Thought-provoking trends in online information literacy tutorials

THE title implies this book is about what leading organisations are using to develop online tutorials to promote information literacy with practical tips and suggestions based on experience. After numerous pages listing tables it provides a copy of the survey and starting at page 46 with only 34 pages summarising the main findings of the survey, the remainder of the book consists of raw data from the survey responses. No analysis of the results is provided despite interesting trends such as a general lack of training and almost 63 per cent not involving subject specialists. It feels disconcerting not to have an introduction providing context by explaining when and why the survey was conducted, or what the researchers hoped to discover. There has been at least one previous edition of this survey in 2013 but that is not mentioned and no comparison is made between the results of the two surveys.

One of the most interesting results centred on the choice of software, it would have been fascinating to discover whether the software used to create online tutorials had changed either by numbers using it or new brands emerging. There is some interesting raw data, particularly from the candid responses to the open ended questions such as which tutorials from other institutions they admired or imitated but this would have been much more valuable with a note of the websites. Other open questions lead to some of the most baffling aspects of the results. In response to the question about reasons for not using vendor created tutorials the majority of respondents specifically state that the suggested reasons are not a factor e.g. quality, unsupported technology or preference for creating their own version but only 11 provided another reason. It identifies thought-provoking current trends in how US academic institutions develop online information literacy tutorials.

Primary Research Group Staff. Survey of Best Practices in Developing Online Information Literacy Tutorials. Columbia, USA: Primary Research Group, 2017. 312 pp. ISBN 978 1 5744 0430 2. $98.