The internet navigator: an online internet course for distance learners

Library Trends, Summer, 2001 by Carol Hansen

The Internet Navigator development team, through the process of course development, and by engaging in this statewide collaborative experiment, became distance learners themselves. Much of the collaborative development work was Web based, at a distance, and team driven. As the team became richly enmeshed in the new distance learning environment, they were able to use this experience to better understand and assist distance learning students.

The Internet Navigator course is delivered over the Internet using the World Wide Web as its primary protocol. Librarians communicate with students primarily through e-mail. Students work through a series of modules to complete the course. Individual modules are also used as independent teaching tools for self guided learning. The original Internet Navigator course consisted of six modules. These were:

* Module 1--Introduction to the Internet: Introduction to basic Internet Concepts, Netscape Tutorial, Internet Overview.

* Module 2--Communicating Over the Internet: Electronic Mail, Newsgroups, Mailing Lists.

* Module 3--Internet Information Systems: Telnet, Gopher.

* Module 4--Resource Discovery: Internet Catalogs and Directories (Search Engines), Library Catalogs, Evaluating Information.

* Module 5--Providing Information on the World Wide Web: HyperText Markup Language, Web Page Creation.

* Module 6--FTP and Remote Access: Downloading files and dial up access to the Internet.

The overall design of the course was meant to be flexible so that sections of the course could be used independently of the larger course as needed. Each module contained a glossary and a quiz. Students were asked to complete assignments in two of the modules and a final research project. The final research project required students to find five Web sites on a topic of their choosing, write a brief description and evaluation (using established criteria) of the sites, and then use a Web form to create an HTML document.

The course receives up to 35,000 hits a week on the Eccles Health Sciences Library server. Course enrollment and evaluations show that the course is very popular with students. The Navigator has received national and international acclaim as an early model of online instruction.

The Internet and the World Wide Web are both content and delivery mechanisms. In 1995 it was critical for students to understand the Internet as a delivery mechanism. By 1998 the Internet Navigator course was inadequate in its approach to library-based Web content. While students continued to like the class, librarians were dissatisfied with the limitations of what was being taught. The course did not adequately describe the Internet as a content mechanism nor fully address new technologies such as full-text databases or information literacy competencies.

The Internet Navigator was initially created at a time when much of the academic library information was still being delivered primarily in print. In 1998 and 1999, many more traditional library resources, full-text article databases, and reference tools were made available on the Web. A whole new set of information content and instruction needs developed (Oberman, Lindauer, & Wilson, 1998). The critical instruction need had shifted, and students now needed to know how to access the rich scholarly content contained in the many traditional library resources now available on the Web. The Internet navigator needed to be enhanced to facilitate access to scholarly academic resources newly available on the Web.