E Learning, Digital Libraries, and the Role of Academic Libraries in the 21st Century

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E- Learning, Digital Libraries, and the Role of
Academic Libraries in the 21st Century

• Christine L. Borgman
• Professor Presidential Chair in Information
  Studies
• University of California, Los Angeles

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John Kemenys Challenge to Libraries

• Symposium at 50th Anniversary of Baker Library,
  1978
• One of the keys to the subject of computers and
  libraries lies in discovering how the computer
  might play a role and do it in such a way that
  the love of the material you are working with can
  still be there. (p 74)

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Responding to Kemenys challenge

• How can computers be used in libraries to sustain
  the love of the material?
• How can libraries use computers to enhance the
  love of the material?
• How can libraries use computers to enhance
  teaching and scholarship?
• New media
• New students
• New faculty
• New librarians

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The new students

• Technology for learning and entertainment
• Information retrieval Google
• Reading WWW, E-books
• Writing Word processors, web sites
• Arithmetic Graphing calculators, Mathlab
• Music Kazaa, Napster, CD-RW, MP3 players
• Photos Digital cameras
• Navigation Global positioning systems
• Communication Mobile phones
• EntertainmentDVDs, Networked computer games
• Instruction course web sites
• Science labs computer based dissection,
  experiments

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The new learning

• Learning can be more like scholarship
• Access to primary information sources
• Inquiry learning - learn by doing, asking
  questions
• Navigate, explore, construct and test hypotheses
• Students can learn to think like, work like
• Scientists
• Social scientists
• Humanists
• Practitioners

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Digital libraries

• Digital libraries are systems that support
  searching, use, and creation of content
• Digital libraries are institutions with people,
  digital collections, and services

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Digital libraries for learning

• Content Primary sources in digital form
• Historical records
• Social science datasets
• Geo-spatial data
• Infrastructure Distributed access from
  classrooms, offices, dorms, and reach of wireless
  networks
• Tools and services search, select, manipulate,
  visualize, display, and create digital resources

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Scholarly and teaching practices

• Information technologies faculty use for
  scholarship
• Digital libraries
• Tools for selecting, organization, manipulating
  digital resources
• Information technologies faculty use for
  instruction
• Textbooks
• Chalkboards
• Overhead projectors
• Slides

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Two case studies

• Alexandria Digital Earth ProtoType (ADEPT)
• UC-Santa Barbara, UCLA
• NSF Digital Libraries Initiative, 1999-2004
• Incorporate geographic digital libraries into
  undergraduate instruction
• Center for Embedded Networked Sensing (CENS)
• UCLA, USC, Caltech, UC-Riverside, CSU-LA
• NSF Science and Technology Center, 2002-2012
• Incorporate networked sensing data into grades
  7-12 instruction in biology and physics

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ADEPT Geographical digital libraries for
undergraduates

• Geography relies on primary data sources
• Satellite observations
• Physical observations
• Remote sensing
• Geography studies dynamic processes
• Educational standards for geographic knowledge
  are information-based
• asking geographic questions
• acquiring geographic information
• organizing geographic information
• analyzing geographic information
• answering geographic questions

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Users and uses of geo-spatial digital libraries
for learning

• Instructors
• Gather geography resources for teaching, using
  ADEPT and other sources
• Present lectures to students using ADEPT
• Design laboratory projects for students using
  ADEPT
• Teaching assistants
• Assist instructors in developing lectures and lab
  projects
• Reinforce concepts in laboratory sections
• Students
• Attend lectures and labs presented with ADEPT
• Conduct science experiments using ADEPT
• Learn to think like scientists

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Embedded Networked Sensing in support of Grades
7-12 science education
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Imagine this...
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Active, Networked-Sensor Investigations

• Advantages
• Sophisticated triggering students direct sensors
  to collect data
• Multi-variate data
• students propose and test numerous
  hypotheses
• Complex query capabilities
• less time required to perform
• authentic explorations

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Educational Vision
Inquiry Modules
Inquiry and Exploration
Networked Sensing
Center for Embedded Networked Sensing
Software and Systems Management Development
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Educational Goals
Inquiry and Exploration

• To teach science as a way of knowing
• To learn science by doing
• To deepen conceptual understanding
• To promote original thinking, collaboration, and
  ownership of the learning process

(AAAS, 1992 NRC, 1996 NCTM, 2000 ISTE, 1999)
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Calibrated Peer Review

• Provides strategic and epistemic guidance for
  students inquiry
• Uses written work as public traces of students
  thinking
• Promotes guided reflection upon science concepts
  and processes

Supported by NSF Division of Undergraduate
Education 95-55605
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Good Technology is Not Enough

• College / university faculty
• Scholarly practices well established, highly
  codified
• Teaching practices individualized, idiosyncratic
• Extrinsic rewards for scholarship are much
  greater than rewards for teaching
• Academic libraries
• Focus on collections, on access to information,
• Little focus on delivery to classrooms, learning
  sites
• Provide tools to search for information, not
  tools to use information

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Implementing new information technologies

• Usability
• Useful for important tasks
• Fits into work practices
• Learning and implementation time / effort must be
  acceptable
• Adoption
• Must offer sufficient added value to be worth the
  effort to adopt
• Assistance and services must be available to
  assist in design, development, and deployment

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The New Academic Library

• Resources / collections
• For teaching and scholarship
• Tools and services
• Access, use, and create information resources
• Persistent availability of resources
• Infrastructure
• To support scholarly and teaching applications
• Integration / coupling
• Tight coupling between library resources,
  services, user behavior, practices, information
  infrastructure
• Digital libraries support life cycle of
  searching, using, creating, disposing of
  information

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The New Academic Librarian

• Library skills select, collect, organize,
  preserve, conserve, provide access to information
  in many media
• Management skills large, complex, evolving
  organizations
• Technology skills design, management, and policy
• Scholarly knowledge theory, method, practice of
  multiple disciplines
• Educational skills pedagogy, standards,
  discipline-specific technologies
• Policy intellectual property, infrastructure,
  technology
• Vision role of libraries in teaching, research,
  information infrastructure, national and global
  policy

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Summary and Conclusions

• Responding to Kemenys challenge to libraries
  use computers to sustain the love of the
  material
• Libraries should be fully engaged in the
  scholarly and teaching missions of the college /
  university
• Computers now can be used to make learning more
  like scholarship
• Digital libraries can help to engage students in
  more active forms of learning and inquiry
• Implementing digital libraries
• Content, infrastructure, tools and services
• Usability
• Adoptability
• New students, new libraries, new librarians
• Integration of library, scholarly, teaching, and
  learning practices