Series Of Interactive Activities Research Articles

Centering Care and Kindness: Mentoring Ph.D. Students in Tumultuous Times

ABSTRACTFeaturing presenters from the U.S. and Canada, participants of this alternative event will engage in discussion about mentoring principles of and approaches to working Ph.D. students that help them balance their busy lives with the stress of research and studying and create an inclusive environment in academia. The session will open with a series of lightning talks whereby the presenters will highlight select aspects of the topic, stressing the notions of care, compassion, kindness, and empathy in successful supervision and mentoring. Subsequently, the presenters will engage the audience in a series of interactive activities that will help attendees to learn specific mentoring techniques that can later be applied in their own work with Ph.D. students.

LIS and Social Work: From Current Issues to a Collaborative Future

As Melanie Huggins, past President of the U.S. Public Library Association, stated, “I cannot think of a profession more aligned with public librarianship than social work” (Blassingame, 2021, n.p.), a sentiment reflected in many recent professional and scholarly publications. Given the similarities and shared values of Social Work (SW) and LIS, there is much support to “the rationale for adopting theoretical, practical, and pedagogical approaches” from SW in LIS (Dali, 2018, p. 84), and for professional blending more generally. Benefits associated with this alignment make LIS professionals better equipped to engage communities in an impactful way; conversely, they prepare social workers for understanding the roles of libraries in community life, information literacy, and the ethical use of technology.
 To facilitate this professional cross-pollination, a concerted effort needs to continue in both higher education and professional practice. The proposed panel discussion and accompanying interactive engagements will build on interdisciplinary narratives from practitioners, researchers, and educators in both fields: social work and LIS. The panel will delve into several current salient issues and propose a way into a collaborative future. The panelists will share their experience working, researching, and teaching at the intersection of SW and LIS while also engaging the audience through a series of interactive activities in small groups. These will be concluded with a general discussion. Panelists will take the lead reflecting on different aspects of the SW/LIS collaboration, as follows:
 
 Training models and professional boundaries: Lydia Ogden will discuss a model that includes training for library workers and onsite social workers, including an exploration of such issues as role definition; gray areas between the practice of librarians trained in crisis intervention and that of social workers; and the politics of negotiating interprofessional boundaries.
 Synergies and struggles: Charles Senteio will present examples of successful partnerships and opportunities to improve collaboration between social workers and librarians. He will share synergies in his work (e.g., placing social work students in public libraries) and discuss the areas that require further development (e.g., managing disparate priorities, cultural chasms, sustainability of collaborations, and seeking grants collaboratively).
 Librarians as essential workers: Rachel Williams will speak about the critical need to support librarians as essential service providers; the logistics of partnering with SW; and the issues of scarce funding, limited-term partnerships, and resulting disservice to both staff and patrons. She will examine a path to a sustainable collaborative future for this kind of work if one is viewed as essential for public libraries.
 Practical and philosophical aspects of collaboration: Noah Lenstra will share his current work with the SW Program at the University of North Carolina Greensboro to coordinate the placement of SW students at local libraries and his research on the expansion of SW-library partnerships, in collaboration with the South Carolina Center for Rural and Primary Healthcare.
 Beyond public libraries: Until now, the focus of SW/LIS collaboration has been on public libraries, partnerships, and populations in crisis. Switching gears, Keren Dali will speak about the potential contribution of SW to the education and professional practice of academic librarians, including advocacy efforts on campus, DEIA engagements, wellness and the “whole person” philosophy, organizational efficiency, and teaching information literacy.
 
 Panel structure:
 
 Panelists’ introductions; brief overviews of the chosen topics: 30 min
 Small group interactive engagements: 40 min
 General discussion on charting a collaborative future: 20 min
 
 All panelists have worked on the intersection of LIS and SW and bring unique perspectives and insight into the topic.

“Maddie is online”: an educational video cartoon series on digital literacy and resilience for children

PurposeThis paper examines children's development of digital literacy, resilience and citizenship in the online environment, addressing active engagement and participation via cartoon videos. Previous research has emphasised the positive role of cartoons in different educational contexts, as important agents of attracting children's attention and interest with opportunities to engage in contextual and collaborative learning.Design/methodology/approachThe work describes the design and an initial pilot study of the animated cartoon video series, with a group of 30 children in an S1 class, at a secondary school in Scotland as part of workshop addressing digital resilience themes. Children worked individually and in teams in a series of interactive activities, which were evaluated by means of a short questionnaire survey.FindingsThe majority of the children enjoyed the cartoon videos which addressed a story of cyberbullying and, in teams, they chose different copying strategies. Children's verbalisations included expressions of positive feelings when connecting online, linked to socialising, creative and playful activities and they expressed a preference towards speaking to their parents and friends rather than their teachers when dealing with online challenges.Research limitations/implicationsChildren not only enjoyed watching the cartoon story but had an interest to learn more about how other children deal with the pressures and challenges of the online world, how to manage their own digital footprint and, particularly, how easy it is to spread personal information online.Practical implicationsCartoon animations present an opportunity to act as a basis for encouraging children to exchange ideas and engage in dialogue in class and at home by means of creating a point of reference which creates an environment, where pressure is taken away from the “self”. The cartoon character can be the focal point for discussion on issues that may be difficult to address directly and on a personal level because of insecurity or fear.Social implicationsBoth teachers and parents have a responsibility to offer support and advice to children and ensure their online safety and resilience. Engaging with children in open further dialogue via fun and interactive cartoon-based activities may help to further explore and understand their perspectives.Originality/valueThe work addresses everyday life issues encountered online and aims to offer educators and parents an engaging and fun series of activities, harnessing the advantages of cartoon video animation as a didactical resource that can utilised as a supplementary learning tool inside the classroom and at home.

Engage and Conquer: An Online Empirical Approach into Whether Intrinsic or Extrinsic Motivation Leads to More Enhanced Students’ Engagement

This paper reviews research literature in the area of student engagement and motivation and discusses the findings of an experiment which examined the effects of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation on the learning process of foreign language vocabulary with the use of a film extract. The extract was part of an online specially-built platform designed to enhance students’ engagement through a series of interactive activities. The article focuses on the relationship between motivation and engagement and looks into the differences in performance between students who are more intrinsically or extrinsically motivated. Based on our findings, we argue that intrinsic motivation leads to more active engagement on the part of learners, which is a pathway to deeper learning and better academic achievements in foreign language learning.

Training multidisciplinary practitioners to deliver SBI on alcohol and other health behaviours

We describe our experiences developing a model of delivery and multidisciplinary training course for screening and brief advice on four lifestyle issues: alcohol, smoking, physical activity, and diet. The one-day, 6-hour training course was developed to equip a wide range of health, social care, and community practitioners with an understanding of basic principles of screening and brief advice and key public health messages on the four lifestyle issues. The course was framed around an overall flow-diagram to illustrate a suggested process of brief advice including raising lifestyle issues and choosing (with the patient/client) whether to focus on one or more issues. The training utilised a series of interactive activities focusing on attitudes and skills including individual, paired, triad and group elements. A training for trainers course was delivered over 3 days to practitioners including prison officers, nurses, health trainers, fitness trainers, dieticians and others. In reflecting on the process and feedback from participants we feel: • It is challenging to train practitioners on SBI generally, and harder to ensure implementation, so it remains to be seen how effective this approach will be. • Covering four topics together can be seen by funders as a more efficient (or cheaper) way to spend public health budgets. • This is risky, as it can be difficult for practitioners to absorb information about four topics at once. • Based on previous experiences in Scotland, we can also speculate that practitioners may not consistently or objectively choose which lifestyle issue to focus in discussion with patients/clients and may avoid topics seen as more complex or sensitive such as alcohol or diet.