This study was designed to inform the renaming of a credit-bearing information literacy course. Researchers surveyed librarians to gather existing information literacy course titles. They also surveyed and held focus groups with students to learn what students consider when choosing electives, to understand how well the researchers' current…

When talking about collection development, few school librarians think about databases. Databases provide learners with a one-stop shop for cross-curricular, up-to-date, vetted information in a structured and easy-to-manipulate format for class projects. To be successful learners, students need to know how to use a database to find the information…

Genrefying a library's fiction collection is a common practice in school libraries. However, there is little research to explain the benefits or drawbacks of this practice. Using a within-subjects/time-series action research design, this study was conducted to understand more about the impact of genrefying the fiction collection in a single…

This study assesses and compares the quality of sources found by undergraduate students when doing research using both Google and a library (federated) search tool. Thirty undergraduates were asked to find four sources (one book, two articles, and one additional source of their choosing) related to a selected research topic. Students used both…

The purpose of this study was to determine the extent to which organized training on accessing library resources affects library anxiety. The researchers revised and used the Multidimensional Library Anxiety Scale created by D. J. Van Kampen-Breit, which was designed to assess an individual's perception of an academic library and the information…

This study compared two common types of online information literacy tutorials: a streaming media tutorial using animation and narration and a text-based tutorial with static images. Nine sections of an undergraduate biology lab class (234 students total) were instructed by a librarian on how to use the BIOSIS Previews database. Three sections…

EBSCO Discovery Service (EDS) has been heavily used by UMUC students since its implementation in fall 2011, but experience has shown that it is not always the most appropriate source for satisfying students' information needs and that they often need assistance in understanding how the tool works and how to use it effectively. UMUC librarians have…

Extensive engagement with current academic sources is expected of all psychology undergraduates. Thirty-eight undergraduate psychology students took part in a series of focus group discussions of their information-searching experiences and skills. The majority of students had not been required to engage with any form of information searching while…

Eighteen scholarly papers and twelve abstracts comprise the content of the fourteenth annual Brick and Click Libraries Symposium, held annually at Northwest Missouri State University in Maryville, Missouri. The proceedings, authored by academic librarians and presented at the symposium, portray the contemporary and future face of librarianship.…

This study identifies the development of information search expertise of 12 beginning research students (six in education and six in engineering) who were provided with a set of systematic search training sessions over a period of one year. The study adopts a longitudinal approach in investigating whether there were different stages in the…

Some faculty and administrators naively believe that undergraduates come to campus as information literate individuals since these students know how to use computers and the Internet. Yet, as librarians, they know that there is more to IL than surfing search engines, IMing, and word processing. So marketing IL becomes a very important task. This…

Fullerton, California--College students use technology constantly. They text-message friends, compile playlists for their iPods, and are whizzes at updating their MySpace profiles. But when it comes to one kind of work they are required to do in college--namely, academic research--they can be inept. Too often, college officials say, students rely…

Surveys the literature on the teaching of bibliographic search strategies to college students, emphasizing the areas of instructional content and teaching methods. (FM)

Many teachers think too little about the role of the library media specialist in their professional lives, and because of this oversight they underutilize this great resource. This article explains the top ten reasons why teachers should work with their library media specialists: (1) Improving test scores and enhancing student academic…

A timed comparison was made of two methods of searching. Five bibliographic searchers timed themselves while searching by possible main entries in the National Union Catalog. The authors then timed themselves searching the same items by title in the English Language Books by Title and in Library of Congress National Program for Acquisitions and…