Brief Communications A Slide-Tape Program for Beginning Pharmacy Students: Effect on Learning BY VIRGINIA B. HALL, Assistant Professor and Head Pharmacy Library DANIEL KRAUTHEIM, ED.D., Associate Professor and Director
Office of Educational Development College of Pharmacy BALJIT S. HANSRA, Doctoral Candidate College of Education
The Ohio State University Columbus, Ohio
ALONG with the advent of many new storage and retrieval systems that try to contain and make accessible the burgeoning volume of new information, particularly in the sciences, comes the necessity for the individual to maximize his potential as a searcher. Storage and retrieval systems are necessary and useful, but to locate detailed, unindexed information they do not suffice. Frequently this type of information is of utmost importance, and finding it requires a knowledge of the subject, of possible sources, and of how to find and use these sources. In the health care field the ability to use the library and its material is important to the undergraduates. They need this ability not only during their school years, but also when they become professionals and must solve problems unique to each patient. The Office of Educational Development and the Library of the College of Pharmacy at The Ohio State University developed a series of slide-tapes for beginning pharmacy students as training tools in the use of the library. These slide-tapes (revised in 1976) are fifteen to twenty minutes in length and are kept on closed reserve in the library. They cover four areas: the card catalog, reference books, current periodicals, and periodical indices. Viewing these slide-tapes is an assignment for Pharmacy 400, "Introduction to pharmacy," a required course for beginning pharmacy students. Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 65(4) October 1977
By providing the program in the library to students on an individual basis, and presenting them with a manual that includes the script of the tape for future reference, the library makes students see that it is an important part of their educational experience. The course instructor also gives a library assignment, and questions taken from the tape are included in the final examination for the course. The script starts with the definition and purpose of reference books, and points out several types, such as handbooks, compendiums of drug monographs, dictionaries, directories, and encyclopedias. Beginning students tend to confuse "reference" books with "reserve" books; therefore, a distinction between these groups is made in the program. Pertinent information regarding the circulation and location of reference and reserve books is given. Also, before proceeding to the descriptions of the books, definitions and discussion of the terms "trade name," "generic name," and "overthe-counter drug" are presented. Various reference books use one or more of these terms for organizing their contents. Descriptions of the eighteen reference books most useful to pharmacy students are presented. When the students have finished viewing, they will know where to find the following types of information: identification of a drug when only one term for the drug is known, therapeutic use, chemical composition, price, interactions with other drugs, toxicity, identification of a capsule or tablet in hand, new products, and, if important, how often the book is updated, and by whom it is published. Four science handbooks which will be useful at times are also mentioned, as well as a medical dictionary, an encyclopedia, and a group of foreign dictionaries. To ascertain the effectiveness of the slide-tapes, a pretest and a posttest were developed. An attempt is made to determine the student's cognitive knowledge about drug terms, the difference in the use of "reference" and "reserve" books, and types of information to be found in the various books described. The ten-item pretest and posttest are parallel forms developed from the following objectives, as described in the program manual:
443
BRIEF COMMUNICATIONS
1. Students will be able to differentiate reference books from closed reserve books. 2. Students will be able to locate the reference books in the Pharmacy Library. 3. Students will be able to list examples of the various available reference books. 4. Students will be able to recognize the differences between generic, trade, and overthe-counter drug names. This study was conducted in order to learn the characteristics of the students and to determine whether the students retained what they had learned about reference books from the slidetape. METHODOLOGY
All freshmen students enrolled in Pharmacy 400 (Introduction to pharmacy) during the fall quarter of 1976 in the College of Pharmacy at Ohio State University were the subjects in this study. Demographic, pretest and posttest instruments were developed to collect information. It was announced in class that students should view the slide-tape in the library at their convenience. They did so individually; they were given the pretest and the demographic data questionnaire before viewing the presentation, and the posttest immediately following it. Both the pretest and the posttest were scored at the same time, using a test-scoring machine. If the score was low in the posttest, students were advised to view the presentation again. For analysis, the mean scores of the pretest and posttest were calculated. The t-test was applied to study the relationship between the pretest and posttest mean scores. RESULTS Out of 149 students enrolled in the course Pharmacy 400 (Introduction to pharmacy), 98 had viewed the slide-tape presentation. Of these 98, 56 were male and 42 were female. Eighty-four percent of the students were eighteen to twenty years old; 16% were more than twenty. Fifty-five students had a 3.50 or greater high school grade point average; thirty-seven had between 3.00 and 3.49, whereas only four had less than a 3.00 high school grade point average. All of the students who enrolled in this college had a library in their high school. Only 70% had had the opportunity to view a slide-tape before viewing this one. Pretest Scores All students who viewed the slide-tape completed the pretest and posttest. The pretest mean
444
TABLE 1 COMPARISON OF PRETEST AND POSTTEST SCORES Test Pretest Posttest
Number
Mean
(x)
S.D. (a)
t-value
(N) 98 98
5.48 7.94
1.70 1.68
10.15
Figures significant at 0.000
score was 5.48. The range of pretest scores was from I to 10. Eighty students scored between 4 and 7 in their pretest. Posttest Scores All of the students were given the posttest when they finished viewing the slide-tape. The mean score was 7.94. The maximum and minimum scores were 3 and 10 respectively, with a range of 7. Eighty students scored between 7 and 10 on the posttest. Only one student scored below 4.
Relationship between Pretest and Posttest The t-test was applied to the pretest-posttest mean scores to determine whether the students learned from the slide-tape. It showed a highly significant result. (See Table 1.) CONCLUSION The ten-item pretest had a 0.452 mean difficulty index and the posttest a 0.206/item difficulty index. The mean pretest and posttest scores were 5.48 and 7.94 respectively. This difference was statistically significant, indicating that students did in fact learn the cognitive content of the slidetape on reference books. It should be noted that this type of teaching assumes the cooperation of several people. The tapes and slides must be prepared by individuals with technical production skills, and the librarian should be capable of writing the script. The library staff must be trained in operating the slide projector, tape recorder, and test-scoring machine. Finally, the professor in whose course the slidetapes are incorporated must agree to assign not only the slide-tapes but a library project as well. Also, questions based on the content of the slidetapes need to be included in the course examination as an incentive for the students to view them. Because of the heavy course-work demands on student time, learning library skills must be a required activity. The authors are also investigating instruction in two other areas using slide-tape presentations: Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 65(4) October 1977
BRIEF COMMUNICATIONS
current periodicals and the use of the card ANALYSIS catalog. If such slide-tapes consistently improve Keypunched cards for the "missing" books students' skills, then they would appear to be an were sorted by computer in three arrays and effective way to teach library information. listed. The list by accession number provided a means of estimating how long the missing books had been in the collection and which accounts had been used. Thus we could report to the Nursing for instance, books they had purchased School, Inventory of a Monograph Collection that were missing. It was interesting to note that BY VIRGINIA M. BOWDEN, the losses were spread fairly evenly across 1969 Assistant to the Library Director through 1974 acquisitions. The second list was in main entry sequence. It The University of Texas has been used by the circulation staff to answer Health Science Center at San Antonio Library queries about missing books. It has also been San Antonio, Texas marked whenever a book is returned. The missing books lists confirm that the missing books were, in popular ones. THE University of Texas Health Science Center general, The third list was in call number sequence. The at San Antonio Library conducted an inventory of totals from this list were compared to a computer the monograph collection in 1975. In addition to of the analysis collection made in January 1976. the usual purposes of determining losses from the collection and identifying errors in the shelf list Although the data base had increased by 4,398 in and physical volumes, the inventory was used to the six months since the inventory was begun, and validate the conversion of the shelf list to machine lacked the 1,187 titles missed in the conversion, readable form. This was the first monograph in- the comparisons of the collection with the inventory were assumed to be reasonably valid. Alventory since 1970. An approximate 1,417 man-hours were used in though several tables were produced, only one is the inventory. There were 852 man-hours (60%) shown in this brief report. Table 1 ranks classes in involved in the shelf-reading phase which covered order of the percentage of holdings missing. The seventy-one working days. The follow-up phase number missing is also given. took 425 hours, while supervision and problems of TABLE 1 the entire project took 140 hours. A complete inRANKED BY BOOKs CLASS, PERCENT MISSING ventory is a major project and should be planned with care. Class holdings Number missing missing INVENTORY OUTCOME The items inventoried were the 34,620 WY Nursing 127 13.6 monograph volumes in the regular, reference, QS Human Anatomy 13.5 83 10.4 235 reserve, and leisure collections. The history of WM Psychiatry 9.9 21 medicine and rare book collections were not in- WT Geriatrics WH Hemic-Lymphatic System 9.7 39 ventoried. The following are the results: 35 WQ Obstetrics 8.9 89.55% no problems 30,996 BF Psychology 8.7 48 5.65% missing from 1,957 WS Pediatrics 7.6 73 collection 3.4 % missing from data base 486 1.4 % physical volume and shelf list corrections needed. Physical volume corrections included wrong accession number, incorrect call number, incorrect title on the book card, incorrect spine labels, and book repairs needed. Shelf list errors were usually
1,181
typographical. Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 65(4) October 1977
HQ Family, Marriage, Women WG Cardiovascular System WB Practice of Medicine QY Clinical Pathology WL Nervous System WR Dermatology QA Mathematics WE Musculoskeletal System QL Zoology QK Botany HV Social Welfare, Criminology
6.7 6.5 6.4 6.3 6.2 6.1 6.0 6.0 5.9 5.7 5.6
20 61 99 28 94 15 12 55 24 5 14
445
Office of Educational Development College of Pharmacy BALJIT S. HANSRA, Doctoral Candidate College of Education
The Ohio State University Columbus, Ohio
ALONG with the advent of many new storage and retrieval systems that try to contain and make accessible the burgeoning volume of new information, particularly in the sciences, comes the necessity for the individual to maximize his potential as a searcher. Storage and retrieval systems are necessary and useful, but to locate detailed, unindexed information they do not suffice. Frequently this type of information is of utmost importance, and finding it requires a knowledge of the subject, of possible sources, and of how to find and use these sources. In the health care field the ability to use the library and its material is important to the undergraduates. They need this ability not only during their school years, but also when they become professionals and must solve problems unique to each patient. The Office of Educational Development and the Library of the College of Pharmacy at The Ohio State University developed a series of slide-tapes for beginning pharmacy students as training tools in the use of the library. These slide-tapes (revised in 1976) are fifteen to twenty minutes in length and are kept on closed reserve in the library. They cover four areas: the card catalog, reference books, current periodicals, and periodical indices. Viewing these slide-tapes is an assignment for Pharmacy 400, "Introduction to pharmacy," a required course for beginning pharmacy students. Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 65(4) October 1977
By providing the program in the library to students on an individual basis, and presenting them with a manual that includes the script of the tape for future reference, the library makes students see that it is an important part of their educational experience. The course instructor also gives a library assignment, and questions taken from the tape are included in the final examination for the course. The script starts with the definition and purpose of reference books, and points out several types, such as handbooks, compendiums of drug monographs, dictionaries, directories, and encyclopedias. Beginning students tend to confuse "reference" books with "reserve" books; therefore, a distinction between these groups is made in the program. Pertinent information regarding the circulation and location of reference and reserve books is given. Also, before proceeding to the descriptions of the books, definitions and discussion of the terms "trade name," "generic name," and "overthe-counter drug" are presented. Various reference books use one or more of these terms for organizing their contents. Descriptions of the eighteen reference books most useful to pharmacy students are presented. When the students have finished viewing, they will know where to find the following types of information: identification of a drug when only one term for the drug is known, therapeutic use, chemical composition, price, interactions with other drugs, toxicity, identification of a capsule or tablet in hand, new products, and, if important, how often the book is updated, and by whom it is published. Four science handbooks which will be useful at times are also mentioned, as well as a medical dictionary, an encyclopedia, and a group of foreign dictionaries. To ascertain the effectiveness of the slide-tapes, a pretest and a posttest were developed. An attempt is made to determine the student's cognitive knowledge about drug terms, the difference in the use of "reference" and "reserve" books, and types of information to be found in the various books described. The ten-item pretest and posttest are parallel forms developed from the following objectives, as described in the program manual:
443
BRIEF COMMUNICATIONS
1. Students will be able to differentiate reference books from closed reserve books. 2. Students will be able to locate the reference books in the Pharmacy Library. 3. Students will be able to list examples of the various available reference books. 4. Students will be able to recognize the differences between generic, trade, and overthe-counter drug names. This study was conducted in order to learn the characteristics of the students and to determine whether the students retained what they had learned about reference books from the slidetape. METHODOLOGY
All freshmen students enrolled in Pharmacy 400 (Introduction to pharmacy) during the fall quarter of 1976 in the College of Pharmacy at Ohio State University were the subjects in this study. Demographic, pretest and posttest instruments were developed to collect information. It was announced in class that students should view the slide-tape in the library at their convenience. They did so individually; they were given the pretest and the demographic data questionnaire before viewing the presentation, and the posttest immediately following it. Both the pretest and the posttest were scored at the same time, using a test-scoring machine. If the score was low in the posttest, students were advised to view the presentation again. For analysis, the mean scores of the pretest and posttest were calculated. The t-test was applied to study the relationship between the pretest and posttest mean scores. RESULTS Out of 149 students enrolled in the course Pharmacy 400 (Introduction to pharmacy), 98 had viewed the slide-tape presentation. Of these 98, 56 were male and 42 were female. Eighty-four percent of the students were eighteen to twenty years old; 16% were more than twenty. Fifty-five students had a 3.50 or greater high school grade point average; thirty-seven had between 3.00 and 3.49, whereas only four had less than a 3.00 high school grade point average. All of the students who enrolled in this college had a library in their high school. Only 70% had had the opportunity to view a slide-tape before viewing this one. Pretest Scores All students who viewed the slide-tape completed the pretest and posttest. The pretest mean
444
TABLE 1 COMPARISON OF PRETEST AND POSTTEST SCORES Test Pretest Posttest
Number
Mean
(x)
S.D. (a)
t-value
(N) 98 98
5.48 7.94
1.70 1.68
10.15
Figures significant at 0.000
score was 5.48. The range of pretest scores was from I to 10. Eighty students scored between 4 and 7 in their pretest. Posttest Scores All of the students were given the posttest when they finished viewing the slide-tape. The mean score was 7.94. The maximum and minimum scores were 3 and 10 respectively, with a range of 7. Eighty students scored between 7 and 10 on the posttest. Only one student scored below 4.
Relationship between Pretest and Posttest The t-test was applied to the pretest-posttest mean scores to determine whether the students learned from the slide-tape. It showed a highly significant result. (See Table 1.) CONCLUSION The ten-item pretest had a 0.452 mean difficulty index and the posttest a 0.206/item difficulty index. The mean pretest and posttest scores were 5.48 and 7.94 respectively. This difference was statistically significant, indicating that students did in fact learn the cognitive content of the slidetape on reference books. It should be noted that this type of teaching assumes the cooperation of several people. The tapes and slides must be prepared by individuals with technical production skills, and the librarian should be capable of writing the script. The library staff must be trained in operating the slide projector, tape recorder, and test-scoring machine. Finally, the professor in whose course the slidetapes are incorporated must agree to assign not only the slide-tapes but a library project as well. Also, questions based on the content of the slidetapes need to be included in the course examination as an incentive for the students to view them. Because of the heavy course-work demands on student time, learning library skills must be a required activity. The authors are also investigating instruction in two other areas using slide-tape presentations: Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 65(4) October 1977
BRIEF COMMUNICATIONS
current periodicals and the use of the card ANALYSIS catalog. If such slide-tapes consistently improve Keypunched cards for the "missing" books students' skills, then they would appear to be an were sorted by computer in three arrays and effective way to teach library information. listed. The list by accession number provided a means of estimating how long the missing books had been in the collection and which accounts had been used. Thus we could report to the Nursing for instance, books they had purchased School, Inventory of a Monograph Collection that were missing. It was interesting to note that BY VIRGINIA M. BOWDEN, the losses were spread fairly evenly across 1969 Assistant to the Library Director through 1974 acquisitions. The second list was in main entry sequence. It The University of Texas has been used by the circulation staff to answer Health Science Center at San Antonio Library queries about missing books. It has also been San Antonio, Texas marked whenever a book is returned. The missing books lists confirm that the missing books were, in popular ones. THE University of Texas Health Science Center general, The third list was in call number sequence. The at San Antonio Library conducted an inventory of totals from this list were compared to a computer the monograph collection in 1975. In addition to of the analysis collection made in January 1976. the usual purposes of determining losses from the collection and identifying errors in the shelf list Although the data base had increased by 4,398 in and physical volumes, the inventory was used to the six months since the inventory was begun, and validate the conversion of the shelf list to machine lacked the 1,187 titles missed in the conversion, readable form. This was the first monograph in- the comparisons of the collection with the inventory were assumed to be reasonably valid. Alventory since 1970. An approximate 1,417 man-hours were used in though several tables were produced, only one is the inventory. There were 852 man-hours (60%) shown in this brief report. Table 1 ranks classes in involved in the shelf-reading phase which covered order of the percentage of holdings missing. The seventy-one working days. The follow-up phase number missing is also given. took 425 hours, while supervision and problems of TABLE 1 the entire project took 140 hours. A complete inRANKED BY BOOKs CLASS, PERCENT MISSING ventory is a major project and should be planned with care. Class holdings Number missing missing INVENTORY OUTCOME The items inventoried were the 34,620 WY Nursing 127 13.6 monograph volumes in the regular, reference, QS Human Anatomy 13.5 83 10.4 235 reserve, and leisure collections. The history of WM Psychiatry 9.9 21 medicine and rare book collections were not in- WT Geriatrics WH Hemic-Lymphatic System 9.7 39 ventoried. The following are the results: 35 WQ Obstetrics 8.9 89.55% no problems 30,996 BF Psychology 8.7 48 5.65% missing from 1,957 WS Pediatrics 7.6 73 collection 3.4 % missing from data base 486 1.4 % physical volume and shelf list corrections needed. Physical volume corrections included wrong accession number, incorrect call number, incorrect title on the book card, incorrect spine labels, and book repairs needed. Shelf list errors were usually
1,181
typographical. Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 65(4) October 1977
HQ Family, Marriage, Women WG Cardiovascular System WB Practice of Medicine QY Clinical Pathology WL Nervous System WR Dermatology QA Mathematics WE Musculoskeletal System QL Zoology QK Botany HV Social Welfare, Criminology
6.7 6.5 6.4 6.3 6.2 6.1 6.0 6.0 5.9 5.7 5.6
20 61 99 28 94 15 12 55 24 5 14
445
