Faculty Toolkit: Library Support for CORE 3990

Online Sections: About the Library Modules

If you are teaching the course online, the librarian will work with you to add an advanced research lesson to your course. We have designed two modules aligned to the 3990 course learning outcomes and associated Fisher Outcomes. 

Preview the Modules

Faculty, we can add you to a mock Brightpace course where you can preview the modules. Please contact the librarians (libraryreference@sjf.edu) or Mia Breitkopf (mbreitkopf@sjf.edu), the library's 3990 coordinator, if you would like to be added.

Module 1: Librarian Intro & Library 3990 Essentials

• Learning time is 25-65 minutes.
• This module should happen when students have selected a research topic and are ready to start background research and literature searching.
• New in academic year 2024-25: It will direct students to enroll in Library 3990 Essentials. This certificate course will walk students through how to do background research for their topic, and search for a scholarly journal article on their topic. It also covers citation basics.
• Module 1 is especially important for transfer students because they will need to get a basic library orientation. For other students it will be a refresher of library information and research practices they learned in Research-Based Writing 1299.

Related Fisher Outcomes:

• Inquiry & Analysis: Evidence (F.O. 2.1)

Module 2: Advanced Searching Strategies to Find Sources

• Learning time is 20-30 minutes.
• It should be timed for a week after students have already selected their topic, soon after they have begun actively searching for scholarly articles.
• Students will learn how to examine the references in an article in order to find additional sources and how to use Google Scholar for citation tracking.

Related Fisher Outcomes:

• Inquiry & Analysis: Evidence (F.O. 2.1)
• Inquiry & Analysis: Design Process (F.O. 2.2)
• Inquiry & Analysis: Analysis (F.O. 2.3)

What Students Will Learn

For both online and seated sections, the learning objectives are the same.

By the end of the library modules, students will be able to:

• Use an article's references list to find more sources.
• Find the full text of an article by searching for its title in the library's Big Red Box.
• Use Google Scholar's Cited By feature to find more sources.
• Describe how these search strategies can be important to the research process.
• Determine whether an article may be a good fit for your paper using a given set of criteria.