Not So Distant Future

I’m going to be blunt in this post.  Databases are dead.  (Okay, maybe that is a bit dramatic.)  And who would mourn their loss?  What value do they add to our internet experience?

Both Joyce Valenza and I (and I’m sure scores of other librarians) have probably written similar posts in the past asking database vendors to improve their wares.

Now, don’t get me wrong.  I personally think databases are very helpful to students–obviously getting good sources of information that are accurate and current and informative is a good thing.  They make one stop shopping easier for students.

However, unless database companies make some changes the writing is on the wall in this era of shrinking budgets….

1.  Databases are dead unless they develop an interface like this:

instead of this:

Students and teachers alike just want to search.  They don’t care which particular database has the article. They’ll winnow their choices out once they get results.

And If they really care which source they are using, which on occasion they do, they can use something called “Advanced search.”  (or the librarian can help them use it)–which can be a simple button on the toolbar.

2. Databases are dead unless they get more “hip.” Databases aren’t hip for high school students.  Facebook is hip, texting is hip, Deviant Art is hip, but databases, nope.  Why can’t portals to research be fun and hip?  Why don’t they look more fun?  

Ebsco Kids search is called “Searchasaurus” and has a island with clickable icons;  Newsbank’s Kid search has a hounddog sniffing out the facts.   But the high school search pages?  Text, and more text, too many menu choices, and clutter.

3. Databases are dead unless they can have a box like this on the toolbar.  (or as Joyce Valenza says, are a widget you can embed on your own webpage.)

No one wants to wade through three or four screens just to begin a search.

4.  Databases are dead unless they realize that Google (and other sites) are beating them at their own game.

At the college level, perhaps this is  a different matter.  But if you are talking 9-12, the database companies need to get with the program.  The more offerings on Google, the more database companies need to really focus on promoting their value–promoting it via fun advertising pitched at k-12 students, promoting it via clever and witty interfaces–promoting the creativity of research.

The market is getting tougher as the economy worsens and school districts are having to make tough choices.   Will that drive changes in the database market?

In her presentation at NECC on information fluency, Joyce Valenza  described how she sees herself as “version 1.8,” in perpetual beta, because she is always learning.

What a great way to project to your students and staff that you are always in the process of “upgrading” and exploring new things.

She pointed out that students often settle for a “good enough/why bother” point of view when it comes to searching and using information, and that both teachers and librarians need to “own” this problem, and ask more of our students. 

One way she tries to do this is by always providing them lists and pathfinders of the best resources.   We do this for some assignments by creating pathfinders, but the number of pathfinders she has created or has on her site is simply inspiring.   They set up a wiki for each pathfinder and invite teachers and some students to help create it –which is a wonderfully collaborative way to gather the best resources and to bring together the best practices.

She also includes resources in the pathfinders that make sense, but that I wouldn’t have necessarily thought of, like wikibooks that have been created on a topic or blogs about a topic.  

She suggests asking students to do more original research–at least using a survey tool like zohopolls, surveymonkey, surveyscholar, zoomerang or responsomatic.  At her campus, when they ask students to use these tools, they guide the student in creating appropriate research-based questions and preview the poll before the student publishes it, so it is a guided experience.

Another type of guidance the library provides is creating evaluation tools for each different type of site–like she has tips on evaluating a blog, or on evaluating a wiki.  Interesting idea.

I think one of the most powerful things in all of this is how the library and the teachers provide more guided experience for students, so that they are using the the best sites and using best practices for their research process and for creating their work.  I think too often we assume students know all there is to know about the internet or production and so don’t provide them enough guidance.

I really want to approach this as a team at our campus and need to sort out how to do that better.   I am putting this out here for my campus to read and to be honest, I want to know that teachers think of me as a partner when they are creating a research assignment, not as an add-on, or a barrier, but as someone who can help their students and help them as a teacher create the best practices for research for their students, because it’s in the students’ best interest.   Our schedule has more planning time this year so I think that will facilitate connections as well.

     I’m going to have an interesting opportunity this year (since I am trying to think of it as an opportunity, as Vinny Vrotny mentioned at NECC, not as an obstacle) — our library is being gutted and renovated(which is another post altogether as it has been an exciting process).   I foresee my role changing in ways that maybe it already should have–and I foresee that while the library is closed, I can be an “outreach” person–and go to where the students and teachers are–the classroom.

I am planning on going to the classroom to do booktalks, help with research guidance, collaborate with teachers on projects, and it may end up totally transforming my practice and their practices as well.  That is my hope–that in the end, this renovation will have transformed our library from the inside and the outside, so to speak.

Joyce has an excellent resource wiki with links to many of the tools she mentioned,  including the NECC powerpoint, and I blogged the presentation that she and Ken Rodoff did as well.   Ken also mentioned some fascinating projects they did in the English classroom, and the links can be found on the wiki.

    I’m wondering about other ways libraries can provide that support and guidance and be collaborative.   There are so many web 2.0 tools that we talked about at the conference and I’m going to be spending time thinking about how to put those to use effectively, and to reflect to students that our program, too, is in perpetual beta.

Technorati Tags: n07s765 Technorati Tags: necc2007

Images: 

 http://www.flickr.com/photos/ansleystaton/431000280/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/saveena/218668190/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/ariesandrea/273871692/

When you are searching for sites that are helpful to use with students, it’s such a slow process, looking through each site to see if the graphics, design, layout, etc., are appealing for younger students. 

During a workshop I was teaching today on Pageflakes (great visual tool for introducing RSS feeds–Thanks Will Richardson for sharing it), we ran across a very helpful tool I hadn’t seen before, Pagebull.

Pagebull is a visual search site–it displays the results of your searches visually.  For example, I did a search on “education blogs” and here is a screen shot of the results.

If you scroll over the little magnifying glass for each page, it enlarges it also so you can “check it out” in more detail.

A pagebull search box can also be added as a “flake” in Pageflakes, by the way, which is how we found it (Or I should say Susannah found it during my workshop!)  It is in the “full gallery” of additional “flakes.”

I love it when tools are this easy to use!