"Big up the library"

That was the formal brief from the academic who booked me to do an induction for his civil engineers (are there some that are less polite somewhere?).

That was fine and I was expecting large numbers - he'd said there were 300 but that the lecture theatre seated 200 and it would be first come first served.

What he didn't tell me was that although it was an induction, it wouldn't just be 1st years. Fortunately, quite by chance and another academic dropping by to book some training for his 3rd years, I found that I was actually going to be facing the whole department. First, second, third years and post-graduates on masters courses.

Good grief, what do I tell such a mixed group - some of whom are going be complete newbies and some completely familiar with the library. And for 50 minutes?

I'd decided that despite the large numbers I'd better be as engaging as I could and try to interact with the students. So I came up with a couple of plans. One to use mindmapping techniques to get them doing something at the start and then at the end show how it was useful in different ways to the different levels. Secondly, I wondered if this was the moment to try out something I'd been introduced to at one of the conferences I attended over the summer.

At that particular session everyone in the audience had been given a red, green and blue card and at various points had been faced with a PowerPoint slide giving us options we could vote for. Basically a cheap way of doing without an expensive electronic voting system.

Creating a couple of hundred such cards in three colors seemed, if not a waste of card, at least something I wanted to be sure of doing. But a quick discussion with boss who quite liked the idea and was happy for me to slice up and mark the cards convinced me to go for it.

Of course, I'd expected it to take some time to take 150 letter sized cards, cut them in half and mark the center with an A, B or C. Doing that three times over (for each color) I was glad I could get some assistance from the issue desk. (The letters - one for each color - are for to make it clear which color goes with which answer on the PowerPoint, but also to help anyone who is colorblind). But what I'd not really taken into consideration was just how much card that was to transport to the lecture - along with all the other handouts I thought of taking! (Not helped by the absolutely torrential monsoon that hit just as I had to set off for a 10 minute walk in the open.)

I got to the venue only to meet the academic outside who then informed me that I only had 30 minutes instead of 50. I removed a dripping coat from myself and plastic bag from the box of paperwork and card but that was all the time I had to revise what I was going to do. I decided to drop the mindmapping stuff and showing a video clip from Buffy the Vampire Slayer (good job as I'd actually changed bags thanks to the rain and managed to leave the video behind). I kept the interaction with the cards.

In the event the whole thing seemed to go surprisingly well. The students engaged with the voting (and I had a very clear mental picture of which years of students were sitting where), the content seemed to just about hit the mark for most of those there and even the academics who were lining the walls - along with the head of department were complimentary about the content (and the cards!).

(Out of politeness, interest and to round up the cards, I stayed for the next session and heard from newly graduated students encouraging applications to join the relevant professional society. Part of their talk included the poor public perception of civil engineers. I told them afterwards I'd swap their professional image for that of librarian any day!)

Final comment on the cards. Our reprographics room only had a pale yellow rather than the strong one I really wanted. It was really interesting to note that I got all/most of the red and blue ones back but the yellow set had been more than decimated. Less than half were returned. I figure they were just too easy to lose amongst pieces of paper. Still, boss now wants to use them and the law librarian is considering it too.