Snapshot impressions #6 -- first class of the Winter 2013 term

First class of the term. The challenge? to introduce the students to a variety of sources that are relevant to thei assignment AND to play nice with the librarian! Okay, I will admit it; that's not so hard. On one hand, I have lots of sources of the assignment. On the other hand, the team of librarians here are great, being both welcoming and supportive of my teaching style. This session was an opportunity to show the students how the sources in the library and archives work together within the research process. The friendly, neighbourhood librarian and I set to demonstrate just that practice.

The first part of the session addressed the benefits and challenges of secondary sources, ending with the most familiar source -- the book. This allowed me to pick up on the discussion of how a book's content is found. I took the students on a journey, deconstructing a specific book which was related to their assignment for which the archives has most of the original research and copies of the drafted manuscripts. The students were given time to explore the documents and answer a set of questions, comparing the collection to the book and thinking about the publication as a finished "product". [To see the exercise in more detail, look here: http://archivallessons.blogspot.ca/2013/02/deconstruction-zone-getting-to-bottom.html] Seriously, the students became so engaged in these records that they did not want to stop working with them.

After guiding the students through this exercise, we divided the them into two groups (one with primary sources and one with secondary sources) to answer a set of research questions that were directly related to the assignment. It was an opportunity for the students to do some preliminary research during class and be able to ask questions while their professor, librarian, and archivist were on hand.

Overall, the session went well and the students were able to do some work on their assignment. For me, the best part was being able to deconstruct a book and show the students how much research goes into a scholarly publication. It was an excellent and opportune example.