empower research skills

Empower College Students' Research Skills Via Digital Media

This presentation focuses on demonstrating an ongoing project designed to utilize digital media for learning, instruction, and performance. By producing YouTube videos and Flash-based tutorials, the multimedia project team at a Midwest university library was able to provide virtual services for students who don’t usually come to library for research help. The design and development process for producing low-cost projects will be shared. An example of each type of digital media project will be provided.
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This presentation focuses on demonstrating an ongoing project designed to utilize digital media for learning, instruction, and performance. By producing YouTube videos and Flash-based tutorials, the multimedia project team at a Midwest university library was able to provide virtual services for digital natives who don’t usually come to library for research help. The design and development process for producing low-cost projects will be shared. An example of each type of digital media project will be provided. As the face of education and the idea of the university library are changing, getting students to ask for research help is a higher education challenge. Today's learners are known as digital natives, some of the characteristics of digital natives have been described as: they are multimedia oriented, web based, impatient, surface-oriented, nonlinear, multitasker, risk taker, creative, social, instant gratification, expressive, active involvement, constant engagement, prefer electronic environments, have electronic friends, less textural, less structures, and information overload (McLester, 2007). In particular, some characteristics give us an idea about how digital natives are accessing information. For example, digital natives are not looking for the right answer, they see all information equally whether the information is retrieved from Google, Wikipedia, and the sources to which those sites point them, and the gaps to access information are widening. Obviously, digital natives learn differently as their parents did. Palfrey and Gasser (2008, p. 241) argues that “there is no evidence to suggest that they are learning less..”. Therefore, rather than letting digital natives lose their way of learning; the challenge for universities and libraries is to help them make sense of the information and the surrounded context. What is digital media? Heinich et al. (2002) articulate medium as "a channel of communication" that "carries information between a source and a receiver" (p. 9, p.10). Over the years, new media has been elaborated to a broad definition as "digital, often having characteristics of being manipulability, networkable, dense, compressible, and impartial" (Wikipedia, 2008). According to Briggs (2007), digital media is content and services delivered over digital channels such as the Internet. While watched, the content and services can be connected (streaming/live) or unconnected (downloads/DVD). From YouTube to YouNiversity Since October 2008, several universities have been setting up channels on YouTube. The video collection is not only distributed educational content, but also "selling" the university to outer world. For example, being the first to launch YouTube, University of California-Berkeley offers a series of university courses for free; UChannel by Princeton University provides a collection of international and political affairs videos, or MIT's new collection of classroom lectures. Other universities include Vanderbilt, University of Southern California, Duke University, Purdue University, Oxford University, and Auburn University. Some university professors also use YouTube to extend their classroom, a well-known example is Dr. Michael L. Wesch, an assistant professor of cultural anthropology at Kansas State University, who made the video "Web 2.0: The Machine is Us/ing Us" and drew more than 400,000 views. Unquestionably, "Web video offers a new way for scholars to communicate" (Young, 2008). Begin in spring 2007, a multimedia production team was established at the University of Northern Iowa Library. The team’s primary goal is to produce a series of ongoing podcasts, YouTube videos, and Flash-based tutorials for virtual service. This team consists of a librarian and an instructional designer; in addition, some student assistants are hired to work with the team. The student assistants' roles vary based on the project need. Some of the main roles include: (1) brainstorm ideas to capture college students’ attention; (2) help polish scripts using their common language; (3) act in the videos; and (4) help edit and produce the final products. While the ultimate goal for these videos is to empower college students' research skills, these digital media projects are designed into small modules with clear purposes to meet the diverse students' needs. For example, for college freshmen, a series of "quick tips" such as how to use online databases, electronic newspaper resources, and how to schedule a research consultation were developed. For international students, tips for how to check out books, study rooms, DVDs, laptops, and lockers were developed. For specific research tools such as how to use print-based Social Science Citation Index and the library's meta-search engine, a series of Flash-based tutorials created by Adobe Captivate were developed. After the production, the videos were then announced on the University's online newspaper, the library’s news blog, and the library's print newsletter. This presentation focuses on demonstrating an ongoing project designed to utilize digital media for learning, instruction, and performance. By producing YouTube videos and Flash-based tutorials, the multimedia project team at a Midwest university library was able to provide virtual services for digital natives who don’t usually come to library for research help. The design and development process for producing low-cost projects will be shared. An example of each type of digital media project will be provided. In this session, the presenter will demonstrate this on going project that utilized digital media. The design and development process for producing low-cost projects will be shared. An example of each type of digital media project will be provided. Everyone who is interested in using digital media for learning, instruction, and performance will benefit from the participation. McLester, S. (2007, March 15). Technology Literacy and the MySpace Generation. Technology & Learning. Retrieved February 14, 2009, from http://www.techlearning.com/article/7074. Young, J. (2008, January 25). YouTube Professors: Scholars as Online Video Stars. Chronicle of Higher Education, 54(20), A19-A19. Retrieved February 16, 2009, from Professional Development Collection database. Jenkins, H. (2007). From YouTube to YouNiversity. The Chronicle of Higher Education. Rolls, A. (2006). New media (The reference shelf, v.78, n.2). New York: H.W. Wilson. Palfrey, J. & Gasser, U. (2008). Born digital: Understanding the first generation of digital natives. New York: Basic Books. Buckingham, D. & Willett, R. (2006). Digital generations: Children, young people, and new media. Mahwah, N.J.: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers. Marselas, K. (2006). College lectures go digital. In A. Rolls. (Ed.), New media (The reference shelf, v.78, n.2) (pp. 117-119). New York: H. W. Wilson.