29 March 2010

LILAC2010: Relational Frame of Information Literacy

Andrew Whitworth, author of Information Obesity
An evaluation of a course located in the relational frame of IL

A theoretical point of view. Seeing information literacy in a slightly different way because he is not a librarian.

Classic definitions of Info Lit (ACRL), are useful but they focus on the learner as a subjective user of information. What can it do for me, etc. There are other forms of value. If we omit these other value systems, then there are some serious risks to knowledge base. If we are to be truly information literate, we need to move beyond thinking about what information can do for us and think more holistically about information.

Make explicit what is implicit.

Damien Thompson’s “Counterknowledge” (2008), Bad Science.
Books that discuss basis of thinking that have no scientific grounding.

Objective value: scientific measure to transcend subjectivity.
Intersubjective support: people will believe them. Value created by communities (public opinion, moralities, laws, economics). If you don’t have intersubjective value, you have relativism. Just because those types of value are articulated in ACRL, that does not mean that we are building information literacy programming and instruction around those values. This gets to the idea of whether we, as librarians, feel like we are qualified to teach information literacy. Is this why we cloak library instruction as information literacy? Because we aren’t comfortable with the deeper critical thinking issues?

Group think (Ricardo Blaug, 2007)—not thinking of yourself, battery cognition.

Media and information literacy course.
Six Frames of IL (2007), Christine Bruce et al.

Lots of ways of dealing with information literacy
Content
Competency
Learning to learn
Personal relevance
Social impact
IL can mean lots of things to lots of different people, hence multiple frames. We intermingle these frames. We might not privilege one frame over the other. They all are important.
The RELATIONAL frame brings all of these together. If you are teaching in the relational frame, then you are preparing your students to move between all of them.

Students ranking what info lit is: only one thought that it is about the world of information.

To teach teachers, we need to teach students about IL. The need to teach teachers well and holistically about IL so it can be passed on to learners. Impact on personal and professional development. How are they using information or changing their habits. Many of them changed their practice. Interesting given what Catherine Williams said this morning about the challenge of habits changing.

Assessing students on their ability to move between frames. Across activities, each activity is assigned a particular frame.

Production of information, putting it back into the public sphere, is transformative. All students felt that they were transforming their practice. They accept the need to transform their practice, even if the assessment didn’t show it. THEY thought so.

Focus on teachers, so it is for specialists.
Converting the course for a more generic post-grad audience.
Will become an open access resource.
http://83.120.93.38/~unimanc/
log on as guest. Feedback will be welcome.
Moodle based.
Creating something short and modular. 7 hours. A component to professional education for teachers and for librarians.

How do you turn information into knowledge?
We have tendencies to avoid information that challenges our prior beliefs. As a PhD student, you need to see how data challenges your view. We look for information that reinforces your beliefs.

Social impact = media literacy
Ben Goldacre

Who writes the news? Single people. Where does your information come from, literally?

A “rounded view” of information literacy.

To offer these components, even those that aren’t traditionally viewed as info lit. Opportunities for collaboration?

No comments: