Successes and Challenges of Using Emerging Technologies to Simulate Authentic Learning Activities

This paper chronicles a series of three case studies for the redesign of a graduate-level course for pre-service school librarians at a mid-Atlantic university from an in-person mode to a fully virtual mode. Specifically, this paper details how the instructors utilized High Leverage Teaching Practices Theory to redesign a rehearsal activity that many school librarians engage in their everyday practice: the reference interview. The case study documents the successes, challenges, and lessons learned throughout the process using Garrison and colleagues’ Community of Inquiry for Online Learning Presence Theory (CoI) to examine three interdependent presences: social, cognitive, and teaching.