutorial was appropriately linked with the designated image. This took a bit of time since some were not connected and I had to double check the order.

Other problems were that the forward/backward buttons somehow moved away from the overlaying hyperlinks, so they stopped advancing to the next page when clicked. I had to go back to Dreamweaver and slide those back over. Also, even after being positive (triple checking) everything was linked and working, one of the pages just stopped working.

I don't know if I'd use Wink again -- now that I understand it better, it might be easier, but it was not the most efficient because I think I spent more time dealing with the software and it's problems than making the actual tutorial. I'm mostly pleased with the final product and would like to post it but don't feel comfortable since student names are captured in screen shots, but if I am able to make a version with fixes for privacy, I hope to share that in the near future.