In a previous post, I mentioned an article I read by Anne-Marie Deitering. She talked about using Wikipedia as a browsing platform in the information literacy classroom; or at least that perhaps it’s better suited to browsing then the databases we’re advocating. Inspired by her article, I decided that most web 2.0 applications are better tools for teaching students how browsing is different than searching. I also decided that because browsing is overlooked in favor of searching (or we assume the student has already gone through those motions prior to coming in for library instruction), I wanted to emphasize the importance of browsing as a crucial component of the research process because it leads to discovery. Instead of just saying that, however, I wanted to actually host a browse session.
After doing some ice-breakers and introductions, I opened the class with a browse session. In other words, I created a fun handout in which I encouraged students to think about topics that “boiled their blood” or “confused them beyond belief.” (Students were in between assignments when they came in.) The handout had a picture of a woman pushing a shopping cart through the aisles at walmart. Below that, I urged them to choose topics guided by their own interests (the former composition instructor in me.) I provided a list of news portals (BBC news, CNN news, Yahoo news, Youtube, New York times, etc.) and gave them 7 minutes to peruse the headlines noting things that caught their attention. (Only a 50 minute class…)
What I found was a little shocking, though: students were really browsing AND writing things down! What joy! As I walked around the room, occasionally glancing at monitors, no students were checking their email, looking at their facebook page, or playing solitaire. It was a miracle. I was witnessing the beginnings of the research process and it was a beautiful thing. I really hated to have to stop them because I could tell they were really using their time productively.
I asked them: “so you just did a brief browse session to see what kinds of things are out there. What’s the difference between “browsing” and “searching”?
One student is always willing: he said that you search when you want something in particular, but you browse when you don’t have anything in mind. Indeed! Here, I insert a little anecdote about shopping with my mom. A clerk would always ask: “is there anything I can help you find?” My mom replied: “No thank you:) I’m just browsing.” I think this little anecdote exposes my humanness and clarifies the differences between searching and browsing quite simply.
I was pleased that students got to see that browsing is a crucial part of the whole research process…AND the library was a premiere space that celebrates and facilitates that discovery and curiosity! The browsing activity was a great segue into the group work that proceeded it: how you can begin to create a search strategy and brainstorm key words.
All of this experimenting with browse sessions and collaborative group work hints at my obsession with how NOT to teach information literacy to undergraduates. (That wretched demo comes to mind here in which the instructor stands like a statue at the front of the classroom while students sleep or talk to their friends.) We are always walking a fine line in the information literacy classroom, and students’ “success” comes from the balancing of engaging instructors on one hand and and motivated students on the other. It get’s really exciting somewhere in the grey areas. I am trying to be careful not to place all of the burden of effective teaching on the shoulders of instructors alone. (You may have heard musicians talk about the energy exchange between performer and audience: there are bad audiences–the unaffected or uninspired.) But the best of instructors or performers have the ability to shape an experience and draw people into it, even if only for a little while. (Bill Hicks did this often. He worked with “tough crowds” that were virtually unresponive and was able to amazingly reinvigorate them.)
That said, it’s tough NOT to talk too much when you’re an instructor. But I’ve been getting away from talking the more I teach. My last two classes, I think, were far more engaging then any other class I’ve taught. I included a mixture of mediums in the classroom to better serve a multiplicity of learning styles. (I had some individual work, collaborative work, and integrated web 2.0 technologies like Youtube in addition to the browse session.) For the most part, the students were always doing something.
It’s easy to do boring demos, but I can’t do that anymore in my work with undergraduates. Maybe that I’m a new librarian makes me overzealous. But when you lose the responsiveness of an audience, you lose the energy that propels the class forward. It’s the energy and motivation that make a classroom environment stimulating and meaningful; and I think you can get that by creating a space of action or hands-on learning rather than the space of sedation or passivity that just won’t cut it anymore–if it ever did.
