Not Quite Jane Eyre or an Overview of the Fledgling Librarian’s Fieldwork
In truth and in contrast to that memorable opening of Charlotte Bronte’s revered work Jane Eyre, there is every “possibility of taking a walk” on this gloomy fall day in 2019. I could wax poetic for hours, dear reader, on the reasons why a lengthy stroll will typically soothe my agitated mind, particularly as I begin my second year of MLIS-ing at UW-Seattle. But, this Pressbook is neither about ambling through forests, nor does it focus on the Victorian governess novel. Nonetheless, I’m quite certain I’ll spend much of the quarter feeling a certain kinship towards Jane Eyre, Lucy Snowe, and Agnes Grey, while acknowledging the limitations of these characters as white, Victorian women who reaffirm social class hierarchies and heteronormativity throughout their narratives (and in Jane’s case, fail, from a 21st century perspective, to fully register and rectify the abhorrent treatment of Bertha, the entrapped woman of color in the attic).
The purpose of this DFW, unlike Jane Eyre, is to give the student hands-on experience with academic librarianship, specifically in the Humanities. To this end, she will co-teach library instruction sessions for literature courses with Elliott Stevens (UW English Studies librarian) and work on the pre- and post-planning attendant to these sessions. Furthermore, she will have the opportunity to critique and create curriculum as well as research best practices for library instruction and digital pedagogy. A final component of this DFW relates to Digital Scholarship. The student will have the opportunity to gain familiarity with podcasting, digital storytelling, Pressbooks, and, time-dependent, Manifold. In addition to gaining familiarity with these platforms, which may take place independently or in conjunction with instruction, a significant component of the Digital Scholarship portion of this DFW will address/assess accessibility issues, particularly in relation to Disability Studies.
LEARNING OUTCOMES
Goals for the DFW include:
- Research 21st century librarian instruction pedagogies to provide grounding/context for teaching.
- Generate “best teaching practices” for literature courses as well as podcasting and digital storytelling workshops by co-teaching sessions and creating curriculum.
- Gain familiarity with new Digital Scholarship platforms and explore ways in which the accessibility issues they may engender can be problem-solved.
Deliverables for the DFW include:
- An annotated bibliography for the pedagogical research.
- A series of short reflective papers and assessment essays for the co-teaching, assessment, and curriculum creation.
- A teaching manifesto.
- A podcast and/or short digital narrative.
- A Pressbook as the repository for these various materials.
Finally, a few words about this Pressbook. First, to navigate to a different chapter, click on CONTENTS in the upper-left-hand side of the screen, and then click on the + (plus sign) next to “I. Main Body.” Second, Hypothesis has been enabled in the main body chapters, so feel free to sign in and comment on content. Lastly, I’ve alt-texted most photographs, captioned the two short videos in this digital book, and created transcripts for the podcast drafts. However, I acknowledge that there is MUCH more accessibility work to be done in the future on this Pressbook.
Image
Oakwell Hall” by sgwarnog2010 is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
Bonus Fun!
And here, dear reader, is a commercial for a Brontesaurus, courtesy of YouTube; if only it were real!
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