Kemper, Haley

ET

Bladek, M., & Okamoto, K. (2014). What's Theory Got to Do with It? Applying Educational Theory and Research to Revamp Freshman Library Workshops.College & Undergraduate Libraries, 21(1), 19-36. doi:10.1080/10691316.2014.877730

Article Summary: 

This article details experiences that higher education academic librarians have had in recent years at their place of work, the John Jay College of Criminal Justice. Finding themselves in the roles of both librarian and teacher, these information professionals took it upon themselves to become more familiar with educational theory and research in order to add to and restructure their freshmen library workshops. Detailing learning style theories, the importance of active learning, as well as group and collaborative learning, the authors suggest ways in which librarians can reshape their lessons and teaching exercises surrounding information and media literacy. 

"It rightly recognizes that not all students learn in the same way and not all teaching techniques appeal equally to all students (Riener and Willingham 2010). To keep students interested and involved, teachers cannot rely on a single method of instruction but should instead vary the ways in which they introduce new concepts and skills (Riener and Willingham 2010)."

"To capture and maintain the attention of our students, we design our sessions so that they account for the students’ varied learning preferences. "

"Active learning, an approach to teaching that emphasizes learning by doing instead of learning by listening."

Evaluation:

This is a helpful article for those wanting more information about constructivist teaching, learning styles, and how old teaching styles can be repurposed so as to benefit more learners. I suggest reading the abstract and introduction, then skip down to Learning Style Theories, Active Learning and on to the end. Because this article takes specific examples from the library where the authors work, there are a few sections that detail the library and its student body that we may not be interested in as readers. The meat of this article lies in its discussion of educational theories, learning styles, active learning, and group work and learning, all of which we are working closely with in LIBR 250.