During a two-year period, over 1,900 undergraduate students completed a version of an online asynchronous library module either with or without decorative images. Two instruction librarians compared quiz scores and affective feedback from both versions to determine the impact decorative images had on student performance and analyzed the results…

This research study investigates the effects of library instruction tutorial format (written versus video) on student preference and performance in chemistry education. The authors assessed the format of tutorials used to provide library instruction in an introductory chemistry course by observing 27 student participants as they took in…

Library labs are dedicated spaces with highly trained library, IT, and research support staff. The staff are on hand to help teach faculty and advanced graduate students new and emerging methodologies and technologies. Such a lab is a place to engage in new ways of, for example, doing digital scholarship or putting Open Science into practice. This…

This study demonstrates that a library instruction observation instrument can effectively foster critical self-reflection among academic library faculty and staff on their teaching practices. The paper outlines the instrument's design, which gathers low inference observations on instructors' use of questioning as a pedagogical strategy based on…

The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic required shifting information literacy instruction from face-to-face to online formats at the University Libraries of the University of South Dakota. This case study narrates how the instructional team there introduced innovations into a Freshman Writing course that enabled instrumental (that is, goal-oriented)…

For the most part, information landscapes such as libraries are structured, organized, created, and used by the dominant groups. These spaces may be unfamiliar territory for many students. Humour used in library orientation elicits enjoyment and helps to connect librarians and students. Low and high inference humour used during orientation can…

What perceived role do one-shot information literacy sessions play in the professional status of librarianship? In what way is this perception resulting from and contributing to the feminization of instructional labor? How will criticizing and/or changing one-shots disrupt or perpetuate gender and other forms of inequity? All these questions…

In "Connected Teaching: Relationship, Power, and Mattering in Higher Education," Harriet L. Schwartz presents "relationship as a site and source for learning." It is both where the learning takes place and the mechanism through which we teach and learn, making it the "essential driver of teaching and learning."…

This essay explores the tension between pursuing meaningful work in instruction librarianship and the realities of working in a society in which many jobs provide little fulfillment or pleasure, or, as the journalist Sarah Jaffe puts it, "Work won't love you back." Drawing on a recent conference keynote by Anne Helen Petersen, C. Wright…

This exploratory study examines trends in librarian teaching support for open science (OS) practices in higher education. The study was conducted through semi-structured interviews with academic librarians and a survey that was distributed through academic librarian interest groups. The results indicate that academic librarians have varied…

This project report describes an internal scan of library staff involved in instruction in a large academic library system. 64 semi-structured interviews were conducted and qualitatively analysed in order to produce a summary of instruction across the library system, and both the challenges faced and supports desired by these instructors. The most…

This article describes the creation and piloting of a series of online information literacy instructional modules intentionally incorporating Universal Design for Learning (UDL) principles. Using UDL frameworks to guide different elements of the online modules, the authors have been able to accommodate the challenging learning differences,…

Teaching roles in academic libraries can be accompanied by a great deal of anxiety. This study surveyed librarian attitudes toward their teaching role and librarians' experiences with teaching anxiety. Sixty-four percent of librarians participating in the survey said they experienced teaching anxiety, including 65.10 percent experiencing physical…

An academic librarian providing one-shot instruction sessions to first-year students is uniquely positioned to enact a feminist ethic of care in the classroom. First-year university students are particularly in need of caring. The library instruction session is often their introduction to and first impression of the library and an opportunity to…

This personal narrative describes strategies for incorporating relevant lived experience as narrative storytelling during library instruction in an academic classroom setting. Integrating personal narrative into curriculum is proposed as a technique for expanding instruction librarians' development as teachers and mentors, and for motivating and…