Guide on the Side and LibWizard Tutorials side-by-side: How do the two platforms for split-screen online tutorials compare?

Split-screen tutorials are an appealing and effective way for libraries to create online learning objects where learners interact with real-time web content. Many libraries are using the University of Arizona’s award-winning, open source platform, Guide on the Side; in 2016, Springshare released a proprietary alternative, LibWizard Tutorials. This article reviews the advantages and limitations of this kind of tutorial. It also examines the differences between each platform’s distinctive characteristics. These platforms create similar split-screen tutorials, but have differences that affect diverse aspects of installation, administration, authoring and editing, student learning, data management, and accessibility. Libraries now have the opportunity to consider and compare alternative platforms and decide which one is best suited to their needs, priorities and resources

Recoding “Guide on the Side” to collect learner performance data: Collaboration, customization, and assessment

University of Vermont (UVM) libraries use the open-source tutorial platform “Guide on the Side”. This flexible and robust platform for split-screen tutorials provides learners with dynamic, authentic learning experiences. But the out-of-the-box program has a major shortcoming: learners’ performance data is generated in the form of email “certificates”. This poster describes how we collaborated with a UVM Center for Teaching and Learning programmer on the integration of custom code that aggregates and reports this data. It explains how our custom installation now supports the validation of our learning objects and the large-scale assessment of our students’ performance

Practices, policies, and problems in the management of learning data: A survey of libraries’ use of digital learning objects and the data they create

This study analyzed libraries’ management of the data generated by library digital learning objects (DLO’s) such as forms, surveys, quizzes, and tutorials. A substantial proportion of respondents reported having a policy relevant to learning data, typically a campus-level policy, but most did not. Other problems included a lack of access to library learning data, concerns about student privacy, inadequate granularity or standardization, and a lack of knowledge about colleagues’ practices. We propose more dialogue on learning data within libraries, between libraries and administrators, and across the library profession

Meeting users where they are: Delivering dynamic content and services through a campus portal

Campus portals are one of the most visible and frequently used online spaces for students, offering one-stop access to key services for learning and academic self-management. This case study reports how instruction librarians at the University of Vermont collaborated with portal developers in the registrar’s office to develop high-impact, point-of-need content for a dedicated “Library” page. This content was then created in LibGuides and published using the Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) for LibGuides boxes. Initial usage data and analytics show that traffic to the libraries’ portal page has been substantially and consistently higher than expected. The next phase for the project will be the creation of customized library content that is responsive to the student’s user profile

What Does it Take to Make Discovery a Success?: A Survey of Discovery Tool Adoption, Instruction, and Evaluation Among Academic Libraries

Discovery tools have been widely adopted by academic libraries, yet little information exists that connects common practices regarding discovery tool implementation, maintenance, assessment, and staffing with conventions for research and instruction. The authors surveyed heads of reference and instruction departments in research and land-grant university libraries. The survey results revealed common practices with discovery tools among academic libraries. This study also draws connections between operational, instructional, and assessment practices and perceptions that participants have of the success of their discovery tool. Participants who indicated successful implementation of their discovery tool hailed from institutions that made significant commitments to the operations, maintenance, and acceptance of their discovery tool. Participants who indicated an unsuccessful implementation, or who were unsure about the success of their implementation, did not make lasting commitments to the technical maintenance, operations, and acceptance of their discovery tool

Apples to apples? Lessons learned from a comparative evaluation of online platforms for interactive tutorials

What does your library need from a tutorials platform? For several years, the University of Vermont has flipped library instruction with tutorials created in Guide on the Side. This open-source program, provided by the University of Arizona, is a simple tool for producing frame-based tutorials centered on the learner’s interaction with web content. UVM adopted it principally because of its suitability to formative learning. But in 2016 Springshare launched LibWizard, an alternative platform for frame-based tutorials. It offered important functionalities that were not available in Guide on the Side, while lacking others that were integral features of our existing tutorials. Come to this session to hear how the availability of similar, yet distinct, products helped us to rethink our current and future tutorial needs. This presentation will explain how we developed and applied an evaluation rubric that could be applied to any platform of this kind. It will also highlight other aspects of our decision-making process, including questions about migrating existing tutorials, about rewiring our approach to creating tutorial objects, and about advocating for product development

Information Use in History Research: A Citation Analysis of Master\u27s Level Theses

This article addresses the need for quantitative investigation into students\u27 use of information resources in historical research. It reports the results of a citation analysis of more than 3,000 citations from master\u27s level history theses submitted between 1998 and 2008 at a mid-sized public university. The study\u27s results support the hypotheses that the predominant format in history research is the monograph and that history research entails use of older resources, and in greater proportions, than other disciplines. Results also support the conclusions that journal usage is comparatively low and that there is a high degree of citation dispersal across journal titles