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ALRGInfo skills @ UELElla Mitchell9th May 2012 www.uel.ac.uk/infoskills

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Info skills…. Info skills is an award winning online resource which guides undergraduates through researching their first assignment, with emphasis on identifying, finding and evaluating information and referencing

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The origins:• At UEL a resource developed by Employability Unit: „Get that Job‟• Established a precedent• Brand• Open

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Why the Library felt a need for theresource:• What we had was good but cumbersome to find• Wanted highlight key information for students tackling their first assignment in an easy to navigate structure• A resource to suit different learning needs of our students and students that are not always on campus• We wanted a refresher for students• Available 24/7 to match many of our services and to meet students‟ expectations• A resource that was not too dictatorial: to suit our „strategic learners‟

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Why this approach?• Focus on level one learners due to cost and time restrictions• Information skills and academic integrity the priority• Making information skills relevant to the student / assignment-focussed• Students sometimes respond better to their fellow students- different media and use of different voices on the resource• Professional-looking resource, students have higher expectations• Student choice about where, when and how they access help and support: “dark recesses of their bedroom” www.uel.ac.uk/infoskills

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Inspiration….• Staffordshire Assignment Survival Kit• Cardiff Information Literacy Resource Bank• Leeds Skills@Library• OU Safari There are many other examples of good practice in this area. www.uel.ac.uk/infoskills

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What we produced www.uel.ac.uk/infoskills

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How we did it• Getting funding• Setting up project team• Consultations• High level design• Content map• Prototype• Detailed design• Content collection from SMEs• Intensive development – web design – video production – guides – demonstrations – quizzes - writing pages• Uploading content• Summative evaluations• Final version and launch• Copyright• Marketing www.uel.ac.uk/infoskills

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Creative commons • This is an Open Access Educational Resource. • Videos on Youtube: can link to, embed etc. • PDFs downloadable • It is openly available on the internet. =Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlikehttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/ [accessed 30th March]

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What do users think?• “Found Info skills very useful – great idea to put it all together” D. Patel UEL student• “It makes me feel like you care about my education” UEL Student• “I have had another look at your Info skills pages and they are very impressive” K. Virdee, Academic Liaison Librarian• “p.s. I only discovered the eBook thanks to the InfoSkills website - very useful!” An e-mail from a student support officer, at one of our collaborative partnership institutions.• „UEL‟s new information literacy site looks good. Does what it says on the tin.‟ Tweet• “Some of the questions on plagiarism [quiz] for example really got the students talking and debating - particularly self-plagiarism” Module leader for VT1013 Study Skills• Library staff have been using the site and there has been some good feedback from students in information skills sessions. Lecturers have also been using the site and noting the resource in course materials. www.uel.ac.uk/infoskills

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What do users think: Would you Which sections of the site did you recommend Info skills find most useful? to a friend? 18 1630 1425 12 1020 8 615 410 2 0 5 Identifying Finding Evaluating Referencing information information information information 0 Yes No How would you rate this site? 16 14 12 10 8 6 4 2 0 Excellent Good Satisfactory Poor Very poor

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Visitor Overview 3000 2500 2000 1500 1000 Number of visits 500 Number of absolute 0 unique visitorsSource: Usage statistics from Google analytics collated by UEL LLS

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Impact:• The usage figures seem to be consistently high with peak around assignment time.• Info skills has been integrated by many of the skills module leaders at UEL.• Business, Health and Bioscience, Psychology, Arts and Digital Industries and Architecture, Computing and Engineering all use Info skills in the level one skills module.

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Looking to the future:• The site has been running since Sept 2011• The usage statistics are strong, however need continued marketing to promote use.• Develop more multimedia content- currently the subject team are working to produce quizzes• Continuing collaboration with UEL Connect• Conduct further evaluation- possibly looking into the wider use of Info skills- more focused on academics use• Study skills branding at UEL: next project Write it right…. www.uel.ac.uk/infoskills

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Info skills @ UELThank you!Ella Mitchell: e.mitchell@uel.ac.uk www.uel.ac.uk/infoskills