Building a Teaching Community: 2nd Annual Summer Retreat for Librarians, June 29 @ Chapman University

Gentle readers--LIS Candidate Derek Stalcup and I attended this one-day conference at the Leatherby Libraries, Chapman University in Orange, CA.  Annie Knight, Wenling Tseng and Stacy Russo were our gracious hosts and I thank them for their hospitality.  This gathering wasn't billed as an "unconference", such as the one at Santa Barbara City College and was a bit more formal, but still with a relaxed summer "vibe". 

Take-aways:  Derek and I learned about systems for students to give instant feedback with cell phones (no clickers needed).  We intend to look into this for the before- and after-lecture surveys that Derek has created for assessing library instruction.  SurveyMonkey and similar programs can be used in on lab computers...but what if you're teaching 100 students in a big lecture hall?  Cell phones may well be the answer, since almost every student has one.  Paper surveys can be used by anyone who might have to pay for data messages.