1. Teaching Internet research skills
New directions for the
Intute: Virtual Training Suite
Emma Place, Intute
ILRT, University of Bristol
LILAC Conference, April 2009
emma.place@bristol.ac.uk

4. • What’s new with VTS?
• Why we decided to change
• Sneak preview of the changes
• Discussion

5. You are the first to know ….
The Intute: Virtual Training Suite
is launching
30 new Internet tutorials
this July

6. New tutorial titles …
Arts and Humanities Health & Life Sciences
• Archaeologist • Agriculture
• Historians • Microbiology
• Philosopher • Health & Social Care
• Religious Studies • Medicine
• Modern Languages • Midwifery
• Biodiversity
• Photography • Nursing
• Performing Arts • Veterinary Medicine

7. Science & Engineering Social Sciences
• Aeronautical • Business & Management
Engineering
• Economics
• Civil Engineering
• Chemical • Education
Engineering • Lawyers
• ICT • Psychology
• Physics • Social Work
• Chemistry • Government & Politics
• Environment • Social Research Methods

8. So what’s new?
We update the service in light of:
3. Internet developments
4. User feedback

9. Internet developments
Intute editors have been following:
Web 2.0 developments
• blogs, podcasts, videos, social networks
Academic Web trends
• Changes in online academic publishing,
library services, eBooks, eJournals,
eLearning objects, Google scholar etc.

10. User feedback
1. Internal review of the VTS
2. Intute user-surveys
3. External market research

11. Research questions
• Is there a proven need/demand
for VTS?
• How do users want to see VTS
develop?

12. Methods
• Analysis of User-Feedback Forms: qualitative and quantitative
analysis of the c5,000 online feedback forms received from VTS
users over the last 5 years
• Analysis of Web Statistics: focusing on statistics compiled
during the year 1st Jan – 31st Dec 2007, but also making use of
statistics from the previous 5 years.
• Locating Examples of Use of VTS in Higher Education:
examining university and library websites that link to VTS and a
sample of feedback data collected via email
• Online Survey of over 100 VTS Authors and Intute Staff: to
gather internal views on the way forward for VTS
• Tutorial Technology Review: comparison of different
technologies available for offering online training tutorials
• Literature Review: recent evidence in the academic literature
about Internet research skills in higher education

13. Results
There is a growing recognition of the need to teach
Internet research skills to university students:
• 100% of VTS survey respondents agreed
• 66% of Intute user-survey respondents felt that
a national training service like VTS was needed
• Literature review reveals that Internet research
skills are now increasingly mainstream for
undergraduate degrees (eg. explosion of text
books in this subject)

14. Is there a proven demand for VTS?
• Analysis of Web statistics reveal an upward
trend in use of the service from 2 million page
views in 2002 to 12 million for 2007
• Market research revealed that VTS is one of the
most highly used parts of the Intute service as a
whole
• Peaks in use match university terms dates,
suggesting the service is being used by the
target audience (and 67% of our online
feedback forms come from university students)

15. Is there evidence of VTS being
used in HE courses?
• Online feedback forms from students
state that they were guided to the tutorial
by their lecturer/course materials
• Referrral data from the Web stats
revelas 1/3 of users are coming to VTS
from .ac.uk websites, and access via
search engines in low
• Backlinks reveal many library websites
now link to VTS tutorials, as do some
course materials

16. Which tutorials are most popular?
• Web stats enabled us to rank
tutorials from most to least used.
• Market research suggests we
should focus more on HE degree
subjects – with limited resources
focus on those subjects with the
highest student populations

17. What do users like/dislike about VTS?
Feedback forms from students suggested they:
Like Dislike
• Collection of links • Length of the
• Links basket tutorials
• Easy to use • Reading lots of
text on screen
• Clarity and
simplicity • Technical
problems
• quizzes

18. Feedback forms from staff:
• Revealed some strong views that Web
2.0 actually increases the imperative for
teaching students to Internet research
skills.
• That significant changes to VTS would
be unpopular, now that it was built into
websites/courses
• 70% of respondents to the online survey
thought VTS would be missed if it were
gone

19. What works well, what would they
change?
Works well Would change
• Use of experts from • More focus on
the community to academic Internet
update tutorials resources
• Tutorial approach / • Help students
tone (“friendly understand the
expert”) process of academic
• Not just spoon- research
feeding links but • More on the
teaching search and difference between
evaluation skills academic publishing
and Web 2.0 user-
generated content
• More community
engagement

20. Change in approach
• Target audience is now students in
higher education (not staff)
• Subject coverage VTS will not grow
in size but tutorial titles will be
based on most popular university
courses

21. Changes to content
• Written for HE students
• To help with coursework &
assignments
• Focus on academic sources online
• Includes Web 2.0 but in academic
context
• Much more about libraries!

22. Changes in design
• Brand new web design
• Easier to read online
• Shorter
• More graphics
• No technical hitches!

27. Questions
• Would you use a VTS online
community area?
• Would you like VTS to offer a place
to share methods for teaching
Internet research skills in HE?
• Would you be willing to share how
you teach these skills / use VTS?