Evaluating and assessing"against the grain" applying mixed methods in support of critical library pedagogy Carol Leibiger and Alan Aldrich: Pam blogs from #ECIL2017

Alan and his colleague Carol are based at the university of South Dakota in the USA. They teach information literacy at their institution and have been heavily influenced by a critical literacy perspective, however these methods of involving students are labour and time intensive, particularly if one has to do large scale instruction and also justify the worth of Information Literacy instruction to the management at the university.

Came up with a simple quantitative evaluation instrument using 4 questions inviting a likert scale response, combined with 2 open ended questions "how could the librarian have taught this session better?" And "what recommendations would you make for the librarian"

Likert scale responses were very positive and could be used to justify time and effort of librarians. Qualitative responses indicated a high level of satisfaction with the librarian's teaching. However responses to the 2nd question indicated that students wanted librarians to use appropriate pacing, and not give too much attention to one or two students.

Stratified the quantitative data to look at the lowest and highest quintiles, and tested the relationships between this quantitative data with the qualitative data. Students wanted tutors to show enthusiasm for their role and to demonstrate their positivity. 

It was important to combine the qualitative and quantitative data to reveal the true responses of the students, and to identify points for development.