English 101 Class

So I have been teaching students in the library one-shot sessions for close to three years now, but I still get nervous. Preparation for this class began two or three weeks ago, but I still felt like I was scrambling to get ready. Last week I sent a tentative outline with some tentative worksheets to the instructor. He asked if this would include/allow for a "quick tour." Then I looked at his request a bit more closely and saw that he did ask for an introduction to the Library's resources, so a tour made sense, though I wonder if librarians know how to give a "quick tour." We love libraries, so where do we stop?

As with other classes, I asked for a list of student topics. Instead, the instructor gave me access to his Moodle course, which allowed me to go see students' posts within a class forum. This proved to be very useful. With the topics I chose one that allowed me to find a resource on three of our four floors (apparently there are not many books on human genetic engineering in our Special Collection = basement). With call numbers in hand, we went straight to the spot on the shelves where the resources could be found. This emphasized that items with call numbers can be found on all floors of the Library, so researchers to pay attention to the "Library Location" within the catalog.

Once we found and discussed the book a bit, I had students read previously printed questions, which just happened to be color coded. Students with a blue question read it aloud on the 3rd floor before I answered it. It did tax my memory to remember which floor went with which color; perhaps I should have written it out on my outline, which I did take with me. This livened up the tour a bit, and it even solicited a few extemporaneous questions. Many refer to this as the Cephalonian Method.

Admittedly, the tour was not so quick as I wished it would have been, but the instructor commented that he had never had one of classes take a tour, but he was glad we did it today. He thought that the questions would be used after my spiel, sort of as a review exercise, but he said that this actually worked better having students ask questions. It seems that students become owners of their questions, they get to hear someone else's voice, and they tend to pay a bit more attention.

Ideally, it works even better if you can insert a couple humorous questions, anecdotes, or bits of information on the tour. If you have any examples, please share. My tour spiel could use some improvement. I did not tell them everything I know about the Library, which is always tempting, but students do not remember it all anyway. It's good to emphasize to them to come ask us for help in case they do forget stuff.

During the class we also talked about the research process and looked up materials in our Library catalog, so this seemed to be a good course to follow for an English 101 class. The active-learning, Cephalonian exercise contributed to make the class a bit better.