Issue 5 April 2009

Issue 5, April 2009

University of Lincoln Library & Learning Resources

Newsletter for staff and students Student Advisers: your new PALS

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ibrary & Learning Resources and the Centre for Education and Research Development (C.E.R.D.) are piloting a peer-assisted learning (PAL) project, in which Student Advisers (undergraduates), will "rove" in key student working areas at three of the University's campuses.

Inside this issue: Student Advisers: your new PALS

All 7 UK research councils now 1 mandate Open Access

Student Advisers will offer first line study support, addressing information and academic literacy, I.T. enquiries and providing general mentoring and support for student learning. They will make referrals to Academic Subject Librarians, where appropriate, and assist with shelving and tidying, and maintaining printer/ copiers. There are currently 11 undergraduate students working as Student Advisers (PALs) across all three campuses (Hull, Riseholme and Brayford). Visit the PAL page on the Library and Learning Resources Portal page for further information. For specialist subject support contact your Academic Subject Librarian.

Reconfigured learning at Risholme

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My name is ERL* - Paul Stainthorp talks about his new role

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Free online training from Microsoft

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Academic staff event in June

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LibraryThing; What’s on your bookshelf?

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Supporting learning at Holbeach 3

Four of the eleven PALs—Clockwise from top left: Emily Gough, Charlotte Gibling, Raechel Lemmon and Akua Asamoah

Summer loan changes

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News blog

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LearningDevelopment@Lincoln: 4 supporting student success Theses online

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All 7 UK research councils now mandate

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he Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) (www.epsrc.ac.uk/ AboutEPSRC/AccessInfo/ROAccess) has agreed to mandate open access publication for research that it has funded, bringing it in line with the other 6 councils and with the Research Councils UK’s policy (www.rcuk.ac.uk/access). Guidance on open access is available on the CERD Academic Commons website (commons.lincoln.ac.uk/

open-access). The University of Lincoln's Institutional Repository (eprints.lincoln.ac.uk) has been established by CERD. It is for the permanent deposit of research and conference papers, e-theses, student projects and teaching and learning materials produced by our community of staff and students. Repository content can be browsed or searched through this website or through searching Google. Page 1

Newsletter for staff and students

Reconfigured learning at Riseholme

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ollowing staff and student feedback, we have changed the usage of two of the rooms in the Riseholme LRC. The former silent study room is now designated for use as a group working room. This reflects the trend towards students working more in collaboration and means that you should have

more opportunity to work in this way. The former group room is now designated as the silent study room. This room is easier for staff to monitor so that it is used in accordance with LRC guidelines, thus enabling you to work undisturbed when you wish to. Please let us know if someone is disturbing your study! The “middle room”

‘Please let us know what you think of the changes, and let us know your suggestions to make the Riseholme LRC a better place!’ Pam Young, Riseholme LRC

Free online training from Microsoft

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icrosoft has an extremely comprehensive library of online training packages that are free for anyone to use.

The training sites can be accessed directly from any Microsoft package by pressing the Help key ‘F1’ this will open a sidebar with various useful links. You will need to select ‘Connect to Microsoft Office Online’ this will then take you to the ‘Office Online Homepage’. The home page has a number of links including ‘Free online training’. Follow this link to the training page for Office 2003 and 2007. All you need to do then is select the Office package in which you would like training. Then select what you need to learn about that package. Each course takes about 30 minutes, and has audio content as examples.

remains a multi-purpose PC working area, and don’t forget there is space to study without a PC in the library, and you can use our wireless network in any of our study areas.

Riseholme LRC group working room

My name is ERL*

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lectronic resources librarian Paul Stainthorp talks about his new job, working to get the best out of e-books, journals and more...

Since October last year, I've been working as the University of Lincoln's first-ever dedicated electronic resources librarian (ERL). But what does an e-resources librarian actually do? Well, I've been… Improving the information on our Electronic Journals A-to-Z, so that you can find full-text electronic journals more accurately. Helping to launch our new collection of 40,000 e-books (which are now all visible on our catalogue), and to consider the impact of e-books on the paper library. Fixing the Athens login system, with University ICT services, so that it's quicker and more reliable. Arranging more training on RefWorks personal bibliographic management software for academic staff and postgraduate research students. Piloting digital-to-digital copying and online reading lists in Blackboard, to bring information much closer to your modules and course of study. Using our blog to get information out to you about any ongoing problems with e-resources, improvements to the service, and hints & tips on using our resouces. Now it's over to you… What do you think of Lincoln's e-resources? Are they easy to use? Is our information up-to-date and accurate? How relevant is our range of e-books and e-journals? What extra training and support could we offer you? Please let me know! Email me on: [email protected] Twitter me on: http://twitter.com/pstainthorp

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Newsletter for staff and students

Academic staff event in June

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he Library & Learning Resources department and the Centre for Educational Research and Development (CERD) at the Brayford campus are hosting an internal event for academic staff from the University with the aim of promoting various resources, services and projects. The event entitled 'Supporting the learning experience: a joint event by Library & Learning Resources and CERD' will include a programme of 10 minute presentations and an exhibition in the foyer with suppliers and book publishers who will set up stands on the day. The event is scheduled for the 23rd June starting at 12 noon for lunch and ending at 2pm. It will be held in the EMMTEC building on the main campus at the University in Lincoln. Publicity for the event will start in May but if you have any questions in the meantime, please contact Oonagh Monaghan at [email protected] or telephone (01522) 886078.

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f you're a devotee of the booklovers' social network LibraryThing, we'd love you to join us online!

We're developing pages on LibraryThing for all four of our library / LRC centres; in Lincoln, Riseholme, Hull and Holbeach. You can access our LibraryThing pages at: www.librarything.com/local LibraryThing allows you to add and share information about books in your own collection (you have to register to do this), and to get in touch with readers of similar tastes… building the world's largest shared database of bibliographic information.

UniversityofLincolnLovesLibraryThing

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Supporting learning at Holbeach he Holbeach LRC team, Julie Smith and Daniella Nundy, now cover the service desk five days a week.

The Holbeach LRC supports food science and manufacture, agriculture

and management courses with a range of resources such as books and journals. There are also study tables, 16 open access computers, wireless access and most importantly friendly staff ready to help with your information enquiries!

Opening hours

Desk services

Monday

8:00am - 5:30pm

8:30am - 4:00pm

Tuesday

8:00am - 5:30pm *

8:30am - 3:30pm

Wednesday

8:00am - 5:30pm

9:00am - 4:30pm

Thursday

8:00am - 5:30pm *

8:30am - 4:30pm

Friday

8:00am - 5:00pm

9:00am - 3:30pm

Saturday

CLOSED

Sunday

CLOSED

* The LRC will stay open later on Tuesdays & Thursdays when evening classes are running.

Julie and Daniella also offer off-campus support to the growing number of distance learners such as postal loans, photocopy request service, Blackboard and network access support. Julie and Daniella can be contacted on Holbeach (01406) 493007. Page 3

Newsletter for staff and students

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News blog

Summer loan changes ook loans will not be extended over the summer vacation. This is to allow greater accessibility to the collection for all borrowers.

To accommodate the change we will be extending the number of renewals to 20 during this period only. We will revert back to 10 renewals from the 28th September.

Renew online at www.library.lincoln.ac.uk using your Student ID number and PIN

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Please remember to renew your books over the telephone - or renew your books online 24/7. Also check your email account for pre notifiers and return books by post, if necessary.

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Workshops have included report writing, referencing, literature searching and essay writing. We are now seeking to expand the range of workshops on offer from September 2009. A Learning Development Workshop Group has been established and at the present time the group is talking to staff and students to find out what workshops they would like.

on't forget that you can keep up to date with what's going on in the University Library and campus LRCs day-to-day, by following our news blog.

Read it online, at: blogs.library.lincoln.ac.uk/news

Contact telephone numbers for all campus Library and Learning Resource centres are at the bottom of this page.

id you know that over the past two years the library has run a very successful series of workshops for students covering information literacy and study skills?

(3D RSS icon by Tiago Pinhal)

You can subscribe using an RSS feed reader (such as Google Reader or Bloglines), or register for updates to be sent direct to your email inbox.

Theses online Broad areas have been agreed for the workshops and include: •

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Writing (more than one workshop to include reading academic texts, making notes, academic style, essay writing, grammar, spelling and punctuation) Presentation skills Critical thinking Exam preparation Getting started with research

If you have any comments, then please contact the chair of the group

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ThOS is the new Electronic Theses Online System from the British Library which allows researchers to access and archive e-theses that have been produced in UK HE institutions. The EThOS database can be searched directly at ethos.bl.uk. You don't have to register to search the database. However, if you want to download an e-thesis or request that a listed print thesis be digitised you are required to register for a username and password. Links to EthOS and more information about the database will shortly be available on the Portal.

Helen Farrall, Learning Development Co-ordinator 01522 886169 [email protected]

University Library

Hull Campus LRC

Riseholme LRC

Holbeach Campus LRC

Brayford Pool Lincoln, LN6 7TS Phone: 01522 88 6222

The Derek Crothall Building George Street Kingston Upon Hull, HU1 3BW Phone: 01482 31 1654

Riseholme Park Lincoln, LN2 2LG Phone: 01522 89 5310

Minerva house Holbeach Technology Park Park Road, Holbeach Phone: 01406 49 3007

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