written by Chao-yu Wu, National Taiwan University
This week, I observed 3 different classes to see how librarians in Bracken teach students in literature searching. Students had enough time to try library search tools and databases by themselves in these classes, and then the librarian asked students what they found and experienced in using these tools. It’s a good way to hold students’ attention and make them notice the differences with Google!
Suzanne, the head of Bracken Library, introduced me to their missions and major patrons in Bracken. We shared some differences in services. One of the major difference is most classes in Bracken had been integrated with faculty’s courses; it is something we should make more efforts to do in my library!
Sandra M., my preceptor, showed me how they work on their reference shifts. I also got an opportunity to shadow her while she was servicing a user on the reference desk.
I also talked about social media with Amanda, who is in charge of social media in Bracken. Bracken posts news, events, and interesting things happened in Bracken on Facebook and Twitter. It’s very similar to what we do in Taiwan, but my library chose LINE (a popular messenger in Taiwan and Japan) instead of Twitter because there are fewer Twitter users in Taiwan.
On Friday, I attended the ‘Library Day’ of Queen’s Joanna Briggs Conference with Bracken Librarians and other librarians from Canada and the United States. It’s an excellent opportunity to gather professional health science librarians from different libraries. Six speakers shared their experiences in systematic review literature searching, and the final workshop offers a chance to practice peer review for search strategies. An eye-opening experience!
