Search

Blended education, which mixes elements of face-to-face and online educational delivery, can occur at the activity, course, program, or administrative level. This study examined the use of student blogs to test the benefits of course-level blended educational delivery for LIS students enrolled in a face-to-face course. Data collected from students' blogs were also used to assess whether Zach and Agosto's (2009) framework for maximizing student collaboration and knowledge sharing in online courses can be applied to face-to-face courses. The study found that blogs successfully supported collaboration and community building because they were well-suited to sharing course-related knowledge and because students encountered few technical barriers. These findings support Zach and Agosto's proposed criteria for selecting technologies to foster increased collaboration and knowledge sharing, e.g., low learning curves and easily facilitated student interaction. The results suggest that blended education can bring many of the educational benefits of online learning to face-to-face students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigated the teaching and learning barriers that prevent LIS instructors from achieving their goals in teaching reference and information services and considered what educators can learn from these barriers in order to improve the teaching of reference. The study methods involved focus group interviews with 16 LIS faculty members from 13 ALA-accredited LIS graduate programs in the U.S. and Canada. Data analysis uncovered three major categories of teaching and learning barriers: technological obstacles, student characteristics, and the nature of the field of reference. The article concludes with a discussion of the deeper themes that underlie the barriers identified and with ideas for reducing these barriers in order to increase the quality of reference and information services education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The state of remote reference services in the United States was assessed by surveying remote reference availability at 100 U.S. public libraries, examining remote reference in the syllabi of American Library Association (ALA)-accredited library and information science (LIS) courses in the U.S., and analyzing national competencies and guidelines. Findings indicated that the telephone was the most common medium in use for remote reference services at public libraries, followed by e-mail and chat. In teaching, however, syllabi at US programs addressed digital remote reference media far more often than the telephone. Reference standards and guidelines primarily focused on general practices applicable to both remote and face-to-face reference work, rather than on specifics relevant to differing remote reference media types. Included in this study are recommendations to address this apparent disconnect among reference practices, teaching, and professional guidelines. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]