Exploring Open Pedagogy in a Librarian-Taught Honors Course

Abstract

This case study describes how the authors incorporated the principles and practices of open pedagogy into a three-credit Honors College course focused on information literacy and undergraduate research. It included using literature review sources to help edit Wikipedia articles, registering a research project proposal with the Open Science Framework (OSF), and the creation of an openly licensed toolkit crowdsourced with students’ tips and suggested resources for other students new to research. Students demonstrated improved understanding of several information literacy concepts, such as the role of copyright. The use and benefits of open pedagogy were, however, hindered by unrelated classroom issues, like low enrollment and, at times, a lack of student engagement. Nevertheless, the authors’ general approach and the activities and assignments they developed could be adapted and used in other library instruction contexts.