Library Skills: synchronous (live and face to face) training guide

Inviting attendees to submit questions online ahead of a Q&A session is helpful for structuring the session and avoiding those awkward silences at the start of a session when no one wants to be the first to ask a question.

Trainers delivering Q&A sessions are responsible for sending out a message to attendees to invite them to submit questions. This message should be sent 1-2 days in advance of the session.

We use a LibWizard survey for attendees to submit questions, which is easy for attendees to complete and easy for any trainers to see the types of questions that are coming up for each session.

1. Set up a pre-filled survey URL for the survey in LibWizard.

• Log in to LibWizard and click on Surveys and then the LibrarySkills@UCL folder.
• Click on the Library skills Q&A - submit your questions in advance survey.
• Click on the Settings button in the top right, and then on Pre-filled survey UCL from the left hand menu.
• Next check that Active is selected at the top of the survey, if it is not toggle the switch from inactive to active.
• Complete the fields for Live session name free text and Date.
• When complete, click the Generate custom URL string button at the bottom.
• Copy and paste the custom URL somewhere temporary where you can come back to it in the next step.
  You can ignore the warning to click save to activate the pre-filled via URL function, just make sure Active is selected. You can view your survey to make sure the name and date of your session appear once you have generated your custom URL.

2. Email attendees with the link to the pre-filled survey:

• Log in to LIbCal, click on Events and access the Library Skills Training calendar.
• Navigate to your session, click on it and then click on the Manage Event button in the bottom left of the pop-up window.
• Click on the Email attendees tab.
• Click on the Add registered button beneath the 'Reply to' box. This will add all the attendees email addresses to the BCC box. You might also like to type in your own email address in the BCC field (separate email addresses with a semi-colon ;) so you have a record of the email that you sent.
• Copy and paste the following text into the 'Message' field, replacing the session name, date and time with your own session details, and inserting a hyperlink to your pre-filled survey on the words 'short form'. 

Thank you for signing up to attend 'Session name' on Session date and time.

It would be helpful if you could please submit any questions you already have in advance by completing this short form.

If you have multiple questions, please complete and submit the form more than once.

There will also be opportunity in the session to ask more questions.

We aim to answer all questions in the session but depending on the nature of your enquiry, we might suggest that you arrange to see a specialist librarian for a more in-depth discussion.

• Click on Send email.

Prior to your session, you should retrieve the questions that have been submitted so you can address them in the session:

• Log in to LibWizard and click on Surveys and then the LibrarySkills@UCL folder.
• Click on the Library skills Q&A - submit your questions in advance survey.
• Click on the View Reports button in the top right.
• By default, submitted questions are ordered by date, so you may just be able to browse questions submitted for your session. Alternatively you can search for your session name or date.
• If there are lots of questions, you may like to export them. Check the boxes for the relevant questions and click on Export CSV. The exported file can be viewed in Excel.