Communities of Inquiry: A Shift to Inquiry-Based Learning in LIS Education?

1
Communities of Inquiry A Shift to Inquiry-Based
Learning in LIS Education?

• Muzhgan Nazarova, Ph.D Student
• Ann Peterson Bishop, Associate Professor
• Bertram C. Bruce, Professor
• Graduate School of Library and Information
  Science
• U. Of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

2
Presentation Overview

• Community Inquiry (CI) track in LIS
• Why and how it emerged?
• Theoretical background
• Mechanisms of implementation
• Perceptions of the students.

3
Librarianship and information services is
experiencing a radical redefinition of the task
and nature of both the profession and preparation
for entering it. Overwhelmed by new waves of
technology and an information explosion, the
profession is almost drowning in the sea of
change.
Stueart,1989
4
Core Competencies for Librarians and Information
Professionals

• Technical skills (e.g., knowledge of sources in
  all formats, collection management skills,
  application of critical thinking skills to
  library problems)
• Skills related to communication and human
  relations (e.g., conducting reference interviews,
  producing reports and presentation, effective
  management of group processes).
• Lois Buttlar and Rosemary Du Mont, 1996

5
Core Competencies for Librarians and Information
Professionals

• Knowledge of the conduct of research and of
  information resources, management, access,
  systems and technology, and policy.
• Tenopir, 2000

6
Core competenciesWhat is missing?

• Audiences and communities the librarians and
  information specialists work with and serve
• Libraries become increasingly service-oriented
• Role of a librarian in a collaborative knowledge
  construction

7
Changes in Library Education NeededThe KALIPER
Project

• Library education as a vibrant, dynamic, changing
  field that is undertaking an array of initiatives

8
The KALIPER ReportSix Trends

• 1. Broad-based information environments and
• information problems.
• 2. User-centered core
• 3. Infusion of information technology into
  curriculum
• 4. Experimenting with specialization
• 5. Instruction in different formats with more
• flexibility
• 6. Offering related degrees at the
• undergraduate, masters and doctoral levels.

9
Communities of Inquiry

• Community of Inquiry theory understands
  knowledge as communally constructed and emergent,
  proceeding through the interaction of critical
  and creative thinking
• Kennedy, 1996

10
Community Inquiry Track

• 391LIA Literacy in the Information Age
• 450IBL Inquiry-Based Learning
• 450PT Pragmatic Technology
• 450SJ Social Justice
• 450PAR Participatory Action Research
• 450CIS Community Information
• Systems.

11
CI Track and KALIPER Trends

• 1. By implementing the CI track, GSLIS addressed
  much broader information environments including
  different communities and address their needs
• 2. While faculty members working on CI track have
  joint appointments and are actively engaged in a
  community service and work with diverse
  communities, a main focus is on understanding the
  users representing different communities and
  meeting their needs

12
CI Track and KALIPER Trends

• 3. Along with increasing infusion of
  information technology into the curricula, as a
  part of a CI track, a main focus is on
  communication and collaboration technologies and
  how these technologies can bring communities
  together
• 4. CI as an informal track in GSLIS curriculum
  has already passed its experimentation phase. It
  attracted the students from the other subject
  areas to engage in a dialogue with the students
  in LIS join in a community of inquiry

13
CI Track and KALIPER Trends

• 5. Inquiry-based learning as an innovative
  method of instruction in LIS found its place in a
  field where dealing with inquiries on a daily
  basis is a major part of your work, providing
  more flexibility and developing and engaging in
  different communities of inquiry with people from
  all walks of life
• 6. Some Community Inquiry track courses open to
  Undergraduates and PHDs

14
American Pragmatism and Theory of Inquiry

• They all believed that ideas are not out
  there waiting to be discovered, but are tools -
  like folks and knives and microchips-that people
  devise to cope with the world in which they find
  themselves. They believed that the ideas are not
  produced by the individuals - that ideas are
  social.
• Louis Menand, 2001

15
American Pragmatism

• William James (1675-1749)
• Charles Sanders Pierce (1839-1914)
• John Dewey (1859-1952)
• Jane Adams (1860-1935).

16
Charles S. Pierce and Theory of Inquiry

• All inquiry requires a cooperative community
  of minds and stresses the fact that notions of
  such a community of minds. Such a community is
  involved in the philosophic definition of the
  real.
• Goudge, 1950

17
John Dewey and Communities of Inquiry

• Inquiry is the life-blood of every science
  and is constantly engaged in every art, craft and
  profession (Dewey, 1938).
• Men live in a community in virtue of the
  things which they have in common and
  communication is the way in which they come to
  possess things in common. What they must have in
  common in order to form a community or society
  are aims, beliefs, aspirations. (Dewey, 1916).

18
Inquiry-Based Learning (IBL)

• Inquiry-Based Learning is often described as a
  cycle or spiral, involving the formulation of a
  question, investigation, creation of an
  appropriate solution or answer, discussion and
  reflection on the outcome but in practice not all
  the steps I this cycle are necessary to be
  followed in sequence.

19
Inquiry-Based Learning (IBL)
The Cycle of Inquiry

20
Communities of Inquiry

• A group (a social setting) of individuals who
  use dialogue (interaction among participants) to
  search out the problematic borders of a puzzling
  concept (inquiry as philosophical)
• Turgeon, 1998

21
Characteristics of the CIs

• Coming to understand, and to build upon, a range
  of different perspectives and points of view
• Thinking which is self-correcting, and thinkers
  who care for the procedures of inquiry
• Developing an environment in which all ideas are
  listened to and respected as potential sources of
  truth

22
Online Environment for CI CILs

• Community Inquiry Lab (CIL) is a place where
  members of a community come together to develop a
  shared capacity and work on common problems.

23
Community Inquiry Labs

• Community
• A collaborative activity and for creating
  knowledge that is connected to peoples values,
  history and lived experiences.
• Inquiry
• An open-ended, democratic, participatory
  engagement.
• Laboratory
• A space and resources to bring theory and
• action together in an experimental and
  critical manner.
• CIL is most importantly a concept.

24
Community Inquiry Labs

• Web-based suite of Open Source software tools to
  support collaboration and communication (e.g.,
  bulletin board, document uploading, calendar,
  inquiry units)
• People create CILs (websites) on their own, to
  support their activities within and among groups
• Inquiry units lesson plans, action plans,
  meeting minutes, research reports, journals,
  policy statements, etc.

25
Community, Content and Collaboration Management
Systems (C3MS)

• C3MS systems are considered a form of Web
  portals, gathering a variety of useful
  information and communication resources into a
  single, one stop web page
• Looney Lyman, 2000

26
Community, Content and Collaboration Management
Systems (C3MS)

• C3MS consist of a collection of objects called
  information bricks and services operation on
  these bricks that can be accessed from a portal.

27
Community Inquiry Lab

• Is based on a C3MS model and consists of
  different bricks performing different functions

28
CIL Features Software

• Open software model (1) users can mix-and-match
  bricks, (2) bricks are open source
• A brick maker, which allows non-programmers to
  make their own bricks
• Community development collaborations with a
  diverse group of people working in education,
  e-government, and other areas
• Inquiry development model (use -gt build -gt
  design) (1) participatory design, (2)
  development as research on community inquiry

29
CIL Features Relation to Community

• Open participation start open and then create
  private spaces, vetting, etc as needed
• Universal design an emphasis on accessibility,
  not only in terms of disabilities, but in terms
  of bandwidth, screen size, local support
• Community work first situating the technology
  within ongoing communities, rather than seeing it
  as a replacement or complete in itself

30
Community Inquiry Track

• 391LIA Literacy in the Information Age
• 450IBL Inquiry-Based Learning
• 450PT Pragmatic Technology
• 450SJ Social Justice
• 450PAR Participatory Action Research
• 450CIS Community Information
• Systems.

31
(No Transcript)
32
Paseo Boricua Street Academyhttp//inquiry.uiuc.e
du/cil/out.php?cilid112
33
SisterNets CIL in Action Taking Action for Water
Quality
34
Pilot Study Perceptions of Students

• It seems to me to be more appropriate to the
  type of work that LIS represents. It is also
  much more responsive to the various learning
  styles that people come bring? to LIS. At
  least it does represent some form or model of
  learning upon which LIS can grow

35
Pilot Study Perceptions of Students

• In addition, the CIL allows for distant people
  to come together around the shared interest of a
  topic. Also, the CIL encourages the involvement
  by allowing for different interpretation of the
  information and its evolution by the members of
  the CIL

36
Pilot Study Perceptions of Students

• Learning is not linear, the inquiry cycle
  allows me to perfect my work, and allow others to
  input
• I think the inquiry cycle is in general the
  learning cycle for me. To have the structure
  lets you feel through the part of the process you
  are currently in, and enable the focus of
  attention to the part of the cycle

37
Pilot Study Perceptions of Students

• The topics have a strong connection to LIS, but
  also have an appeal to other fields of study.
  To see that there are strong connections across
  disciplines in a valuable learning opportunity.
  I also think the topics in the track are ones
  that are often lost between the technical and
  traditional branches of LIS

38
Pilot Study Perceptions of Students

• I think the biggest potential issue might be
  the practicality of not recognizing or
  understanding a more commercial, corporate,
  conservative arena within which we all have to
  exist and hopefully thrive in this world. It is
  wonderful to put forth social issues, concerns
  and agendas but doing that with students and not
  giving them an understanding of what real world
  is can be very disconcerting for the student once
  they are out on their own.

39
Conclusion

• CI is
• Response to a complex array of
• changes in LIS
• Building bridges in LIS knowledge
• Much work to do!

40
Resources
41
Contacts