Thing 18: Teaching information literacy

The session in week 11 (4th November) has a session from three of the librarians at Sheffield University: Lyn Parker, Vicky Grant, and Maria Mawson. They will each talk about teaching information literacy. There is a section on Information Literacy on the Sheffield University website here: http://www.shef.ac.uk/library/infolit/index


Note that if this is a major interest for you, then the module Educational Informatics will be very relevant next semester.

There are a huge number of articles and resources about teaching information literacy, for those that are interested in this topic.  A few examples are:

- This site, which has material from a project about a "New Curriculum" for Information Literacy: http://newcurriculum.wordpress.com/

- A "toolkit" developed by the London-based Clinical Librarians and Information Skills Trainers http://www.londonlinks.nhs.uk/groups/clinical-librarians-information-skills-trainers-group/trainers-toolkit

- Cardiff University's Handbook for Information Literacy Teaching http://www.cf.ac.uk/insrv/educationandtraining/infolit/hilt/index.html

- Wilson, C. et al. (2011) Media and Information Literacy Curriculum for Teachers. Paris: UNESCO. http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0019/001929/192971e.pdf

- A number of the presentations in the 2012 LILAC (information literacy) conference: http://lilacconference.com/WP/past-conferences/lilac-2012/

- The Peer-Reviewed Instructional Materials Online Database http://www.ala.org/apps/primo/public/search2.cfm

- One of my own articles: Webber, S., Boon, S. and Johnston, B. (2006) British academics from different disciplines: comparing their conceptions of pedagogy for information literacy. In : Actes des 5èmes Rencontres Formist: Lyon: 2005. Lyon: ENSSIB. http://dis.shef.ac.uk/sheila/webber-formist.pdf

Thing 8: Communicating using posters

This week you will be starting to create posters which say something about the place of Information Literacy in your future careers. You will be using physical media (e.g. pen and paper) rather than electronic media. You also will not have very much time to produce them. However we have had some interesting posters for this exercise in the last few years.

There are pictures of all last year's posters on my Flickr account: http://www.flickr.com/photos/23396182@N00/sets/72157627880923331/
and this is a video from last year's event



Note: you are not being asked to produce a scientific paper, nor an online paper, so you do not have to read through the following advice before creating your poster! However, paper posters can still have an impact, and ones created electronically can be exhibited online and in print. It is useful to learn about techniques to communicate through posters.

Advice about producing posters:

Links to several useful resources with advice on producing academic posters: http://tash.group.shef.ac.uk/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&layout=blog&id=110&Itemid=685
University of Minnesota (2007) Creating an effective scientific poster presentation. http://www.tc.umn.edu/~schne006/tutorials/poster_design/index.htm
Glogster enables you to create online posters: http://www.glogster.com/

Some examples of "good" posters of different types:

Posters that won a best-poster competition for doctoral students in the midlands, 2011 (links are on the right of the page): http://www.vitae.ac.uk/policy-practice/336341/The-Midlands-Hub-Regional-Poster-Competition-2011.html and there is a Flickr pool of the 2012 event at http://www.flickr.com/photos/65599022@N07/sets/72157630954745024/
Winners of a similar competition for posters from doctoral students in Yorkshire 2009: http://www.vitae.ac.uk/policy-practice/71651/Yorkshire-and-North-East-Hub-Poster-Competition-Gallery-2009.html
Posters about the major oil spill disaster in the USA, 2010: http://tedxoilspill.com/2010/07/06/poster-competition-winners/
Library posters created by Phil Bradley, based on old British wartime posters: http://www.flickr.com/photos/philbradley/sets/72157625923493122/

Thing 7: Your Information Literacy in context

This is the activity:
1. Create your own map of changes, using the elements in the diagram "The information literate person in a changing information culture and society"
2. Share it with your team: are your maps similar or different? can you help each other identify ways of meeting IL needs?
3. Write a team blog post about a factor/ Information Literacy need that you are willing to share on the blog
4. Individually, note down a plan to address some of your Information Literacy development needs. Please finish this after the class, if you do not complete it in class. We will return to this in week 5.

Links to articles etc.

- Association of College and Research Libraries. (2012) Information literacy in the disciplines. http://wikis.ala.org/acrl/index.php/Information_literacy_in_the_disciplines
- Cheuk, B. (2008) Delivering business value through information literacy in the workplace. Libri, 58(3), 137-143. Retrieved 19 September 2012 from hCheuk, B. (2008) Delivering business value through information literacy in the workplace. Libri, 58(3), 137-143. http://www.librijournal.org/pdf/2008-3pp137-143.pdf
- Hoyer, J. (2011) Information is social: information literacy in context, Reference Services Review, 39(1), 10 - 23. Abstract
- Lloyd, A. (2005) Information literacy: different contexts, different concepts, different truths? Journal of Librarianship and Information Science, 37 (2), 82-88. Abstract.
- Lloyd, A. (2009) Informing practice: information experiences of ambulance officers in training and on-road practice, Journal of Documentation, 65 (3), 396-419. Abstract
- Lloyd, A (2004) Working (in)formation: conceptualizing information literacy in the workplace. In Proceedings of 3rd International Life Long Learning Conference, 13-16 June, Rockhampton, Central Queensland University Press, pp. 218-224. http://acquire.cqu.edu.au:8080/vital/access/manager/Repository/cqu:1415



Please add any links below or (probably better) feature them in posts on your team blog.

Thing 2: Information Literacy: additional material

Continuing and Professional Education and the University Libraries at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst have teamed up to produce this video which outlines the concepts and practices of the Information Literacy Standards as defined by the Association of College and Research Libraries.

Thing 2: Information Literacy

The SCONUL 7 Pillars model of Information Literacy gives you a framework for understanding areas of information handling that are important for academic study. The 7 Pillars model was first published in 1999, and it was revised in 2011. We will be using therevised version.


The SCONUL 7 Pillars model was developed by a group of British university librarians: SCONUL is the Society of College, National and University Libraries.


The document describing the pillars can be found here: http://www.sconul.ac.uk/groups/information_literacy/publications/coremodel.pdf



Post about the 7 Pillars and your team
The purposes of this exercise are to get you familiar with the 7 Pillars, and to start thinking about your own information literacy, and also to get to know each other further as a team.

• Think individually 1) what is your strongest pillar? 2) What is your weakest pillar? 3) Can you think of a time when you were particularly information literate?
• As a team, share your strongest/weakest pillars.
• Write a team blog post on your blog. Discuss what you think are the team’s strongest Pillars and why (you don't have to mention your weakest pillars!), and give at least one example of being information literate.
• Add labels to your blog post and publish it