Friday, March 31, 2006

IL talks online

In looking for the Libraries support learning etc. documents mentioned in my previous post, I came across audio files from the Scottish Learning Festival SETT 2005 (held in September, for school teachers etc.). There was a session on information literacy, including a talk from Dorothy Williams on Libraries Supporting Learners and from Joyce Kasman Valenza on Spreading the Gospel of Information Literacy - How Do We Get the Kids to Care? I just listened to the start of Dorothy's audio file and once you get past the start (chair introducing speaker in background, someone opening a bottle of sparkling mineral water in the foreground) it is nice and clear. Actually, I suppose it must have been Dorothy opening the water.
http://www.ltscotland.org.uk/sett/previousconferences/
2005/seminarsandkeynotes/index.asp
- click on the Information Literacy session (or any others that take your fancy ;-)

Anyway, the actual Libraries supporting learners document can be found at http://www.slainte.org.uk/learners/index.htm

Photo by S. Webber, March 2006.

LILAC conference (2)

This is the 2nd report from the LILAC conference earlier this week. Themes which emerged more than last year were “context” and “reflection”. I enjoyed all the keynote sessions which I attended (unfortunately I had to leave before the last two sessions because of a meeting in Sheffield). This is in contrast to last year, when the keynotes were more of a mixed bag, ranging from very good to highly irritating.

Professor Dorothy Williams, from Robert Gordon University kicked things off on Monday with a talk entitled Libraries supporting learners - really? This phrase (“Libraries supporting learners”) comes from a report about school libraries in Scotland - there have been some very useful Scottish documents on the impact and performance of school libraries (see my next posting). Dorothy highlighted the fact that there is increasing emphasis on the real world relevance of information literacy, and that the definitions are increasingly focusing on use of information (rather than just searching). This provokes the question “how can we prepare learners for the world beyond the doors of formal education?”

Dorothy questioned whether the models and frameworks of information literacy were enough. In her research on teachers’ perceptions of information literacy, the teachers seemed to find it difficult to engage with these models, or related them to the classroom. An important issue is “how to engage with where the learners and coming from and where the teachers are coming from.”

Again drawing on her research she identified how important interaction (with peers, teacher or librarian) was in the learning process. But it’s the quality of interaction that can make a difference, and in their research they found “many examples where the quality of the interaction was not supporting the learner”. It can’t be assumed that just because there is “interaction” it is good: they found examples of interactions where learners were demotivated by interactions in the library environment.

The three strategies which Dorothy proposed were:
- Mediation within the learning process, intervention at the critical point to develop the student’s learning. In ordinary life, people use other people (friends, family, colleagues) a lot to help them understand and solve information problems, as has been shown by research. This process of mediation was something that needed to be brought into the everyday work of the library, not just in training sessions;
- Reflection “encouraging self-awareness of information experiences and strategies; metacognition”;
- Integration within teaching and learning - this doesn’t just mean integration into a course of study, but into the learning context.
She then focused again on her research into school teachers’ information literacy, and how they talked about the importance of information literacy, but the problem of incorporating it into their students’ learning (partly and significantly because of the constraints of the national curriculum and the performance culture fostered by the Government).

Dorothy finished by saying that, rather than the role being “Libraries supporting learners” it should be “Librarians developing learners”. As with our research with academics, Dorothy and her colleagues had found teachers more enthusiastic about “librarians” than about “libraries.” From a marketing perspective (my observation) this fits in with ideas of Relationship Marketing. The “development” role is obviously more proactive and responsible than “support". Dorothy also talked about all library staff being involved, and I was reminded of a paper which I often cite when I’m teaching/writing about marketing, namely “Marketing is an attitude of mind.” (Ref 1), which says marketing is "a way of working, a way of living". When you get involved in information literacy you do see things through a slightly different lens..... on the other hand I think an information literacy evangelist in full flow describing the One True Way to Information Literacy can be a wee bit scary (nb I am not thinking of Dorothy here!)....

After writing this I realise that I won't have time to report any of the other sessions in this detail (need for a Life, need to tackle huge backlog of other stuff), so I'll just aim for a couple of shorter postings with some observations and highlights.

Reference 1: Orava, H. (1997) ‘Marketing is an attitude of mind’. In 63rd IFLA General Conference: Conference Proceedings, August 31 – September5, Copenhagen. The Hague: IFLA. www.ifla.org/IV/ifla63/63orah.htm

Photo by S. Webber: The hall at Leeds University where we had food, drink and the LILAC exhibition. You will see from the banner in the background that Leeds has apparently renamed itself "Leeds Fairtrade University" ;-).

Thursday, March 30, 2006

New IL website launched at LILAC

One important event at the LILAC conference was the launch of the Information Literacy Website, a new UK portal to information literacy information. It is a product of a partnership between the CILIP CSG Information Literacy Group, SCONUL, Museums and Libraries Association, and Higher Education Academy. It is generously being hosted by Eduserv. There has been a collaborative approach to content gathering, and Ruth Stubbings from Loughborough University has been coordinating this initiative. The website was officially “unveiled” by Jonathan Douglas from the MLA. It is to be found at the memorable web address http://www.informationliteracy.co.uk/ I have contributed some information about research resources, and also I am going to be editor of a new journal hosted on the site, the Journal of information literacy. You will be hearing more about this in due course! The first issue of JIL (it’s a free web journal) comes out in October.

Photo by Sheila Webber: Spring is arriving! March 2006

US IL workshop in may

The California Clearinghouse for Library Instruction is running a Workshop: Challenges to Instruction in the Age of Federated Seaching and Google on May 12, 2006 at Menlo College, Atherton, USA. For info email Scott Hines shines@pgsp.edu
Includes sessions from Lynn Lampert, Amy Kautzman and Patricia Martin, and a panel discussion.

Wednesday, March 29, 2006

LILAC Conference (1)

I've just been attending the Librarians' Information Literacy Annual Conference (LILAC) at the University of Leeds, UK. In fact I feel a bit guilty that I've not been blogging it properly as it happened. Especially when I look at the Computers In Libraries 2006 "unofficial wiki" http://cil2006.pbwiki.com/ which includes a big list of people who blogged the CIL conference. It includes Amanda Etches Johnson (http://www.blogwithoutalibrary.net/), who I'll mention because I've actually met her (at last year's WILU conference in Guelph, Canada), but also to pick up on something she said, namely:

"Blogging a conference makes the experience better. It just does. It certainly was a lot more work to summarize the sessions and add the linkage after the fact, but I’m glad I did it. It gave me a chance to check out the stuff the speakers pointed out as well as reflect upon what I’d heard. I feel like I really engaged with the content rather than having it simply wash over me. I hope you got something out of it too. "

It's interesting. Certainly I've found that blogging helps me to focus on key points, means I record then in a (semi-)coherent way, means I'm more likely to follow up on interesting things I heard about, and I'm more likely pull thoughts and ideas together in the effort to make blog entries that other people might find interesting. Unlike in a library situation there isn't really any pressure on me (as an academic) to report back to colleagues otherwise. So I'm going to be blogging retrospectively over the next few days, but ...

..on the other hand, I have found a conflict between being-at-the-conference and blogging the conference. Perhaps it would be different if I was at a conference where loads of people were blogging, also it might make a difference if I could blog from my hotel room (I don't actually use my laptop for the internet) as I probably would have fired off something late at night, whereas I didn't fancy going down to the hotel lobby to blog at 1am. Anyway, at LILAC I decided that I'd spend my time talking to people and going to all the sessions and the evening events (which were jolly good).

So, I will actually talk about the conference (rather than talking about not blogging it) tomorrow ;-)
In the meantime, the LILAC conference website is at http://www.cilip.org.uk/specialinterestgroups/
bysubject/informationliteracy/lilac/lilac2006


Photo by Sheila Webber: Splendid light fitting hanging in the dome of the Brotherton Library, University of Leeds. The Parkinson Building, which it is in, was built in the 1930s-50s.

Monday, March 27, 2006

Presentations on assessment

There are some interesting short videos plus powerpoint on the Open University website, all around the subject of assessment of student learning. You need to have Quicktime 7 installed (although you can see the non-video material without this.) "Assessment is at the centre of the student's experience. It provides a means of evaluating student progress and achievement; it drives the activity of the student and therefore their learning.This collection of short presentations is intended to provoke debate about assessment. "
http://stadium.open.ac.uk/perspectives/assessment/

Photo by S. Webber: Bathroom window, March 2006.

Sunday, March 26, 2006

Fifth Information Literacy conference: Mexico

The Fifth Information Literacy conference will be held on October 18-20, 2006 in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico. "The Universidad Autonoma de Ciudad Juarez libraries, in collaboration with IFLA’s Information Literacy Section invites librarians, educators, faculty members, library products and services vendors, and other professionals to participate in this event, developing the theme: Assessment and Evaluation: Key Elements to Information Literacy Programs.” Papers can be in English or Spanish as there will be simultaneous translation, and the keynote is from Cristina Tovote from Stockholm University. There is a call for papers which I think closes on May 31 (that bit of the site is in Spanish)
http://www.uacj.mx/dhi

Photo by S. Webber: Italian Centre, Glasgow. This is the companion sculpture to that of the little pig/dog sculpture a few postings below this, both are by Shona Kinloch

Friday, March 24, 2006

Empowering the learner

An interesting article (I think) is:

Doherty, J.J. and Ketchner, K. (2005) "Empowering the intentional learner: a critical theory for Information Literacy instruction." Library Philosophy and Practice, 8 (1). http://www.webpages.uidaho.edu/
~mbolin/doherty-ketchner.htm


which describes a class informed by a Freirian concept of education, problem-posing and democratic. This includes, for example, engaging with the students' concepts of information. "In our course, through class readings, discussion, and personal reflection, students were expected to take a closer look at intellectual inquiry and what it means to be critical."
See also: Chapters from Freire's Pedagogy of the oppressed: http://marxists.anu.edu.au/subject/education/
freire/pedagogy/index.htm


Photo by S. Webber: Flowers in my vase, 2006. Perhaps I should have chosen a more radical image for this posting.

Health information literacy & Danish toolbox

Just spotted a nice article:
Haines, M. and Horrocks, G. (2006) "Health information literacy and higher education: the King's College London approach." Library review, 55 (1), 8-19.
Not free on the web, I'm afraid. The title pretty much tells you what it's about. In the same issue of the journal there is an article talking about the initiative to create training materials that librarians in Denmark can share. This project has a website at http://www.bibteach.dk/ (in Danish)
Poulsen, L.G.S. (2006) "The digital guide to user learning and information competence development: the teachers' electronic toolbox, project BibTeach." Library review, 55 (1), 59-65.

Thursday, March 23, 2006

Irish Information Literacy

A report which I missed at the time is the following, which: gives an overview of activities in (mainly) university libraries in Ireland; highlights challenges and issues; and makes recommendations.

CONUL Working Group on Information Skills Training. (2004) Report of the CONUL Working Group on Information Skills Training. Dublin: Consortium of National and University Libraries. http://www.conul.ie/conulistfinalreport.doc

Photo by S. Webber: Seaweed on Howth beach, Ireland, 2004.

Training day on VLEs

So you've got a VLE... Now What? A CoFHE Mid-West Training Day
on Virtual Learning Environments will take place on 27th April 2006 at Oxford Brookes University; CoFHE Members £45, Non-members: £55. Bookings close on 7th April. More information at http://www.cilip.org.uk/groups/cofhe/mwevents.html

Wednesday, March 22, 2006

IL resources

My colleague Bill Johnston, at Strathclyde University is co-author of a research report which is part of a Learning and Teaching Scotland initiative. You can down load the report in full or chapter by chapter. It looks at the Scottish educational context, at different aspects of study skills and information literacy, and at similarities and differences between study skills and information literacy.

Johnston, B. and Anderson, T. (2005) Information literacy and study skills. Glasgow: Learning and Teaching Scotland. http://staging.ltscotland.org.uk/lts/external/ctad/
informationliteracy/additionalinfo/index.asp


This accompanies a website which contains learning objects developed for use in information literacy learning by CTAD consultancy.
http://staging.ltscotland.org.uk/lts/external/
ctad/informationliteracy/index.asp

You can use the resources online and they have notes for teachers and parents. I haven't had time to explore them, and inevitably my eye was caught by a misconception, namely in the "Asking people" learning object it states "librarians are there to help you find information in the library." sigh. However, that shouldn't blind one to the possible usefulness of the objects. They are divided up by age group (9-11, 12-14, 15-18)

There are also sets of objects for Study Skills at
http://staging.ltscotland.org.uk/lts/external/
ctad/studyskills/index.asp


Photo: Unseasonal cheery blossom last autumn. Currently unable to upload new photos as Blogger has yet another glitch, but I found this one that I'd uploaded but not published.

Tuesday, March 21, 2006

Intellectual property comic

Duke University's Law School has produced a comic book Bound by Law, which focuses on the issue of documentary film making to explain and discuss issues to do with intellectual property. When it comes to explaining the detail of the law, it is US law, but still there is enough in common with (from my perspective) UK law to still make this a useful tool for unpacking the issue. The central figure is a woman trying to make a documentary about New York life and then realising all the problems about music, TV etc. being in the background of her shots. It will be interesting to see whether students here do find this a nice way of exploring the topic.
Bound by Law is available free on the web, or in print form from online bookstores or directly from Duke University. Also on the Duke site are entries in a competition for a short fim illustrating the problems of "documentarians" with intellectual property rights. Go to http://www.law.duke.edu/cspd/comics/

Sunday, March 19, 2006

Scottish IL meeting

SALCTG and the CILIP CSG ILG are running a course Information Literacy in Academic Libraries in Glasgow, Scotland, on 28th April . Cost is £45 including lunch.
- Information literacy: what is it and why is it important? (Debbi Boden and Ruth Stubbings)
- A quick fix for all? - Embedding IL into the curriculum (Hannah Hough)
- Measuring (or trying to) information literacy (John Crawford)
- But we've done the library tour already (Chris Powis)

Numbers are limited to 25. Contact Anabel Marsh, a.c.marsh@strath.ac.uk, giving your full name, institution name, postal address, email address, and order number (if applicable). Please also mention any special requirements, e.g. diet, access.

Photo by S. Webber: Sculpture in the Italian Centre, Glasgow.

Saturday, March 18, 2006

flip-flop chlorophyll

I got a nice bit of spoetry on Thursday. Spoetry is formed from the random words which spammers put in their emails about dubious chemicals & devices, to fool spam-blockers into thinking the emails aren't spam. Because I view my emails primarily as text, I just get the spoetry. There was an article about this inadvertant art form in the Guardian a couple of weeks ago.
Wiseman, E. (2006) "An introduction to spoetry." Guardian, 7 March. http://books.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,1725415,00.html

My spoetry was emailed by one "Christina Flowers" and ran as follows (I've just put in some line breaks) I particularly liked the title: Subject: flip-flop chlorophyll
according to sticky and anticipate, to plurality of hypertension
in methane polo tingle territory lethal urchin silly drawl:
crudely fossil an bankruptcy
at free will
at secondary school
consul papergirl as ceramic of heart-to-heart style
culminate the eye-catching.

gore lowdown is raspberry only child
scan equality, stakes to puma,

at mockery unbounded dispense raft.
the suspense.
A, with perfume as niggling ostrich facetious putter
the primal A of monster burnt stirrup.
double standard a seat belt.
the recovery
a blond and wise exploratory plaid.

Friday, March 17, 2006

ANZIIL Symposium Series Six

ANZIIL Symposium Series Six Transitions will be held on the 5th and 6th of July 2006 at the Southbank Institute in Brisbane, Australia. Further info will appear at http://www.anziil.org/events_meetings/2006/
events/symposium-series-six/overview.htm


Photo by S. Webber: Brisbane, 2004.

Thursday, March 16, 2006

Visit by Prof Dorothy Williams

Yesterday (Wednesday) Dorothy Williams, from the Information Management Department at Robert Gordon University, Aberdeen, Scotland, visited the Department. I had invited her to talk about her research to the students in my Information Literacy Research class, and also to give an open research seminar in the morning. In the latter seminar she talked about some recent qualitative research looking at school teachers' conceptions of information literacy and its relationship to learning. The data was collected from teachers in three phases: small focus groups, a reflective period, and then a 2nd round of focus groups. There were interesting similarities to and differences from our own research into academics' conceptions of information literacy.

In the afternoon, she shared experiences of data collection for a project investigating teachers' use of research in informing teaching practice. In particular, she highlighted the challenges of getting teachers to participate in research, and issues of questionnaire distribution and response rates. The full report for this project can be found linking from http://www.rgu.ac.uk/abs/research/page.cfm?pge=5843, as can a page with some information about the first project.

After this session she had a discussion with three other people in the Department, and the photograph on the right shows her with them. Form left to right they are:
- Yazdan Mansourian - PhD student, who is supervised by me and Prof Nigel Ford: I am presenting a talk about Yazdan's work at the LILAC conference the week after next. I have also mentioned his blog which is at http://invisibleweblog.blogspot.com
- Andrew Madden - Research Associate, working on an AHRC-funded project on Understanding the dynamics of information seeking: analysing researchers’ strategic changes over time
- Dorothy Williams
- Peter Stordy, University Teacher in the Department and also studying for a PhD on the subject of internet literacies.

Information literacy course 5th April

An Aslib Course: Information Literacy will run on 5 April 2006 in London. The Course Director is David Bawden. Further details, including how to book, can be found at: http://www.aslib.com/training/4/18.html

Wednesday, March 15, 2006

Call for case studies

The CILIP Community Services Group, sub group on Information Literacy (CSG-ILG) is commissioning six case studies that illustrate best practice in the delivery and / or promotion of information literacy in differing library sectors: Commercial / special libraries; Further education libraries; Health libraries; Higher education libraries; Public libraries; School libraries. CSG ILG hope that these case studies will provide a valuable resource to help librarians and teachers choose successful strategies for designing and delivering information literacy programmes for customers in their fields, by collecting the experience of others who have implemented them in a practical situation. The case studies are being commissioned to
document existing good practice and lessons from working situations.

Up to £500 funding is available for one case study within each of the target areas outlined above. It is expected that this funding will be primarily intended to support the process of capturing knowledge about best practice in information literacy. This would include promoting information literacy to key customer groups, staff development and the design and delivery of information literacy to a range of client groups, in both formal and informal settings. Funding is not being provided for commissioning activity. Apply via http://www.cilip.org.uk/specialinterestgroups/
bysubject/informationliteracy/research
. Deadline for proposals is Monday 24th April 2006 to Adrienne Harris at Adrienne.harris@dti.gsi.gov.uk. Completed case studies will be required by 17th July 2006.

Photo by S. Webber: Snowdrops in botanical gardens, Sheffield, March 2006.

Tuesday, March 14, 2006

Evalued toolkit

There is a revised version of the evalued toolkit, a free resource to help information services staff in Higher Education evaluate electronic information services. The web site is at: http://www.evalued.uce.ac.uk/
The most relevant area for information literacy seems to me to be under the theme "impact" (see http://www.evalued.uce.ac.uk/evaluating/impact/ ) which includes impact on learning and teaching. There are example questionnaires etc. (e.g. questions for a focus group of academics) and suggestions for analysing data.

Photo by S. Webber: Crocus in the snow, Sheffield, March 2006.

Blogging....

This entry is to celebrate my office window being cleaned (only happens every 3 years: though as you can see there isn't much of a view for grimed glass to obscure) and also to celebrate Blogger operating normally again . I hope it lasts! For the last 10 days or so I've had to be really persistent to get anything posted at all. The most annoying thing was that there was no news posted on the "Blogger status" page either. Anyway, I hope we are returning to Blogger normality...

Monday, March 13, 2006

More on media literacy

As an addendum to yesterday's post: I've now had more of a look at the report from Ofcom (though I still can't say I've read it cover to cover). It does have some interesting findings (for example, that overall newspapers are less trusted than TV, radio or websites, although in fact this breaks down into a deep level of distrust for tabloids and a higher level of trust for broadsheet newspapers (except as they have all now reduced the size of their sheets, there is going to have to be another name for them...) Additionally, the fact that the sample was more representative than is often the case in such surveys highlights the fact that the internet is not yet as influential as tthose of us who use it every day are tempted to think.

The questions they ask are focused mostly on broadcast and digital media, with emphasis on what features of the medium (e.g. mobile phones or TV) people know about or say they are confident about. Again this is intersting, especially as the responses of different groups (gender/age/ethnicity etc.) are compared. However, it seemed odd to me that they didn't probe the aspect of how people use newspapers (which may not be as complex as DVD recorders, but actually finding your way round a multi-supplement newspaper can be quite confusing (well, I get confused), and I wonder if people know to look for things like content lists, or generally how they cope with newspapers). Apart from in the "news" section, there seemed to be an assumption that media literacy = digital literacy. I suppose, though, that this is where Government's interest is focused, and the pressure to justify/explore this area comes more from digital media companies....
(P.S. Blogger continues deliquent, thus lack of photos. Added next day - Blogger seems to be a bit better, so added photo)

Sunday, March 12, 2006

Media literacy

Ofcom is a UK official agency with the remit to be a "watchdog" as the communications industry, and they have taken up Media Literacy as part of their remit. They have recently published a survey (interviews with 3,200 British adults) which investigated various questions to do with use of the media and perceptions about the media (e.g. trust, knowledge of regulation). It is quite a substantial survey. The survey deliberately boosted the numbers from Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, from those with disabilities, and from those in ethnic minority groups. Otherwise it was a quota sample related to the UK's 2001 census. The media in question are: TV, radio, the internet, mobile phones, and "news" (which is the only place where newpapers come in).

Ofcom. (2006) Media Literacy audit: Report on adult media literacy. Ofcom.
http://www.ofcom.org.uk/advice/media_literacy/
medlitpub/medlitpubrss/medialit_audit/

Educator's spotlight digest

The S.O.S for Information Literacy project has upgraded its newsletter into a regular online magazine that includes video content. It is called Educators' Spotlight Digest and is mainly aimed at those in schools teaching information literacy. The site is at http://www.sosspotlight.org/ and the first issue includes news, advice and articles plus obviously links to the SOS resource itself. S.O.S. for Information Literacy is a project of Syracuse University's Center for Digital Literacy, in collaboration with the American Association of School Librarians (AASL) and funded by the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS).

By the way, sorry that this blog is not as regular as usual. Blogger continues to act up, making it difficult to post.

Friday, March 10, 2006

Voices from the future

There is a conference Voices from the future hosted by the University of the Virgin Islands ("Historically American... Uniquely Caribbean... Globally Interactive.") and the National Forum for Information Literacy at Frenchman's Reef & Morning Star Marriott Beach Resort, St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands, on December 10-13th 2006. A call for papers and registration will be opening on April 15th.

"the specific aim of this first time conference is to bring together information literacy advocates and proponents in support of integrating, at the grass roots level, current international information literacy initiatives worldwide by: 1. establishing an international information literacy coalition of diverse practitioners that meets in a conference setting every other year, holding international regional colloquiums in the off years to share and monitor lessons learned and best practices; and 2. providing a forum for new and entry level library professionals and other diverse information literacy professionals and advocates to engage in an international community of practice designed to enrich the current international dialogue on mainstreaming information literacy philosophy and practices." The keynotes are all from the USA, plus one each from the Virgin Islands and from UNESCO. Currently more information is available at http://library.uvi.edu/InfoLitConf_files/frame.htm(a powerpoint with the information)
Photo by S. Webber: Crocus in my neighbour's garden, March 2006. Added a few days later: actually these can't be crocuses, look more like tulip leaves....

Wednesday, March 08, 2006

Two journals: SIMILE and ELIP

Thanks to Yazdan Mansourian for reminding me about Studies In Media & Information Literacy Education (SIMILE) at http://www.utpjournals.com/simile/

Also worth watching is the site of Evidence based Library and Information Practice, where vol 1. issue 1. will appear soon: http://ejournals.library.ualberta.ca/index.php/EBLIP

Student-centred learning

There is a workshop on Student-centred learning organised by SALCTG (Scottish Academic Libraries Co-operative Training Group) in Dundee, Scotland, on 14th March 2006.
The facilitator is Lorraine Walsh, Director of Academic Professional Development, University of Dundee. The aim of the workshop is to support participants in exploring the concept of student-centred learning and its impact on teaching, learning and the delivery of effective training.
Places are limited to 20. To book: please contact Morag Pollard (email: m.j.pollard@dundee.ac.uk Tel: 01382 348213)

Photo by S. Webber: Snowdrops in Sheffield Botanic Gardens, March 2006.

Blogger down time

Apologies for not posting for a couple of days. Blogger was down - access to read blogs was functioning a lot of the time, but one couldn't get in to edit or create posts ... Blogger are not any good at communicating with their community via the "Blogger status" page either ;-(((

Online IL course for librarians

ACRL (in the USA) is offering its online seminar, Creating a Comprehensive Plan for Information Literacy March 27 to April 15. "This course will provide you with the information you need to create a comprehensive plan for information literacy for your institution" More information at http://www.ala.org/ala/acrl/acrlproftools/
comprehensiveplan.htm

Payment by credit card or purchase order (PO) only. The seminar is limited to 60 participants.

Saturday, March 04, 2006

Approaches to induction in FE and HE libraries

There is a meeting, Approaches to induction in FE and HE libraries, on 23rd May 2006 in Wolverhampton, UK. Speakers from Higher and Further Education libraries will describe approaches to induction. Cost is £55. For more details or to download a booking form, go to http://www.ebase.uce.ac.uk/events
Photo by S. Webber: Henry Moore sculpture by the Neue Pinakothek art gallery, Munich, Feb. 2006.

Friday, March 03, 2006

German IL blog

Thomas Hapke has a German language blog covering "information literacy, history, philosophy, education and beyond" at http://blog.hapke.de/ Some of the items he highlights are in English.
One of the German language resources he mentions is a page including presentations from a conference in September last year entitled Informationskompetenz stärken - Schlüsselqualifikationen lernen (Improve information literacy - learn key skills) [at least I think "key skills" is the right translation here]
http://www.informationskompetenz.de/
aufsaetze-vortraege.htm#lvbayern2005


Photo by S. Webber: Englisher Garten, Munich, Feb. 2006.

Thursday, March 02, 2006

Weetman's information literacy

Yesterday the guest speaker in my Information Literacy Research class was Jacqui Weetman, from De Montfort University, Leicester. She came to discuss her research: the key results are in the paper:
Weetman, J. (2005) “Osmosis: Does It Work for the Development of Information Literacy?” The Journal of Academic Librarianship, 31 (5), 456–460.

There is a shorter version free on the web:
Weetman, J. (2005) The ‘Seven pillars of wisdom’ model: a case study to test academic staff perceptions. SCONUL focus, (34), 31-36. Available from http://www.sconul.ac.uk/pubs_stats/newsletter/34/

There were the 10 students in my class (100% turnout!) and Pam Bing, from CILASS (see previous entry), so as usual with this class we sat in a circle and Jacqui described her research and in particular, as we were focusing on questionnaires this week, on issues to do with questionnaire design. Jacqui had, as part of her work for her part time MBA, administered a questionnaire to level 3 course leaders at De Montfort University, asking them about how important they thought information literacy was, whether they taught and assessed it etc. Since it had emerged that the lecturers thought that it was pretty important, but teaching and assessing it were not so widely done, it had impacted information literacy policy in the university. She also mentioned some more recent developments: a couple of questionnaires to specific departments, and the fact that information literacy is now being included in the University's Programme Development Handbook (which people developing new courses are supposed to refer to).

There is also one of Jacqui Weetman's presentations on the web:
- What do architecture staff really think about information literacy? Presented at the ARCLIB 2005 Conference, July 13th-15th, University College, Dublin. http://www.livjm.ac.uk/lea/misc/weetman.ppt

Photo by S. Webber: Snowy leaves, Englisher Garten, Munich, Feb 2006.

Wednesday, March 01, 2006

Interesting report from international Colloquium

In a previous post I mentioned the Alexandria Proclamation on Information Literacy that was produced before the World Summit on the Information Society in November 2006. Now the full report from the Colloquium has been published on the National Forum for Information Literacy website. This website also has the Alexandria Proclamation in lots of languages.
It is an 89 page document reporting fully on discussion and with a good number of recommendations touching on a range of aspects of information literacy. I might say more about this when I have done more than skim it through!
You can find it on the Colloquium homepage at http://www.infolit.org/International_Colloquium/index.htm

Photo by S. Webber: Englisher Garten, Munich, February 2006.