“Help RobAI Fix Its System Bug”: An Escape Game Assisting Teaching AI Literacy #ECIL2025

Sheila again logging at ECIL 2025 “Help RobAI Fix Its System Bug”: An Escape Game Assisting Teaching AI Literacy presented by Zuza Wiorogórska (University of Warsaw, Poland), Tatiana Sanches (Universidade de Lisboa, Portugal), Zuzanna “Zu” Sendor (University of Warsaw Library, Poland).
This was a comparative exploratory study with Polish  and Portuguese students. Step 1 was ChatGPT exercises (defining IL in English and asking for articles; asking for info on the instructor; writing an introduction to a topic; shorten a text and translate to your language; summarise english task and assign keywords; and asking ChatGPT to convert a bibliography from one style to another). For each ChatGPT task the students had to assess the results from ChatGPT. The assessments varied between the cohorts from the two countries.
The students found ChatGPT useful for some tasks e.g. translating texts, generating abstracts but also had concerns e.g. innaccurate content, impersonal tone of replies. The overall view was the view that it could support academic but must be used with critical thinking and human oversight.
The second step was an Escape Game. They developed the game themselves with an application. Mission 1 was understanding what influences CHatGPT's responses and how it can support academic work. The 2nd challenge was about truthfulness and the 3rd challenge was identifying true and false statements about GenAI's capabilities and limitations. If you succeeded you got a number that enabled you to tackle the next mission. They had a cute cartoon robot (RobAI) accompanying them, and had, for example, drag and drop answers, answers where you had to choose either the true or false statement. The robot cried if you failed. When you won and fixed the robot it was happy - the students liked this aspect.
The advantage of the game was reinforcing key concepts and enabling reflection on integrating AI in a critical and ethical way. There were some cultural differences between the two cohorts (who were in 2 countries and also one on campus and one online). Future research could explore long term impact and cross-disciplinary use. They gave a link for the game as https://tinyurl.cm/ujp7y278 though it wasn't loading for me (I will try and check up on that).

Humanities, Humanism and Ethics in a Digital Context: Challenges for Digital Literacy Research and Learning #ECIL2025

It's the afternoon session at ECIL and this is Sheila Webber liveblogging Humanities, Humanism and Ethics in a Digital Context: Challenges for Digital Literacy Research and Learning authored by Paula Ochoa and Leonor Gaspar Pinto (Universidade Nova, CHAM, Portugal), Ana Novo (Universidade Aberta, CIDEHUS-UÉ, Portugal) and presented by Novo. There was a background of project collaboration e.g. specialised course development on digital culture and participation in a think tank. So this collaboration evolved organically. Novo presented Critical Information Literacy as a framework for considering the question "what challenges arise at the intersection of humanities transformation and digital literacy research and learning?" Digital fluency was seen as going basic competencies and literacy, but there are challenges. These include operational focus (looking to much at the skills agenda) and conceptual ambiguity.
Humanistic Information Studies was presented as having as key concepts of information experience, information creation and information work, with a culturally situated and reflective approach. This perspective on Information Science brings it closer to Digital Humanities.
Novo identified the need for digital ethics and an evolving ides of digital literacy. Arising from this they have recommendations: commitment to interdisciplinarity; instutionalisation of the process (embedding digital literacy fluency) and focus on systematic change.
Photo by Sheila Webber: under the linden tree in Bamberg, Germany, September 2025

International standards for information literacy

An article in the latest issue of Liber Quarterly is:
Sanches, T., Antunes, M. L., & Lopes, C. (2022). International standards for information literacy: the inspiration for national practices. LIBER Quarterly: The Journal of the Association of European Research Libraries, 32(1), 1–22. https://doi.org/10.53377/lq.11131
It includes a perspective on IL development, and has a table drawing out specific features of various information literacy frameworks (from the ACRL Standards (2000) to the ACRL Frameowork (2016). Their discussion leads on to presentation of the Portuguese Recommendations for Academic Libraries (2020–2022) which have 4 dimensions
- "Teaching and learning support, specifically in the promotion of IL skills and in fostering digital fluency and user empowerment.
- "Research and scientific publication support, especially in the context of Open Science.
-"Professional and organisational development places the librarian at the centre of the process and the institutions as synergy aggregators for continuous improvement actions.
- "Design and provision of services and partnerships that facilitate and enhance the creation of networks for cultural expression, including the preservation and dissemination of documentary heritage"
Photo by Sheila Webber: Aberystwyth beach, again, January 2023

New articles: Open Science & information literacy; Information behaviour in millennials; Info creation; Trust; Self-directed learning in public libraries

These are open-access, apart from one that is indicated below.
- Antunes, M-L., Lopes, C. & Sanches, T. (2021) Open Science and information literacy: case study at a research center. Journal of the European Association for Health Information and Libraries (JEAHIL), 17(1). http://ojs.eahil.eu/ojs/index.php/JEAHIL/article/view/448/397
- Inthiran, A. (2021). Trust or do not trust: evaluation strategies used by online health information consumers in South East Asia. Information Research, 26(1), paper 886. http://InformationR.net/ir/26-1/paper886.html
- Yoshida, Y (2021). Public libraries as places for self-directed lifelong learning: narratives of empowerment. Information Research, 26(1), paper 888. http://InformationR.net/ir/26-1/paper888.html (uses a life history approach with 4 Japanese participants)
- Lee, L., Ocepek, M.G., & Makri, S. (2021). Creating by me, and for me: investigating the use of information creation in everyday life Information Research, 26(1), paper 891. http://InformationR.net/ir/26-1/paper891.html
- (priced publication) González‐Teruel, A., Campos‐Peláez, M-I. & Fortea‐Cabo, G. (2021). Information behaviour of the millennial generation: a scoping review of medical residents and their use of social media. Health Information & Libraries Journal, 38(1), 5-31. https://doi.org/10.1111/hir.12306 I will also mention that the commemorative issue of this journal in honour of Shane Godbolt (December 2020) is still free to access here https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/toc/14711842/2020/37/S1
Photo by Sheila Webber: little daffodils, March 2021

Information literacy papers from #WLIC2019

These are full-text papers related to information literacy which were presented at the IFLA World Library and Information Conference this week:
- REPANOVICI, Angela and LANDOY, Ane (2019) Methods to implement new information technologies for teaching Information Literacy. Paper presented at: IFLA WLIC 2019 - Athens, Greece - Libraries: dialogue for change in Session 234 - Education and Training. http://library.ifla.org/id/eprint/2529 "The authors ... will share their experience with the introduction of training masterclasses on the use of knowledge and interactive teaching technologies using Kahoot and Hypersay
- BRINDESI, Hara and PAPAZOGLOU, Alexandra (2019) Information literacy efforts addressed to schools in Greece. Paper presented at: IFLA WLIC 2019 - Athens, Greece - Libraries: dialogue for change in Session 207 - Information Literacy with Library Theory and Research. http://library.ifla.org/id/eprint/2579
- COSTA, Margarida (2019) The issue of media literacy in Portuguese school libraries: data inspire action. Paper presented at: IFLA WLIC 2019 - Athens, Greece - Libraries: dialogue for change in Session 190 - School Libraries. http://library.ifla.org/id/eprint/2546
"Launched in 1996, the School Libraries Network Program aims to install and develop libraries, making available to users the necessary resources for reading, accessing, using and producing information in print, electronic and digital media. ... systematic gathering of information led to the identification of a critical issue, because it corresponds to the persistence of a trend: there is an uneven distribution of activities by the three areas of literacy and media literacy is clearly the one that is less addressed. In order to solve the above-mentioned problem, the intervention strategies designed by the School Libraries Network have involved raising awareness of teacher librarians and training them for a more consistent and confident approach to media literacy."
- CHANG, Naicheng and HSU, Hsuanyu Sheila (2019) Integrating action learning into information literacy instruction in a cross-disciplinary blended learning environment. Paper presented at: IFLA WLIC 2019 - Athens, Greece - Libraries: dialogue for change in Session 207 - Information Literacy with Library Theory and Research. http://library.ifla.org/id/eprint/2507
- CONNAWAY, Lynn Silipigni et al. (2019) Authority, Context and Containers: Student Perceptions and Judgments When Using Google for School Work. Paper presented at: IFLA WLIC 2019 - Athens, Greece - Libraries: dialogue for change in Session 207 - Information Literacy with Library Theory and Research. http://library.ifla.org/id/eprint/2508

Recent articles: Digital media and learning

The latest issue of open access journal, Comunicar has just been published with the theme Digital media and learning: Emergent forms of participation and social transformation. It is Vol. 27, no. 58, January 2019. All articles are available in both Spanish and English language version - if you follow the HTML link you will see the links to both pdfs. This issue includes:

- Designing for deep learning in the context of digital and social media by James-Paul Gee, Tempe (United States) & Moisés Esteban-Guitart, Girona (Spain) https://doi.org/10.3916/C58-2019-01  "Deep learning and change are hard, and people will avoid them unless they are highly motivated to take on the challenge. The very basis of effective deep learning design is to attract and hold (some) people in space/site/activity through an emotionally-charged socially-shared “affinity” for a cause, idea, or endeavor and with the sorts of people who pursue that idea, endeavor, or cause. However, to truly motivate humans, that affinity needs “legs”, it must offer to take them to better places, to transport them on a journey with others with whom they feel valued and vice-versa."

- Google or Gutenberg Generation: Chilean university students’ reading habits and reading purposes by Giovanni Parodi, Valparaíso (Chile), Tomás Moreno-de-León, Valparaíso (Chile), Cristóbal Julio, Valparaíso (Chile) & Gina Burdiles, Concepción (Chile). https://doi.org/10.3916/C58-2019-08
- Connected learning ecologies as an emerging opportunity through Cosplay by Sophia Bender, Bloomington (United States) & Kylie Peppler, Irvine (United States). https://doi.org/10.3916/C58-2019-03
- Young people learning from digital media outside of school: The informal meets the formal by Sara Pereira, Braga (Portugal), Joana Fillol, Braga (Portugal) & Pedro Moura, Braga (Portugal). https://doi.org/10.3916/C58-2019-04
- Distributed digital contexts and learning: Personal empowerment and social transformation in marginalized populations by Arul Chib, Nanyang (Singapore), Caitlin Bentley, Canberra (Australia) & Reidinar-Juliane Wardoyo, Nanyang (Singapore). https://doi.org/10.3916/C58-2019-05
- Exploring the influence of the teacher: Social participation on Twitter and academic perception by Sonia Santoveña-Casal, Madrid (Spain) & César Bernal-Bravo, Madrid (Spain). https://doi.org/10.3916/C58-2019-07
- Multiple intelligences and video games: Assessment and intervention with TOI software by Pablo Garmen, Oviedo (Spain), Celestino Rodríguez, Oviedo (Spain), Patricia García-Redondo, Oviedo (Spain) & Juan-Carlos San-Pedro-Veledo, Oviedo (Spain). https://doi.org/10.3916/C58-2019-09

Contents page at https://www.revistacomunicar.com/index.php?contenido=revista&numero=58&idioma=en
Photo by Sheila Webber: Maryon Park, December 2018

Literacies and participations: from practice to (critical) reflection #ReDMIL2018

The final keynote from ReDMIL I will be liveblogging is that of Maria José Brites (Universidade Lusofona do Porto, Portugal), talking on Literacies and participations: from practice to (critical) reflection. Her publication citations list is here.
The first question she posed was - do we need new research methods, can we continue to use the old, should we be developing hybrid methods? Secondly, characterising herself as an audience researcher, she asked what methods we can use to capture that moment in time when people are using new media. Thirdly she asked about the place of participation and reflection in research (and associated questions, like the impact of participation on people in their daily life).
Brites referred to a publication she had co-authored Methodological challenges in the transition towards online audience research. They came up with four challenges: (1) the expansion of online ethnography (which has varieties and labels such as net ethnography, virtual ethnography, cyber ethnography), and the importance of contextualisation (so seeing online in the context of the whole life - I will mention that there is interesting work from the ethnographer Tom Boellstorff arguing that this is not always necessary) (2) the influence of big data (3) reliance on mixed methods, and using research methods with different philosophies in one project (4) the ambiguity of online data and ethical issues that arise when you are doing online research. The ethics include issues of what is public and what private, and whether the particiapnts whose data is being used understand the implications of participating in research.
Brites identified Paulo Freire as important for her when considering issues of critical thinking and digital life. She pointed out that "connecting daily practices and reflexive thought is not a new idea" since it had already been developed by Freire. These aspects were important for participative methodologies. Brites emphasised the importance of being theoretically strong, but that when you are carrying out a research project, it was also a dialogue between the theory and the data.
Brites moved on to "learning by doing" and said she was fond of the European Commission's Key competencies for Lifelong Learning (2006). These include competencies in communication in mother tongue and foreign languages, mathematical and scientific competences, digital competences, "learning to learn" competences, social and civic competences, entrepreneurial competences, and cultural awareness. I most easily found the page about the 2018 review of the 2006 competencies. Brites regretted that this recent review left out "learning to learn" competences, and the earlier framework was the one that they used in a very recent project about young people and digital media, RadioActive. Brites also mentioned the DigiComp 2.0 framework.
She went on to talk about the Young People, News and Participation project, the RadioActive project , the ANLite project, and they have a new project about digital and civic literacies in juvenile delinquency institutions.
Brites firstly talked a bit more about the one year Media in Action project (part of DGConnect, I think this is the website http://mediainaction.eu/pt/). This involves gathering togther material and ideas created in previous projects, so that teachers can use them in practice, and it also has a digital storytelling strand.
She then explored the methods used in the project on young people, journalism and participation. There were 35 young people of various backgrounds involved, and the methods included direct observation, interviews, and focus groups, on a longitudinal basis. The longitudinal aspect enabled the young people to be more reflexive. For example in a second semistructured interview the participants were asked to bring along information or conversations they had used during the political campaign that was going on at the time. The participants were also shown the results of the first interview, so they could discuss that, and new interview questions were introduced on the basis of findings from the first interview. Additionally, the young people became "quasi researchers", interviewing peers. This article talks about the research.
Brites moved on to the RadioActive project (there is an article about it here, it was focused on competences assessment). It was looking at young people in low income areas, who had to produce online radio shows. As part of this, they were asked to do interviews with people on the street, which was challenging for the young people, but they found it improved their confidence in general communication and in creating material for the radio show.
The ANLite project involved enquiring with journalists, young people, parents and teachers about their media, news and digital literacies. An area of concern for Brites was that these people mostly had to learn these literacies by themselves, because the education was not embedded elsewhere.
Finally, the new project involves working in three educative centres for young offenders, with about 70 people. It will be an interesting issue of what methods to use in this challenging context (and altogether sounds an interesting and challenging project!)

I will be finishing up the ReDMIL coverage tomorrow, with a blog about my own keynote and one or two wrap posts, including talking about the doctoral contributions to the summer school.

Vitenamese immigrants; international workshops; Street lighting industry; Open access book on infolit in Portuguese: Sheila blogs from #ecil2017

This morning I presented on behalf of Dr Batool, a former PhD student, in a pecha kucha session at the European Conference on Information Literacy in Saint-Malo, France. I will blog this separately, but are some notes on other presentations in the session (the slide is from the first talk):

Dominant Traits of the Information Behavior of Vietnamese Immigrants in the Czech Republic: Influences on Building Their Information Landscapes – Preliminary Paper from Petra Cernohlavkova (presenter) and Helena Lipková
Vietnamese have migrated for various reasons to many countries, and in the Czech republic they are concentrated particularly in cities. The extent of integration (contact) depends on the age of both Vietnamese and Czechs (e.g. older people mostly encounter in shops as seller/customer). Because incoming Vietnamese may have low literacy and Czech language skills, and need to earn money, they are liable to exploitation. Collective coping strategies are important to them. Vietnamese will use personal networks rather than social media etc. which they have not used in Vietnam (see slide), and they don't use libraries, and distrust services provided for free (as they might have had poor experiences with NGOs). She recommended a closer cooperation between libraries and NGOs to help introduce the Vietnamese to the new information landscape.

Information Literacy for Scientific Organizations: Progress by International Co-operation from Paul Nieuwenhuysen
"Scientific organisations" included, here, universities: the main focus is on international cooperation (between the host country here, Belgium, and other countries). They aim to bring together experts from different (mainly developing) countries. They aim to confront the experts witheach others' views to surface problems, challenges, hopes and expectations. There have been training programmes of a few months, hosted at Belgian universities, with the target group young information professionals mainly from Africa, Asia and Latin America. There are also workshops so far in India and the Philippines. There is some material from the author e.g. here and here

Information Literacy in Portuguese University Context: a Necessary Intervention by Carlos Lopes, Tatiana Sanches (presenter), Maria da Luz Antunes, Isabel Andrade, Julio Alonso Arevalo
They had noted that not everyone had access to the new forms of creation and publishing (so had difficulty building digital identities); also the large flow of information; and the need to adapt to new ways of interacting, knowing and thinking. Library professionals in Portugal had posed themselves the question of how to address these issues. They identified two goals: reaffirming the importance of IL/transversal competencies amongst university colleagues, and the second developing librarian skills. They have responded by developing a book: chapters include an infolit self-evaluation framework, a smmary of existing models, best practice examples, material relatting to intergration of IL in the curriculum, and current and future trends/issues. This is the first open access book on information literacy in Portuguese. The book is at http://repositorio.ispa.pt/handle/10400.12/5067

Information Literacy in Street Lighting Industry: Content curation with Scoop.it by Gilbert Charles Faure
This was characterised as a niche industry with a major global impact. There are tech innovations, but also e.g. environmental concerns. Knowledge management and infolit is rather poor in these companies. Informal communications, product and industry publications etc. are important. Scoop.it is being used here as a curation tool for knowledge management. Content hubs have been created related to the Lighting industry and curated for four years. There can be a watch on technical aspects (e.g. LEDs, solar power) and societal aspects (e.g. light pollution, effect on ecology). The speaker also highlighted the topic of lighting in art - that lighting may be installed as an art work (so serving a dual purpose). He noted that he collaborated with others to share resources, both companies and agencies.

Movies for visually impaired in China; School students create videos wlic2017

This is the second liveblog report on the session Media is the Message: Critical Use of Video in the Digital Age at the 2017 World Library and Information Conference in Wroclaw, Poland

Watching Movies Through Listening at Any Place in Any Time - A Special Event for Visually Impaired People from Jian-hao He (Taipei Public Library, Taiwan, Republic of China), Shih-chang Horng (Taipei Public Library, Taiwan, Republic of China). The first speaker started by identifying the large size of the city of Taipei (2.7 million). The have one branch (Qiming) devoted to visually impaired people and have a large collection of braille and audio books. They have a free e-library, free newspaper reading, and a pay-for-use hotline about activities. When it comes to movies, obviously a lot of what movies convey is through visual means. Therefore they have programme to make videos accessible to the visually impaired. An example was shown, in which a video was being shown and there was a describer saying what the people were saying and also saying what was happening in the movie. The process of being a describer at a live event was described. Ther describer had to watch the movie many times and take notes, beforehand, and write an introduction. A braille leaflet is then produced by the library. At the live event, the describer gives an introduction before the movie and add a simultaneous description, and finally the participants can discuss the movie. A recording is made, and the editor of the recording is visually impaired so that he has good understanding of people's needs. They have 540 movies so far, with 31,000 downloads. The full paper is here: http://library.ifla.org/1771/1/242-he-en.pdf

Advocacy Through Videos: Short Movies on School Libraries from Isabel Mendinhos (School Libraries Network, Portugal). She is on the far left of the photo, which shows most of the panel members. She talked about a 2016 project to increase awareness of the good work undertaken in school libraries. The School Library Network in Portugal has 45 regional coordinators and 1400 teacher librarians, and there are also local networks which undertake training etc. Clusters of schools can carry out projects to become part of the network (I think).
The network launched a campaign to get testimonials about the SLN, to celebrate 20 years of growth, and the idea was to get school students to create videos on school libraries. There were rules about the length of the video, legal and ethical permissions etc. The librarians explained these to students. The videos were put on Facebook or Youtube and sent to the SLN, to eventually be put on their Facebook page. The videos that got the most FB likes went onto the SLN anniversary page. 130 videos were submitted, involving 1000 students. The SLN published rankings (by likes) on their blog.
The participants enjoyed the exercise, and they had to use critical and creative skills, mostly through collaboration. They could also think about the impact and use of social media. Also, for the school libraries, the videos provide an excellent testament to the value of school libraries. The full paper is here: http://library.ifla.org/1772/1/242-mendinhos-en.pdf There is also an article in English with video examples here https://www.schooleducationgateway.eu/en/pub/latest/news/20-years-of-enhancing-literacy.htm

National policies; Media education #2ndEURMIL

These are some impressions from the latest plenary at the European Media and Information Literacy Forum. Kristina Juraite, Chair, Department of Public Communications, Vytautas Magnus University spoke on Towards shared responsibility in MIL policy making: the case of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE). She identified media and social changes, with media more of a "mediated public space", and media education no longer undertaken wholly by the state. Additionally society was seen as being in a permanent state of change. Everyday life is becoming more highly mediated, with the illusion of connectivity, polarisation, increase of anxiety and distrust, and merging of the public and private. Juraite presented a chart from research which showed some correlation between feeling happy and assessing one's country as democratic. She indicated major groups of MIL actors in CEE and identified the level of involvement, type of literacy and target groups in each of the "major groups" state/public authorities, public sector, academic/research institutions, CSOs, Media Industry and Private Sector.
I noted that "Information Literacy" was not mentioned at all (the literacies were Digital, Media, Film and Digital, and ICT skills). Since there are certainly IL iniatives in higher education in CEE countries, at least, this seemed an omission: I think in fact it was focusing on Media Literacy and Education, rather than MIL.
A lack of systematic approach in ML was identified, and a lack of well-developed and sustainable partnerships across sectors. The most innovative practices seemed to be from NGOs.
Manuel Pinto, Professor in Communication Sciences, Communication and Society Research Centre, University of Minho talked about Defining a MIL policy through informal action and networking: the Portuguese case. He gave examples of initiatives in media education in POrtugal e.g. school media and journalism, newspapers in the classroom and the role of media in children's lives. There has been an Informal Group on Media Literacy (GILM) since 2009. There is a GILM Parnership which includes school libraries network, UNESCO, National Educational Council and others. A key aim of this group is to work together and share information and expertise. The group meets every 2 months, has a media literacy conference every 2 years (the next one in 2017), has a portal on media literacy education (I think possibly this: http://www.literaciamediatica.pt/pt), created curriculum guidelines for promoting school media literacy and has an event "7 days with the media" to coincide with World Press Freedom Day. They are now enlarging the network to include more media literacy actors, with a new informal network (FILM) founded in March 2016. There are, however, challenges in the overall political and economic climate (e.g. less investment in teacher training, mistrust of legacy media, an instrumental approach to MIL focused on digital skills). They are now hoping to develop an observatory.
Mark Higham, Cultural Educator, Film Literacy Europe, talked about school film clubs. There are 4 countries with film club networks (including the UK), with 6 countries carrying out pilots, and 7 other countries very interested in the concept. Higham proposed that films have educational value For example, research in Romania and Spain indicated that film clubs stimulated students' critical discussion. Higham mentioned the Empathy project, using film to give insights into conflict and possibilities for reconciliation. It includes young people making their own films to explore the issues and contemplate ways forward.
The first talk in this pelnary session was from Irma Velez (ANR TRANSLIT Network; Associate Professor at the ESPE Académie de Paris-Université Paris Sorbonne) who presented results of the Translit project, investigating Media and Information Literacy policy in Europe (country reports have been published on the Translit website). They identified dimensions for enquiry as: the question of definition, policy framework, capacity building (resources, training and other), funding and evaluation. They identified experts in each of 28 European countries (a total of 68 experts) and asked the experts to comment on their country's level of development in each of these dimensions. Interesting and complex results were presented, but I am afraid I wasn't quick enough to capture these accurately (apologies, I think I ate too much at lunchtime....) If I can find out more I blog about them later!
Photo by Sheila Webber: Art Nouveau house, Riga

#QQML2016 : Collaboration and information literacy in Portuguese school libraries

A final day of liveblogging from the QQML conference. Ana Novo presented on Collaboration and information literacy in Portuguese school libraries. This presentation was based on PhD work (interviews with 20 teacher-librarians) and also work with Masters students (perceptions of 32 Masters students who were teacher-librarians). In Portugal they have to be qualified as teachers as well as librarians to work in schools. Novo identified some of the models that could be used for IL in the classroom e.g. Herring's and Kuhlthau's. She identified that part of the teacher librarian's role was convincing a school's director, teachers etc. that it was worth spending curriculum time on information literacy. Novo said that collaboration with teachers was important, but the teachers had more of an individualistic culture (my class, my pupils...). She cited Montiel-Overall (2005, 2006) as identifying that collaboration can impact school achievement, and Montiel-Overall also proposed 4 models of collaboration (coordination, cooperation, integrated instruction, integrated curriculum).
In the 20 interviews for the PhD study only the first two models were identified (coordination, cooperation). For the 32 Masters students, 12 each were in the first and 2nd model, 2 in the third and 6 were in transition (between 1st and 2nd and between 2nd and 3rd).
The conclusions were that there are difficulties in intergrating IL, with teacher very focused on his/her class.
Masters students had recommended e.g. training and awareness for teachers, flexible opening hours, organisisng events in the library, publicising it in the school newspeper etc.

Electronic/ Print preferences in Portugal and France #ecil2015

I will put together the next 2 studies about print/electronic reading, given at the European Conference on Information Literacy 2015 in Tallinn (one study in France and one in Portugal). Firstly: Student Reading Behavior: Digital vs. Print Preferences in Portuguese Context by Ana Lúcia Terra. Her study was carried out in the Polytechnic Institute of Porto, Portugal. The 23 item survey was administered March-June 2015. 262 students completed the survey, 73% undergraduate students, 57% male. 53% agreed/strongly agreed they preferred to print course readings. 67% disagreed/strongly disagreed that they preferred electronic textbooks. In comments, preferences for manual handling of books was mentioned. A majority preferred to print items over 7 pages, and 32% preferred to read items less than 7 pages in print (slightly less than the number who disagreed with this statement, 36%). Language did not strongly affect preference. A with studies already presented in this session, students annotated print more than electronic texts, and felt that print was better for remembering and focusing on material. "Portuguese students prerceived print as more suitable for successful learning"- however the students did want a mix of print and digital resources.

Next, Joumana Boustany talked about: Print vs. Electronic: What Do French Students Prefer in Their Academic Reading Material? She started by highlighting how digital technology is everywhere, and the French Government had a goal of making 100% of educational materials in digital format. The survey was the same one as others had mentioned in this session. The author mentioned that it had been difficult to get the questionniares disributed, and she had feared that respondents were biased towards those liking technology as social media was important in recruitment of participants.
1629 completed responses were received, 80% female. The majority were studying at undergraduate level. A majority agreed or strongly agreed that they remember information best, and can focus on and review information better when it is in print. 68% disagreed that electronic was more convenient. The majority of students also preferred to read material in print, and annotated it in print, but not if it was electronic. Preferences were not affected by language (French or another language).
Thus there was a clear preference for print format despite the Government and University push towards the digital format. This leaves a problem for the librarian - to go with user preference or University/Government.

Photo by Sheila Webber: outside a cafe, Tallinn, October 2015

Informal Education, Social inclusion and Media and Information Literacy #emilforum

Next at the European Media and Information Literacy Forum 2014 at UNESCO headquarters in Paris, France a session is focusing on Media and Information Literacy (MIL) and information/social contexts. As with other sessions, the focus is more on media literacy than information literacy, and I will pick out some of the contributions. Firstly, Francine Cunningham talked about an initiative of the European Newspaper Publishers Association, What’s your news. The website for this is at http://www.enpa.be/en/publications/whats-your-news-_62.aspx

Abdel Jalil Alami (Doha Centre for Media Freedom, Qatar) talked about the important issue of children who are outside schooling. He felt that media literacy should be linked to literacy, and was concerned about how we could form initiatives to get children into schooling. I was not sure whether Alami was meaning this specifically, but I know there is a serious problem of, for example, Syrian refugees, who do not have access to schooling.
Olli Vesterinen (Finnish Society on Media Education) talked about initiatives in Finland. I will save my effort by linking to a recent report http://ppemi.ens-cachan.fr/data/media/colloque140528/rapports/FINLAND_2014.pdf and his slides are here http://t.co/31aEfh4IEy. He also showed a video about young people making "how to" videos for each other, using quotations from research with young people who make these videos: there is a prezi about this here. Pleasingly, he also mentioned libraries as partners in media literacy education.
Manuel Pinto talked about a Portuguese group on media literacy which has an interestingly broad membership. Unfortunately I can't find it by Googling ... so I may add the name/link later. He identified the benefits of working with different kinds of organisations to further the media literacy agenda. One project he mentioned was "7 days with the media" - which challenges citizens to think about the role that media has in their lives. There is some information about it here
Photo by Sheila Webber (as are the others blogged from the conference, as usual): spot the delegate: she might have been rehearsing a speech, or perhaps she was just on the phone, in the UNESCO gardens.

European Media and Information Literacy Forum 2014: 1st report

I am attending the European Media and Information Literacy Forum 2014 at UNESCO headquarters in Paris, France. Despite the title, the focus is mainly on media literacy, influenced by the fact that this is also the final conference for the EMEDUS project (http://www.eumedus.com). However it also reflects the fact that media literacy has more of a hold on national and international agenda (something that information literacy people have to take action on...)

In the session at the moment ("Formal Education: New Curriculum"), the focus is on Media Literacy in the curriculum, with contributions from different countries. Firstly Sara Pareira (University of Minho, Portugal) has highlighted the lack of ML in the curriculum in Portugal, hwoever now there are being introduced ML guidelines for several levels of education. Other important documents include the Braga Manifesto on Media Literacy (2011) and National Educational Council's (2011) recommendations for ML. However these have had relatively little impact, and more is expected of the new Guidelines.
Next, Lazslo Hartai (Hungarian Institute of Educational Research and Development) has explained that media literacy only becomes a separate option at upper secondary level (before that it was, I think, seen to be part of visual literacy).

Unfortunately I have just lost some of my blogging (connection problem, grrr), but I will try to remember what I blogged! Carmen Campos (Spain) stressed the importance of having media literacy as a subject, but also intergrated into the curriculum transversally, and she saw teacher education as vitally important (teachers being supported to teach all forms of literacy). Ditemar Schipek (Austria) felt that ML was well intergrated in Austrian school curricula. He cited the work of the Austrian national library, broadcasters etc. in developing children's ML and also mentioned a conference on gaming aimed at young people. He identified "doing" as important - e.g. children learning how to be broadcasters. He also talked about ways of assessing whether schools are dealing adequately with ML (a "minimum standard"). Patrick Verniers (Belgium) pinpointed ways in which ML might be in the curriculum, but felt that at the moment it was rather reliant on the teacher's individual enthusiasm/ initiative. He proposed a framework for media literacy education (I took photos of those slides, so I may blog that later).

At the moment in the session, the speakers are coming forward again to consider ML education in Europe, as opposed to in their specific country. Interestingly, some speakers see things as having got a worse, posibly due to the Bologna Process of harmonisation of education in Europe. Frequent themes are the lack of requirements for media literacy education as part of teacher education, and the lack of a clear policy framework. Laszlo Hartai mentioned the lack of substantial data on what is going on in classrooms around Europe and some confusion around the concepts of ML, information literacy and digital literacy. The contribution from Natasa Slavikova (Slovakia) included mentioning translating the UNESCO MIL curriculum for teachers into Slovak.

Web Resources Credibility; Teacher's role as facilitator #ecil2013

Earlier today Ana Lúcia Terra presented on Strategies to Assess Web Resources Credibility: Results of a Case Study in Primary and Secondary Schools from Portugal, a paper co-authored with Salvina Sáthe, at the European Conference on Information Literacy.
She started by talking about different models of web credibility assessment, variously concentrating on authors, affiliation, comparison with other sources etc. The authors produced an omline questionnaire, administered in 7 schools in the Oporto district of Portugal; there were 195 respondents, aged between 11 and 19. They asked them about what criteria the students used in evaluating websites. The top criterion was "Ease of navigating the website" (chosen by 76%), the 2nd was "appealing design", 3rd was "Information about last update", then "author is identified" (chsoen by 19%), finally "there is music I like" (respondents could choose 2 items).
In another question, 33% students stated they looked for identification of the author in a website. 62% said that did know that author name was an important element to consider, with email and Facebook contacts also considered useful. 79% of students said they considered website originality, whilst 84% said they assessed website design (for example looking for information in thematic blocks, and correct grammar and spelling). The authors hope to use the results to plan training in evaluation.

Civic literacy projects in libraries: acting in the present, thinking in the future #wlic2013

Civic literacy projects in libraries: acting in the present, thinking in the future from Vera Maria Da Silva (Public Library of Seixal, Seixal, Portugal) and Francisco Vaz (Escola de Ciências Sociais, Universidade de Évora, Évora, Portugal) is the final presentation in the Civic Literacy session at the IFLA World library and Information Conference in Singapore. It is being presented in Spanish, and my Spanish is very patchy, so I will just attempt to the points that I grasp. Their full paper is at http://library.ifla.org/264/1/099-silva-en.pdf.
Part of the talk described a project "Derechos por derechos?", a project to promote and understand human rights and freedoms, and the ambition is to promote reading and develop citizenship and information behaviour. Objectives include to introduce concepts of huiman rights are intrioduced, to foster reflection and debate and develop an idea of citizenship. This is not seen as an abstract idea, but one of real life. They prepared various material for the initiatives including promotional and teaching material. Pedagogic material included books, conceptual maps, but also paintings (ones which portayed situations or emotions relevant to civic literacy e.g. I think one was Picasso's Guernica, for discussion) and music. There were preparation sessions for the teachers and the speaker described various activities and the form of the curriculum. One statistic I grasped near the end of the presentation was that 80% of the evaluations of the project said it was good, and 20% very good! Also the need for a pedagogic approach based on critical engagement (not passive consumption) was emphasised. There was a lot of interesting detail in this presentation and so it is worth looking at the paper, which is in English.

Public libraries, the crisis of the welfare state and social networks: the Portuguese case #wlic2013

It's the IFLA World library and Information Conference in Singapore, and another post from the Librarians and social movements: a force for change session
Luisa Alvim (in a paper coauthored with Jose Antonio Calixto) talked about Public libraries, the crisis of the welfare state and social networks: the Portuguese case. These are photos of a couple of her slides, which used striking images. She talked about the background for public libraries and the current problems consequent on the economic recession. Because of the pressures on the welfare state there was a question about whether they could (with reduced resources) continue to have social concerns and reduce social exclusion. She highlighted the vital role of public libraries, and at the same time the threat because of public sector cuts.
The speaker identified the role of Web 2.0 in battling these problems and generate social capital for the library: libraries can use them to fulfil their social mission. The authors had done some research into Facebook use.

In May 2013 99 public libraries (about a third of the total) had a Facebook presence. The paper's authors collected information on the libraries involvement in social actions: 42% did have social actions in the month they studied. Examples are: contributing to the sense of community, being a lifelong learning centre, promoting peace/international understanding, promoting intercultural dialogue. Most of these were promoted to the general population, 14% to the elderly and there were a number of more specific populations targetted by one or a few initiatives. The speaker observed that they felt that this did not present as much engagement with the current social crisis as might have been hoped. "It's time to rethink the public library's mission" and social media can be an important part of that.
The full paper is here: http://library.ifla.org/43/1/084-alvim-en.pdf

IL in schools; Media Literacy

I don't think I've mentioned the Argentinian blog Alfin en la escuela (information literacy in schools) http://alfinenlaescuela.blogspot.com/. It is in Spanish.

One publication it just highlighted is a new Portuguese-language publication, the proceedings of the First National Congress on media literacy and citizenship, held at the Universidad de Miño, Portugal, 25-26 March 2011. It includes numerous papers on media literacy, digital literacy, information literacy etc. The proceedings are at http://www.lasics.uminho.pt/OJS/index.php/lmc/issue/view/38/showToc
Photo by Sheila Webber: Botanic Gardens, Sheffield, July 2011

Hispanic Information Literacy

Alejandro Uribe Tirado has created a very useful site using Google Maps: Alfabetización Informacional - ALFIN Iberoamérica / Bibliotecas y Proyectos. This enables you to click on the name of a Hispanic university at the side: then it pops up showing uou where it is, and with links to their documents or projects on information literacy. http://bit.ly/9hu80u
Photo by Sheila Webber: Llandudno, Happy Valley, August 2010

Computer gaming and media literacy

In my final post about the Oeiras a Ler conference in Portugal 20-21 May, I will mention the session from Luís Pereira (Universidade do Minho - Portugal) Contributos dos videojogos para a literacia dos media (Contribution of videgames to media literacy)
Luis Pereira described two research studies: into the opinions of parents about their computer gaming children, and into 10-12 year old’s perceptions of video games. They identified media literacy education needs amongst the children. Building on this research, and on the 20 years of work on media literacy by their group, they produced a colourfully illustrated booklet How to watch TV followed up by one called How to play videogames (both in Portuguese). There are pictures of the covers here: http://comedu.blogspot.com/search/label/Booklet
The booklets are written for parents and children, and give concisely worded information and guidelines (so e.g. it says what really might be of concern or beneficial about videogames, so that it counters scaremongering about them). Very large numbers of the booklets have been printed and e.g. distributed with their regional newspaper as an insert. Their excellent media literacy blog (in Portuguese) is at http://comedu.blogspot.com/ and the Centre’s website is at http://www.cecs.uminho.pt/
Photo by Sheila Webber: Foxglove, Sheffield, June 2010