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Research Guides

PWR Instructors: Library Instruction Options

PWR instructors

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The Learning Services department is currently offering a range of online resources and OWRC consultations you can mix and match to meet the needs of students in your composition classes this year. Our goal is for students to learn how to use the UW Libraries strategically, ask questions, and hone their research skills in a manner that is supportable by you and our Learning Services staff.

If you are looking for...

Option 1: Instructor Consultations

  • Use the consultation option as a gateway to conversation about the research dimensions of your syllabus. A consultation will help you choose which option on the menu is right for your needs.  Talk about assignment design, ideas for information literacy activities, Canvas materials, and other ways to teach your students information research skills, or to help develop a library-specific research assignment for your course.
     
  • Book a consultation with a librarian
  • In order to download or access a set of UW Libraries resources for teaching your students some key practices in finding and using information sources...go to DIY Information Literacy Instruction Resources

Option 2: In-Class Workshops

Instructors in UW in the High School sections may feel free to access or download any of these materials for use in their classrooms.

30-45 minute presentations by a research peer consultant that can take place in your classroom or via Zoom. Workshop availability is dependent on schedule availability of our peer consultant team.
 
You can choose from these workshop topics:

 

Workshop slots for Fall Quarter 2023 are now available and must be reserved at least a week in advance.
 
Tip: If students  need a quiet place to attend a Zoom workshop they can use a library study space or search Scout to find study spaces across campus.

Option 3: Online Tutorials

Option A: The Undergraduate Researcher Tutorial Is  is a self-paced 6-module Canvas-based tutorial that introduces undergraduate students to conceptual research skills and UW Libraries resources and services. You can assign your students one module or several, or import individual modules into your own Canvas course via Canvas Commons.

Option B: The Library Research 101 Notebook* is a self-paced Google Forms-based interactive activity that you can assign to orient your students to the Libraries' research tools and to help them do some introductory research. While it is designed to be completed asynchronously, it can also be used as the outline for a class, as long as students have means to complete the form and perform the searches they are prompted to do along the way. 

Two options for using the Notebook:

  1. Complete the public version of the Notebook, have results emailed to them, and forward them on to you;
  2. Or, create a copy of the Notebook for your own class, and either use it as-is or tweak the content to suit your individual class assignments. You will see the results of your students' work as individual responses and collated in Google Sheet upon completion. 

 

Tech tip: The Notebook is a Google Form, so the UW IT Connect website is your source for specific technical support, and the Google Workplace Learning Center has excellent guides for training and help.  

 

* The Notebook was inspired by a similar project at UC Berkeley.

Bonus option: Student Research Consultations

Sometimes there's just no substitute for one-on-one help. Encourage your students to make an appointment with a research peer consultant on defining a research question, exploring background information, narrowing or broadening a topic, finding appropriate sources, and identifying useful and credible information.Choose from online appointments via Zoom or an in-person appointment in the Odegaard Writing & Research Center (OWRC).

E-Book: Processes: Writing Across Academic Careers. "Showcasing the diversity of writing processes, styles, and formats in academia. Students, faculty, and staff share both published and unpublished work and reflect on their writing process as well as writing in their fields and disciplines. .... Students learning to write in college and in their specific disciplines will gain a holistic understanding of the kinds of writing they will encounter over the course of their academic careers and an appreciation for the multitudes of ways writers work." (Useful for instructors in the Program for Writing across the Curriculum (PWAC.)