An Online Tutorial for SciFinder for Organic Chemistry Classes

An online tutorial for SciFinder, the premier database for searching the chemical literature, was created by a team consisting of the science librarian, the systems librarian, and a chemistry professor at Rider University using Adobe Captivate 4 software. It was then used by two sections of an Organic Chemistry class during the spring 2010 semester. Traditionally, the science librarian has demonstrated this resource in a single, twenty- to thirty-minute session during class time. However, time constraints pose numerous obstacles for direct library instruction, allowing no time for hands-on practice afterward. The online tutorial for SciFinder was designed to teach students how to search for relevant, scholarly articles, and how to retrieve these articles from the university library or those of neighboring institutions, obviating the need for the customary classroom instruction that taught those skills. To encourage the students to follow the tutorial and develop their SciFinder skills, they were further r...