Are You a 21st Century Library-Ready Instructor?

Another slow week in Library News, so once again I'm going to point to interesting stuff I've found elsewhere. This time it's a post on the Tomorrow's Professor blog (a great resource if you haven't seen it before - lots of thought-provoking posts on all aspects of teaching and learning in Higher Ed). This one is by Michael L. Rodgers and David A. Starrett, Southeast Missouri State University, and talks about the challenges and opportunities of academic libraries in the 21st Century and how instructors can encourage students to get the most out of them.

Google Jockeys - why you need one (or don't) in your class

It's been sort of a slow couple weeks for library news, so I thought I'd bring up something a bit different. Some of you are likely aware of Educause's "7 Things Your Should Know" series, covering all aspects of technology in education. Usually I'm at least aware of the concept they cover in these, but Google Jockeying was new to me! A Google Jockey is a student in class who is assigned by the professor to surf the web for info on terms, ideas, Websites, etc. being covered in the lecture. A screen displays everything the jockey turns up for all participants to see. I'm not sure how I feel about this. Does it just reinforce students' ideas that everything can be found using Google? Does it cause them to be more critical of wha they find? Would it really add to the class or just be major distraction? What do you think?

The Educause report is available at
http://www.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ELI7014.pdf