wiki, wiki, wiki

A wiki is an expression of democracy, if anyone wants my personal description. It is also described as a medium through which, hopefully true information, can be added or edited by anyone with access to it. It is therefore collaborative and easy to use. An area of some information disconnect that directly affects librarians or certainly library services is instruction. I will very soon be contributing to the Wiki, Library Success: A best practices Wiki. My contribution will entail the importance of instruction for online catalogs and databases for 1st year students. Weekly, no exaggeration here, I teach students (college students)how to use their school library on-line resources to look up book holdings and mostly journal articles----I work at a public library. There is a real need for 1st year students to have some real hands on training in order to use the resources provided for them at the library. And I don't mean they should come in on their own time and get a few minutes of instruction. Students need a required tutorial. Yes, many students are savvy on-line users, they can blog, e-mail, game and so on, but they are not versed in library usage. Searching the databases is probably not considered "fun" and most students have not taken the initiative to learn on their own and are not being required to learn it as part of their education. It is a resource they need for classes and should have official instruction.
No, they don't need to go to library school, librarians are available to assist. But they should have at least some basic instruction. So, on my Wiki, I will provide some background on the importance of instruction and suggestions for how that instruction could be implemented for 1st year students.