Final reports from #lilac13 - health literacy and teachmeet sessions

On 10th April we had a meeting in the virtual world Second Life (SL) in which Vicki Cormie (St Andrews University) and I highlighted sessions at the LILAC 2013 information literacy conference that we had particularly enjoyed. The SL meeting was attended by people from the UK and North America (picture, right). The complete chat log from the session is here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Zbn1fwFntO74-d5OPMz4BNqvVnMGeSOaJIbFg4nlLUY/edit?usp=sharing
I introduced a couple of sessions that I had blogged already. Vicki Cormie introduced the following (ones I haven't blogged, so I will give some details):

1. Vicky Grant and Liz Brewster: Creative pedagogies and health information literacy: the Storying Sheffield Knowing as Healing Project

The powerpoint is here: http://www.slideshare.net/infolit_group/grant-220-lilac

The video is here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v9DNaYwOHeI

The article that Vicky Grant co-wrote with a doctor is here http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23239770

Vicki Cormie introduced it by saying "I am interested in Health Librarianship, having the Faculty of Medicine under my remit, although I am not so familiar with patient information. This session was fascinating covering a variety of diferent areas, from where and how patients get their information, using storytelling as both an information and therapeutic vehicle for patients, bringing together patients and student doctors and finally, using patient sourced information itself."

2. Teachmeet sessions:
- Quick referencing with QR codes: Sarah Munks and Nicola Howarth. Abstract at http://www.lilacconference.com/WP/programme/abstracts-tuesday/#munks (Vicki said: "What they are doing is putting QR codes physically on the front cover of books which link to web pages which tell students how to reference that particular item")
- Project: Mobile Academics: Anna Kågedal, Ninna Wiberg, Linda Vidlund and Ebba Warén. Abstract here http://www.lilacconference.com/WP/programme/abstracts-tuesday/#kagedal (Vicki said: "This was interesting because it is the Library who is running sessions on mobile devices and apps. They have an ENORMOUS number of devices available and they take them along to classes run in the Library and talk about them to researchers and academic staff.")
- No rock stars involved: Capturing the interest of first-year medical students in a health information literacy session Carla Hagstrom and Heather Cunningham. Abstract: http://www.lilacconference.com/WP/programme/abstracts-tuesday/#hagstrom (They asked medical students to create their own videos - see where medical students actually find the answers http://guides.library.utoronto.ca/content.php?pid=222901&sid=1849893

Vicki and I said more about our chosen sessions, and there was interesting discussion, so do look at the full chatlog here

Mainstreaming Information Literacy #lilac13

The only keynote at the LILAC conference #lilac13 (held 25-27 March) that I didn't liveblog was Mainstreaming Information Literacy for the Promotion of Universal Access to Information from Dr Irmgarda Kasinskaite-Buddeberg, programme specialist at UNESCO. Her presentation is now online (I have embedded it below), but I did also make some notes during her talk, and so I am including some of those as well.

Irmgarda Kasinskaite-Buddeberg - Mainstreaming information literacy for the promotion of universal access to information - Keynote Speaker LILAC 2013

You can see that her first couple of slides highlight new trends and issues (particularly technical developments). She went on to question why the information literacy community did not talk so much about human rights, as well as needs. For UNESCO this is a very important element, with the Knowledge Societies initiative founded on human needs and human rights. Dr Kasinskaite-Buddeberg acknowledged that there has been a lot of emphasis on technological issues, but there needed to be more emphasis on critical issues. Information Literacy is being mainstreamed within this broader perspective.

The speaker emphasised that Media Literacy (ML) and Information Literacy were important to all citizens as part of Lifelong Learning: she identified this as "Core Media and Information Literacy (MIL) competencies towards transliteracy" with "Basic literacy" as the other aspect, which is still very important. Dr Kasinskaite-Buddeberg presented a wheel of literacies (her slide 10) with MIL in the middle. I noted that there are a number of literacies which they see as associated with ML (e.g. cinema literacy), but only Library literacy is associated with IL. There is also Freedom of Information/ Expression in its own bubble, and some technology-related literacies.
The speaker talked about initiatives on the development of MIL competencies and the rationale for putting ML and IL together: I have blogged about this quite a lot so I won't repeat it here, but refer to posts e.g. here. So far professional communities were targeted in UNESCO's consultations, but they want to involve more representatives of: Educators, particularly teachers; Policy and decision makers; Statiticians; Industry and employers; Marginalised and disadvantaged groups.Dr Kasinskaite-Buddeberg stressed the need to engage with teachers (since MIL was important from an early age) and also with policy makers who have such influence over resources and strategic direction.

She mentioned the UNESCO Recommendations, various Declarations (e.g. the Prague Declaration on IL) and Proclamations. The UNESCO Recommendations on MIL are particularly useful as member states are urged to provide reports on the state in their country.As already noted, UNESCO are now aiming to achieve the goals articulated in the Declarations etc. through the MIL/Lifelong Learning "Integrated" approach, together with an "Expansive approach" which is situational and context specific i.e. looking at MIL needs and rights in specific cultures, sectors etc. At the end of the presentation the speaker mentioned various publications (which which I have blogged here, I think, over the last year or so) and also upcoming meetings in Nigeria (June), Russia (September) and Istanbul (the ECIL conference in October)

#lilac13 presentations online!

Impressively, the presentations from the #lilac13 conference (held at the end of March) are up online. These are mostly powerpoints etc. and I think there must be "something for everyone". The presentations are listed by theme: Active learning and creative pedagogical approaches; IL and the digital future; Collaboration and partnerships; Transliteracy; IL and employability; Future-proofing the IL practitioner. The links from the Teachmeet items lead to the abstracts (rather than presentations). http://www.lilacconference.com/WP/past-conferences/lilac-2013/

#LILAC13 blog posts

Today I'll highlight some other people's blog posts about the LILAC conference. There are three posts from Library Patrick
- http://librarytrainee.wordpress.com/2013/03/25/lilac13-my-day-at-lilac13-part-one/
- http://librarytrainee.wordpress.com/2013/03/27/lilac13-my-day-at-lilac-part-two/
- http://librarytrainee.wordpress.com/2013/03/29/lilac13-my-day-at-lilac13-final-part/

Steve Wheeler, one of the keynote speakers, has some brief observations at http://steve-wheeler.blogspot.gr/2013/03/technology-wont-replace-teachers-but.html

Katy Wrathall gives her roundup of the sessions she went to at http://smilylibrarian.wordpress.com/2013/04/02/lilac-2013-a-brief-personal-overview/

Photo: patterns made on a LILAC conference banquet tablecloth by one of my fellow delegates.

Presentations from #lilac13 - skills, gamification, reflective practice, digital literacy ...

Here are some presentations from the LILAC conference last week (on the right is a view of the area where they served lunch etc.) - from sessions I didn't attend but which look interesting!
- experienced, empowered, engaged: showcasing skills for the future: David Parkes,Alison Pope and Kathleen Morgan http://www.slideshare.net/djp/djpajplilac2013v3
- Arming the teacher-librarian: Using experiential learning and reflective practice to guide pedagogy: Alan Carbery http://www.slideshare.net/acarbery/arming-the-teacher-librarian
- A Room Without Walls: Using problem based learning in a collaborative real-time virtual space to develop critical research skills in an FE college: Christine Stevenson & Leanne Young, University of Sunderland http://prezi.com/tkraf3xnh0bj/final-lilac13-prezi/
- Embedding digital literacy at Leeds Metropolitan University - there is an e-book on pdf by Sue Smith and Simon Thomson at http://www.eshare.edgehill.ac.uk/1766/1/Day_2_Session_5_We%27ve_Made_an_eBook_-_text.pdf and there is a Storify of the tweets from the session at http://storify.com/leedsmetlibrary/embedding-digital-literacy-at-leeds-metropolitan-u
- Games and gamification for information literacy: Adam Edwards, Andrew Walsh, Vanessa Hill http://www.slideshare.net/EISLibrarian/lilac-2013-games-and-gamification-for-information-literacy

Also Emma Cragg has put together some presentations given or mentioned at LILAC at http://bundlr.com/b/lilac13 and Eleni Zazani has made a LILAC 2013 Twitter archive https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AkGq4A6nr7oQdGxXd2Q5V21qT1pNeWRGRlRPNHVtUmc#gid=36

Collaborating for Deep Critical Information Behaviour #lilac13

Yesterday I gave a presentation at the LILAC conference #lilac13 in Manchester with some discoveries from the Deep Critical Information Behaviour project, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council. This was gathering data from students and staff in schools and at university. The principal investigator was my colleague Professor Nigel Ford, and Dr Andrew Madden and Mary Crowder were researchers on the project who, in particular, gathered a large amount of qualitative and quantitative data. I am currently doing more work in siting the research in relation to other relevant research findings and analysing the qualitative data. I have put the presentation on Slideshare and it is embedded below.We will be producing several papers (as there is lots more in the data e.g. a whole strand about Wikipedia use) and also there is likely to be an event in July here in Sheffield, which will include more from the project.

Collaborating for deep, critical information behaviour from Sheila Webber

Information Literacy and the 21st Century: a personal view #lilac13

The final keynote at the LILAC conference #lilac13 in Manchester, UK, was from JP Rangaswami, salesforce.com’s Chief Scientist and chairman of School of Everything. His talk was called Information Literacy and the 21st Century: a personal view. He started by emphasising his belief in the importance of people being able to use and access information. He said that "librarian" meant many things to people (from indices to a shoulder to cry on).
Culture was the first word he put on the screen after that, and talked about how although he himself had loads of books and liked them - books were just one mature technology, albeit a likely sustainable one. At this point her referred to his TED talk, Information is food, which I have embedded below:



Putting up pictures of ancient libraries, he said that "You want people to be in places where information is with joy" - so that people need to enjoy being in the space with information, including the library. Like the first keynoter, he talked about the importance of discriminating between information sources, and being aware of how photoshopping and juxtaposing text and image in what seems an authoritative way can mislead and misinform. Another emerging decisive factor is how shareable and transparent the source is: leading to the success of wikipedia. He pointed out that "sharing happens by design". He felt that this ability to share was restoring the possibility for community that had been disrupted by the growth of easy physical mobility: so people who formerly had had to live in physical proximity could (through improved transportation) been able to disperse, but couldn't neccessarily keep or develop community. Now technology had "caught up" with physical transportation, so communities could be brought with you or newly formed via technology.

The nature of worth and value in relation to information (including books) brought him back to the issue of looking at the book as a form of technology: not conflating the delivery mechanism and the content or message. That was another important thing to discriminate about.


He referred to librarians as advisors, who it was important to trust. This is an important role and librarians can be the "one teacher" who makes a difference and learners talk about afterwards.  This led to talking about the value of story, and librarians as "the future of storytelling". He also gave a new definition of information literacy as "the ability to tell stories" (with accuracy). He saw information as our past, present and future, not a mere commodity.

The talk was very engaging and interleaved with the speaker's own stories and anecdotes, and so I couldn't capture the exact flavour: it is worth looking at a video of him in person.

International Students: a collaborative approach to teaching IL skills #lilac13

Here at the LILAC conference #lilac13 in Manchester, UK, I'm afraid I missed the start of International Students: a collaborative approach to teaching IL skills from Amanda Southam and Julie Moody as I was talking to Brian Kelly after his talk. However, when I sneaked in, she was emphasising the importance of developing material that was jargon-free and straightforward.
 At Plymouth University they developed a programme for tutors (to "teach the teachers") that were a key group for reaching the international students. There was a tutor welcome and training day, and support materials were available online so they could be used anytime and incorporated into sessions. The library materials were designed to improve English skills as well as developing information literacy.
This approach used the skills that the international tutors had developed (language and teaching skills). The librarians do not have time to give intensive training to all students, and it freed up more time to develop better training materials. They feel that it has built an effective alliance and has meant that they are more proactive in their approach.
The feedback from tutors was mostly positive, with comments about students getting more confidence in using the library, liking the library tour etc. They learnt that they needed to have default subtitles on the video, so it was easier to follow and that "less is more" as regards materials, as it could be confusing for the tutors to decide which to use.
Some issues that emerged were: needing to make sure materials are kept up to date, that it is important to get feedback from students and tutors, that working with academic partners has been worthwhile but requires trust, importantly - that internationsl students do need tailored support.
Looking to the future: they hope to work with the tutors will continue, since it is a more sustainable approach. They want better visibility of the IL materials e.g. producing a LibGuide.
The picture is not of this talk, as I was too far from the front to take even my usual mediocre speaker photo - so this is people assembling in the main lecture room on day 1.

LILAC: When Staff and Researchers Leave Their Host Institution #lilac13

Next session for me at the LILAC conference #lilac in Manchester,UK, is When Staff and Researchers Leave Their Host Institution from Brian Kelly (who is shown here checking a handheld device before the session started). Helpfully, Brian already posted his slides at http://www.slideshare.net/lisbk/when-staff-and-researchers-leave-their-host-institution.
I agree with Brian that this is an issue that universities themselves have ignored. He started by talking about how the thing that united everyone in the room was that at some point they would leave their institution. Who has responsibility for people when they leave? The basic attitude of universities appear to be that when staff leave, they just cut them off and want them out the door. In some cases there may be no "grace" period, and all your content deleted. In his own institution if people die in post, their accounts are closed and deleted immediately.
Therefore supporting people making this transition seems very relevant to information literacy practitioners: developing skills that can be used beyond university and also being literate in understanding what to do when you know you are leaving.
Since JISC is cutting funding to UKOLN, Brian will be in this position later in the year: but hewants to continue to maintain and manage his profile, protect his content and so forth. His first example was the institutional repository: although it seems very secure, the fact is that with his university's repository the paper stays there, but you can no longer find it through a search - only if you know the web address. When Brian he queried this the response was "Records disappear when someone leaves because that's entirely appropriate" (although the records manager may now try and fix this).
In terms of making yourself findable: previously you might have relied on your university home page. Instead he recommended using Linked-In for your profile and also using ResearchGate for depositing his papers, since he can manage that. With blogs etc. you may also need to move that to a service in the cloud. Brian pointed put that teaching people how to set up their own domain could also be useful.
He moved on to the issue of digital identity and mentioned ORCID ID (Open Researcher and Contributor ID). It is a code to uniquely identify scientific/ academic authors, independent of the institution.
Migrating email can be vital, and so you need to know how to do this, manage connections and also migrate your list usage. Very importantly you need to remember which online tools etc. have your email address as your validation address, and change the address, or you may lose access to those accounts.
Brian pointed out that the leaver can bring value to their former institution because of "link love" (links to your material etc.) It should be important to support migration of material so they can continue to be used. However, this whole issues seems to be overlooked by universities. It would be good if librarians took on the opportunity to do something about it.

Learning from the learners: the student voice in information literacy #lilac13

My first session at the final day of the LILAC conference #lilac13 Learning from the learners: the student voice in information literacy from Antony Osborne (Huddersfield). He started by identifying reasons for listening students: for example, they are paying to learn, you are (hopefully!) contributing to their experience of learning, and it can also help you improve the effectiveness of your information literacy teaching. His talk was drawing on his doctoral thesis on The Value of Information Literacy: Conceptions of BSc Nursing Students at a UK University (which I've blogged before, I think it is very interesting).
He started by talking about the danger of making assumptions about students e.g. that young people were all good with technology. Looking specifically at assumptions that people might make about student nurses, he identified that his participants didn't necessarily see "research" as relevant to them (preferring the practical side), that they found the librarians and librarians a bit scary (as they were worried about looking students etc.), that Il labs were going "ok" (whereas some people felt they went too fast, were too big, and didn't include any individual attention for help and reassurance).
So how can you address this? The obvious one is - asking them, and listening properly to the answer. Next Antony advocated avoiding the "smiley face" syndrome, giving people evaluation forms straight after the session and possibly just getting what they think you want to hear. His other advice was: Don't have a one size fits all approach, use focus groups, follow up later (and/or via the lecturer), and use social media to interact.
Finally, Antony mentioned the "Students as consultants" project where they give students basic training, the student observes an educator teaching class, the students interviews the students in the class, and then the student writes a report on his/her findings to give back to the educator. That does sound a useful scheme.

Congratulations to winners of the #lilac13 awards!

Award winners were announced at the conference dinner at the #lilac13 LILAC Conference last night. Winner of the Information Literacy Practitioner of the Year Award was Kim McGowan (Learning Advisor and Information Literacy Academic Liaison Librarian, University of Cumbria) and runner up was Michelle Schneider (Skills@Library, University of Leeds).
The Credo Reference Digital Award for Information Literacy was won by Open University Library’s Digital and information literacy (DIL) framework and Being Digital site (Jo Parker, Katharine Reedy, Kirsty Baker, Natasha Huckle and Matthew Taylor). Highly commended were The Final Chapter: the undergraduate research project guide (Sally Dalton and Skills@Library, University of Leeds) and The Final Chapter: the undergraduate research project guide (Sally Dalton and Skills@Library, University of Leeds).
It had already been announced that winner of the student places at the conference were Darren Flynn (Manchester Metropolitan University) and Roisin Cassidy (from my own department, University of Sheffield).
Congratulations to all the winners!

Extending the academic library: social responsibility, information literacy and schools #lilac13

Next up for me at the LILAC conference #lilac13 in Manchester, UK, is Extending the academic library: social responsibility, information literacy and school, from Carol Hollier (University of Nottingham: she was the presenter), Annike Dase (Nottingham Academy) and  Neil Smyth. As it says in the abstract "University of Nottingham librarians created a pilot for an information literacy service targeting schools in the local community. The project’s aim was to transform a piecemeal array of school visits to our libraries into a consistent service delivered by librarians in collaboration with local schools, university faculties, and the Widening Participation Office."
A particular stimulus was the more competitive environment, with students having to pay more for their education in the UK etc., but it did also fit in with university aims to widen and promote access to its resources within the local community.

They already had visits to the library from schools, but it was very ad hoc and piecemeal. It also tended to be the more privileged schools. The librarians decided to have a more systematic programme, with an explicit agenda of widening participation. There was a lot of consultation, involving librarians and also some other staff such as academics and widening participation staff. They went beyond the university as well, to get an insight into what is going on in secondary schools.

There is a lot of variation between English schools, from schools where the qualified librarian is doing excellent things with full support from the school, to ones where there are "lunch ladies" minding the library. Whereas for IT skills and literacy there is careful progression through the primary and secondary schools, there is no such progression for IL.

The "Step into University Libraries" visits for local schools focus on library locations, because there are lots of places that books can be, and on finding a book in the catalogue. A bit more than half the time, visitors ask for an academic to be there (to e.g. give a talk in their subject area) as well as having a librarian there. The aim is for school students to go away with a positive experience, feeling they would be able to find a book. Then there are optional items for students, e.g. tailored to A level students or at pre-16 students.

Success factors have emerged as: that "visits and activities need to be timely and curriculum related"; and that they need to work closely with school leaders. One of the suggestions from the audience was also working with primary schools, which is also an interesting idea!

The information literacy challenge in public libraries in Wales #lilac13

The first session I'm attending this afternoon at the LILAC conference #lilac13 in Manchester, UK, is The information literacy challenge in public libraries in Wales, from Gina Maddison. Gina herself has a public libraries and adult learning background. There was lots of detail in this presentation, and I'm afraid that I didn't manage to capture all of it! The Welsh Information Literacy project is often given as a good example of a national initiative on IL that has succeeded in getting attention and impact at the strategic national level.

She started by asking us where a young person would look for information about Wales: using the obvious answer (Google) Wikipedia is the top entry, followed by a commercial site (Visit Wales) and the most accurate information is on the Welsh Government's website (which is the fifth hit - and Gina mentioned that there some inaccuracies in the Wikipedia entry!) Looking at the demographics: there is a high level of unemployment in Wales and also concerns about standards of teachers' literacy. There has been an increase in poverty and evidence of the disadvantage that this brings with it.

Gina went on to talk about the history of the Welsh Information Literacy Project, which I have blogged about, so you can find that information by searching using the tag Wales http://information-literacy.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Wales. Aims of the first and second phases included developing accredited units of learning in information literacy (with the Welsh agency Agored), and developing an overarching statement of IL for Wales.

Phases 3 and 4 has three strands: work with schools, advocacy and public libraries. There are three part timers employed by the project, one per strand. It is based at Coleg Llandrillo in North Wales.Gina drew attention to the Mapping of best practice exercise - the publication is also on the project website: The project website is at http://www.welshinformationliteracy.org

One of the leaflets I photographed above is on "Information Literacy in the workplace", produced last year, which highlights how IL can save time and help businesses in various ways. There are also various Welsh policies to do with employment, lifelong learning etc. and they have identified the rol of IL in relation to each of these.

Current projects are: two pilots embedding the IL framework in schools; Identifying IL champions in each local authority library service; Supporting training of public library staff; and supporting delivery of formal qualifications in IL.

Giving more details about the schools side: it is embedded in the Welsh Baccalaureate qualification, and there are school visits and mapping to school literacy frameworks. They are including IL in primary schools, as they think it is important to start at that level, and also IL advocacy at teacher training colleges.

There is a lot going on with the public libraries IL champions programme: this includes staff taking the AGORED IL qualifications, addressing the IL element of local strategies (e.g. for supporting particular populations), communication through various media and advocacy for IL. The way that the qualifications are approached (e.g. which level of IL qualification, and which particular services it is linked with) varies between authorities. For example, health information is of particular interest in one authority. Assessment is via logbooks, which fits in with the practicalities of the workplace, and allows them to use evidence from the searches etc. that they are working with. If you want to find out more about any aspect, you can find the details of the project staff on the website.

Using visual literacy in teaching and learning #lilac13

Second day at the LILAC conference #lilac13 in Manchester, UK, and I attended a session on Using visual literacy in teaching and learning, from Gwenda Mynott and Catherine Bonser, Liverpool John Moores University.
They gave "The ability to understand and produce visual messages" as a straightforward definition of visual literacy. They also referred to the ACRL guidelines http://acrlvislitstandards.wordpress.com/. Then the speakers gave examples of what they did with their students.
Visual boards. They ask students to put together images that represent their experience e.g. if the subject focus is management, the learners were encouraged to select images about work experience, that represent what they think work is, hobbies and clubs that might have a managment aspect to draw out. It gives a good focus for discussion, drawing out reflection around the subject. Also it is good for getting to know the students.
Selecting photos of leaders. The photos selected by students were put physically on the wall, and they could be grouped in different ways (e.g. sector, male/female) to stimulate discussion around the notion of leadership.
Drawing - for example drawing pictures of themselves as learners. At this point the speakers highlighted that of course not everyone is a visual learner, some people don't like being asked to draw things, so that examples can include text as well as drawings.
Concept maps of key key concepts and theories - they used this for assessment, and stressed that you needed to develop the learners' confidence in developing them. I have found this myself when I've used concept and mindmaps in teaching and assessment of information literacy - there are usually some people in the class who are immediately pleased we are using them, and a few who say they hate having to do them. The presenters highlighted the need to think-through what criteria you will use for assessing the concept maps.
The photo shows me taking a picture of someone taking a picture of the presentation

Supporting workplace information literacy at university #lilac13

My final session of the first day at the LILAC conference #lilac13 in Manchester, UK, is: Is it possible to support workplace information literacy already at university? An opinion paper, from Christina Brage and Kajsa Gustafsson Åman, both from Linköping University Library. The talk is based on a survey carried out last year. Their goal was to gain an understanding of the graduate's information world. They were looking at what type of information and information tools the alumni used, and whether the IL training at university had been useful in the workplace.
The survey instrument was an online questionnaire, to alumni of 10 programmes, with 12 questions including free-text options. They analysed all responses together, then by programme and by question.
90% had particiapted in IL training: 63% had found it useful in their studies, 38% useful for work outside university (sometimes because they were using the same sources). 48% were using research databases, 35% using scientific journals (mostly lawyers and physicians). 92% solved information problems through discussion with colleagues, 90% learning from experience, 88% by using relevant literature. 67% were using books, 64% news articles and 63% professional webpages. Teachers were high users of these last 3 categories (perhaps not having access to the databases).

As a result the presenters identified a need to have more emphasis on certain aspects in the information literacy curriculum, such as how to restructure information, how to monitor social media, use open access journals and use alerting feeds. They have made a LibGuide aimed at people outside the university, and also are designing an information literacy contribution to a "goodbye" course being organised by one of the programmes.

Towards a model of critical information literacy instruction #lilac13

Here at the LILAC conference #lilac13 in Manchester I am now in a session with Lauren Smith, a PhD researcher at the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow. She is giving a talk based on her PhD topic, Towards a model of critical information literacy instruction for the development of political engagement and knowledge. As with all my conference posts, this is my instant take on the session, so apologies to Lauren if I got any of it wrong.

She is interested in a model of information literacy in secondary schools that is more critical and engaged. She started by highlighting that young people are interested in social political issues, but may be more likely to engage with issues (rather than parties) and in an informal way. She cited a researcher who had identified that you cannot defintely say that young people are less potically engaged than previous generations.

Lauren had read more about critical pedagogy (particularly the work of Giroux e.g. this). Going on to critical literacy, this involves engaging critically with the ideas expressed in the text. In the area of information literacy, she has identified that there have been various authors who have critiqued the notion of information literacy. Whilst there is a rheteoric about the value of information literacy for democracy, there is a lack of research, which is a gap that Lauren aims to address. By drawing on the concepts of critical literacy and information literacy, she has identified a potential critical information literacy.

Her methodology is one of mixed methods, but with an emphasis on qualitative data and employing a critical theory approach. She will look at a small group of secondary school students, get a perspective on their factual knowledge about local and national politics (updating and revising a social attitudes survey). Lauren will then use repertory grid interviews to understand how the young people conceive of the topic of politics (here is an article by one of my colleague using this approach http://www.emeraldinsight.com/journals.htm?articleid=1923906&show=abstract) . She will also ask them to keep diaries about their experiences with politics information, and finish with focus groups or interviews.

Exploring the information-seeking experiences of mature learners #lilac13

Here at the LILAC conference #lilac in Manchester I'm at the session “Time’s a factor here!” Exploring the information-seeking experiences of mature learners from Sarah Clark, Rogers State University. She had put some quotes from her research on her blog http://infoliterate.com/2013/03/14/times-a-factor-here-quoteable-quotes/. She is Assistant Library Director and is a PhD student investigating the information-seeking experiences of mature students (she was presenting results of her pilot study). She saw the research problem as that, while IL is a key skill, the uncertainties of information seeking may lead a mature student to believe they are incapable of success, and librarians can help the students navigate that process, if they understand the students' context.

The participants were at a university (Northeastern State) which has a lot of "non traditional" students, for example older and studying part time. She used comfortable venues for her interviews, using a narrative inquiry approach. Sarah was looking at the students' experience through the lens of Carol Kuhlthau's information seeking model: you can find out about that on Kuhlthau's page here: http://comminfo.rutgers.edu/~kuhlthau/information_search_process.htm

Sarah presented the stories of a couple of the participants. In "Ashley's story", Ashley was 44, with 3 adult children. She felt "blocked and overwhelmed". She was blocked by the APA format and having to conform to presenting in particular layouts and she found "research" stressful. There was a lot of fear and anxiety. However it was something she found difficult to talk about with teachers and librarians, as she said that "smart people intimidate her". A key stimulus for improving her confidence was a new relationship, with a boyfriend who encouraged her to study actively. In conclusion, on one hand she felt she was a "lost cause" and on the other felt that she was discovering more strength than she thought.

Veronica's story was the second one. She was 39, a single mother, who had left school early and working part time while she studied. A key thing for her was her passion about topics, which kept her going through the ups and down of researching the topic. Veronica felt she needed that personal interest to motivate herself to get stuck into an assignment. Time was at a premium for her (a reson why she preferred topics she was already knowledgeable about). In contrast with Ashley, she did ask for help and had found a librarian useful, and showed her work to her peers and teachers to help improve it. She also "hopes to help others via her writing."

Sarah compared the two stories. Similarities were technology travails (using applications, access to teh internet etc.), citation style struggles, challenges with personal life (but which they downplayed as causes of stress), and managing time. Contrasts were "supportive and unsupportive relationships", "university as helper or obstacle", "feeling passionate vs. feeling blocked".

Looking at the stories through the lens of Kuhlthau's model, Veronica was able to negotiate all the stages in the process, building on preexisting strengths. Ashley had major problems at the explore, formulate and collect stage, and at the present stage (particularly in terms of "actions"). One of Sarah's conclusions was that information literacy and reference did not seem to influence the affective domain (feelings). Also experiences from outside the library influenced attitudes about searching and the library. Both students "seemed to be driven (or blocked) by their feelings."

I think a key message for me was the importance of looking at learners in their own context and working through the different complicated factors that are impacting their life as learners. This can help educators and librarians to help the learners more effectively.

Steve Wheeler: #lilac13 Learning 2.0: Digital pedagogy

Here at the LILAC conference in Manchester, the first keynote was Steve Wheeler, on Learning 2.0: Digital pedagogy. Steve's blog is Learning with 'e's (I think there may be a pun going on there) and his Slideshare is here. I will summarise some of the points that caught my attention, with some of my own thoughts mixed in. He identified that today's learners need to know the "why" of things, the critical and transformative element of learning. In discussing the role of libraries in this, he quoted Ian Clark "Libraries are a bridge between the information-rich and information-poor", feeling that they still had arole as regards content, services, spaces and skills. He identified the huge amount of stuff being published online every minute and noted some digital trends (like gaming; but I know that some libraries are very much up with this trend!)

He showed a diagram of "Learning 2.0" which included User generated content, networking, voting, tools, sharing, tagging and collaborating. He also showed a picture of students taking pictures of a slide which he captioned "Taking notes" (which does resonate, but personally I think that although this can be useful, it means even less than with conventional note-taking that the learner will have engaged their brain with that "content". I am thinking here of the times I've taken pictures of slides at a conference ;-)
Steve talked about user generated content, both in terms of your own content (like blogs and slideshare) and using it as part of students learning. Obviously if you are using this approach is enfolds several different areas of knowledge and skill (e.g. copyright, dealing with the technology, writing in different styles).

He also mentioned the "Flipped classroom" idea, which he expressed in terms of "flipped roles", e.g. getting the students to research the subject and present their discoveries in class (something I do as well). One thing he emphasised which I don't always allow enough time for is the "bearpit pedagogy" aspect i.e. challenging the students and getting them to defend their views and evidence.

Steve went on to talk about very young people and the importance of mobile technology and he showed this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Weq_sHxghcg. He also, though, cited the research which differentiates between people who use the digital applications and those who don't use it very much (rather than talking about natives and immigrants):
Kennedy et al. (2010) "Beyond natives and immigrants: exploring types of net generation students" Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 26 (5), 332–343. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1365-2729.2010.00371.x/full

Steve emphasised that learners need "digital wisdom" - a critical and questioning approach, and also identified various literacies that are important - within which he particularly highlighted transliteracy. He finished by talking about crowdsourcing, particulary in relation to Wikipedia, MOOCs and connectivism, and Twitter. Steve mentioned about how using these tools can expand the boundaries of the classroom, as you can involve people outside the "classroom" in real time.

Flipping the classroom libguide #lilac13

First post from the LILAC conference in Manchester, UK - and its about a session I've not attended! My workshop on the #infolit project was at 10am and I'm afraid I took an hour to chill out with a coffee afterwards (I'll blog about my session later). However the people who were using the room after me looked like they were running an interesting session: Creating time for learning: strategies for flipping your library classroom, Erin Davis and Kacy Lundstrom. Thanks to Victoria Cormie ‏@Viche for tweeting a good link from the session, a Libguide on Strategies for Flipping the classroom: http://libguides.usu.edu/content.php?pid=424275&sid=3561901
Coffee and netbook after my workshop, using free wifi in Manchester Uni's Blackwells

#infolitpro Profiles of the Information Literacy Professional #lilac13

Today I am giving a workshop at the LILAC conference in Manchester about a new IFLA Information Literacy Section project that I'm leading: #infolitpro: Profiles of the Information Literacy Professional. I will do a write-up after the workshop this morning, but in the meantime below is the poster I will also present at the conference, and here is the just-started blog: http://infolitpro.blogspot.co.uk/

Developing profiles for the information literacy professional from Sheila Webber