Bizzell 5th Floor Special Research Collections Instruction Services

Service Overview

This page provides a overview of the instruction support and services offered through the 5th Floor Special Research Collections. We encourage faculty member to incorporate collections materials into their courses, to collaborate with our team on facilitating their use, and to plan class visits to our space.

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What We Offer

Curators and staff of the 5th Floor Special Research Collections encourage faculty members to integrate special collections materials into their class plans, and we welcome discussions with faculty about our resources and about the use of the collections for teaching and research.

Instruction support consultations
Course presentations
Class visits

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Using 5th Floor Special Research Collections Items in Instruction

We encourage you to work with us to identify materials in the Collections relevant to your teaching or for student projects. Such conversations also provide us with opportunities to learn more about the content of our collections!

Options for instructional support:

Presentation providing a general introduction to Special Collections, including how to access materials and what types of resources are available for research and study relevant to course themes or projects
Class visit focusing on viewing of Collection materials relevant to specific course themes or student assignments
Class visit focusing on viewing of Collection materials relevant to specific course themes or student assignments, including exercise or activity (individual or group) to promote on-hands work with materials

Class Visits to the 5th Floor

We host class visits to the 5th floor Special Collections from OU academic departments and other local universities.These class visits require advance notice and prior consultation with our curators. If you’d like to set up an initial consultation, please contact Dr. JoAnn Palmeri.

Examples of previous class visits:

Mary Anna Evans’ Professional Writing Class

Students in Mary Anna Evans’ Professional Writing class visited the Collections in February 2020. They viewed a variety of materials related to the history of forensics as well as literary works by Edgar Allan Poe, Arthur Conan Doyle and Agatha Christie.

Jennifer Davis' “Atlantic Revolutions” Class

During the Fall Semester 2019, Jennifer Davis visited the Collections multiple times with her “Atlantic Revolutions” students. For the first visit, the students were given an introduction to the Collections and viewed a selection of books. During subsequent visits, students had the opportunity to study individually-selected primary sources in a group setting, with the ability to share findings with their peers and to ask for help from their instructor and the librarian.

Robert Lifset's “Great Books of Western Civilization” Class

In Fall 2018, Robert Lifset visited the Collections with students in his “Great Books of Western Civilization” class. Students viewed many of the most significant political texts in Western history, including the earliest printed editions of works by Aristotle and Plato, and texts by Hobbes, Locke and Machiavelli.