It's the time of the season for reading lists

https://www.flickr.com/photos/kristykay/63408853/sizes/o/

Manically preparing for this year's induction and for the 14-15 academic year, as students all over the country shout with glee with their A Level results or ponder their future academic path because they have not been so successful, my mind turns to reading lists. I am about to start a project with my colleagues to implement more widely our Rebus reading list software after a successful pilot. This is open source and provides an online reading list the url for which can be put in various locations for students. Academic staff when creating the list can pull information from our library catalogue which should help mitigate errors.

Our reading lists don't look like Kirsty's 1998 Reading list on the left but the illustration is analogous of the difficulties some students have finding and using their reading lists, for example I have encountered  a situation where the reading list was midway through the module handbook, we also still have occasions where reading lists have not been proof checked and students struggle to find the title on the library catalogue. Admittedly, as staff increasingly put their content into the VLE and can see the benefits of linking straight to resources some have created their own interactive reading lists using  MS Word.  The benefits of having software to creating reading lists are similar to having anything online in a web format it can be viewed anywhere, you don't need a viewer for MS products, although tablets are pretty savvy re: this these days. However, linking to the existing collection provides a more streamlined approach for students accessing their resources, for example they may be one or two clicks away from viewing the availability of the title and reserving it if it is on loan.

For students about to start their courses acquiring their reading lists is a part of their rights of passage when starting their HE career, along with getting their key to their accommodation, joining clubs, finding the nearest supermarket and bar, meeting fellow students and teaching staff and the library induction. I was trying to find some articles on reading lists and pedagogy, a challenge that seemed to equal the challenge some students have with finding their reading list. I did however find this presentation from the University of Northampton Reading List Revolution: Exploring the Value of Reading Lists as a Pedagogic Tool (2012) by Sidall and Rose, it contains some insightful quotes from students about the value of reading lists, in particular this quote from a 1st year student:
particularly with students that have been out of the education system for a number of years, styles of learning have changed dramatically from when I was at school. So reading this [list] gives me some sort of idea as to where I can begin, where I can start, even what things to look at..
Lea and Jones (2010) in their research for their article Digital literacies in higher education: exploring textual and technological practice (Studies in Higher Education Volume 36, Issue 4, 2011) also found for students
guidance given by their tutor is the starting point for their studies, following links on reading lists, lecture notes and PowerPoint presentations, and supplementing these with searches using their own chosen applications, usually Google and Wikipedia. (p.387)
I think the last word should be left to Brewerton and O'Neil's at the University of Loughborough, in their presentation The Reading List Challenge: Implementing the Loughborough Online Reading List System (LORLS) (2014) they reveal ambiguous nature of reading lists
Academics aren’t aware of how (or even if) their Reading Lists are being used; The Library can only provide access to resources it knows about ; The institution’s reputation may suffer if Reading Lists aren’t doing their job.