Author Archives: edmunsot

Library Instruction Workshop: 7/27/07

Early/Other Instruction Models

  • Madeline Hunter model: 7 Step Lesson Plan:
    • objectives
    • standards
    • anticipatory set
    • teaching
    • input
    • modeling
    • check for understanding
    • guided practice/monitoring
    • closure
    • independent practice
  • Heinich & Molenda: ASSURE Model
    • Analyze learners
    • State objectives
    • Select instructional methods, media, and materials
    • Utilize media and materials
    • Require learner participation
    • Evaluate and revise
  • Both good models for new teachers who are learning their way around the classroom. Is there another way? Yes, this one.

Dynamic Systems

  • Modified from Newell (1986), which was initially a discussion about motor development, moved to learning skills, called it a “model of constraints.”
  • These 3 systems interact: you change one thing and it changes the system– not all 3 have to change for the system to change. This is in opposition to the motor skills development theory.
  • Individual: you bring what you are: skills, body, intelligence
  • Environment: physical arrangement, equipment
  • Task: what are you/they trying to do?
  • Outcome: the system will achieve a steady state, will emerge from the interaction. The system struggles with chaos, but it will resolve itself.
  • How can you change the constraints of an individual? Model different behavior, give them information, engage them immediately and pique their interest, motivate. Conditioning happens over time. Are they being graded?
  • How can you change the structure of the environment? Layout of classroom/room, surface stability, environmental level of predictability (static/dynamic), grouping people based on task.
  • How can you change the task? Motor skills theory related (change speed trajectory of movement), equipment (type, length, size, weight, texture, etc.), c complexity/simplicity, options.
  • Research is a dynamic activity
  • What decisions do people make when they do research?
  • What knowledge do they need to have to use research tools?
  • What skills do they need to have efficiently use tools?
  • Are poor choices and/or a lack of knowledge/skills okay? Who says it’s a poor choice? It’s only poor if we/faculty says it is. They have to be given choices.
  • Manipulating Outcome: what are the desired behaviors? How does discovery learning fit into the classroom?
  • Make sure there are choices wherever they are rather than a sequence of events or stations.
  • The purpose is giving them experiences. Learning retained.
  • Warnings: you can lose them with a lot of instruction, lose them with a complex first task. Make sure you increase the complexity with each task. However, if this is an entirely new skill or new subject matter, don’t be afraid to give them instruction (though if you can make it dynamic, do).

Dynamic Systems Teaching Model

  1. Establish the task goal: structure the environment, give information about the task, do not demonstrate (but you can provide instructional support).
  2. Provide choices: one size doesn’t fit all, have a selection of skills/movements/equipment available, allow safe student decisions. Get them to looks at the choices and the outcomes. Give them feedback about the choices they have made/are making. Ask “what do you notice when you ___?”
  3. Modify the variable: “restructure” the environment for the group and the individuals who are ready.
  4. Provide instruction: only after the first 3 steps, instruct about skills students have selected, instruct about “teacher preferred” skills.

Example: Use good keywords

  • Research task: Ask them to search for something/an article, may not discuss specific results.
  • Restructure task: Ask them to find a synonym, repeat their search multiple times.

Example: Use varied databases

  • Research task: ask them to find an article in a database, do not set any limiters. If they ask, you can define “scholarly source.”
  • Restructure task: ask them to explore the advanced search page for limiters (ie specific journals). Give them different databases to use to search for scholarly sources. Ask them to compare magazine to scholarly journals.

Example of lesson plan for one-shot instruction session (library focus)
Visit the Wikipedia current events section for topics that are very recent and from the past couple of months.

  • Give students a topic and ask them to find a relevant/suitable article (don’t limit or define your terms here, let them explore & come back with anything).
  • Discuss with the students/instructor to see what they define as “suitable.”
  • Ask the student to find articles with as much bibliographic information as possible, from a variety of sources.
  • Discuss the difference between broadcast & print, how important permanence is in academia. Search for print sources in databases, tell them they have to use certain databases (ie Lexis/Nexis, EBSCO).
  • Where did you find more?
  • Discuss the publication cycle and how it is not suitable for very current events (periodical database isn’t going to provide you with articles if the event happened yesterday.
  • Ask them to “experience” different databases.

How can archivists use this? Tiah’s Dynamic Systems lesson planning model

  • Task 1: Research w/o constraints. “Find something in the yearbooks that is interesting to you.”
  • Discussion outcomes: “What did you find? Why was it interesting?”
  • Task 2: Research with some constraints (change the task/environment): “Look at another yearbook that is at least 20 years older or 20 years more recent than your first choice.”
  • Discussion outcomes: “What differences did you notice?”
  • Task 3: Research with more constraints (change the task/environment): “Look at another yearbook that is at least 20 years older or 20 years more recent than your first or second choices. This time look for a similar topic or subject.”
  • Discussion outcomes: “What did you find?” “What differences did you notice?”
  • Task 4: Research with more constraints (change the task/environment): Give them a set of photographs and ask them to discuss what they see. Ask them to date the images given what they learned in their experiences with the yearbooks.”

Adventures in the Archives: Hunting for History

Students Map of Campus1.jpg

Upward Bound Students: Welcome to the OSU Archives!

Congratulations! You have found your first clue!

The map shown above is one that was drawn by a student for the 1934 Beaver yearbook. We don’t know much about the artist, Wayne Bagley, but we do know that he included all the clues on his map that you will need to finish this scavenger hunt.

In your hunt for Oregon State University history, you will use Wayne’s map to find buildings in the main quad of campus, going from building to building in search of clues. On the second day of the hunt, you will spend some time investigating the Archives, looking for more information about Wayne and his roaring 1920s college life!

Wayne was a student at Oregon State College, as OSU was known in the 1920s, from 1926-1930. He was an active artist while at OSC, though he was an Engineering major! He was a member of Kappa Kappa Alpha, the Hammer and Coffin (the Oregon State chapter of the national honor humor fraternity), the National Honorary Fraternity in Art, as well as a member of Theta Delta Nu and an editor for the Beaver yearbook. In 1928, he was on the staff for the Orange Owl, which was a comic magazine on campus and a publication of the Hammer and Coffin.

The Orange Owl, Oregon State’s humor magazine for 8 years, was full of literary articles, verses, jokes, skits, cartoons, and pictures. In 1928, the same year Wayne was involved, the Hammer and Coffin decided to stop publishing the magazine because there were so many complaints by people who were offended by the articles; later that year, the magazine was shut completely down by a student interest committee.

To begin, click on the map, and then write down the “Item Number” on a paging slip and give it to the person at the Archives reference desk.

Good luck and have fun!

Congratulations Beaver Baseball!

National Champions — for the second year in a row!

1898 Baseball.jpgPlease help us in congratulating the OSU Beaver Baseball Team as they return to Corvallis today after clinching the National Championship for the second time in as many years.

And while baseball is on your brain, please visit our digital collection Oregon State Baseball: 100 Years to a National Championship, 1907-2006.

Early Forestry Education in America

Forest History Society Photograph Collection Exhibit Features OAC!

forest history society1.gif

The Forest History Society in Durham, NC, has posted a gallery of historic photos called “Early Forestry Education in America.” The photos come from the Society of American Foresters Collection, and depict forestry education activities, facilities, students and personnel at six different forestry schools from 1920-1923. In addition to OSU, other schools included are Michigan Agricultural College, Penn State, University of Washington (Seattle), New York State College of Forestry, and UC Berkeley.

The images from OAC were collected in 1923 by Col. Henry S. Graves, then Dean of the Yale School of Forestry. He intended to have them mounted in an album to be placed in the new library building at Yale. These 6 Oregon Agricultural College photos were submitted by Dean George W. Peavy on August 20, 1923. Dean Peavy wrote the following in his correspondence to Graves: “Possibly the more staid and dignified forestry students at Yale would be interested in more strictly technical matters. However, these prints seem to be the ones most readily available at the time.”

For reference assistance, please contact the Forest History Society Photographic Archivist, Elizabeth Hull. Mailing address: Archives, Forest History Society, 701 William Vickers Avenue, Durham, North Carolina, 27701. Phone: 919-682-9319. Fax: 919-682-2349.

The Archivists Join Friends & Colleagues in Moscow, Idaho

dance.jpgIt’s that special time of year, the time for NW archivists to congregate for our spring conference. Several OSU Archivists are heading east to the greater Pullman/Moscow area for the Northwest Archivists Conference this week: “Dynamic Archives: Preserving the Past and Speaking to the Future” will take place from May 17-19, in Moscow, Idaho.

On the program are two plenary sessions by Thomas E. Mills & Augusta Rohrbach, as well as sessions that address leadership skills for archivists, coordinating national and regional projects, online tutorials, disaster planning resources, the challenges in working with ephemera, MPLP processing standards, and how archivists can flourish in a Web 2.0 world.

Our hours on Friday, May 18th will be shortened, so please contact the desk at (541) 737.2165 or archives@oregonstate.edu with questions.

Franklin Elementary School

Franklin Elementary.jpgWelcome Adams Elementary students!

“Schoolhouses were among the first buildings erected once the settlers took care of the more pressing needs of food and shelter. The rural school site, which was often one acre, contained the schoolhouse, a wood shed, two outhouses, perhaps a horse shed, and sometimes play equipment. The schoolhouse was usually a rectangular, front-gabled building with one room. The outsides of schoolhouses ranged from crude, unpainted board, to exteriors finished with painted trim elements. Many of the first schools were of log construction, like the schoolhouse erected in 1848 on what is currently the northeast corner of Second and Jackson in Corvallis and the Gingles Schoolhouse, located in the North Albany area.”

“Most students walked, while some rode horses to the district schoolhouse– often a mile or more away but rarely more than five miles from home. Many schools were closed in the worst winter months because of deep mud and heavy rains. In the summer, farm work closed the schools, leaving several months in the fall and spring for classes.”

“Schoolhouses were also the social hubs of communities, because the schools sponsored many community events. Popular amusements included box socials, pie socials, and ice cream socials. Christmas, May Day, and graduation were among the most important days for school celebrations.”

From A Pictorial History of Benton County, found on the Archives Reference shelf on the 3rd floor of The Valley Library.

Collecting, preserving, and sharing history

Please visit our blog and let us hear your stories, thoughts, and concerns.

Society for American Archivists
Saving Our Archives
MayDay 2007

MayDay.jpg

MayDay is a time when archivists and other cultural heritage professionals take personal and professional responsibility for doing something simple, something that would make a difference when and if an emergency occurs.

Last year, while working as an archivist at Lane Community College, I gave a class on preparing for a disaster for Lane employees, and I never thought my former boss would be using our emergency resources less than a year later. On April 18th, 2007, the Archives experienced significant water damage due to a water leak. Information, photographs, and disaster resources can be found on the Archives and Records Management web page.

This disaster serves as a reminder to us all that preparing for an emergency is more than just an exercise we go through once a year …

Mathematical Awareness Month

In the tradition of a true mathematician, we celebrate Mathematical Awareness Month at the very last moment possible!
Joseph EmeryWhereas the words “Mathematical Awareness Month” might bring feelings of anxiety to most, here in the Archives it brings us great pride when we remember one of our university’s great math professors, Joseph Emery.

One out of seven children, Emery was born in Pennsylvania on June 2, 1833 along with his twin sister Mary Emery. He began showing his mathematical uniqueness early, since we all know the probability of being born a twin isn’t very high!

In 1867, a year after his brother-in-law, William A. Finley, became president of the school, Emery joined the faculty teaching mathematics, physics, geology, and physiology. Emery was also involved in administrative affairs with his efforts in raising the money used to purchase the Roberts farm that made up the original school campus.

During his time here Emery was known as an enthusiastic teacher who took a lot of pride in his department and his work. Emery often used hands-on methods of teaching to involve his students in their studies. In 1869 the first mechanical and chemical apparatus was purchased for the school. Emery used it to perform demonstrations, such as sending a shock through the whole student body when they joined hands in a long chain that stretched down one stairwell, outside, and back up the other stairwell. Among his many students during his years here were J.K. Weatherford, William E. Yates, and Ida Burnett Callahan.

In 1871, after the resignation of Finley, Emery was offered the position of president, which he declined. He did however agree to serve as acting president during the summer of 1871, until incoming President Arnold could arrive in September. During this time Emery wrote the biennial report of the college. Included in this report was not only a request for an increase of $10, 000 in the college appropriations, but also an appeal that the legislature “open the doors of the Oregon Agricultural College to the young ladies of Oregon”; at that time the law, if interpreted as written, the law recognized the college as accessible only to male students. Approval was given to both requests — making Emery’s role even more significant. By any calculation, Emery definitely made his mark on university history!

A photo of the 1883 faculty is available.