Final Presentation Companion Paper Composed for LIS 764 Library User Instruction Jason D.

. Nosek Dominican University, Graduate School of Library and Information Science

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The purpose of this paper is discuss a lesson in which several learners will be presented with the Chicago Public Librarys (CPL) For Kids page. This discussion will cover the intended audience and context of the presentation, the method and rationale with regard to the contents covered, and finally the instructional objectives. To begin, the intended audience of this presentation is juvenile/young-adult public library patrons. More specifically, I envision the audience being grammar school students, roughly 3rd4th grade on a field trip to the local public library--in this case a branch of the Chicago Public Library--for an orientation session and to check out materials. The learners would most likely have some basic computer skills, i.e. rudimentary knowledge of the keyboard and mouse, and most likely able to perform moderate web navigation. Further, the learners are essentially a captive audience. This being said, the learner will be presented with the website in a way that hopefully invokes levity and fun by means of style and interaction/active learning which will be discussed in further detail later. Moving on, the first step in crafting a presentation is performing a needs analysis. As is noted by Grassian and Kaplowitz, No one is identifying information needs for you. You are actively going out there and looking form them. During the Needs Assessment process, you gather information about what is currently happening in instruction and compare that to what potential library users would like to have happen (133). Thus, I set out on my analysis at my own local branch of the CPL and observed a few things--juvenile patrons generally like the For Kids page, but do not know very much about it and struggle to locate and understand things like databases and of course, games and activities. After speaking with librarians at the branch, and from our in class discussions and readings, it was clear that active learning was key, and that

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learners seemed to take-in and remember more when information is presented/re-iterated in a game format. With this in mind, the learner will be engaged in a scavenger hunt near the end of the lesson. Lastly, young learners (like most learners across the board) tend to need things that are eye-catching; thus handouts need to have lots of color and presenters need to fully command their space and present material energetically and (for lack of a better word) loudly. After assessing the needs of the learners, it is important to consider the differences among learners, and then design the lesson(s) appropriately. Different learners may take internalize information in very different ways, and ...a better understanding of these differences will give the instructor a clearer insight into the who in our equation...learning styles help us to better understand who our learners are and how they prefer to learn(Grassian and Kaplowitz, 60). The author later continues this thought, mentioning that learners are rarely of one shape or size, and often ...fall somewhere along the [learning] continuum, but are probably closer to one end or the other(60). With this in mind, the learner will be presented with information in variety of formats to suit a variety of learning styles (and their overlap). The learners will view material on the screen, as they watch the instructor navigate the For Kids page--this will assist the visual, and to some extent, the read/write group. The presentation will of course be delivered in a traditional spoken format, which will be the strong suit for aural learners. Kinesthetic learners will be givn the option of following along, thus filling their needs to manipulate objects while learning, regardless of whether it directly or indirectly increases their capacity to learn (i.e. following and comprehending or just mindlessly clicking to keep their hands busy). Additionally, learners will receive a handout which contains text and images, thus (hopefully) satisfying both visual and read/write, and will have an activity in which we will speak to one another as it is in scavenger hunt form--thus facilitating learning for kinesthetic and aural

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learners. Lastly, the activity will be another iteration of the material, and it is widely accepted that young learners internalize information best through multiple iterations. Continuing on to the teaching approach, the presentation is essentially cognitive/constructive, in that it is assumed that the learner is coming to the library with some knowledge about what he or she may find, and may already understand some of the concepts and skills being presented. Then, the learner is presented with a variety of information, and asked internalize it and build on it through an activity--in this case, a scavenger hunt. This holds true to Grassian and Kaplowitzs description; Constructivists propose that learners are particularly likely to develop new ideas when they are actively involved...[which] causes them to reflect upon what they are learning and share that learning with others(43). Furthermore, Laura Saunders describes this type of learning in her article Teaching in the Library: Best Practices; Incidental learning, another active learning technique...takes place when learning is linked to fun activities or games. In this scenario, information is presented to the students in a game-like environment, so that learning is gained indirectly, as a by product of the entertainment(http://www.webpages.uidaho.edu/~mbolin/saunders.html). To reiterate, the approach is cognitive and involves active learning, thus the teaching method is essentially Constructivist. Lastly, it is imperative that goals and objectives be set. Grassian and Kaplowitz describe goals as big picture, overarching ideas, whereas objectives are more concrete and quantifiable, and may indicate the progress on accomplishing the larger goals (136). Objectives may also be called competencies (Battersby, http://courses.capcollege.bc.ca/faculty/mbattersby/whatsalearningoutcome.htm). For this presentation, the goals are that the learner become familiar with the For Kids site, how the

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library works, and improves critical thinking skills via active learning. The objective is that the learner completes the scavenger hunt activity.

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