American Chemical Society
Teaching Chemical Information:
Tips and Techniques
— August 1998 —
Short Course: Advantages, Disadvantages and Considerations
Definition of Short Course (or Seminar Series): multiple lectures given during short period of time (1-2 weeks) on a focused set of topics.
Advantages
- Instructor is able to teach modules that build upon one another
- Users gain more expertise than is possible from a single workshop
- Consolidated block of time helps focus users attention on seminar topic
- Teaching a group (e.g. class, lab group) help builds peer support network
- Users learn skills that they can apply immediately to real information problems
Disadvantages
- Schedule conflicts hard to avoid
- May have to offer multiple times, depending on topic and how often user population turns over
- Preparation and teaching take a lot of hard work
Considerations
- Need to decide what teaching formats provide the “biggest bang for the buck”
- Offer during Intersession or Summer (slow times) in response to a course being taught or to a special set of information needs
- Including hands-on practice results in a higher retention rate of skills
- Instead of offering stand-alone seminars, work to integrate seminars into a larger organizational structure (e.g. a course being taught, new student orientation)
- Funds for printing handouts and online access
- What infrastructure is needed (e.g. classroom, network access, computer equipment, etc.) ?
- Possible to share workload by team teaching or by bringing in a guest lecturer