march06b.indd


Marilyn R. Pukkila 

The
other
side
of
the
podium


Student information needs from inside the classroom 

Whether long­time veterans of informa­tion fluency or recent graduates from 
library and information science programs, 
librarians who teach usually think they have 
a pretty good idea of what students need in 
the way of information. Having taught library 
instruction sessions for more than 20 years 
(during which time they have been called 
by many names), I was aware that assign­
ments, teaching, and expectations on the part 
of faculty and students had changed, but I 
wasn’t satisfied with my limited exposure to 
those changes. 

In fall 2004, I used my semester sabbatical 
to audit courses at Colby College with the 
intention of observing students’ information 
needs within the classroom and in the context 
of their entire courses, not just their assign­
ments. I also wanted the chance to observe 
my colleagues’ teaching styles as a means of 
enhancing my own. 

Wishing to replicate the student experi­
ence in terms of course load, I chose to 
audit “The Dramatic Experience,” “Religion 
in the USA,” and “Indigenous Peoples and 
Cultures of North America.” I also took an 
online course on pagan pastoral counseling 
for death and dying offered by the Cherry 
Hill Seminary, which met weekly for online 
discussions, giving me, in effect, the standard 
Colby four­course load. My “extra­curricular” 
activities included participation in CIRCLE 
events (a student group for nontraditional 
religions, of which I am faculty advisor) and 
occasional library meetings, and I taught a 
weekend intensive workshop; this seemed to 
replicate a typical student load pretty success­
fully. Indeed, I eventually decided I had to 

drop one class part way through the semester 
due to lack of time, something students are all 
too familiar with. I also took a three­week trip 
to New Zealand, during which time I visited 
the information commons at the University of 
Auckland, discussed information fl uency with 
the head of the program at Victoria University 
of Wellington, and explored filming sites used 
by Peter Jackson in his version of Lord of the 
Rings to enhance the course I teach, “Tolk­
ien’s Sources.” This trip meant that I wasn’t 
able to participate in every session of the 
classes I audited, nor did I keep up with the 
reading or the written work. Nonetheless, my 
time as “librarian in the classroom” produced 
some useful and unexpected results. 

Observations 
I was fascinated by the amount of information 
with which students are bombarded from the 
moment they buy their texts. In the three bags of 
books I purchased, I received no fewer than 14 
pieces of advertising (which made me wonder 
why we think that students will read the infor­
mative flyers we so carefully design for their 
orientation). I learned the ways that publishers 
make use of textbooks to promote their other 
products. A required text for the drama course 
included a CD for three months’ free access to 
a database, which we in the libraries deem to 
be below college level. The text even included 
relevant “keywords” for the database at the end 
of each chapter, along with recommended Web 
sites for further research. 

Marilyn R. Pukkila is head of instructional services at 
Colby College, e-mail: mrpukkil@colby.edu 
© 2006 Marilyn R. Pukkila 

162C&RL News March 2006

mailto:mrpukkil@colby.edu


I was interested to learn of such aggressive 
marketing to a more or less captive student audi­
ence, though I’d be very surprised if any of the 
students actually used the CD or visited the Web 
sites; they simply don’t have the time (nor, in all 
likelihood, the inclination) to explore beyond 
the required material on the syllabus. 

And, yes, those assignments have changed. 
The first­year (and even second­year) research 
paper was absent from all of my classes; instead, 
students had group projects or labs, response 
papers, and text­based essays or tests. While 
library research could certainly enhance many 
of these tasks (something that I pointed out on 
more than one occasion), there was no incen­
tive to look for material beyond that which was 
presented in class, particularly in the libraries. 
Issues of proper citation were rarely addressed, 
and, in one instance, a faculty member was 
displaying images during a lecture without at­
tributions, despite having urged the students 
earlier not to do this. (Said faculty member did 
provide a list of sources for the images after I 
shared my observations in private.) 

I was also firmly reminded that for this gen­
eration of students, a pixel is worth a thousand 
words. During one class discussion, a question 
was raised, and the professor urged the students 
to “Google” for the answer rather than consult 
the appropriate librarian. In a class where 
printed texts and films were used with equal 
weight, the students were notably more active 
in discussing the films than the texts. Given this 
obvious evidence of increased reliance on digital 
and visual media over print resources for both 
teaching and learning, it’s clear that our infor­
mation fluency programs will need to address 
issues of media literacy, as well. The principles 
of evaluation are still the same (authority, reli­
ability, bias, timeliness, and proper citation), 
but we need to make this clear to our students, 
who rely so heavily on e­media for all of their 
information needs. 

In observing my colleagues, I received 
welcome reminders of the many aspects of 
good teaching, from attention to the physical 
space (“this lighting is terrible!”) to good use 
of humor, motion, open­ended questions, and 
modeling of expectations (“if I were given this 

assignment, this is how I would proceed”). 
Clarifying expectations for student performance 
and assignments is crucial, as these vary widely 
from teacher to teacher. One professor urged 
students to ask for extensions rather than write 
a paper the night before it’s due, while another 
stated flatly that there would be no extensions 
on any assignment. Skillful use of technology 
in the classroom is no longer an option; it is 
a necessity for anyone who hopes to engage 
students who, by and large, learned how to use 
computers at about the same time that they were 
learning how to walk. That said, it’s also impor­
tant to ensure that students have the necessary 
skills to offer a technology­based presentation, 
if that is expected. Having one group presenta­
tion suffer from failed technology is an all too 
painful reminder that while we may suppose 
our students to be technologically literate, we 
cannot assume it. 

Take a class 
Given all this, and the simple experience of be­
ing a student once again, with all the uncertainty, 
challenge, and constraint that that entails, I am 
convinced that anyone who teaches should take 
a class themselves at least once every other year 
or so, just to remember what it’s like to be on 
the other side of the podium, whether virtual 
or literal. 

I am very grateful I had the chance to 
relive that experience, even if I didn’t retain 
much of the subject knowledge that I’d hoped 
to acquire. First­ and second­year courses of 
necessity introduce an enormous amount of 
material; students must absorb new vocabu­
laries, theoretical frameworks, and perspec­
tives which often challenge previously held 
views. This applies to information fl uency as 
much as to theatre or religion or indigenous 
peoples. I was reminded of the reality of that 
fifteen­minute attention span we all talk about 
but rarely allow for, and of how uncomfort­
able one could get in a “one size does not 
fit all” chair in the course of a fi fty minute 
session, and of how frustrating it is when one 
can’t see the screen clearly or hear the instruc­
tor. I developed a keen discernment between 
a truly open­ended question and one that was 

March 2006  163 C&RL News 



fishing for a particular response, and in doing 
so recognized how many times I posed the latter 
when I thought I was asking the former. I felt 
sympathy for my fellow faculty when I saw them 
struggle with the difficulty of allowing silence 
to stretch out for people to have a chance to 
think about such questions before answering 
them. Whatever one’s age, one doesn’t wish 
to appear the fool in public! 

How to find out what students need 
Even without the magnificent opportunity of a 
sabbatical, there are many things we can do to 
become more familiar with student information 
needs in our classes. Ask if you can sit in on a 
session or two of a class you will be instructing 
in the mysteries of library research before you 
offer your session. Talk to students you see in 
those classes and ask them about their prefer­
ences and challenges in fi nding information; 
you can encounter them in the dining halls, in 
performances, in clubs or interest groups, and 

in the stands of the sports arenas as well as in 
the library and the classroom. Take the time to 
look at the texts for those classes; the results can 
be enlightening, to say the least. 

It might have been very interesting to use the 
Web sites from the text for the drama course in a 
library exercise to evaluate Web pages. Review your 
instructional material with an eye to media literacy 
as well as information fluency. If you have a center 
for teaching and learning on your campus, see if 
they have a peer observation program and ask to 
be included in it as both an observer and as one 
who wishes to be observed. Sit in on instruction 
sessions of your fellow teaching librarians and really 
focus on all the aspects that impinge on learning: 
physical space, movement, technology, content, 
delivery. If possible, do this for classes that are 
unfamiliar to you or which cover unknown mate­
rial. The more we can put ourselves in the place of 
“learner,” the more we will experience the needs 
of learners, and the more effective our teaching 
will become. 

(“Long­range planning across generational lines” continued from page 145) 

serve on your library advisory committee, 
library­friendly IT staff, or a representative 
from the provost’s office. They will serve 
as outside advisors and will broaden your 
perspective in the planning process. 

A final tip for any long­range plan­
ning process is to identify those issues 
that don’t require paradigm shifts and 
are easy to solve. We developed a list of 
such issues and addressed them before 
turning to the larger questions of the 
newly adopted long­range plan. This 
approach preserved the momentum of 
the planning process and allowed for 
the quick and decisive actions that all 
generations appreciate. 

Epilogue 
Despite the generational divides that 
needed to be bridged during the long­
range plan’s development, the process has 
already been deemed a success. A univer­
sity­wide meeting that was supposed to 
focus on the long­ range planning efforts 
of all units was modified to focus on the 

library’s plan, as it was recognized by the 
provost as the model of how plans should 
look. 

Within the library, the generational les­
sons learned during the planning process 
led to thoughtful consideration of how 
the plan’s implementation group would 
be composed. Along with other diversity 
concerns, we made a conscious choice to 
balance the generational representation. 
So far, so good. 

Notes 
1. For further exploration of generations 

in the workplace, see Lynne C. Lancaster 
and David Stillman’s When Generations 
Collide: Who They Are. Why They Clash. 
How to Solve the Generational Puzzle at 
Work (HarperBusiness, 2002). 

2. William M. Curran, “Succession: The 
Next Ones at Bat,” College & Research Li­
braries 64 (2003): 134–40. 

3. Carolyn Wiethoff, “Management 
Basics: Managing Generation X,” Indiana 
Libraries 23 (2004): 53–5. 

164C&RL News March 2006