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Volume 29, Number 1, October 2002

Helping students use virtual libraries effectively

Mary Ann Fitzgerald and Chad Galloway

Around the United States, universities and state departments of education have been mounting "virtual" or "digital" libraries. Using these systems, patrons can access periodical articles and other scholarly information. Periodical database vendors have provided increasing amounts of their holdings in full-text digital form, and databases indexing citations and abstracts are available in most subject areas. Georgia's virtual library, GALILEO, was launched in 1995, making it one of the oldest of these systems.

GALILEO (GeorgiA LIbrary LEarning Online) provides services to academic, public and K-12 school library patrons. Access is controlled through password entry, and the menu of databases varies according to the patron type. For example, K-12 users can access EBSCO products for primary and middle school children, the Funk & Wagnalls New World Encyclopedia, MAS FullTEXT Ultra, and CollegeSource Online. University users have access to more scholarly databases such as Current Contents and ERIC. GALILEO works via a web browser. Users may login from any terminal at home or on campus, although some databases may be limited to certain campuses depending on licensing arrangements. Once logged onto GALILEO, patrons may search secondary indices of periodicals, multimedia encyclopedias or primary databases containing full-text articles from journals and newspapers. GALILEO provides a significant supplement to any library's periodical holdings and can replace or reduce the need for purchased CD-ROM databases or online database subscriptions.

With the proliferation of GALILEO and other virtual libraries like it, questions arise. How well equipped are students to use these systems? How can they best be used to support information literacy instruction? Also, what strategies can teacher-librarians use to help students apply their information literacy skills in these environments?

This article is based upon a research study in which we observed the online behavior of high school and undergraduate college students using GALILEO. In this article, we will discuss the problems students faced, along with their successful ventures, in the context of information literacy skills. Finally, we will suggest teaching strategies that teacher-librarians can use to improve students' success within these online environments.

Success stories

In the high school setting, we observed 10 students using GALILEO as the result of a teacher's assignment. Their task was to work in groups of two or three, and to write a paper about a mathematician for an advanced calculus class. In the university setting, we observed 10 volunteer students who were working on a research project from one of their classes. In both situations, we interviewed students and observed them "thinking aloud" as they used the virtual library. Their tasks varied, but most were information inquiries based on class assignments. As it happened, nine of the high school students and eight of the college students were seniors. The comparison of the high school seniors to college seniors gives a fresh perspective of how the college experience contributes to information search skills. It also alerts high school teacher-librarians to college-bound students' need to progress into college-level skills. We were especially interested in the higher order thinking skills of these students, given the increasing necessity of evaluating information in online environments (Fitzgerald, 1997).

Generally, all of the students were successful in their searches. That is, they all left the session with useful material. College students required very little assistance, but the same was not true of the high school students. Despite an introductory session that led the high school students through the GALILEO login procedure and basic searching, most of them needed further coaching when the time came to conduct the search in which we were monitors. Still, over an hour's time, they were increasingly able to manipulate the system and problem solve as needed.

High school students found the information they needed about Benjamen Banneker, Hypatia and other mathematicians. The undergraduate research projects were far more varied. One student sought information about the reliability of lie detectors, while another needed to learn about a significant animal extinction event between the Permian and Triassic eras for a geology paper. Using the full-text databases combined with the significant resources of the nearby university library, students easily found more than enough information.

What we learned

After satisfying our curiosity about whether students would be successful or not, we looked deeper. Through the "think-aloud" activity, we were able to gather information about the types of thinking involved in their projects. In this activity, students narrated their work as they used the online databases.

For users, exploring a system like GALILEO makes several cognitive demands. Users need:

1. A reasonable level of technology literacy to access and manipulate the system
2. At least a minimal amount of domain knowledge in order to choose among the many databases offered through the GALILEO system
3. To be able to search using interfaces provided by individual databases
4. To be able to interpret searh results and problem solve in order to refine searches
5. To be able to assess the relevance of articles found to their own information problem
6. To evaluate in a critical way the quality of the information provided by the items
7. To be able to tally or reconcile these multiple judgments into a decision of whether to accept or reject the items found.

To our surprise and dismay, we found that students in both groups had conducted few, if any, resource-based inquiry projects in the past. Although the high school seniors were advanced students in the top of their class at the end of the school year, most said they had never written research papers before. The college seniors likewise reported that they had written very few research papers during their scholarly careers and were having difficulty coming to terms with the tasks they now had to perform. This inexperience with the research and writing process itself probably caused many of the difficulties we are about to describe.

Technology literacy

Because high school students were using a 56K modem telephone line, they experienced special difficulties that illustrate a common but often overlooked problem in many settings. While the university students complained about the occasional slowness of the T1 network connections on campus, the high school students had very real problems. Although GALILEO is not particularly graphics-laden (by design), each screen seemed to take 10 to 20 seconds to load. It was very common within a one-hour session for the Internet connection to break unexpectedly, requiring re-dialing and then logging in all over again. Many times, the computer crashed completely. Although students seemed stoic in the face of these frustrations, several good searches were lost. They did not have the level of technical skill that would have helped them surmount these problems. Where Internet connections are this poor, we cannot expect students to find virtual libraries very useful.

Another problem found in both high school and undergraduate students was a lack of system knowledge. They made many errors due to misunderstanding browsers, operating systems, the Internet, and especially the boundary separating GALILEO from the Internet. Even participants who claimed that they were extremely familiar with GALILEO often displayed naïve errors that pointed to the contrary. On an even more naïve level, one high school student thought that she was being watched: "Can people actually see what we're sending?" Another student thought that all the information on the Internet would be searched through GALILEO. Some had trouble with basic browser navigation and in understanding what search results represented.

Students in both groups had trouble differentiating between GALILEO and other Internet entities. Several college participants seemed confused about what GALILEO was, or the difference between it and the local online public access catalog (OPAC) or the Internet itself. One student described how she had experienced trouble distinguishing between GALILEO and the Internet at first: "I just didn't know what it was, I think. I think I thought it was part of the Internet or, I mean, I didn't really know exactly what it was." Another student clicked the browser search button when she wanted to search GALILEO, and seemed completely confused when an Internet search engine appeared. It would seem that teachers and teacher-librarians must continue to work on technology literacy when lack of it affects the ability of students to find digitized information.

Domain knowledge

Virtual libraries often offer a menu of databases to choose from - sometimes a large and bewildering array of choices. We found that students, especially high school students, had trouble making an effective database choice. In GALILEO, databases were distributed within disciplinary categories, such as "Humanities." The high school students often did not know which academic discipline a topic would fall into and were thus confused. This remained a problem even after some initial instruction. In addition, several participants said that they felt overwhelmed at times in finding the proper category or database to search: one student said it took time to learn "where to go."

Another problem relating to subject knowledge was comprehension. Students in both groups who encountered difficult text or text laden with advanced vocabulary gave up and looked elsewhere. In K-12 settings, mismatches between developmental level and difficulty of reading material is a problem that will occur more often as the availability of information increases. With advanced students, we need to provide strategies for them to sift through resources, perhaps saving more difficult material for later in an information search when subject knowledge should have increased.

Searching

Most students experienced trouble with searching. High school students needed help in getting started. None of the high school students and few of the undergraduates understood the logic of Boolean searching, or how to access the "Precision" or "Advanced" search features available in most of the databases. Some students understood that databases had specific syntax, but demonstrated a patchy knowledge of how it worked combined with a reluctance to check the readily available help files. Very few participants seemed to notice a feature that would allow them to view large numbers of results at once, or the "Mark" feature. Many students seemed unaware that several databases provided full-text articles (although a few depended upon his feature). They often made spelling errors that went undetected, causing searches that were mysteriously unsuccessful to them. On the other hand, most students were familiar with Internet search engines such as Yahoo. Some expressed frustration that GALILEO was more difficult to use than Yahoo. One student wanted to know if GALILEO had a relevance ranking feature, like Internet search engines often do. It was clear that both groups of students would benefit from more instruction and practice with the mechanics of searching.

Relevance

Students in both groups spent much energy determining if articles were relevant or not. The data in this study support three statements about relevance-seeking. First, relevance-seeking usually occurred independently of evaluating the quality of the information. Second, although the processes were usually independent, they often occurred almost concurrently. In other words, the participant seemed to jump back and forth between considering relevance and considering quality. Finally, relevance was the strongest reason for choosing or rejecting information items. We noted strategies used by students as they considered relevance, and some of these are given in Table 1.

Evaluation

We observed that high school students especially seemed to consider most Internet information valid and useful. Although information found within GALILEO is far more reliable and substantial than typical Internet resources, it is far from perfect and needs evaluation according to the information user's purpose. The high school students we observed did not seem to consider the credibility and reliability of information in either context, while the university students were somewhat more aware of the potential problems. Again, we noted strategies used by students as they evaluated the resources they found, and some are listed in Table 2.

Virtual libraries and the Information Literacy Standards

Using a virtual library relates to many of the nine Information Literacy Standards for Student Learning (American Association of School Librarians & Association for Educational Communications and Technology, 1998) . Certainly, students must be able to access information in digital form to be considered literate in the future. Although the students we observed were successful in their quests, they were inefficient and probably missed many valuable resources through flawed searching. It is clear from this study that students need a great deal of help in achieving competence in this most basic of information skills.

The second standard requires students to evaluate information. A common but mistaken assumption is that information within virtual libraries is "clean" and "pure," relieving students of this responsibility while within the virtual library. It is important to remember that databases draw their information from a wide spectrum of published print resources, which are prone to all the traditional information quality problems: currency, bias, authority, and many others. Although the quality of information found within a virtual library is certain to be generally much higher than that of the open Internet, it is still absolutely necessary that students exercise critical thinking in choosing between resources and in applying the information they find. Also, the confusion students showed about the difference between GALILEO and the rest of the Internet caused additional problems.

In addition to these first two basic standards of information access, virtual libraries should contribute to independent information use (Standards 4, 5, and 6) and social responsibility (7, 8, and 9). The need for development in the area of Standard 8, regarding ethical behavior relating to information use, becomes abundantly clear when using digital libraries. It is particularly important to teach students the importance of citing the work of others and borrowing and applying ideas in ways which do not violate accepted standards of behavior. In any electronic context, abuse through copying and pasting become extremely easy. Talab's (2000) suggestions are valuable here: require students to use information from at least several different resources, and to use only a little from each. Further, they should carefully analyze the merits and usefulness of each piece of information. They should spend time synthesizing their overall arguments or expositions, using scraps of information to their best advantage. If they faithfully execute this process, ethical problems will be minimized. More important, they will be exercising the crucial higher-order thinking skills of evaluation, analysis and synthesis - a desired by-product of any inquiry project.

Helping students use virtual libraries more effectively

How might teachers and teacher-librarians capitalize on a virtual library to enhance information literacy skills and education in general? In what specific ways can they help students use virtual libraries more successfully? Based upon the results of this study and the wisdom of other writers in the field, we present the following suggestions:

1. Collaboration and integration are key components of the Information Power philosophy. It is crucial to integrate virtual library use into information literacy instruction, which in turn should be integrated into the curriculum. Collaborate with teachers to get students involved in resource-based projects. Once students are conducting research on a regular basis, they will find using the virtual library a vital tool for most projects. As the teacher-librarian, you can watch for problems as students use the virtual libraries and seize opportunities to infiltrate information literacy skills where needed. Due to our observation that the level of research experience among all of our participants with research was very low, it is clear that more proactive efforts in this area are needed on the part of teacher-librarians.
2. Students need an information search process, such as Kuhlthau's (1993) , Big Six (Eisenberg & Berkowitz, 1990) , or the I-Search (Joyce & Tallman, 1997) . In the context of whatever process is used, show students exactly where in the series of steps the virtual library should be used. Model the process using the virtual library.
   Spend some time with students helping them become oriented to the virtual library. Finding the balance between explaining just enough to get them started and boring them with irrelevant information is tricky, but it is clear that at least a minimal level of orientation is helpful. We recommend teaching four concepts, perhaps in a series of mini-lessons:

• Explain how the virtual library differs from the open Internet, and show them where the boundary is.
• Give students a quick guided tour of the system, highlighting two or three relevant portions.
• Explain the basics of Boolean searching, no more than the "and" and "or" operators in the beginning.
• Point out that most databases provide a translation of the last search into Boolean language somewhere on the results screen, and that it is helpful to notice this message after each search. Many times, the system may not be doing what the student expects, and this message is the best way to monitor this.

3. In addition, keep in mind that some students will likely need individual coaching when they embark upon their projects.
4. In the beginning, help students choose a database. Further, we recommend that students become accustomed to one particular database "home" before they venture out and use others. The next step would be to use another database with a similar interface. Once they thoroughly understand one particular database, we feel that they are more likely to transfer what they know about the first one to others.
5. Be a dedicated virtual library user yourself. The more you use the system for your everyday information needs, the better able to help students you will be.
6. Help your faculty to become dedicated virtual library users. Conduct staff development sessions relating virtual library use to specific subject areas. Discuss how the virtual library can figure in any collaborative unit you conduct. Show teachers how the virtual library can help them in their graduate work.
7. After students become more familiar with your virtual library, promote it just as you would other materials in your resource center. Highlight new or little used databases in "book talks." Feature one or two powerful elements at a faculty meeting. As classes assigned with specific projects visit the resource center, promote relevant features to them. If the virtual library is available in classrooms, demonstrate it there.
8. Configure your resource center home page to contain a direct link to the virtual library. Do everything possible to facilitate the entry of learners into the system.
9. Listen for problems. As you help students use the virtual library, notice where the problems are and design interventions for them. These could take the form of mini-lessons, job aids or tutorials.

In Georgia, GALILEO has been a grand success. Although expensive to citizens through tax and lottery dollars, it provides an avenue for equalizing access to information throughout the state. As schools and homes become increasingly wired to the Internet through faster connections and better hardware, the value of GALILEO will increase. As it and similar systems become available all over our continent and the world, it is our responsibility to ensure that students can use virtual libraries in a beneficial way. Virtual libraries are one powerful tool through which we can increase information literacy in all students.

References

American Association of School Librarians & Association for Educational Communications and Technology. (1998). Information power: Building partnerships for learning. Chicago: American Library Association.
Eisenberg, M.B., & Berkowitz, R.E. (1990). Information problem-solving: The Big6 skills approach to library and information skills instruction. Norwood, NJ: Ablex.
Fitzgerald, M.A. (1997). Misinformation on the Internet: Applying evaluation skills to online information. Emergency Librarian, 24(3), 9-14.
Joyce, M.Z., & Tallman, J.I. (1997). Making the writing and research connection with the I-Search process: A how-to-do-it manual for teachers and school librarians. New York: Neal-Schuman.
Kuhlthau, C.C. (1993). Seeking meaning: A process approach to library and information services. Norwood, NJ: Ablex.
Talab, R.S. (2000). Copyright, plagiarism, and Internet-based research projects: Three "golden rules". TechTrends, 44(4), 7-9.

Table 1: Relevance Strategies

1. What information do I need? Choose several keywords that relate to this information.
2. Scan the resource, paying special attention to headings. Using the keywords you selected, find the occurrences of these words in the text. Use the browser's Find feature if necessary. Are the keywords used in a sense that will be useful to me?
3. How does this resource compare to what I already know? Does it add to my knowledge?
4. Can I think of a way that I can specifically use this information?
5. Is it interesting?

Table 2: Evaluative Strategies

1. Is it current?
2. Who is the author? What evidence is there that the author has credentials and expertise to write about this topic?
3. How was the information published (journal, web site, newspaper, etc.)? Is this resource one that I generally can trust?
4. If I concentrate, is the information clear and understandable to me?
5. Compared to my prior knowledge, does this information confirm or disprove what I already know? If there are contradictions, where might I look for resolution?
6. What are the author's conclusions or main points? What evidence is presented to support them? What is the quality of the evidence?
7. Are biases present in the resource? What might be the author's purpose for writing this information?

Authors

Mary Ann Fitzgerald worked in Georgia public schools for 11 years as a teacher and teacher-librarian. She is now an Assistant Professor in the Department of Instructional Technology at the University of Georgia, where she teaches library media courses. She can be reached at mfitzger@coe.uga.edu.

Chad Galloway received his M.Ed. in Mathematics Education in 1997 and is currently pursuing his Ph.D. in Instructional Technology at the University of Georgia, focusing on community building in online courses. He can be reached at cgallowa@coe.uga.edu.