Last week the Dalhousie Medical School librarians, Robin Parker, Jackie Phinney and Melissa Helwig, welcomed the new class of medical students to the health sciences libraries with an orientation scavenger hunt.

The scavenger hunt took place on both the Dalhousie and Saint John campuses and involved the use of QR codes located throughout the libraries. Teams of students equipped with smartphones scanned QR codes that linked to webpages with clues. Although the Kellogg Health Sciences Library and the Hans W. Klohn Commons did separate hunts, the learning objectives were consistent.

The use of QR codes and the scavenger hunt was first used for last year’s medical orientation and the librarians were happy to build on the momentum of the inaugural session. Many thanks to Angela Hersey, Kellogg library technician and Amir Feridooni, Faculty of Medicine liaison/instructional designer. Angela organized the QR codes at the Halifax site and Amir put the clues on the web.

The support of the library staff of the Hans W. Klohn Commons in Saint John and the Kellogg Health Sciences Library in Halifax was also crucial to the organization and facilitation of the scavenger hunt. Thanks also to last year’s medical librarians, Karen Neves in Halifax and Kathleen Gadd in Saint John, for the initial design of the hunt.

 

The success of the session was reflected in the accurate completion of the questions, which were emailed back to the librarians. Most importantly, students at both sites were engaged and enthusiastic about the exercise.