A Faceted Taxonomy for Rating Student Bibliographies in an Online Information Literacy Game

Chris Leeder is a Doctoral Student, Karen Markey is a Professor, and Elizabeth Yakel is a Professor in the School of Information at the University of Michigan; e-mail: [email protected], [email protected], [email protected]. The researchers wish to thank the members of the BiblioBouts team: Victor Rosenberg, Beth St. Jean, Fritz Swanson, Brian Jennings, Greg Peters, Andrew Calvetti, and three university faculty members who participated in the study. Special thanks to the Institute for Library and Museum Studies for their support of this project through a National Leadership Grant. © Chris Leeder, Karen Markey, and Elizabeth Yakel This study measured the quality of student bibliographies through creation of a faceted taxonomy flexible and fine-grained enough to encompass the variety of online sources cited by today’s students. The taxonomy was developed via interviews with faculty, iterative refinement of categories and scoring, and testing on example student bibliographies. It was then applied to evaluate the final bibliographies created in BiblioBouts, an online social game created to teach undergraduates information literacy skills. The scores of players and nonplayers were compared and showed a positive impact from the game. Findings of the evaluations of these student bibliographies are discussed.