This experiment was designed to investigate the effectiveness of the CDROM hands on instruction program provided by the University of Canberra library by comparing it with demonstration only sessions and a
group that received no instruction at all. The results indicated that the
hands-on instruction program evaluated did not prove to be superior to a
demonstration in providing students with necessary skills to search CDROM
databases. A sample of 98 novice users enrolled in Research Skills
were randomly allocated to three groups. The first group received hands
on instruction on CD-ROM searching. The second group watched a
demonstration using a liquid crystal display. The third group acted as a
control group and received no instruction. Each group conducted a search
on three pre-determined questions.
The experiment was conducted in three stages. The first stage was a pretest
in which students searched the three search questions. The second
stage was instruction. Two groups of students were instructed, either
hands on or demonstration. The final stage was a post-test which involved
searching the three questions used in the pre-test.
The following databases were used in the study: ERIC, MEDLINE and
Sports Discus. The results were measured in terms of a number of search
terms used, number of retrieved records, number of Boolean operators
used, and a appropriate choice of a database. The statistical significance
level among the groups was tested by the means of the technique of oneway
analysis of variance to test The F test was used to compare differences
between the different groups.
The results of this experiment indicated that groups of students instructed
on either method of instruction, hands-on and demonstration, performed
significantly better than the control group. However, there was no
significant difference between the two methods of instruction. This
research confirms the need for CD-ROM instruction for novice users if
CD-ROM databases are to be used effectively by students. Furthermore,
this result shows that demonstrations can be used as alternative methods
of instruction.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ADTP/219275 |
| Date | January 1995 |
| Creators | Ramaoka, Elizabeth, n/a |
| Publisher | University of Canberra. Information, Language & Culture |
| Source Sets | Australiasian Digital Theses Program |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Rights | ), Copyright Elizabeth Ramaoka |
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