Evaluating the effectiveness of bibliographic instruction

Abstract

Examines and evaluates the types of bibliographic instruction provided by school libraries to secondary school students who are preparing and writing their term papers. Attempts to determine the extent to which students adopt systematic and graduated strategies in the searching and retrieving of bibliographic information using existing bibliographic tools and aids (computer software, databases, internet/World Wide Web). Reports results of a study, conducted from October 1995 to January 1996, involving an experimental group of 28 tenth-grade students in one school, receiving bibliographic instruction and a control group of 26 students, from the same school but without bibliographic instruction. Each student within the two groups had to write a paper on a specific topic, all of the topics drawn from the same historical period. Three days before the submission date of the term papers (March 1996), the students were requested to fill out questionnaires, which included 20 questions dealing with proficiency in the use of the library to carry out work on the particular project. The study sought to test hypothesized disparities between the two groups in three areas: extent of use of bibliographic materials; proficiency in search of bibliographic material; and independence in location of material. Concludes that the experimental group utilized a larger number of bibliographic items in the work for their term papers compared to the control group; the experimental group performed a more systematic search procedure in terms of phases of the search compared to the control group; and no disparities were found between the two groups in regard to the requesting of assistance from the librarians.