Would you be interested in "sounding out" the listowners and background
elves of AUTOCAT to see what they might think about having some of those
AUTOCAT reports posted? I could do it for you.
janet
Janet Swan Hill, Professor
Associate Director for Technical Services
University of Colorado Libraries, CB184
Boulder, CO 80309
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*****
Tradition is the handing-on of Fire, and not the worship of Ashes.
- Gustav Mahler
-----Original Message-----
From: Discussion List for issues related to cataloging & metadata education
& training [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Suzanne Stauffer
Sent: Thursday, November 29, 2007 6:54 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [eduCAT] Student use of discussion lists
Cheryl,
That is, as usual, a brilliant assignment, and I am going to borrow it for
my advanced course. It's being taught online, and I've been searching for
appropriate, meaningful weekly assignments that would foster communication.
Suzanne
Suzanne M. Stauffer, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
School of Library and Information Science
Louisiana State University
275 Coates Hall
Baton Rouge, LA 70803
(225)578-1461
Fax: (225)578-4581
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________________________________
From: Discussion List for issues related to cataloging & metadata education
& training on behalf of Cheryl Boettcher Tarsala
Sent: Wed 11/28/2007 3:42 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [eduCAT] Student use of discussion lists
I require that my beginning cataloging students subscribe to
AUTOCAT and lurk. Over the past few years a few have (appropriately)
responded to threads about distance education or cataloging courses
or an area of their personal expertise. I too would be disturbed to
find one of my students asking a very general question about MARC
records that we should be dealing with in the discussion boards of
our own course. As an instructor/subscriber, I would step in and
answer any student query from my class. I think that there are people
on every list who are willing to gently answer such queries, and that
those who find them inappropriate should just ignore them or talk to
the listowner to see if there would be gentle email to such posters
discouraging it in the future, if it got out of hand. Under the old
listownership, those kinds of student queries were probably censored,
but I don't think that's in spirit of public discussion. As a
cataloging instructor I always feel sorry for anyone on AUTOCAT who
dares to ask these very basic questions--if only they had had a good
cataloging course!
What I hope (and know) that my students get from listening in to
AUTOCAT is a sense of the contours of cataloging and its everyday
issues. Each student is required to select a thread that interests
them (I place absolutely no limits on this) and write a summary of
its issues for posting on our student discussion boards where other
students in the class can also read it. This gives them the
opportunity for writing about a topic of interest without having to
do a research paper; it gives them experience in managing and
monitoring a high-traffic professional e-mail list (some students
have never had to set up an e-mail filter); they're of necessity
forced to listen in on several conversations before they find their
topic; and they have to grapple with understanding terminology and
issues to summarize the thread.
I am amazed by the quality of work that's produced in these
AUTOCAT reports, and I almost wish the students could post their
summaries on AUTOCAT because it would so valuable to have a summary
of points made so you don't have to go through so many messages in
the archives to find out consensus or issues raised in a thread. ( I
wouldn't do it; FERPA and protecting them from public tongue-lashings
etc., if they editorialize about posters and the content of answers.
BTW, they also are given the option of writing about AUTOCAT
personalities ... ;-) )
I'd be interested to know how widespread subscribing to AUTOCAT
is used in cataloging courses; I know that I've been using it since
the 1990s.
Cheryl
--
Cheryl Boettcher Tarsala
Adjunct Assistant Professor
LEEP Program, Graduate School of Library and Information Science
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
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The views expressed here are my own and not those of UIUC or GSLIS.
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