The Perfect Storm: A Review of the Literature on Increased Noise Levels in Academic Libraries

The combination of new technologies, changing librarian roles, and a generation of “digital native” students has led to an increase in noise levels in academic libraries. The authors present a review of the literature on increased noise levels in academic libraries in an attempt to identify best practices for adapting libraries to noise and to assist reference librarians who must confront disruptive patrons. They discuss such practices as zoning libraries, furniture arrangement, written policies, signage, and peer policing for noise.     

Evaluating Continuing Resources: Perspectives and Methods from Science Librarians

Five science librarians share their experiences with the evaluation of continuing resources at an academic university and discuss implications caused by the evaluation process. Four of the authors were new to collection evaluations at the time of the Serial Evaluation Project. These new librarians faced many challenges, both personally and professionally, in dealing with the cancellation process. Although the differences in approaches to collection analysis are discussed somewhat, they are not a focus of the article.     

Telling the Story of a Collection with Visualizations: A Case Study

Patrons and scholars are increasingly likely to first encounter a collection in a digital space rather than a physical one. This article considers how to utilize data visualization in an academic library to promote a unique collection to remote visitors. In order to create awareness of the Valente Italian Library at Seton Hall University, one of the largest Italian collections in the United States, subject librarians considered ways to convey and describe the collection beyond the search box or the discovery filters of the catalog. After considering meaningful data points available in the records data, the authors harvested, cleaned, and mined the data for interesting collection facets. Visualizations were created from the data and the authors explore whether they offer a greater understanding of the collection and aid in telling its story, as well as recreate a sense of browsing for the online visitor.     

Using Google Scholar at the Reference Desk

ABSTRACT

Google Scholar has multiple uses as a reference tool of last resort, including citation completion, an alternative when catalogs are down, and interdisciplinary metasearching and database suggestion. During the reference desk transaction, users can be taught effective Google Scholar search techniques such as advanced search functionality and the nuances of results' groupings. In addition, reference desk interactions with Google Scholar give insight for instructional workshops.     

Action research: professional development to help support and retain early career teachers

This article analyzes how participation in teacher-led, semester-long, action research projects influences early career teacher (fewer than three years of teaching experience) perceptions of support and learning. All teachers at an urban, newly developed, small high school participated in action research projects as a result of the administrations’ attempts to modify the school’s approach to professional development to better meet the teachers’ needs. Two cycles of action research projects were implemented and teachers provided feedback through an end-of-project evaluation. Data were also collected through participant observation and informal interviews. Results show that teacher-led action research projects as a professional development structure contribute to the development of a supportive professional culture, feelings of context-specific support, and feelings of empowerment and being overwhelmed in an urban school staffed primarily with early career teachers.     

Role of Significant Life Experiences in Building Environmental Knowledge and Behavior Among Middle School Students

Significant life experience research suggests that the presence of role models, time outdoors, and nature-related media foster pro-environmental behavior, but most research is qualitative. Based on a random sample of middle school students in North Carolina, USA, we found limited positive associations between presence of a role model and time outdoors with behavior and a negative association between watching nature television and environmental knowledge. The strongest predictors of environmental knowledge and behavior were student/teacher ratio and county income levels, respectively. We also found that Native Americans engaged in environmental behaviors more than Caucasians, and that African American and Hispanic students had lower levels of environmental knowledge. Accordingly, life experiences appear less important than promoting small class sizes and addressing challenges associated with lower incomes in schools.     

Book review section

FREE SPEECH: RESPONSIBLE COMMUNICATION UNDER LAW. By Robert M. O'Neil. Indianapolis, Indiana: The Bobbs‐Merrill Company, Inc., 1966; pp. viii 123+$1.25.

THE MOYNIHAN REPORT AND THE POLITICS OF CONTROVERSY, by Lee Rainwater and William L. Yancey. Cambridge: MIT Press, 1967; pp. xvii+493. $3.95.

VOICES OF CRISIS: VITAL SPEECHES ON CONTEMPORARY ISSUES, by Floyd W. Matson, New York: The Odyssey Press, Inc., 1967; pp. xi+304.

THE BLACK POWER REVOLT. Edited by Floyd B. Barbour. Boston: Porter Sargent Publisher, 1968; pp. 287. $5.95 cloth; $2.95 paper.

THE AGITATOR IN AMERICAN SOCIETY. By Charles W. Lomas. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice‐Hall, 1968; pp. viii+182.

BLACK POWER: THE POLITICS OF LIBERATION IN AMERICA. By Stokely Carmichael and Charles V. Hamilton. New York: Vintage Books, 1967; pp. xii+ 198. Paper $1.95.

REPORT OF THE NATIONAL ADVISORY COMMISSION ON CIVIL DISORDERS. New York: Bantam Books, 1968; pp. xi+609. Paper $1.25.     

Literary precocity: An exceptional case among exceptional cases

This article presents the case of Geoffrey, a prolific 5‐year‐old writer. It examines his writing and how his intrapersonal factors and propitious environment contribute to his prodigious output. Childhood precocity is presented as an age‐based comparable rather than as an adult‐based predictor, consistent with Jackson's (2000) domain‐specific developmental theory of giftedness. Geoffrey demonstrated highly precocious writing, both in production and in sophistication, and he demonstrated these abilities across a range and variety of content topics. The convergence of contributing influences evident in Geoffrey's life supports a growing literature on the coalescence factor within precocity. This implies that parents and educators have to carefully consider their influences. Suggestions are made concerning how developmental models of giftedness may need to expand to accommodate precocious writers.