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Sara Thompson

The Learning Black Market - 0 views

tallblog.conted.ox.ac.uk/...the-learning-black-market

info-literacy search training education research students

shared by Sara Thompson on 12 Dec 11 - No Cached
  • In simple terms students personal use of the internet is generally very effective for their education but they are nervous that their practices are not valid and don’t reveal them to their tutors.
  • The learning black market exists largely in the Personal area of the map. Our data from the Transitional education-stage (Late stage secondary school + first year undergraduate) is indicating that learning activity in this area has two main elements
  • I suspect that Facebook IM is used extensively for homework as it’s convenient and immediate. It’s also private and a very low risk way of collaborating with a fellow student.
  • ...5 more annotations...
  • The debate should be around how we evolve educational processes to take advantage of or to account for these new forms.  We cannot continue to teach the literacies that have been the mainstay of the educational system in their current form because the web smashes traditional paths to understanding.
  • A search on Google to help complete an assignment commonly returns a Wikipedia article. As we know Wikipedia articles are pitched at an ideal level and length to get a handle on a new subject which is something our Transitional students have to do a lot. The problem is that most of the students in the Transitional education stage we have spoken to in the US and the UK have been told not to use Wikipedia and so keep this practice a secret.
  • This is generating the learning black market in which is it all too easy to simulate understanding for coursework and formal assessments. Worse still, it is a market in which genuine learning can take place but is not being recognised because resources and practices are not seen as valid and therefore do not become visible to the formal education system.
  • I think what you are describing here is more accurately a grey (or parallel) market “the trade of a commodity through distribution channels which, while legal, are unofficial, unauthorized, or unintended by the original manufacturer”.
  • I chose the name ‘Learning Black Market’ because of the way in which I think current approaches are pushing students learning practices ‘underground’ (as Jo’s experience would indicate). It’s the clandestine aspect of the phrase that I’m interested in. The ‘goods and services’ are not in themselves illegal but they are being treated that way by students.
  • Sara Thompson on 12 Dec 11
     
    "The messages or lack of messages from educational institutions on these practices is generating a learning black market which masks the sheer scale of these new modes of engagement."
Sara Thompson

"I need three peer reviewed articles" or the Freshman research paper | Information Want... - 0 views

meredith.wolfwater.com/...or-the-freshman-research-paper

instruction info-literacy libraries writing education

shared by Sara Thompson on 08 Dec 11 - No Cached
  • And every year, I become more and more convinced that having first-year students use peer-reviewed literature in their research is a terrible idea that takes the focus away from what is important for them to learn.
  • Expecting a first-year student to be able to grasp literary criticism and science articles written for other PhD’s seems crazy to me.
  • It becomes more about finding an article that is at least somewhat related to their topic than finding good evidence for their argument.
  • ...4 more annotations...
  • I understand perfectly that faculty want their first-year students to find quality resources and they want their students to have an understanding of scholarly communication. But is the best way to do that forcing them to find scholarly articles for a research paper? That requires so many different skills that many of these students don’t have yet: 1. The ability to turn a topic into a search strategy 2. The ability to search in library databases 3. The ability to look at a citation and determine whether it is a scholarly journal or not (or maybe they’ve just checked a box in a database which means that they never need to learn this important skill) 4. The ability to read an abstract and determine whether the article is relevant to their topic 5. The ability to read a scholarly journal article and synthesize information from it 6. The ability to integrate evidence from the scholarly literature into their paper 7. The ability to write effectively
  • Another thing that the focus on requiring students to only find peer-reviewed sources does is that it distances them from research and information literacy.
  • But when the focus is on telling students that the only quality stuff comes from the peer-reviewed literature, we are distancing what students learn in school about information literacy from what they will do in the real world.
  • I also love the idea of giving all students in a class peer-reviewed articles from different disciplines and have them analyze them together. It can not only help them to understand and dissect peer-reviewed literature, but it can also show them the differences in scholarly communication in different disciplines.
fleschnerj

Why Kids Can't Search - 1 views

www.wired.com/...st_thompson_searchresults

Digital Native Searching Research

shared by fleschnerj on 08 Nov 11 - No Cached
  • fleschnerj on 08 Nov 11
     
    The more I read about digital natives, the more I want to call the idea bunk. (I used to be a big proponent of the concept.)
  • Sara Thompson on 08 Nov 11
     
    Oh the idea is completely bunk. Just had a little rant about that on my blog.
  • fleschnerj on 09 Nov 11
     
    Ah! I must read that. Perhaps an article on the topic? I've been keeping halfway decent records of reference/computer questions. Combine that with anecdotal evidence from you and we might have a nice little read...
Deb Robertson

ACRLog » Convenience and its Discontents: Teaching Web-Scale Discovery in the... - 1 views

acrlog.org/...overy-in-the-context-of-google

information literacy instruction ACRLog Grand Vallet State University

shared by Deb Robertson on 30 Jan 12 - No Cached
  • Deb Robertson on 30 Jan 12
     
    Providing a unified interface through which patrons can access nearly all of your library's collection has an obvious appeal on all sides. Users get the googley familiarity and convenience of a singular, wide-ranging search box and, according to a recent case study done at Grand Valley State University, the reduced friction patrons face when using library resources correlates to an increase - potentially dramatic - in the frequency with which they access them. If the new tool is like Google, then why does it require instruction?
Deb Robertson

Balancing Act: How College Students Manage Technology While in the Library during Crun... - 0 views

projectinfolit.org/...11_TechStudy_FullReport1.2.pdf

Project Information Literacy PIL information literacy College Students

shared by Deb Robertson on 24 Feb 12 - No Cached
  • Deb Robertson on 24 Feb 12
     
    Our major findings are as follows: 1. During one of the busiest times of the academic year, the students we interviewed were mainly using different IT devices to stay in touch with their friends while they were in the campus library. In the hour before we interviewed them, 81% of the students in our sample had checked for new messages (e.g., email, Facebook, IMs, texts). 2. At the same time, many of the same respondents who said they had checked for messages had also prepared assignments for submission (60%), studied and reviewed materials for class (52%), and satisfied personal curiosity with a computer search (e.g., sports score, news, gossip) (45%). 3. Despite the pressing need to complete assignments at crunch time, few respondents reported having used the full range of library resources and/or services during the previous hour. Many more respondents said they had used library equipment (39%) such as computers and printers than anything else, including scholarly research databases (11%), library books (9%), face-to-face reference (5%), and/or online reference (2%). 4. Overall, we found most respondents (85%) could be classified as "light" technology users. These were students who used "only" one or two IT devices primarily in support of coursework and, to a lesser extent, communication. The most frequent combination (40%) of devices being used was a cell phone (including smart phones) with a personally owned laptop computer while they were in the library. In stark contrast, only 8% of the sample could be classified as "heavy" technology users. 5. For over half the sample, a personally owned laptop (58%) was the primary-most essential-device in use at the time of the interview. A smaller percentage of respondents (35%) were using a library desktop computer. 6. More than any other combination of applications, respondents had both a Web browser and a word processing program open at the same time (47%) while they were in the library. 7. Despi
fleschnerj

Google-Trained Minds Can't Deal with Terrible Research Database UI - 0 views

www.theatlantic.com/...253641

Searching digital native

shared by fleschnerj on 01 Mar 12 - No Cached
  • fleschnerj on 01 Mar 12
     
    Comments are the best p Students of all ages can have a good deal of trouble doing research online. (And not just students, we'll admit, if we're honest.) The obvious answer to this problem is to train people to do better searches. But the most obvious answer may not be the best one.
fleschnerj

The three mindsets of searching. - 2 views

lisnews.org/nswer_me_educate_me_inspire_me

searching websites interesting

shared by fleschnerj on 04 Oct 11 - No Cached
  • fleschnerj on 04 Oct 11
     
    Here's an interesting one. I wonder where most of our users would fit in...
  • Sara Thompson on 05 Oct 11
     
    I'm pretty sure they would mostly fall under "Answer Me" ... our challenge is to open them up to the "Educate Me" and "Inspire Me" possibilities as well.
Sara Thompson

Wolfram|Alpha Analyzes Shakespeare's Plays - 0 views

blog.wolframalpha.com/...ha-analyzes-shakespeares-plays

dighum literature data statistics reading language search

shared by Sara Thompson on 11 Apr 12 - No Cached
  • Sara Thompson on 11 Apr 12
     
    "We thought it would be interesting to see what sorts of computational insights Wolfram|Alpha could provide, so we uploaded the complete catalog of Shakespeare's plays into our database. This allows our users to examine Romeo and Juliet, Macbeth, Othello, and the rest of the Bard's plays in an entirely new way."
Mark Lindner

Glorious Generalist: Simplifying Library Database Interfaces - 2 views

www.gloriousgeneralist.com/...ng-library-database-interfaces

librariana database research search

shared by Mark Lindner on 28 Mar 12 - No Cached
  • Mark Lindner on 28 Mar 12
     
    EBSCO interface tweaking & general thoughts on db interfaces By the way, I know this author personally.
Sara Thompson

Library Labs RSS4Lib - 0 views

www.rss4lib.com/library-labs

libraries innovation creativity technology examples webtools search research

shared by Sara Thompson on 28 Jun 12 - No Cached
  • Sara Thompson on 28 Jun 12
     
    "The following is an alphabetical list of library web pages that list experimental, beta, or trial web tools and services."
Deb Robertson

Best practices for integrating e-books in academic libraries | The Search Principle: vi... - 1 views

blogs.ubc.ca/...-e-books-in-academic-libraries

collection development eBooks best practices

shared by Deb Robertson on 17 Sep 12 - No Cached
  • Deb Robertson on 17 Sep 12
     
    This posting offers links and references to several other articles on this topic.
  • Deb Robertson on 17 Sep 12
     
    Still trying to solve this puzzle
Mark Lindner

It occurs to me that my desire for our discovery... - LSW - FriendFeed - 2 views

friendfeed.com/...at-my-desire-for-our-discovery

libraries search friendfeed have_read

shared by Mark Lindner on 11 Jan 12 - No Cached
  • Mark Lindner on 11 Jan 12
     
    Excellent discussion of discovery layers vs. OPACs, especially in small liberal arts schools. Should be read and seriously thought about.
Sara Thompson

Nobody cares about the library: How digital technology makes the library invisible (and... - 1 views

www.foundhistory.org/...isible-and-visible-to-scholars

libraries usability userstudies training professional

shared by Sara Thompson on 23 Feb 12 - No Cached
  • Yet, while it is certainly true that digital technology has made libraries and librarians invisible to scholars in some ways, it is also true, that in some areas, digital technology has made librarians increasingly visible, increasingly important.
  • The invisible library
  • Let me offer three instances where the library should strive for invisibility, three examples of “good” invisibility:
  • ...8 more annotations...
  • Search:
  • APIs and 3rd party mashups:
  • Social media:
  • The visible library
  • Focus on special collections
  • Start supporting data-driven research
  • Start supporting new modes of scholarly communication—financially, technically, and institutionally.
  • Here I’d suggest tools and training for database creation, social network analysis, and simple text mining.
  • Sara Thompson on 23 Feb 12
     
    Skip the first bit about the Chuck clip - not important and too long. Scroll forward to the part starting with "The Invisible Library" -- excellent food for thought about the roles we play. 
Sara Thompson

10 Amazing Uses for Wolfram Alpha - How-To Geek - 0 views

www.howtogeek.com/...amazing-uses-for-wolfram-alpha

search webtools data research statistics

shared by Sara Thompson on 02 Mar 12 - No Cached
  • Enter two terms with a vs in between them and you’ll get a comparison. For example, you could compare websites to see the differences in traffic between them.
  • Enter a type of food and Wolfram Alpha will provide you with its nutrition information. You don’t have to stop at one — enter multiple types of food and Wolfram Alpha will compare them for you.
  • Ask where you are and Wolfram will use your IP address to track you down. You can also enter an IP address into the box and Wolfram will track that IP address down and tell you where it is.
  • ...5 more annotations...
  • Wolfram Alpha can come up with a random password and estimate how long it will take to crack. You can even tweak the rules used to generate the password.
  • Have you been drinking? Wolfram Alpha can estimate whether you can legally drive home. Ask it if you’re drunk and you’ll get a form asking for more information.
  • Enter a name and you can see how common it is, complete with a graph showing you how popular the name has been over time. Enter multiple names and Wolfram will compare how common they are.
  • Type body mass index and Wolfram will present you with another form. After you provide your weight and height, Wolfram Alpha will calculate your BMI and tell you whether you’re within the normal range.
  • Want to find words that begin with a certain letter, end with a certain combination of letters — or both? Just ask Wolfram Alpha in plain English.
Mark Lindner

Comparison - Unified Resource Discovery Comparison - 0 views

sites.google.com/...comparison

libraries search

shared by Mark Lindner on 09 Feb 12 - No Cached
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