You Only Get One Shot: Rethinking the Teaching of Undergraduate Research Skills in One-Shot Classes

Undergraduate students are expected to hit the ground running once they start their academic careers. Although students have been exposed to basic research concepts, researching at a university level can be challenging and stress-inducing for new undergraduates. The Association of College and Research Libraries’ (ACRL) newly revised draft  Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education provides instructors with the opportunity to rethink how we teach undergraduate research skills. By engaging with the ACRL framework and incorporating active learning exercises, library staff can refresh their teaching methods for one-shot instruction classes and help undergraduates develop the crucial skills they need to access information in a higher education setting.  This session will: Identify major elements in the new ACRL framework. Discuss best practices for using active learning exercises to teach research skills to undergraduates. Provide the opportunity for participants to work in small groups to collaboratively develop scenario-specific active learning activities that incorporate elements of the new ACRL framework.  By the end of the session, participants will have begun the process of rethinking the design of in-class exercises for one-shot library instruction classes and will have learned about new and innovative ways to develop students’ research skills, setting them up for future academic success.