Wesleyan University Librarians are dedicated to supporting student learning and research. Librarians collaborate with faculty to help develop the information literacy skills students need to discover, evaluate, and critically engage scholarly material.
Your library liaison can help develop a specific instruction session for your class to provide guidance in the research process or to demonstrate how to use library resources. A sampling of potential workshops is below. Please get in touch at least two weeks in advance of desired class visit date so that librarians can appropriately prepare.
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AI for Library Research 20 minutes AI makes finding information easy--or so it often seems. But how does one know that they are not missing important evidence or perspectives? Is the information even real? Explore how generative AI can be both a help and impediment. Compare traditional methods vs AI for efficiency and accuracy. |
Choose the Right Place to Search 10 minutes With over 400 library databases and free repositories, getting started can be the hardest part. Match topics to tools with an understanding of library databases, repositories, free search engines, and AI. |
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Scope a Topic 15 minutes Is a research topic too broad or too narrow? It depends! Understand the importance of scope when writing literature reviews. Experiment with topic refinement to meet an assignment's parameters. |
Conduct a Literature Review 45 minutes Before one can summarize a topic, they must know what evidence exists. Find sources for each component of a research project, including research and review articles, data and statistics, and images. Explore different search methods such as natural language, boolean, and citation trails. |
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Work with Primary Source Objects Single or multiple sessions Use one of our many museum-quality collections to give students hands-on experiences with primary sources and 3-D objects. Possibllities include working with rare books, book/print history, university archives, music archives, archaeology & anthropology collections, and hwo to make books/zines. |
Information Creation 10 minutes Scholarly communication channels have strengths and weaknesses. Understand how scholarly informaiton is created and disseminated in a chosen discipline. What gets published (or doesn't), how, in what form(s), and by whom? |
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Be Aware of Bias 15 minutes Bias often isn't obvious, especially to those who are unfamiliar with scholarly information. Consider where bias exists in information infrastructures and critically evaluate results. |
Evaluate Sources 15 minutes How does one evaluate the information they find from AI, a scholarly article, or website? Learn to verify information by cross-checking and lateral reading. |
Librarians in Special Collections & Archives offer class sessions focused on primary source materials held in our collections. These sessions are tailored to meet the needs of the class, such as the history of the book, or performing effective research using primary sources at Wesleyan and elsewhere.
To arrange for a class session, call Special Collections & Archives at x3864, or email sca@wesleyan.edu. Please get in touch at least two weeks in advance of desired class visit date so that SC&A can appropriately prepare.
Our librarians are available to assist your students at all stages of the research process through Personal Research Sessions (PRS). Working with students one-on-one, we help identify useful databases for their topic, select keywords, develop their search strategy, or provide instruction on how to use specialized tools. The Personal Research Session allows students to get hands-on help from a librarian, focusing on the specific questions they're encountering in their research.
Students can schedule a PRS by submitting this form.
The library offers online research guides for each academic discipline at Wesleyan. Students conducting research in a new discipline will benefit from reviewing these guides, which provide information on how to find databases, books, and other materials relevant to conducting research in that discipline.
We have also developed general "how to" guides designed to help students learn essential skills, like finding and evaluating sources, developing an essay topic, or writing a literature review. These resources can be integrated into your syllabus or shared in the classroom to prepare students for upcoming assignments.
If you would like to develop a specialized research guide with information and resources tailored to a course you'll be teaching, please contact your liaison librarian.
Finding Primary Sources:
To learn about primary source materials and how to find them online, see our research guide on the subject here.
Visit our Finding and Using Images guide for:
Wesleyan provides access to a number of video repositories, in additional to our physical VHS & DVD collections, including:
To learn how to find and use these, and many other, video resources, visit this guide.
A note about streaming: ITS policy prevents streaming any content from personal devices (e.g. laptops, tablets, or phones) to classroom displays through a wireless connection (such as AppleTV). To show library streaming resources in class, use the classroom’s built-in computer or connect your device following these instructions from ITS.
Ebooks are a dynamic and growing segment of the library's scholarly content. Wesleyan currently has access to over a half million titles. They are acquired in large packages or singly from various providers, each with its own interface, rules, and policies, often directly set by publishers.
Wesleyan Library’s Digital Library collections are developed, maintained, and published in support of the research and teaching needs of the campus and the health of the library collection. Collections include:
Learn more about the Wesleyan Library’s Digital Library collections here.
SensusAccess is a self-service application that converts documents from text or image-based files into accessible formats, such as searchable PDFs, audio & talking books, Braille, or ebooks.
Convert your file. The resulting file will be delivered to you via email. Please use your Wesleyan email address when submitting your conversion request. Instructions are available from the SensusAccess e-learning course. This service is not recommended for materials containing confidential or private information.
Students who require accommodations to use library materials should contact the Accessibility Services office.
Consult our guide to copyright and intellectual property, or contact our Copyright & Permissions Support Specialist:
Joy C. Mlozanowski
jmlozanowski@wesleyan.edu | 860-685-3833
