Today's blog comes from Rene Tanner , subject matter librarian at ASU. Evaluating information in the digital age is a critical skill. In the classroom, as in life, we need to agree on basic facts to advance human knowledge and our understanding of the world. Fake news refers to sources that fabricate information, purposefully deceive, or grossly distort factual news reports (Novotny, 2017). Social media is an important source of information. A recent Pew Research Center study found that 62% of U.S. adults receive news through social media with Facebook (44%) as the lead outlet, followed by YouTube (10%) and Twitter (9%) (Pew Research Center, 2016a). Distinguishing real information from distorted information online can more difficult than we may imagine. A recent study by Stanford University found that most students, from middle school through college, had trouble identifying false or biased information online. For example, students often had difficulty distinguishing be...

Here are some ASU Library resources that you might not be aware of, from our subject matter librarian, Rene Tanner . Post how you would use these for your classes! Learn TechLib: New Resource for Technology and Learning Want to know what is happening in the world of educational technology and e-learning? And do you want reliable research based information? Then the ASU Libraries has a great source for you. Learn TechLib is an online database of journal articles, conference papers specifically for ed tech and e-learning: https://www-learntechlib-org.ezproxy1.lib.asu.edu/ . To stay current, notice the options to receive e-mail alerts for selected journals and to receive the Learn TechLib newsletter. Makerspace in Hayden Library Want to inspire creativity and innovation among your students? Mkrspace and Mkrstudio in the Hayden Library and have all kinds of production equipment and software for any ASU affiliate to use, including video editing, 3D printing and scanni...

"According to a 2005 study done by Nature, Wikipedia contains only slightly more inaccuracies in science-related topics than does Encyclopaedia Britannica" (Chandler, 2010) Shigeru Tamura circa 1939 College courses rarely encourage students to do their research with Wikipedia, but there is value in teaching students the importance of critically evaluating sources, and contributing to the worlds' general knowledge on subjects. Faculty can guide their students, as well as contribute their expertise on subjects. Wikipedia is widely used and ambitious in that it aims to provide a free encyclopedia to anyone in the world. While the encyclopedia is the largest of its kind, there is still an imbalance in the depth and quantity of articles about women. On April 8, 2016, a group of freshly minted and enthusiast ASU editors (students, staff and faculty) participated in the inaugural “Wikipedia edit-a-thon for Women in Science and Engineering.” The event started with a short...

At yesterday's information session, we shared a number of resources to help faculty participate in the Open Educational Resources (OER) Movement . Faculty and Grad Students discussed the many challenges of awareness and finding the right open materials. However, all agreed that with ASU's "inclusive" environment, the use of OERs in the classroom would continue to develop in the future. Our ASU Life Sciences Librarian, Rene Tanner, discussed the benefits of submitting papers to the ASU Digital Repository as an important step in increasing the impact of scholarly work. Making pre-publications, post-review publications, white papers, and data available in ASU's Digital Repository will make it possible for others to find, use, and reference your work without paying a fee. More information can be found on the ASU Library Guide for Open Education . Some other highlights of the session were: Defining OER, Open Access, and Open Pedagogy with this 4-minute video by...

Guest Blogger: René Tanner, Life Sciences Librarian Wikipedia , the free, open, online encyclopedia has the potential to share information and knowledge with people around the world. However, the use of Wikipedia in higher education is often discouraged because, in general, encyclopedias are not adequate sources for college-level research. Also, anyone can edit Wikipedia, so outdated and erroneous information may be present;   But what if, the tables were turned and instead students were encouraged to be contributors and given credit for editing and improving Wikipedia?   What might they learn and how might their critical thinking skills be improved? Jimmy Wales, co-founder of Wikipedia, would like more experts to be part of the project. Wales notes that often enthusiasts develop entries of personal interest and that someone with a deeper understanding would add nuance and improve the quality of articles greatly. However, the number of scientist/editors in Wiki...

Categories of Teaching Resources  In our latest TeachT@lk Webinar (Sept. 1), we highlighted several useful teaching and learning resources available to instructors at ASU. Heidi Blair, Ph.D. , College of Liberal Arts & Sciences, and Rene Tanner, ASU Libraries, showcased services and technologies that are available for free. Furthermore, we showed exemplary resources to stay informed about pedagogy and developments across the university. Please take a moment to review the webinar recording and PowerPoint to see a full demonstration. Teaching with CLAS Hub (email CLAS-IDT@asu.edu for further information) ASU Libraries Streaming Video Lib Guides UTO Training for Blackboard ASU Help Desk Live Chat in Blackboard (how to add it to your courses) TeachOnline Quality Matters at ASU Twitter: ASU Outages TeachOnline If you have a favorite resources that you would like to share, please add them by commenting on this post. Resources: Recording of Webinar...

Our guest blogger today is Rene Tanner ASU librarian, who specializes in biology, life sciences and environmental resources, and will be regularly sharing tips and tricks through our TeachTech Blog. In her post below, she shares how to set up an alert, and a great app called BrowZine that may be helpful for your classes and research. APP:  BrowZine Do you remember coming to the library and browsing the periodicals to see what was new in your research area? BrowZine is an app designed for browsing recent issues of scholarly journals on your iPad, iPhone or Android tablet. As the name implies, BrowZine is unlike many traditional research tools in that it emphasizes browsing over focused research and searching. Many journals develop issues around a research theme and having a tool that displays articles in the larger content of a journal issue can produce serendipitous discovers. In BrowZine you can create a bookshelf of favorite journals, browse a collection of jo...