Friday, July 23, 2010

Project Information Literacy

Interior, Mary Gates Hall, University of Washi...Image via Wikipedia
Got this message via the Infolit listserv today: Debra C. Rollins <drollins@lsua.edu> found an interesting article on Library Babel Fish and thought you might enjoy it too.

The article, by a college librarian, discusses how college professors often spend more time in assignments telling student the mechanics of a paper rather than helping them find good resources for the assignment.

Project Information Literacy is a study being conducted by the Information School at the University of Washington, "a national study about early adults and their information-seeking behaviors, competencies, and the challenges they face when conducting research in the digital age."

This is definitely a problem at the high school level as well where students are even less prepared to make good choices about what resources are best employed to complete research assignments. More often than not teachers seem to think kids should already know how t find the best resources rather than spending some time, along with the librarian, teaching kids how to determine the best resources for an assignment.
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