Emerging Strategies for Supporting Student Learning: A Practical Guide for Librarians and Educators. By Barbara Allan. London: Facet, 2016. 178 p. Paper $75 (ISBN 978-1-78330-070-9).
Supporting student learning is the name of the game for academic librarians, but what that means in the dynamic arena of higher education is constantly evolving. Barbara Allan’s Emerging Strategies for Supporting Student Learning: A Practical Guide for Librarians and Educators presents a helpful overview of the many facets of the topic, with plenty of real-life examples and case studies, plus theoretical underpinnings and references to the literature for those wanting more depth.
The book is very well organized with a clear structure. It begins by presenting overarching trends in higher education and characteristics of today’s diverse student populations, followed by chapters on digital literacies and current learning theories. The first several chapters focus on learning and teaching activities, design principles, and the creation of face-to-face, blended, and online courses. Following is a chapter covering evaluation of activities and courses, and the book concludes with a discussion of lifelong professional development.
The book delivers on its claim to be a practical guide, with concise chapters, text broken up with lots of white space and bullets, and examples set off in boxes. The reader can easily dip into single chapters, which stand on their own as well as contributing to the larger whole. Each chapter includes notes in the text that are easy to locate in the brief bibliographies. URLs accompany all examples and cases, so interested readers will be able to find more extensive information on the originating website.
The brief topic overviews and references to the literature will benefit new and aspiring library educators, as well as practitioners wishing to brush up on current issues. For example, the straightforward introduction to the ACRL’s Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education in the “Digital Literacies” chapter (38–39) will be useful for those desiring a high-level treatment of this important but complicated topic. The accompanying case study on redeveloping a course using the new ACRL framework will likewise help those seeking practical tips. The “Assessment of Learning” section in the “Learning and Teaching Activities” chapter provides a good explanation of formative vs. summative assessment (90–93), concepts that can sometimes be confusing in more academic works. The “Approaches to Learning and Teaching” chapter summarizes several major learning theories, which is beneficial for teaching librarians who have little background or formal education in pedagogy.
The chapters on learning and teaching activities, designing sessions for various formats, and delivering learning experiences provide a wealth of sound practical techniques, examples, and ideas, many of which could be (and have been) written about at much greater length in the scholarly literature. Cited are not only books and articles but also conference presentations and posters, giving an additional freshness to this material.
One minor criticism: The authors mix examples of activities used in hours- or weeks-long courses with those more appropriate for one-shot sessions, and this is sometimes confusing. More problematic, but still relatively minor, are the British spellings and word choices sprinkled throughout the text (e.g., “induction” for “orientation,” A1 and A4 paper sizes, “tutor” for “instructor,” “referencing” for “citing”). A short glossary might have been helpful for readers outside the United Kingdom. However, the author has done an excellent job of including examples from US and Canadian as well as British universities.
Highly recommended for those seeking a concise and practical, yet thorough, overview of important trends and issues relevant to library instruction practice.—Joan Plungis, Reference and Instruction Librarian, University of Dayton, Dayton, Ohio