An Analysis of Contents and Use of Distance Education Printed Materials in the Office of Documentation and Information, Sukhothai Thammathirat Open University

Abstract

               The objectives of this research were (1) to classify the type and language of the distance education printed materials (2) to classify the contents of the distance education printed materials and (3) to study the use of the distance education collection.
               The population was 823 titles of the distance education printed materials, exceptresearch in Thai language, journal and article which were stored from the Distance Education
Unit, the Information Service Section, the office of Documentation and Information, Sukhothai Thammathirat Open University. These materials were printed during 1978-2010. They were analyzed by using the International Centre for Distance Learning - ICDL classification. The statistics employed were frequency and percentage.
               The research findings showed that (1) the type and language of the distance education printed materials were 1) most of the printed materials type was book 440 titles, thesis 208
titles, conference proceedings 123 titles and research 52 titles; the printed materials were published in English language 557 titles and Thai language 266 titles; (2) most of the contents of the distance education printed materials were in the field of General of distance education 196 titles, Teaching material Resources and Media 165 titles and curriculum and curriculum development 25 titles respectively; and (3) printed materials of all types were checked out. When classified by type of printed materials, it was found that all of the Thai language printed materials were checked out. For English language, there were 238 titles checked out , while 70 titles of conference proceedings were checked out.