Reference Services for the Adult Learner : Challenging Issues for the Traditional and Technological Era

This comprehensive guide offers librarians and educators proven, effective approaches for teaching adult patrons how and where to find information. Addressing issues such as technophobia, technostress, and information literacy, Reference Services for the Adult Learner: Challenging Issues for the Traditional and Technological Era helps you understand what older students need to learn about libraries and information technologies and how you can best teach them.

Help adults returning to school learn to find and use the information they need!

Reference Services for the Adult Learner: Challenging Issues for the Traditional and Technological Era offers proven, effective approaches for teaching adult patrons how and where to find information. Unlike younger students, who in many cases grew up with computers at school and in the home, many older patrons are uncomfortable with current technologies. They may not remember how to use a card catalogue, but at least the drawers and index cards look familiar. A phrase like database search may bring on confusion and anxiety for them.

Including the views of faculty, adult students, and administrators as well as librarians, Reference Services for the Adult Learner provides you with theories of educational psychology that explain how adults learn, as well as suggestions from adult learners to help you understand what these clients need to know about using new technologies and finding information.

Reference Services for the Adult Learner provides original empirical research on such vital issues as:

• technophobia, technostress, and information literacy
• the unique needs of the adult learner, including evening and weekend access to information and instruction
• adult-learning theories and appropriate teaching strategies to take advantage of adult students’strengths
• distance learning and the adult student
• issues of information literacy and approaches to seeking, analyzing, and evaluating information
• adult learners in special populations, including international and disabled students
  
  Containing research from librarians and adult learners from the United States, Canada, and Australia, Reference Services for the Adult Learner offers you teaching strategies that will enable adult patrons to easily locate and properly use all of the materials in your library.