An international step forward for Information Literacy

The latest meeting of the UNESCO General Conference voted in favour of the draft resolution on Media and Information Literacy. The text of the draft resolution is here http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0022/002242/224273e.pdf and I blogged a bit more detail here: http://information-literacy.blogspot.co.uk/2013/12/unesco-general-conference-endorses.html This short video shows the opening of the conference (with a good deal of clapping).

Teaching Information Literacy: some links

In week 9 you had a session from two of the librarians at Sheffield University: Vicky Grant, and Maria Mawson. Note that if this is a major interest for you, then the module Information Literacy Research will be 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 from the 2013 LILAC (information literacy) conference: http://www.lilacconference.com/WP/past-conferences/lilac-2013/

- Presentations from the main USA conference on information literacy, LOEX (2013): http://www.loexconference.org/2013/sessions.html

- The Peer-Reviewed Instructional Materials Online Database http://www.ala.org/acrl/aboutacrl/directoryofleadership/sections/is/iswebsite/projpubs/primo

Information Literacy in context: links etc.

Here are some links to items on the initial reading list, and as mentioned in the Information Literacy presentation, plus a few more. If you are not sure where to start: look at the first video (below) which is 17 minutes long and Bonnie Cheuk's paper (the first article linked below) is a nice example of blending practice and theory of information literacy in a workplace.



Information Literacy and the workplace

- Cheuk, B. (2008). Delivering business value through information literacy in the workplace. Libri, 58(3), 137-143. Retrieved 14 October 2013 from http://www.librijournal.org/pdf/2008-3pp137-143.pdf

- Herring, J.E. (2011). From school to work and from work to school: information environments and transferring information literacy practices. Information Research, 16(2). Retrieved 10 September 2013 from http://InformationR.net/ir/16-2/paper473.html

- 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. (pp. 218-224). Rockhampton, Australia: Central Queensland University Press. Retrieved 14 October 2013 from http://acquire.cqu.edu.au:8080/vital/access/manager/Repository/cqu:1415

Information Literacy in other subject disciplines

- Association of College and Research Libraries. (2012) Information literacy in the disciplines. http://wikis.ala.org/acrl/index.php/Information_literacy_in_the_disciplines (lots of links to articles and materials relevant to students studying different subjects e.g. chemistry, history).

- Webber, S., Boon, S. and Johnston, B. (2005). A comparison of UK academics’ conceptions of information literacy in two disciplines: English and Marketing. Library and information research, 29 (93), 4-15. Retrieved 14 October 2013 from http://www.lirgjournal.org.uk/lir/ojs/index.php/lir/article/view/197/242


Information literacy in specific countries

- Dokphrom, P. (2013). Information Literacy of Undergraduate Students in Thailand: A Case of the Faculty of Arts, Silpakorn University, Thailand. In M. Hepworth and G. Walton (eds.), Developing People’s Information Capabilities. (pp.111-126). London, England: Emerald Group Publishing Limited. http://www.emeraldinsight.com/books.htm?chapterid=17093192

- Hepworth, M. and Duvigneau, S. (2012) Building Research Capacity: Enabling Critical Thinking Through Information Literacy in Higher Education in Africa. Brighton, England: British Library for Development Studies at the Institute of Development Studies. Retrieved 14 October from http://opendocs.ids.ac.uk/opendocs/bitstream/handle/123456789/2301/BuildingResearchCapacityR1.pdf?sequence=1

Information Literacy as a discipline

- Johnston, B. and Webber, S. (2006). As we may think: Information Literacy as a discipline for the information age. Research strategies, 20(3), 108-121. Retrieved 14 October 2013 from http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0734331006000097

Expert frameworks and models of Information Literacy

The links to the SCONUL 7 Pillars model are here: http://inf6350-2013.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/information-literacy-and-sconul-7.html

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 (ACRL).

This is a link to the actual standards http://www.ala.org/acrl/standards/informationliteracycompetency: at the moment a task force is revising the standards, and a consultation on this is in progress.

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

Information Literacy month in the USA!

It is Information Literacy month in the USA.The USA's National Forum on Information Literacy got Barack Obama to endorse the first IL month, and they also have a campaign for USA States to sign up for the month. This is the page for this year: http://infolit.org/october-2013-national-information-literacy-awareness-month/
The image is a direct link to the image on the NFIL website, courtesy of NFIL.

Information Literacy and the SCONUL 7 Pillars

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 the revised 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/sites/default/files/documents/coremodel.pdf

There is an Open Educational Resource that explains about the pillars and includes clickable diagrams of Pillars at http://repository.leedsmet.ac.uk/xerte_output/Sconul_7_Pillars/ (produced by Nick Sheppard)

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