Best practices for curating Reading List

Organise resources into manageable chunks, such as, by week, by topic, or by module so as to guide student learning.

Only include necessary readings that directly relate to the material taught so as to not overload the working memory. Set importance of the material by segregating into ‘Required’ and ‘Recommended’.

Regularly check the currency of the resources – is there a new edition available? If rolling over an existing Reading List, be sure to remove any resources which you no longer wish students to access before publishing the list.

In considering relevancy, also assess the inclusivity and diversity of the content and authors. Evaluate the diversity of perspectives, analyses and demographic group of authors. You may also wish to engage with your students and discuss other resources, either for their current teaching period or future offerings of the unit.

Before adding an e-book to the Reading list, check the number of users who can access it (e.g. unlimited or 1 – 3 concurrent users), and the download and printing permissions. eBooks are becoming increasingly unbalanced from an accessibility perspective due to DRM restrictions and rising costs. For example, consider if you have set an open book exam and how an eBook’s limited user access with no permitted downloads may affect student access during the exam.

If you wish to upload a scanned copy of a print resource to Reading List under the Educational Statutory Licence, ensure the PDF is good quality and is OCR supported.

Be consistent with where and how you provide readings to students and promote reading lists throughout the teaching period.

Reading lists should be embedded into your teaching. For example, link readings with specific topics or lectures by adding notes or highlighting key information for students. You can also embed readings into myLearn from the Reading List software.