Library workshop request
If you would like an in-class research workshop, your department's liaison librarian and/or the library's teaching coordinator, Prof. Haruko Yamauchi, would be happy to speak with you about tailoring the workshop to support your research assignment and learning goals for your students.
We request at least two weeks' notice before the date when you would like the workshop.
(1) Student learning goals
Please describe your research assignment, including major deadlines (or just attach your syllabus, if it describes the assignment).
By the end of the semester, what do you expect students to know and be able to do regarding research?
(2) Logistical information
Please note that for classes over 25, we may need to make reservations for smartrooms, computer labs, COWS, and/or projectors, which are all subject to availability – advance notice helps our chances.
We look forward to collaborating with you!
To give you an idea of the kinds of workshops that we may suggest, here are several options:
Many students struggle with moving beyond an overly broad topic to articulating a researchable question of an appropriate scope. We can introduce accessible strategies that help them focus their topic, develop their questions, and identify key words to use as starter fuel for their searching.
Students also often are new to differentiating among the types of sources available to them. We can provide hands-on activities in which students discover differences in scope and appropriateness of a variety of sources (such as reference articles, books, and, when appropriate, peer-reviewed articles). Depending on the nature and requirement of your assignment, different materials will be chosen as the focus.
Students will also have the chance to start hands-on searching using library tools, filtering for appropriate sources and using the key words they have identified.
After graduation (and now, in daily life), the internet is for most people the primary provider of written and audiovisual information. In this workshop, students will start to build critical habits of mind when confronting web sources, learning that they should always investigate: Who wrote this? What is their agenda and POV? Where did they get their information?
In an increasingly complex web environment, students must go beyond the idea of “bad/uncredible” vs “good/credible” websites, to consider which factors would lead one more toward trust (e.g., good logic, known strong reputation, verifiable credentials of author, etc.) and which more toward doubt (e.g., anonymity, poor reasoning, strongly biased language, lack of acknowledged sources)?
Students will actively explore these questions using real websites. They will also have the chance to articulate keywords relevant to their research assignment, and start hands-on searching for appropriate sources using those keywords.
Although plagiarism is essentially a writing, rather than research, issue, a workshop on using outside sources can be brought to your class.
Students should bring to class an article or book that they will use in their assignment, and will examine and discuss best practices for citation. They will have hands-on time to integrate a quote or paraphrase into a paragraph and create at least one citation in class.
What is an empirical article, and what are the best ways to triage the results from a database list? What are strategies for sussing out quickly and effectively whether an article is appropriate to one’s research? Students (best for advanced classes) will have hands-on time learning the answers.
A workshop can be created to get students thinking about differences between primary and secondary sources, and learning where to find relevant material for their project. Depending on the kinds of sources used, this could be an introductory or advanced workshop
The library has a number of databases devoted to historical primary sources, and the Hostos Archives contains some primary sources about the Grand Concourse, Hostos College, and Eugenio Maria de Hostos.
The above list is not meant to be comprehensive – the best workshop is one that is tailored to supporting your assignment, and we’d be glad to speak with you about possible options.
To arrange a workshop for your students:
Please note:
Requests may be sent to the Library Teaching Coordinator, Prof. Haruko Yamauchi, at HYamauchi@hostos.cuny.edu or if you prefer directly to your department’s library liaison.
Library workshop request form (please feel free to either copy and paste these questions into an email, or download the word doc here: Workshop Request Form.
We request at least two weeks’ notice before the date when you would like the workshop.
(1) Assignment: Please describe your research assignment, including major deadlines (or just attach your syllabus, if it describes the assignment).
(2) Student learning goals: By the end of the semester, what do you expect students to know and be able to do, regarding research?
(2) Logistical information
Please note that for classes over 25, we will ask you to make reservations for smartrooms, computer labs, COWS, and/or projectors, which are all subject to availability – advance notice increases the chance of room and equipment availability.
We look forward to collaborating with you!