Do your students struggle with a particular aspect of research? Perhaps source discovery, evaluation, or integration per style manuals? We welcome the opportunity to collaborate with you and your existing assignments to highlight explicitly for students the types of source, questions, or techniques specific to your course. Share your assignment or syllabus with your subject librarian or the Instruction Librarian, to start the journey. We can suggest novel assessment techniques, too.
Librarians can instruct students in strategies for finding, evaluating, and using the most appropriate information sources for their coursework. We can also discuss citation practices and the ethical use of information.
Librarians in class can:
Many students come to us confused by an assignment. As librarians, we may refer them to other services, such as tutoring or office hours, to clarify some aspects. We also welcome the opportunity to improve the universal design of your course one assignment at a time.
Being explicit in the expectations of a discipline improves course assignments for all students. Bradley University's interdisciplinary students may not realize what practices do and don't transfer from one class to another. Work with a librarian to update your syllabus one assignment at a time.
Librarians are generalists and appreciate your input to identify a specific source you expect students to encounter for an assignment. Discuss with your subject librarian the amount of instruction you want students to receive, from how to find the book to an embedded link directly to the book. We can share this with everyone at the research help desk to ensure all students receive the same quality of support.
Finally, let us know in advance if you are including the library in a scavenger hunt or other type of high use assignment. We need to collaborate with the shelvers to be especially responsive to returning a specific book several times in an hour or two. Moreover, we can suggest better assignments that balance students' ingenuity and efficiency to prefer online activities, in order to ensure your students see the spaces and people when and where you intended.
In addition to visiting your physical classroom or hosting your class in the library, librarians can be embedded into your Canvas courses to provide resources and direct assistance to your students. Librarians can create resource pages, participate in discussion forums, and communicate with students about their research needs.
Course reserves are the course-related materials instructors provide for student usage - this could be extra copies of the textbook, additional readings, study materials, or anything else relevant to the course. You can place your personal items on reserve or have library materials put on reserve. These items stay in the library, or are checked out for shortened amounts of time, to increase availability for students. Consult the Course Reserves service page for more information about how to place items on reserve.
If you are redistributing published works within your course - such as sharing articles for your students to read or scanning chapters from library books - it's important to understand the relevant copyright rules. You can consult with your subject librarian about appropriate use of materials as well as utilizing the copyright guide that the librarians have put together.
Open Educational Resources (OER) can help reduce financial barriers to academic success, as well as allow for innovative pedagogical practices. Librarians can help you locate OER that you might use in your class to replace more expensive or hard-to-access materials.
Faculty, staff, and students request for the library to purchase a book or other item for the library's collection. If it is within the library's budget and collection development policies, librarians will consider purchasing it. Use the request form linked below.