Introduction
Competency I
"Use service concepts, principles and techniques that facilitate information access, relevance, and accuracy for individuals or groups of users."
Introduction
When people discover that I am pursuing library and information science, reactions are mixed, "Aren't books getting out of style?" or "People are pretty good about doing research nowadays because of the Internet" or "How nice it must be to be surrounded by books all day." While the library profession does deal with various information "products"--not just books-- the profession is more concerned with service--getting library users connected to appropriate information they need or desire. The purpose of reference service is to "[facilitate] access to information; [instruct] users to find, use, and evaluate information; [and provide] readers’ advisory service" (Simmons, 2011).
This requires good communication skills and techniques to find out a library user's needs, desires, and preferences, which may not always be clear even to the library user. Reference interactions do not always occur in person either; librarians help users over the phone, email, text, and through instant messaging, which presents other challenges in communication as body language is not apparent.
Reference librarians also need knowledge of different types of resources that can help a library user's solve their needs or desires. In today's information-inundated world, people often believe that by going online to Google through their mobile devices, laptops, or computers, they will find all the answers they need. Technology skills, however, are not the same as research skills. Because the web is unbridled, not everything online can be trusted as accurate. Wikipedia, for example, is not the best place to find information on politically-charged topics for a research paper because anyone can edit the content. Wikipedia, however, could be a starting place to get ideas for key terms in order to research the topic elsewhere. It is also important to realize that not everything is available for free online or even through subscription databases that provide access to professional journals. There are many valid resources that are just not available in online format, such as subject bibliographies (see Thomas Mann's [2005] The Oxford Guide to Library Research).
While a great many changes are taking place in communicative and information technologies, however, reference service, whether at the physical or virtual reference desk, will continue to connect users to materials for informational and recreational use. "The personal aspect of library service will continue to distinguish itself from other institutions..." (Cassell and Hiremath, 2009).
Evidence
As evidence for meeting competency I, I am including various assignments from LIBR 210 Reference and Information Services as the class content focused exclusively on how to facilitate reference service in person and virtually as well as a variety of reference resources that can be used to provide answers and resources for library users.
LIBR 210: Neutral Questioning Discussion Post
One unit of LIBR 210 focused on the reference interview. The reference interview is important because even seemingly simple requests are often much complex and should not be taken at face value. The reference interview involves several steps, including establishing rapport with library users; negotiating the question by eliciting more information about the information need (type, format, how much information, level of sophistication, etc.); searching for information; locating, evaluating, and communicating the information to the library users; and closing the interview by making sure the library user’s needs have been met, even if it means referring the user to a different library or contact person.
In negotiating the question, the reference librarian tries to determine what the user needs by paraphrasing the user’s question, asking closed and open-ended questions, as well as neutral questions. Neutral questioning, as explained by Dervin and Dewdney (1986), “is a strategy for conducting the reference interview in a way that allows the librarian to understand the query from the user’s viewpoint. Neutral questions are open in form, avoid premature diagnosis of the problem, and structure the interview along dimensions important to users” (p. 506). This involves asking library users what they need the information for, which can seem a bit prying but would possibly yield some valuable information. The type of book the library user may be asking for may not necessarily answer his or her information need at all, wasting his or her valuable time and perhaps leaving a very bad impression of the library even if the librarian indeed found the “needed” book and was personable. In a discussion post on the topic, I discussed the merits of neutral questioning in reference to my first time providing digital reference service, and also discussed one of the strategy’s weaknesses.
LIBR 210: Evaluation of Physical and Digital Reference Service
One of the major assignments I completed in LIBR 210 was an evaluation of the practices of reference librarians in face-to-face and digital reference interactions. I observed two academic librarians at the University of California provide virtual reference service, and one academic librarian at California State University Stanislaus provide face-to-face reference service. As I mention in Competency N, I used the Reference and User Services Association’s (RUSA) Guidelines for Behavioral Performance of Reference and Information Service Providers (2004) as evaluative criteria of the interactions I observed. What is particularly appealing about these guidelines is that the focus is on how to communicate with library users in order to help them fill their information need, not simply delivering the resources or providing answers, in both virtual and live environments. The introduction to the guidelines stipulates that effective reference service has much to do with “[l]ibrarian courtesy, interest, and helpfulness” (RUSA, 2004). The opportunity to observe practicing reference librarians was very useful to show the wide variety of directional, ready reference, and research questions and how librarians actually interact with library users to discover their needs and help them find the answers or resources they seek.
LIBR 210: Practice Questions 1 and 2 (set 1 with feedback)
Reference librarians need to keep up to date with a wide variety of resources in order to connect library users to the "correct" resource or sets of resources that will fulfill their information need or get them started on researching a particular topic. In LIBR 210, students were assigned two separate assignments to help us become familiar with the content and structure of reference resources. For each set of practice questions, students were provided with a list of resources. Each student signed up to provide a primary annotation of a particular online or print-based resource and a secondary annotation to another resource, noting not only the resource’s structure, strengths, and weaknesses but also the types of questions each resource could answer. For my first set of practice questions, I evaluated the Historical Statistics of the United States database available through San José State University’s King Library and also provided a secondary annotation of University of California Santa Barbara’s freely available American Presidency Project database. For the second set of practice questions, I provided a primary annotation of the Enciclopedia Hispanica, a Spanish language encyclopedia, and another primary annotation for the Encyclopaedia Judaica as I was the only student to sign up to evaluate this resource. The practice questions and answers and the annotations are available in the document below. Through both assignments, I became familiar with the content of many different reference resources, learned how to examine various information resources and retrieval systems for strengths and weaknesses, and was able to successfully find the answers to the questions presented in the exercises.
References
Caswell, K.A., & Hiremath, U. (2009). Reference and information services in the 21st century (2nd ed.). New York, NY: Neal-Schuman.
Mann, T. (2005). The Oxford guide to library research (3rd ed.). New York, NY: Oxford University.
Simmons, M.H. (2011). Lesson 1 [Lecture notes].
When people discover that I am pursuing library and information science, reactions are mixed, "Aren't books getting out of style?" or "People are pretty good about doing research nowadays because of the Internet" or "How nice it must be to be surrounded by books all day." While the library profession does deal with various information "products"--not just books-- the profession is more concerned with service--getting library users connected to appropriate information they need or desire. The purpose of reference service is to "[facilitate] access to information; [instruct] users to find, use, and evaluate information; [and provide] readers’ advisory service" (Simmons, 2011).
This requires good communication skills and techniques to find out a library user's needs, desires, and preferences, which may not always be clear even to the library user. Reference interactions do not always occur in person either; librarians help users over the phone, email, text, and through instant messaging, which presents other challenges in communication as body language is not apparent.
Reference librarians also need knowledge of different types of resources that can help a library user's solve their needs or desires. In today's information-inundated world, people often believe that by going online to Google through their mobile devices, laptops, or computers, they will find all the answers they need. Technology skills, however, are not the same as research skills. Because the web is unbridled, not everything online can be trusted as accurate. Wikipedia, for example, is not the best place to find information on politically-charged topics for a research paper because anyone can edit the content. Wikipedia, however, could be a starting place to get ideas for key terms in order to research the topic elsewhere. It is also important to realize that not everything is available for free online or even through subscription databases that provide access to professional journals. There are many valid resources that are just not available in online format, such as subject bibliographies (see Thomas Mann's [2005] The Oxford Guide to Library Research).
While a great many changes are taking place in communicative and information technologies, however, reference service, whether at the physical or virtual reference desk, will continue to connect users to materials for informational and recreational use. "The personal aspect of library service will continue to distinguish itself from other institutions..." (Cassell and Hiremath, 2009).
Evidence
As evidence for meeting competency I, I am including various assignments from LIBR 210 Reference and Information Services as the class content focused exclusively on how to facilitate reference service in person and virtually as well as a variety of reference resources that can be used to provide answers and resources for library users.
LIBR 210: Neutral Questioning Discussion Post
One unit of LIBR 210 focused on the reference interview. The reference interview is important because even seemingly simple requests are often much complex and should not be taken at face value. The reference interview involves several steps, including establishing rapport with library users; negotiating the question by eliciting more information about the information need (type, format, how much information, level of sophistication, etc.); searching for information; locating, evaluating, and communicating the information to the library users; and closing the interview by making sure the library user’s needs have been met, even if it means referring the user to a different library or contact person.
In negotiating the question, the reference librarian tries to determine what the user needs by paraphrasing the user’s question, asking closed and open-ended questions, as well as neutral questions. Neutral questioning, as explained by Dervin and Dewdney (1986), “is a strategy for conducting the reference interview in a way that allows the librarian to understand the query from the user’s viewpoint. Neutral questions are open in form, avoid premature diagnosis of the problem, and structure the interview along dimensions important to users” (p. 506). This involves asking library users what they need the information for, which can seem a bit prying but would possibly yield some valuable information. The type of book the library user may be asking for may not necessarily answer his or her information need at all, wasting his or her valuable time and perhaps leaving a very bad impression of the library even if the librarian indeed found the “needed” book and was personable. In a discussion post on the topic, I discussed the merits of neutral questioning in reference to my first time providing digital reference service, and also discussed one of the strategy’s weaknesses.
LIBR 210: Evaluation of Physical and Digital Reference Service
One of the major assignments I completed in LIBR 210 was an evaluation of the practices of reference librarians in face-to-face and digital reference interactions. I observed two academic librarians at the University of California provide virtual reference service, and one academic librarian at California State University Stanislaus provide face-to-face reference service. As I mention in Competency N, I used the Reference and User Services Association’s (RUSA) Guidelines for Behavioral Performance of Reference and Information Service Providers (2004) as evaluative criteria of the interactions I observed. What is particularly appealing about these guidelines is that the focus is on how to communicate with library users in order to help them fill their information need, not simply delivering the resources or providing answers, in both virtual and live environments. The introduction to the guidelines stipulates that effective reference service has much to do with “[l]ibrarian courtesy, interest, and helpfulness” (RUSA, 2004). The opportunity to observe practicing reference librarians was very useful to show the wide variety of directional, ready reference, and research questions and how librarians actually interact with library users to discover their needs and help them find the answers or resources they seek.
LIBR 210: Practice Questions 1 and 2 (set 1 with feedback)
Reference librarians need to keep up to date with a wide variety of resources in order to connect library users to the "correct" resource or sets of resources that will fulfill their information need or get them started on researching a particular topic. In LIBR 210, students were assigned two separate assignments to help us become familiar with the content and structure of reference resources. For each set of practice questions, students were provided with a list of resources. Each student signed up to provide a primary annotation of a particular online or print-based resource and a secondary annotation to another resource, noting not only the resource’s structure, strengths, and weaknesses but also the types of questions each resource could answer. For my first set of practice questions, I evaluated the Historical Statistics of the United States database available through San José State University’s King Library and also provided a secondary annotation of University of California Santa Barbara’s freely available American Presidency Project database. For the second set of practice questions, I provided a primary annotation of the Enciclopedia Hispanica, a Spanish language encyclopedia, and another primary annotation for the Encyclopaedia Judaica as I was the only student to sign up to evaluate this resource. The practice questions and answers and the annotations are available in the document below. Through both assignments, I became familiar with the content of many different reference resources, learned how to examine various information resources and retrieval systems for strengths and weaknesses, and was able to successfully find the answers to the questions presented in the exercises.
References
Caswell, K.A., & Hiremath, U. (2009). Reference and information services in the 21st century (2nd ed.). New York, NY: Neal-Schuman.
Mann, T. (2005). The Oxford guide to library research (3rd ed.). New York, NY: Oxford University.
Simmons, M.H. (2011). Lesson 1 [Lecture notes].
Files
Below are the files to my pieces of evidence.
LIBR_210_neutral_questioning_discussion_post.pdf | |
File Size: | 83 kb |
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LIBR_210_evaluation_of_reference_service.pdf | |
File Size: | 316 kb |
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LIBR_210_practice_questions_1.pdf | |
File Size: | 525 kb |
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LIBR_210_practice-questions-2.pdf | |
File Size: | 278 kb |
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