Online Library & Research Instruction with LibWizard TutorialsStephanie C. GillespiePellissippi State Community College, United States of AmericaSince 2017, we’ve created LibWizard tutorials to address equitable library and research instruction opportunities for online students, especially asynchronous ones. Despite our initial hesitancy, we have been delighted to find other benefits to offering them to all students, such as:
- reach students whose instructors do not prefer guest lecturers or have no in-class time;
- strengthen faculty relationships by collaborating to create or update tutorials;
- Offer library and research instruction at students’ point of need;
- provide instruction to students who miss the in-class session;
- provide interactive lessons that include many types of materials;
- have a solution ready when we cannot fulfill an instruction request;
- increase our reach among students by 20-24% pre-Covid;
- assess student’s research skills and how they contribute to course success and retention;
- gather student feedback about which explanations or questions are unclear;
- help us create student-driven FAQs;
- collect quotes of student praise that can be used to market library services.
When the Covid pandemic hit, we were extremely grateful to have them ready to offer instructors while we considered solutions for live sessions online. In this session, we will discuss our experiences, lessons learned, and process for building, managing, and updating tutorials.