A bibliographic (classroom) instruction session is when a librarian visits your class in order to introduce your students to the resources available to them through our libraries and teach them the skills necessary to navigate college-level research. These classes can range from being broad in topic to being subject, and even project, specific. We'll cover everything, from how to search for books and articles, to resource evaluation, to the differences between Google and scholarly databases!

There are all sorts of reasons to have a librarian visit your class! Most often we're called into classes that are research-intensive or have a large paper/research project as part of their requirement. In these instances, the best time to get us into your class and interacting with your students is right as they are choosing their research topics. If any of your students are struggling to narrow down on a topic, we can cover that during our instruction sessions as well!

Make sure to take a look at your syllabi and decide on a good point in the curriculum for us to visit! Due to limited staffing, it may take us anywhere from 3-5 business days to respond to a request for instruction, meaning that trying to book a librarian less than two weeks out may result in us being unable to accommodate your request. If instruction requests are submitted less than a week in advance it is very likely we will be unable to fulfill your request, though we will do our best to accommodate your class in whatever way we can.

The best method is to use the online form. Please send your request at least two weeks in advance; you will receive an email confirmation usually within 24 hours of its receipt. You can also contact Dylan Sprague, Instruction and Outreach Librarian, Haas Library at 203-837-9143 or spragued@wcsu.edu to discuss the possibilities.

It depends what you would like taught! Our Instruction Session Menu provides a list of our most popular topics and how long each takes to cover. In addition, we are now offering follow-up sessions! Following the initial library instruction session have us return a few weeks later, when your students are deep into their research, so we can spend some one-on-one time with them to make sure their information needs are being met!