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Librarians and Writing Advisers merge intentions, information, and identities:

New collaborations based upon research and analysis of how students integrate sources

Presenters (in order of speakers): Elise Y Wong, Sharon Radcliff, Jeff Chon, Tereza Joy Kramer

Saint Mary’s College of California

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In-text citations and bibliographies

Types of sources used in bibliographies

Paraphrasing vs. quoting

How quotations are integrated

How Composition students cite and integrate sources

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Assess students' citing behaviors

Examine how sources are integrated

Evaluate students' citation performance

Students’ writing proficiency and faculty expectation

Compare key data to pilot study

Our study objectives

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Catholic, Lasallian, liberal arts college Undergraduate and graduate schools Total enrollment: 4099 Total full time students: 3590 Number of full-time faculty: 196 Student-faculty ratio: 14:1

About Saint Mary’s College

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First generation college: 36% traditional UG Female: 62%; Male: 38% White: 46%, Minority: 54% 84% freshmen from California Tuition and fees: $37,000 % of full-time undergraduate receiving

financial aid: 75%

Who are SMC students?

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Learning outcomes for ENG 5 includes:

Write analytical, evaluative, and argumentative essays

Employ research skills in writing

Support and cite argument with sources

SMC Composition program

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Learning goal: Information Evaluation and Research

Practices

Learning outcome: students will integrate and cite evidence

appropriately with increasing proficiency

SMC new Core Curriculum Fall 2012 supported our study

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Harvey, M. (2003). The nuts & bolts of college writing. Indianapolis :Hackett.

Hubbuch, S. (2005). Writing research papers across the curriculum (5th ed.). Boston, MA: Wadsworth.

Quaratiello, A., & Devine, J. (2011). The college student’s research companion (5th ed.). New York: Neal-Schuman.

Shields, M. (2010). Essay writing: A student guide. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

First we researched best practices

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Summarizing, paraphrasing, and quoting Paraphrasing, less quoting

Use quotes to support your arguments

Introduce and analyze your sources

Best practices include:

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Nienhaus, B. (2004). Helping students improve citation performance. Business Communication Quarterly, 67 (3), 337-348.

Robillard, A. (2006). Young scholars affecting composition: A challenge to disciplinary citation practices. College English, 68 (3), 253-270.

Shi, L. (2010). Textual appropriation and citing behaviors of university undergraduates. Applied Linguistics, 31 (1), 1-24.

Shi, L. (2011). Common knowledge, learning, and citation practices in university writing. Research in the Teaching of English, 45 (3), 308-334.

Studies that examine students' citation practices/citing behaviors

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Good citation practices are essential

Classroom discussion on citing

Instructor’s assignment requirements

Highlights from the studies:

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Students’ motivation to cite/not to cite

◦ The notion of common knowledge

◦ Knowledge acquired from classroom learning

◦ Unidentifiable prior learning

Instructors' evaluation of students' citation practices

Highlights continued

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SMC Librarians have a long history of collaboration with the English Composition department.

SMC librarians have done two major bibliographic studies and one pilot internal citation study over the past 8 years.

Background

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Instruction: librarians can use their expertise on research methods, processes and sources to teach the research component of the course.

Research: provides both composition faculty and librarians with assessment student performance in various areas and thus on how well existing teaching methods are working

Benefits of collaboration

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Pilot study of 25 papers conducted in 2008.

This study focuses on Standard 3 of ACRL information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education:

◦ The information literate student evaluates information and its sources critically and incorporates selected information into his or her knowledge base and value system.

Current study: 105 papers were collected from 7 Composition classes at the end of Spring 2010. (20 papers were discarded because they had no bibliography attached).

Methodology

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85 papers were analyzed for:

◦ bibliographic content

◦ internal citation practice (paraphrasing vs. quoting)

◦ percentage of bibliography cited in paper

◦ percentage of citable material in paper cited

Methodology continued

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Quotations were analyzed into three categories:

IQ: Quote is preceded by an introduction

QA: Quote is followed by analysis

IQA: Quote has both an introduction and analysis.

More methodology

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Current Study

Pilot Study 2006 study

Books 22% 24% 32% (includesreference)

Websites 44% 34% 22%

Media 3% 2.6% N/A

Magazine/journals/News

30% 28.2% 38%

Interview/survey 1% 9.8% Other:6%

Bibliographic citation types

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58%

42%

use of quotes

paraphrasing

Use of quotes vs. paraphrasing

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Current Study Pilot Study

Percentage of Quotes 58% 57%

Percentage of Paraphrasing

42% 43%

Quoting /paraphrasing

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Quoting contexts

20%

14%

13%

53%

intro comments / IQ

analysis /QA

quote hasno intro oranalysis (Q None)

quote hasanalysis andintro (IQA)

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78%

22%

tot bib cits

Bib uncited

Percent of bibliography cited in paper

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14%

86%

percent uncitedpercent cited

Percent of data cited

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Sources in the bibliographies were fairly evenly distributed between books, articles and websites, with websites taking the lead. Results were similar for the pilot and new study.

Analysis of results

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The researchers see this as an expected and fairly good result, students are not limiting themselves to the web! They are using library resources though faculty could change these percentages via their paper requirements

Analysis of results

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The percentage of quotes to paraphrasing was almost identical in both studies (60/40) and shows a strong preference for quoting.

Generally paraphrasing is preferred as it requires students to integrate the material into their papers.

Results continued

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However 53% of the quotes did have an introduction and analysis which does integrate the next strongest level of integration.

30% of all citations are Quotes without I or A. This group is the one of most concern (in addition to data not cited) and should be addressed by faculty via instruction

Results continued

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The percentage of sources from bibliographies that were cited was high 78 %, but should really be 100%!

This element can be addressed by both faculty and librarians.

Results continued

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The percentage of factual statements and/or data in papers that was cited adequately was high: 86 %

But this should be 100%

Instruction in the importance of citing data needs to be addressed by both librarians and faculty.

Results continued

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MLA format was not followed exactly in most cases though most students did include the essential elements to uniquely identify sources.

In some cases, citing was not counted by researchers because it was too incomplete to indicate a unique source.

Results continued

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Students' citing behaviors

◦ 14% sources in text not cited◦ 22% bibliography not cited in text◦ 47% quotes without I or A or both

Both librarians and faculty can improve instruction

Implications

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No random sampling

Summaries are not defined

No discussion on types of sources

No association between un-cited information in the papers and plagiarism

Papers from different sections by various instructors

Limitations of this study

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Develop multiple instructional strategies

Design a study to test these strategies

Compare results to a control group

Directions for future research

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Connecting Libraries and Writing Center Work

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Written and Oral Communication1.   Recognize and compose readable prose, as characterized by clear and careful organization, coherent paragraphs and well-constructed sentences2.   Recognize and formulate effective written communication, giving appropriate consideration to audience, context and format 3.   Analyze arguments so as to construct ones that are well supported, are well reasoned, and are controlled by a thesis or exploratory question 4.   Use the process of writing to enhance intellectual discovery and unravel complexities of thought. 

Habits of Mind Learning Outcomes

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“Task initiation, topic selection, exploring information, formulating a focus, collecting information, and closing the research process to begin the writing process.”

—Kuhlthau, cited in Elmborg 8

Linear Process

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Holistic Writing & Research Process1.   Recognize and compose readable prose, as characterized by clear and careful organization, coherent paragraphs and well-constructed sentences2.   Recognize and formulate effective written communication, giving appropriate consideration to audience, context and format

3.   Analyze arguments so as to construct ones that are well supported, are well reasoned, and are controlled by a thesis or exploratory question 

4.   Use the process of writing to enhance intellectual discovery and unravel complexities of thought

1. Develop search strategies and use library catalogs and databases to find relevant material 2. Critically evaluate sources

3. Integrate and cite evidence appropriately

4. Understand the concept of intellectual property and practice academic honesty. 

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“The writing process is generally understood to include four major phases: brainstorming, drafting, revising, and editing … These phases, though linear in nature, are really fluid and recursive. … They are drafting while brainstorming. They are brainstorming while drafting.”

—Elmborg 8

Recursive Process

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“If librarians fail to place their advice to students in the rhetorical context, they may reinforce the misconception that the main point of research is to report on knowledge found elsewhere.”

—Hooks 35

Reflective Thinking

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Writing advisers “understand the student perspective because they live that perspective.”

—Elmborg 15

Peer Responsibilities

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“They regularly deal with students who want to have their papers edited for them or have their sources found for them. They do without the power of the grade to enforce their instruction, and … as a result, their relationships with students are more genuine and honest.”

—Elmborg 5

Shared Responsibilities

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“The research process is interwoven with the writing process … [advisers] typically focus helping students in the following areas: invention, outlining, organization, development, revision, integration of sources, and documentation.”

—Hooks 15

Shared Adviser Focus

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“… [Advisers] can refer students to librarians for information needs and librarians can refer students to writing centers for help with ideas, rhetoric, or presentation. Cross-training of [advisers] and librarians can help....”

—Elmborg 11

Collaboration

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For faculty:

Collaborating on faculty development

Pointing to librarians’ study to underscore the need to teach research writing skills

Offering Collaborative Services

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Integrating quotes 47% of all quotes were missing either

introductory lead-ins, analysis, or both◦Of those,30% had neither introductory

lead-ins nor analysis.

Works Cited 22% of bibliography not cited in text 14% of sources in text weren’t cited

Implications of Librarians’ Research

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For students:

Working with students side-by-side

Videotutorials

Research Writing Workshops

Offering Collaborative Services

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Offer workshops for students in courses across the college, particularly Writing In the Disciplines courses.

Work with individual professors to fine-tune workshops for their classes

Research Writing Workshops

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“Libraries and writing centers have many practical reasons for collaboration … [U]nderstanding each other’s pedagogical practices and processes can encourage referrals at appropriate times.”

—Hooks 31

Collaboration

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When working with your students, what similarities do you see with our findings?

How do you address citation and integration of sources, via tutoring or workshops?

What are the core, campuswide research-writing components of your institution?◦ And what assessments/studies have been done?

What types of collaborations have occurred among tutors, librarians, and others?◦ How could you build on those?

With whom could you partner further? How could peer tutors participate?

Discussion Questions

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“The research process involves brainstorming, narrowing or broadening the focus of the topic; searching for, evaluating, and synthesizing the information; revising (i.e. finding more information as the topic changes) through writing, reading, and reflection.”

—Hooks 24

Research Process

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Contact us

Elise Y Wong yw3@stmarys-ca.edu Sharon Radcliff sradclif@stmarys-ca.edu Jeff Chon jhc2@stmarys-ca.edu Tereza Joy Kramer

tereza.kramer2@stmarys-ca.edu

Questions and comments?