Strategies for Integrating Information Literacy into the Curriculum

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Strategies for Integrating Information Literacy
into the Curriculum

• Ilene F. Rockman, Ph.D.
• Manager, Information Competence Initiative, CSU
  Office of the Chancellor
• Presentation to AAPT (August 3, 2004)

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Why Discuss?

• Electronic information increasingly comes to us
  in unfiltered formats, raising questions about
  authenticity, credibility, validity, and
  reliability
• The uncertain quality and expanding quantity of
  information (text, graphic, aural, spatial) poses
  new and special challenges for users

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Why Discuss?

• Students are entering colleges and universities
  lacking basic research and information competence
  skills (including critical thinking, problem
  solving, decision making, self-directed learning)
• Technology is transforming teaching and learning
• concomitant with a proliferation of information
  formats and choices
• Assessment efforts are indicating student over
  reliance on the web as an information source

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Why Discuss?

• Faculty want to see an improvement in the quality
  of student work, an increase in the effectiveness
  of student research, and students taking more
  responsibility for their own learning
• Students want to complete assignments with less
  difficulty and more satisfaction
• Employers want to hire graduates who are
  competent, take responsibility, can solve
  problems, and produce new ideas/directions for
  the future

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The Reality

• For many teens, the Internet has replaced the
  library as the primary tool for doing research
• (The Internet and Education. Findings of the
  Pew Internet American Life Project, September
  1, 2001. http//www.pewinternet.org)

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The Reality

• Less than half (48) feel confident in their
  ability to find informationessentially, in the
  skills needed to research a topic.
• A Report to Stakeholders on the Conditions and
  Effectiveness of Postsecondary Education. Change
  333 (May/June 2001), p. 29.

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The Reality

• More than 31 of all respondents use Internet
  search engines to find answers to their
  questions. However, people who use Internet
  search engines express frustration because they
  estimate that half of their searches are
  unsuccessful.
• OCLC White Paper on the Information Habits of
  College Students.
• June 2002, p. 2.
• (http//www2.oclc.org/oclc/pdf/printondemand/infor
  mationhabits.pdf)

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The Reality

• Many students are likely to use information
  found on search engines and various Web sites as
  research materialA great challenge for todays
  colleges is how to teach students search
  techniques that will get them to the information
  they want and how to evaluate it.
• The Internet Goes to College. Findings of
  the Pew Internet American Life Project, Pew
  Research Center, September 15, 2002,
  (http//www.pewinternet.org)

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Further Support

• Baccalaureate programs engage students in an
  integrated course of studythese programs also
  ensure the development of core learning abilities
  and competencies including college-level written
  and oral communication, quantitative skills,
  information literacy andcritical analysis of
  data.
• (WASC Handbook of Accreditation, Standard 2,
  January 2001 p. 20)

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Information Competence and Information Technology

• Computer use or ownership does not guarantee
  information competence
• Students can manipulate data and create documents
  with information technology skills without
  demonstrating information competence skills

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Wont Students Just Pick It Up Along the Way?

• Students have picked up how to chat, surf,
  program, IM, and send e-mail
• Students have not picked up how to be critical
  consumers and producers of information--they do
  not know how to effectively find, evaluate,
  synthesize, apply, or ethically use information

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What is Information Competence?

• A set of abilities to recognize when information
  is needed and have the ability to locate,
  evaluate, and use effectively the needed
  information
• Presidential Committee on Information
  Competence. Final Report. Chicago American
  Library Association, 1989.

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From Library Skills to Information Competence

• Past Emphasis
• Passive tours, lectures
• Prof-identified topics
• Locate information
• Print only
• Established authority
• Term paper product
• Course level

• Current Emphasis
• Active coordinated
• Student identified topics
• Evaluate, use, comm info
• Multiple formats/choices
• Determine authority
• Multiple options
• Discipline/program level

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What Does an Information Competence Curriculum
Look Like?

• Campus-wide
• Inquiry, problem, performance, and resource based
• Makes effective use of instructional technologies
  
• Student-centered learning
• Active, collaborative, hands-on strategies
  
• Integrated with disciplines learning outcomes
• Links to ongoing coursework and real-life
  experiences
• Promotes lifelong learning skills

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How Can IC Be Achieved?

• Included on class syllabi
• Reflected in class assignments
• Reinforced across the curriculum
• --in freshmen transition courses, lower and
  upper division general education courses, junior
  level courses for transfer students, courses in
  the major, service learning, and senior capstone
  experiences

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Sample IC Learning Outcomes

• formulate an appropriate research question
• understand the scope and use of basic reference
  sources, online catalogs, subscription databases,
  full-text sources, and the Internet-- and how to
  use them to locate and retrieve appropriate
  information

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Sample IC Learning Outcomes

• critically evaluate information resources
• understand the ethical and legal issues
  surrounding information and the rights and
  responsibilities involved
• cite information correctly using an accepted
  citation format
• effectively and appropriately communicate
  information to others

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Sample IC Learning Outcomes

• Reflect on the process
• What did I learn?
• How can I transfer this learning process to a new
  setting?

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Within CSU

• Information competence is the fusion or
  integration of library literacy, computer
  literacy, media literacy, technological literacy,
  ethics, critical thinking, and communication
  skills
• Want students to develop a conceptual framework
  for successfully addressing any information need,
  whether personal or related to academic work

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Within CSU

• IC Initiative began in 1995 as part of
  system-wide strategic planning process
• Full support of upper administration
• Program on each of the 23 campuses

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Ideal

• Student introduced to information competence in
  first year reinforced in general education and
  courses in the major (vertically and
  horizontally)
• Student continues to encounter IC throughout the
  curriculum, culminating in a senior level
  experience
• Rather than graduating based on which courses
  you have taken, you will graduate based on what
  you have learned and can demonstrate (CSU
  Monterey Bayoutcomes based campus).

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Effective Method

• Faculty and librarians partner together in a
  shared understanding of information
  competencelearning is a combination of content
  plus competenciesto empower faculty and students
  in the classroom and beyond

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Assignments

• Well-designed assignments, developed
  collaboratively, increase student
  learning
• Thought-provoking problems based on real world
  situations, encouraging students to collaborate
  and think critically and analytically
• Products can be class presentations, written
  reports, interviews, web sites, PowerPoint
  presentations, etc.

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Challenge To Our Students

• The formulation of a problem is far more often
  essential than its solution, which may be merely
  a matter of mathematical or experimental skill.
  To raise new questions, new possibilities, to
  regard old problems from a new angle requires
  creative imagination and marks real advance in
  science.
• Albert Einstein and Leopold Infield, The
  Evolution of Physics (New York, Simon and
  Schuster, 1938), p. 95

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Grades 7-9 Math and Science, Lubbock ISD

• The US government is exploring the possibility of
  human colonization in outer space. As part of the
  research, the government is randomly selecting a
  group of citizens to aid in their study. You have
  been selected to be part of a team that will
  research Mars, Venus, and Saturn to determine
  which planet is more feasible for human
  colonization. You and your group are responsible
  for choosing the best planet for human
  colonization and preparing and presenting factual
  information that supports your group's chosen
  planet.

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CSU Chico

• Advanced Lab (Phys 227)
• --all majors must take it
• --focuses on experiments x-rays, radioactivity,
  Compton effect, velocity of light, lasers,
  nuclear magnetic resonance, etc.
• --emphasis on writing and research

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CSU Chico

• Students write a series of lab reports they
  submit for critique and rewrite
• Culminating exercise is formal lab report similar
  to research paper that would be submitted to a
  refereed journal

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Want to Avoid Causing Harm

• Dr. Alkis Togias administered hexamethonium to a
  healthy 24-year old woman at Johns Hopkins
  University to study how the lungs of healthy
  people protect against asthma attacks an adverse
  reaction killed her.
• Togias had searched Pubmed whose coverage extends
  back to the 1960s the drugs toxicity was
  reported a decade earlier.

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Want to Avoidcont

• An emeritus medical school professor at another
  institution told reporters that Togias was
  foolish and lazy for not finding the articles
  which warned of lung damage associated with the
  drug.
•  
• (Source http//www.stcl.edu/library/FN13-5Caref
  ulResearch.html and
• Library Journal Academic Newswire, July 24,
  2001.)

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Summary

• IL skills are vital to future growth,
  development, and success
• IL skills contribute to a higher level of
  learning which is long-lasting
• Students need multiple opportunities to acquire,
  practice, and hone IL skills inside and outside
  of the classroom

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Summary

• Best practices tell us to
• Integrate IL skills into the learning outcomes of
  discipline courses
• Collaborate (faculty with librarians) to write
  assignments which promote IL

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Best Practices

• Assess appropriately
• ETS ICT literacy projectweb-based,
  performance-based tool to measure the
  breadth/depth of ICT proficiency among young
  adults seeking to continue their education or
  transition to the workplace

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ICT Literacy Model
Define
Access
ICT Literacy
Manage
Integrate
Evaluate
Create
Communicate
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Thanks Very Much

• Dr. Ilene Rockman
• Manager, Information Competence Initiative
• Office of the Chancellor
• The California State University
• email irockman_at_calstate.edu