Wednesday, December 12, 2007

Ideas for Librarians Who Teach (book)

Lederer, N. (2005). Ideas for librarians who teach: With suggestions for teachers and business presenters. Lanham, MD: The Scarecrow Press.

Containing nearly one thousand individual ideas and bits of advice for teaching, Ideas for Librarians Who Teach is tailored primarily to librarians, but most of the suggestions put forth can be applied to anyone who will be getting up in front of a group to teach (e.g. teachers, business trainers, workshop leaders, craft instructors). If someone has some knowledge or skill to share, this book will help him or her teach it with confidence.

Chapters cover diverse topics that range from preparing for a session to looking over the classroom, and from dealing with questions to using visuals, Web pages, and handouts. There are suggestions for teaching audiences with different learning styles as well as teaching foreign students (and vice versa). Group learning ideas and practical suggestions for what to put on feedback forms are also included. Promoting library instruction, teaching via distance education, dealing with disruptive students, and coping with burnout are addressed with applicable recommendations. There is an extensive bibliography and recommended resources throughout for additional or more detailed descriptions of some of the ideas. Also, example syllabi and a workshop outline are provided as appendixes.

Whether using this book as a base for a semester-long course or for a workshop on teaching, librarians who teach, or who are about to start teaching, will find this book very helpful. Every academic, public, school, and corporate library should have this book.

(This description is from the publisher.)