SU Library Instruction Program

For this frame, learners should begin to understand that:

• The scholarly conversation may not seem like what they think of as a "conversation."  It may help to think of it as a written conversation.
• It may seem like we place a lot of emphasis on finding scholarly books or articles, but that is partly because  research and peer review are reputable, valuable processes.
• However, there are ways for people at all levels to get involved in the conversation.  Just because a student isn't ready to publish in an academic journal yet doesn't mean that he can't respond to the author or write a blog post, article, or tweet about the work.
• It is important to behave responsibly and professionally when entering the scholarly conversation, even if you're writing just a tweet.
• Scholarship and research evolve over time.  What's considered common knowledge or an accepted viewpoint today may not stay that way for 50 years.  Similarly, information from 50 years ago may no longer be considered accurate, reputable, or appropriate.
• The scholarly research and publication process is biased toward the privileged, and it may not represent the viewpoints of people who are not literate or fluent or who don't have access to higher education

The Human Scholarly Conversation

Ask students to think of all the people involved in the scholarly conversation.  Write down their ideas on individual pieces of paper (or you can also bring pre-printed papers with the name of one person on each and then pull them out as students name the players).  You can nudge students toward the ones they haven't thought of.  Your list might include these people, or others that you/the students think of:

• Funder
• Researcher
• Author (bonus points:  mention that sometimes the person who does the research and the person who writes the work are not the same person!)
• Editor
• Peer reviewer
• Publisher
• Reader
• Book reviewer
• Review author (e.g., for a literature review)
• Professor
• Student
• Librarian
• Archivist
• Journalist
• Blogger
• Social media user
• Member of the general public

Give each student one of the "role" sheets.  (This list is generally in order, so it would help to mix them up.)  Ask them to line up in the order they think these roles go in.  If you have a lot of space, you might ask them to spread out according to how much time each role takes (point out that the research and writing part can take years, and the peer review process might take months to a year, whereas the journalists, bloggers, and social media users could be very close together).

If you have more students than roles, assign multiple people to be students or members of the general public.  Ask where they think they go in the process and have them stand next to that person.

Now ask the students/members of the general public to imagine themselves in 5 years or 10 years.  Will they be in grad school?  Will they have a full-time job or a Master's or PhD?  How does this change their role in the process -- will they be ready to be a professor, a reviewer, or a peer reviewer?  What if they change majors or leave the field -- how does that change their role in the scholarly conversation?  Can they still read and respond to research even if they're no longer in a certain program or career?

Lesson Plan Assignment

Students – who they are –

First year students

Outcomes -

Understand from their own experience how multiple contributions can increase knowledge (Scholarship as Conversation)

 Objectives – To know … To do

Students in groups will construct written conversations on a given topic, share those conversations with the whole class, and discuss them.

Hook (motivation)

Topics, Group interaction

Procedures

Divide the students into groups of about 4-5 students each.  Provide each group with a junior legal pad and pencils, if needed.  Instruct as follows:

For this exercise, you’re going to have a written conversation within your group on a topic you’ll select by picking it at random out of a basket I’ll be passing around.  The person in the group sitting closest to the door will start the conversation by writing one sentence on the pad about the topic.  Then the person to their right will read that sentence silently and write a second sentence, either reacting to the first sentence, adding new information, making an observation, or writing whatever they choose about the topic.  (The sentence must add something of substance – not just “I agree”.  NO EMOJIS!) They then pass the pad to the next student who does the same.  This continues until everyone has written three sentences.  When everyone is finished, we’ll read the conversations aloud and talk about them.

Have students construct the written conversations.

Have students read the conversations aloud.

Ask the students

                How did the conversations develop?

                Did everyone agree?

How would it have been different if each person had just written three sentences on their own instead of reading other people’s sentences and then writing?

How do you think this exercise relates to research?

 

Active student engagement

Writing out conversations
                Sharing with the class
                Discussing the experience

 

What students will be able to do after the lesson
The students will be able to understand how scholarly conversations build knowledge.

Possible topics:

Bees
Pizza
Soccer
Electronic textbooks
Flavored coffee
Big Box Stores
Uber/Lyft
Electric cars
Smart houses
Emojis