Thanks to a request from staff in History, the Library currently has trial access to Muteferriqa: Ottoman Turkish Discovery Portal.
On trial: Ottoman Turkish Discovery Portal
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Tag Archives: digital skills
5 things: getting the best out of your library
Welcome, and welcome back, to all students starting the new academic year this week!
Whether you are one of the many descending on campus or one of our online or distance learners logging in from across the globe, we hope you make full use of our library resources, services and facilities while you are at the University.
Main Library
Our newly refreshed Library website has everything you need to know about the Library, while our Library subject guides help you find the resources you may need for your subject area.
But here are 5 things to help you get the best out of our (or your) library in 2024-25. Continue reading
AM Explorer – your primary source hub (trial access)
I’m happy to let you know that the Library currently has extended trial access to AM Explorer, your gateway to millions of pages of primary source content. AM’s collections provide access to digitised historical materials – manuscripts, government records, rare books, maps and more – across a wide range of disciplines, from History to English Literature, Gender Studies, Sociology, Economics, Area Studies, Political Sciences and more.
You can access AM Explorer via the E-resources trials page.
Trial access ends 8 July 2024.
While the Library already has permanent access to 21 collections from AM (listed at end) this trial access to AM Explorer gives us access to a further 66 collections covering world history from the 15th century up to modern times.
AM Explorer allows you to search through all 87 collections at one time. You can use their search to explore through a single keyword search; take a deep dive into your areas of interest; and discover new archival materials to serve your research, learning and teaching. Continue reading
Five reasons you should use LibSmart to prep for your assignments
Here we are midway through the first semester, and you may start to feel like you should be looking ahead to your end of semester assessments. Often students feel a bit overwhelmed before their first hand in, but here at the library we’re keen to help you feel confident from the start. Read on to find out why LibSmart is one of the best ways to prepare for your research and writing….
1. LibSmart shows you the basics of finding information in easy-to-follow lessons
Split into five simple sections, LibSmart I takes you through everything you need to find good material to base your assignments on. You’ll learn about how to search the library catalogue, how to double check your course reading, and suggestions of where to go for follow up resources.
2. You can dip in and out of it any time that suits you
One of the great things about LibSmart is all new students are already enrolled! You just need to log in to learn and click on the ‘Essentials’ tab on the left to find it. It’s there whenever you need it all year long, so if you’re feeling like you need to be productive at 11pm one evening then log on and complete a module. We’re sure you’ll either learn something new or you’ll feel more confident that you’re on the right track.
3. The whole of LibSmart I can take less than one afternoon to work through
We designed LibSmart I so that it’s not a huge effort for you to complete. We know your time is precious and that you may have classes to get to, work shifts to make or social activities that are a huge and important part of your student experience. We wanted to make the information in LibSmart as accessible as possible, and while you can take it at whatever pace you like, we know that some students like to rattle through it in just one day. Whichever route you chose, we appreciate the time you spend there.
4. You’ll learn valuable skills on how to get started with referencing
Referencing is one of the top enquiries we Academic Support Librarians receive – people are confused by it or don’t understand what, where and how to do it properly. LibSmart I has a really useful introductory module that can help you get to grips with the foundations of referencing, and offers top advice on how to find the right style and systems for you. If you’re feeling stuck with where to start then this is the place to go.
5. It’s so much more than just library stuff!
We know it’s a lot to ask students to spend a few hours on looking specifically at library catalogues and databases especially when this isn’t prescribed reading on any particular course. However, students who’ve spent time on LibSmart believe it’s really made a difference to their experience as a student.
When I signed up, I assumed the course was just an introduction to the library but it has really been a guide to how academic research works. I wonder if more people would have signed up for this if they had realised it was not just a tour of the library to see where the books were kept. Along with the one hour “Study Skills” course I did, which was also surprisingly useful in its content, I feel I got as much learning from these free courses as the main one I paid for.
If you’re interested in giving LibSmart a go, you can find out more on our website.
Alternatively if you’re keen to get started straight away, just visit Learn and click on the Essentials tab on the left hand navigation. It’s all there ready for whenever you need it!
E-Resource trial: Skills for study
As we’re midway through the second semester, many eyes are turning to assignments and thinking ahead to final exams. Did you know that we’ve recently secured a trial of the interactive resource Skills for Study?
Based on the bestselling The Study Skills Handbook by Stella Cottrell, Skills for Study offers an interactive and personalised solution to help students hone their academic skills while developing skills required by employers:
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Each of the modules comes complete with exercises, activities, and module assessments along with supplementary videos, articles and blogs. We know how popular the Study Skills Handbook is for students from a range of disciplines, so here’s how to access this interactive resource:
- Visit the Skills for Study website and sign in with your university login. You’ll be asked to register the first time you do, so follow the instructions on this student guide for single sign-on (pdf).
That’s it, it’s that easy! More information about the trial is available on the E-Resources trials page. Our trial ends on the 24th April so have a good look before then, and if you want to offer any comments on this or any of our other E-Resource trials then please consider filling in the trial feedback form.
Resolving to reference in 2023
Whether you’re the type of person who makes New Years resolutions or not, we hope you’ll consider resolving to get comfortable with referencing this year. We have lots of resources available to help you with citations in your assignments, and we know it’s something many students struggle with and so can often leave to the end of their work. Some top tips for getting ahead of the referencing panic:
- Record the information you read as you go. You can do this using a reference manager, bookmarking tools in your browser or DiscoverEd, or good old pen and paper. Whatever method you’re comfortable with, starting off with good organisation will help you down the line.
- Leave more time than you think you’ll need. Do you usually give yourself a day or two before the assignment deadline to sort references? Double it! Triple it! Build in contingency time for writing up and correcting references – and for asking for help if you need it – and if you end up not needing all that time then submit early and then reward yourself with a treat for being ahead of the game!
- Be consistent. There are lots of referencing styles out there (you may already be familiar with Harvard, APA, Chicago, OSCOLA), but whichever one you use for your work, be consistent in how you reference. Make sure you have all the component parts of each type of reference and then style them in the same way each time – this helps you spot when information is missing as well as looking good.
- Use the tools available to you. This includes reference managers like Endnote, Zotero and Mendeley (or any others!), or even ‘quick’ citation engines like ZoteroBib or Cite This For Me. We highly recommend you use Cite Them Right Online which is a database we subscribe to for all staff and students to use – it will show you how to construct references for every type of material in a huge range of styles. Not sure how to reference a personal email, a blog post or a youtube clip? Use Cite Them Right to check! NOTE: Please make sure you check any reference that is created by a citation tool, as they are not guaranteed to be accurate.
- Get help in plenty of time! Still feeling lost at sea? We’ve got training sessions on the MyEd booking system and also recordings on Media Hopper (click on ‘174 media’ below the title card for the full list of videos) designed specifically to help you. There’s also part of the LibSmart online information literacy course dedicated to the basics of referencing, and we have a whole subject guide on the topic. If all else fails, contact your Academic Support Librarian and ask for a one-to-one appointment where we can sit down with you and work through the problems you’re facing.
Do you have any top tips for referencing? We’d love to hear them, you can leave them in the comments or tweet us @EdUniLibraries.
Have you heard about LibSmart?
We’re midway through the first semester now, and many students will have settled into the routine of lectures, seminars and practical class preparation. You may even be thinking ahead to the end-of-module deadlines moving ever closer, and beginning to consider how to research and write assignments. For some students this can be stressful or confusing as they realise they don’t really know where to start with looking up resources to back up their work. Don’t panic though, we’ve got you!
Enter, LibSmart! This is our online information literacy course which you can access via Learn at any time throughout your studies. It’s self-enrol and open to absolutely everyone, and will provide you with a great grounding in how to access resources online and via the library, and how to reference your research correctly. There’s five modules in LibSmart I and although we recommend you work through them all, you can dip in and out of the bits you feel you need a bit of help with.
If you’ve completed that, you may find that you want to go a step further. In that case, check out LibSmart II which has ten modules on a variety of different topics all designed to help you get to grips with a specific focus. Unlike LibSmart I we don’t ask you to work through all the modules here, just pick ‘n’ mix your favourites! You might be interested in health information and systematic reviews, or legal information and government and policy research. Maybe you’re unsure of what’s in our Special Collections and you’d like to explore that more fully. Students who’ve completed these modules before have said that they’re extremely useful and relevant to their work.
If this sounds interesting to you, you can find out more on the LibSmart webpage. Remember you can access LibSmart any time you like throughout the year, and for each module you complete you get a digital badge!
There’s a video here on how to self-enrol in case you’re unsure of the steps. Hope to see you in LibSmart soon!
Welcome! Key library resources for 2022/23
It’s been a bit quiet here on the ASL blog for the past couple of months and that’s because August and September are always spent preparing for the start of the new semester. Now that we’re well underway we’ve been busy doing inductions and welcome sessions to highlight some of our excellent services to new and returning students. In case you’ve missed any of the vital information we like you to have, here are some helpful links!
Library pages: You can find loads of helpful information about our services and library sites here. Look for opening hours, information on borrowing, and how to request resources here.
DiscoverEd: what we call a ‘library discovery tool’ is really what you might call the library catalogue. Look here for readings and research or just to explore the library collections! There’s a great guide on using DiscoverEd here. It’s a Microsoft Sway document but if you need a more accessible version please get in touch with us.
Resource Lists: online reading lists to help you find the core material for classes. Your course organisers have curated these to make sure you can easily access what you need. This link will take you to guides and videos for using Resource Lists too.
Library Subject Guides: these are curated pages of information that our team make up to help you with your studies. There are guides available for a huge range of subject areas and topics of interest.
LibSmart: this is our online information literacy course that you can enrol on any time throughout your time at University. We know not everyone comes to uni feeling confident about finding information, especially online, so this course has been built to guide you through some foundation skills. Follow the five modules in LibSmart I to help you get used to finding information and using the library’s collections, and dip in and out of LibSmart II’s modules on any subject that interests you!
These are just some of our top tips to help you get started during your time at the University of Edinburgh, but if you have questions at any time you can contact our team of librarians to help you get what you need. There’s a list of who deals with each subject on our website so please do get in touch, or leave us a comment on this post.
Check in with our blog regularly as we’ll be posting throughout the year about the upcoming Dissertation Festival, top features of LibSmart, new training sessions we offer, and much more!
Lunchtime seminars: Decolonising and Diversifying the Library
We held our first of three Decolonising and Diversifying the Library lunchtime seminars last week, on the topic of Diversity in First Year Scots Law Reading Lists. The recording (39 minutes) has been uploaded and is now available on our Media Hopper Channel.
We’ve got two more sessions scheduled in this mini series, starting with tomorrow’s look at Supporting diversity through the ECA Library Zine collection and Artists Books collection with Academic Support Librarian Jane Furness. Join Jane at 1pm on Thursday 14th July to hear about the ECA Library artists’ books and zines collections and the ways in which they celebrate the diversity of makers working in these fields today. Book using this link to the MyEd booking system.
The following week we have a special showcase of the work of our Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Digital Engagement intern, Tristan Craig: Diversifying your Reading from a Student Perspective : Digital Engagement (EDI) Internship Showcase
Promoting the use of a diverse range of sources has several pedagogical benefits. It encourages students to become more autonomous learners by going beyond their reading lists and to think critically about the types of sources they’re engaging with. It also prompts them to consider the historical biases inherent in the dissemination of knowledge and look for a variety of voices to conduct more balanced research.
In this presentation Tristan will reflect upon his experiences and discuss how staff can support students to become confident in finding and using diverse sources. To book for this session on Thursday 21st July at 1pm, use this link to the MyEd booking system.
For more information on these sessions or if you have ideas for what you’d like to see in future lunchtime seminars, please contact us by email or leave us a comment.
LILAC 2022: Being Better Teachers
Photo by Austin Chan on Unsplash
In our third and final post about the LILAC conference (you can find part one here and part two here) I wanted to touch on the topic of becoming better teachers. Although there was so much to take in from the conference – as you’ll have read from Ruth and Christine’s posts – one of the most impactful things I learned from the sessions was that the work we do is so important and impactful on our students, and it’s in all of our best interests that we consider that we have a powerful role to play in teaching.
The session I attended on the topic of Students, academic reading and information literacy in a time of COVID really reminded me that there can be a marked difference in the information we think our students want, and what they actually want. The panellists explored the results of the Academic Reading Format Information Study (D Mizrachi, 2021) which shows that over 70% of students prefer to use print books for academic study, with only 8.7% preferring ebooks. A later examination of student trends during the pandemic showed that 73% of students who responded in the US would not complete all their prescribed readings for their course due to their availability online. These results surprised and somewhat concerned us, particularly as many institutions operate on an e-first policy for library acquisitions now. If students don’t want ebooks, are we doing them a disservice by putting such emphasis on online access? Do we need to communicate and provide better training in order to help make these resources more accessible? Ultimately these questions could be answered by working more directly with students and not making assumptions about what information needs they have.
There were also inspiring sessions to encourage us to continue to develop as professionals ourselves, because by allowing ourselves time to write and research and read more about developments in our profession, we not only share the student experience with those we teach but we also develop better praxis for ourselves. All three of our academic support librarian delegates attended the Getting Your Writing Groove Back workshop run by the Journal of Information Literacy representatives, and I think all of us found it both fun and instructive. As a result we’ve already restarted the L&UC Journal Club, and look forward to building research and writing further into our current workplace activities in the future.
Slide from Getting Your Writing Groove Back presentation, by the team from the Journal of Information Literacy.
My final thought on becoming better teachers as librarians is that we need to seek out recognition of the work we’re already doing. The fact is that many library workers don’t consider themselves teachers, but by attending this conference I was able to hear many people from around the country talk about the impact their work has, and it reminded me that we’re already doing lots of this. Whether it’s creating subject guides or video demonstrations of resources, writing web content or blogs to help highlight useful databases, or directly providing instruction in front of hundreds of students, we are teachers too.
Ruth already spoke about the inspiring words of Marilyn Clarke and Emily Drabinski, but I must return to their keynotes as they both drove home the point for me. Libraries are important and library workers have influence. We must be intentional in the work we do. We have the power to affect great change in the lives of our students and our institutions, whether it’s including a range of examples in our work to help our students feel like they belong in their classes, or challenging them to find a wider variety of voices beyond their prescribed reading. We are supporting their learning and we need to recognise the power we have in order to use it to be the best teachers we can be.
SarahLouise McDonald
Academic Support Librarian