About This Site The Hands-On Library Instruction web site was conceived, written, and prepared by the University Library’s Instruction Team: Kathy Dobda - Library Instruction Coordinator and Education Librarian Marianne Nolan - Multimedia Center Coordinator, Distance Learning and History Librarian HTML and Flash development was done by Systems Associate and Web Manager Donna Stewart and Instructional Design Librarian Ken Burhanna. Special Thanks We wish to thank all of you who offered criticism, comments, and advice in helping develop the Hands-On Library Instruction site. We offer special thank-yous to Mary Murray of the Cleveland State University Writing Center and the English Department for their invaluable suggestions. Acknowledgments What is Hands-On Library Instruction? Hands-On is an instructional web site designed to teach the basics of research and using libraries. The site presents a series of self-paced lessons that users can work through in a linear or non-linear fashion. The lessons deliver concept-level instruction in the setting of Cleveland State’s University Library. Skills and concepts are reinforced by active learning exercises that ask users to take a Hands-On approach to the material. The skills and concepts presented seek to support and promote the ACRL’s Information Literacy Standards. What skills and concepts are covered? The lessons from Hands-On Library Instruction are organized into five content areas: Research Planning: covers analyzing the assignment, topic selection, topic development, and finding background information. Finding Books: covers the ins and outs of using the Library’s Scholar catalog. Finding Articles: covers concepts of scholarly versus popular literature, peer-reviewed journals, searching by title and topic, and selecting indexes. Searching the Web: defines the Internet and WWW, covers what info is on the public web and what is not, introduces search engines, subject directories, and the invisible web. Evaluating Information: covers the role of evaluation in users’ lives, evaluating search results, analyzing content, and evaluating information on the web. Who Should Use Hands-On Library Instruction? Hands-On Library Instruction was designed for undergraduate students, but it will assist anyone unfamiliar with the basics of research and using libraries. More specifically, the site is intended to support the information literacy instruction needs of English 102 classes, providing a learning framework against which students can conduct their own library research. How Should Hands-On Library Instruction Be Used? Research shows that students make the best use of instructional materials when they are integrated into the course work. Instructors are encouraged to connect the Hands-On lessons to assignments and classroom activities. Hands-On is also designed to be flexible. Instructors can pick and choose the Hands-On lessons that best fit their instructional needs and assign them to students. See Using Hands-On as a Learning Tool