Transcript Directing information literacy in a digital (school

Directing information
literacy in a digital (school)
environment
James Henri
Associate Professor
Faculty of Education
The University of Hong Kong
SLAV 3 September 2004
So what are the issues?
• What is a digital environment
• Who ‘owns’ this environment
• How does that environment redefine
school
So what are the issues?
• What is information literacy & what is an
Information Literate School Community
(ILSC)
• How does adoption of an ILSC redefine
the curriculum & culture
So what are the issues?
• What is leadership in a digital environment
• How does digital redefine the TL role and
what is understood by ‘school library’
What is a digital environment
• Is this a question about infrastructure
• Is it a question about time & place
• Is it a question about relationships
Who ‘owns’ this environment
• Educators or Entrepreneurs or…
• Teachers or Students
How does that environment
redefine school
How does that environment
redefine school: Past
• Isolation, Short Term Budgets,
Classrooms, Class Teachers &
disconnection, Teaching, Homework,
Bricks & mortar
How does that environment
redefine school: Future
• Connectedness, Long Term Budgets,
Learning spaces, portability, Facilitators &
collaborators, Learning, Homefun
What is information literacy & what
is an Information Literate School
Community (ILSC)
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Information is….
Information skills are….
Information literacy is…..
Information processing models provide…
The information literate school community
is….
What is information literacy & what is an ILSC
• Information is NOT photocopy learning
(dead or alive information)
What is the highest mountain
What is E=mc²
One of Einstein's great insights was
to realize that matter and energy
are really different forms of the
same thing. Matter can be turned
into energy, and energy into matter.
To find the energy, you multiply the mass by
the square of the speed of light, this number
being 300,000,000 meters per second
What is information literacy & what is an ILSC
• Information skills are the ways we learn
(are informed)
• In a traditional classroom what information
skills do the participants need
--The information skills in the digital world
are dominated by visual cues not by text
based cues
What is information literacy & what is an ILSC
• Information literacy is mastery of the
processes of becoming informed
What is information literacy & what is an ILSC
• An information processing model provides
a uniform scaffold and shared language
for learning
What is information literacy & what is an ILSC
• Not all IP models are the same
– Prescription V Description
Kuhlthau’s Information Search Process
Tasks
Feelings
(affective)
Thoughts
(cognitive)
Actions
(physical)
Initiation
Selection Exploration Formulation Collection Presentation
uncertainly
optimism
doubt
vague
confusion
frustration
clarity
sense of
satisfaction or
direction/ disappointment
confidence
focused
increased interest
seeking relevant information
exploring
seeking pertinent information
documenting
Source: http://www.scils.rutgers.edu/~kuhlthau/Information%20Search%20Process_files/frame.htm
What is information literacy & what is an ILSC
Borrowing from Cooper & Boyd(1995)
The information literate school community can
be viewed as ‘a philosophy as well as a place; it
is a way of being as well as a working model. It
is a mindset as well as a map’.
What is information literacy & what is an ILSC
‘A school community that places a high priority
(policy, benchmarking, funding, and evaluation)
on the pursuit of teacher and student mastery of
the processes of becoming informed can be
regarded as an information literate school
community’.
Henri (2000)
How does adoption of an ILSC
redefine the curriculum & culture
Learning what & learning how
(curriculum mapping + process)
Or
Learning how and learning what
(Process mapping + curriculum)
Learning what & learning how
(curriculum mapping + process)
This has been best practice for decades and means:
Curriculum content + Class Teachers are dominant
Marginalization of process & specialist teachers
Learning how and learning what
(Process mapping + curriculum)
This is likely to be best practice of the future:
Learning how to learn + whole school collaboration are
dominant
Photocopy learning a thing of the past
Linkages to real world environments
What is leadership in a digital
environment
Information leadership
Information policy + information literacy
+ knowledge management
What is leadership in a digital
environment
What is the focus
When transportation moved from horse & buggy to motor
vehicle the problem wasn’t getting a drivers license it
was the redundancy package for blacksmiths
What is the focus
Are schools still educating blacksmiths
What is the focus
Being comfortable in the digital world
Realizing it is the world
Not hanging onto the prized icons of the
pre-digital world
Educating the teachers is as important as
educating the students
How does digital redefine the TL
role: Lets consider the accepted role
statements
Curriculum Involvement
Services
Leadership
Teaching
Management
Literature Promotion
How does digital redefine the TL
role: Reward what matters
Leadership
Curriculum Involvement
Teaching
KM
Services TL?
Literature Promotion TL?
Management TL?
Consider inhibitors & enablers:
Analyse for primary inhibitors and basic enablers
 inhibitors – lack of time, confusion of roles,
poorly designed learning & assignments
(busywork)
 basic enablers
 team approach to teaching
 understanding of constructivist learning
 commitment to lifelong learning
 competence developing learning strategies
(Kuhlthau, 1993)
How does digital redefine what is
understood by ‘school library’
Whose library
The library in the school or the school in the
library
- Collection profile
- KM
-‘Intranet’
- Staffing profile
- Links to ICT group
- Links to Curriculum group
Leadership a matter of Partnership
Principals should provide
leadership
Principals can provide:
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Vision
Motivation
Celebration
Forgiveness
A soap box
Resources
CPD
Policy
Whole school perspective
Teacher Librarians are able to
Lead
In fact everyone can demonstrate leadership
Gain Principal Support
• Essential, but not sufficient for success
Gain Principal Support
• How
- Expertise
- Linkages to school vision & defendable
evidence
- Planning
- Providing options
Gain Principal Support
• What is your relationship with the P
-Communication, communication,
communication----early & often
• What is the P getting out of the relationship
Gain Principal Support!
• If you are an inexperienced TL
-mentorship
-networks
-expertise
Principal Influence Findings
• The five tasks identified most frequently as
requiring significantly more principal
attention by principals and teacher
librarians across all participating countries
includes:
• informs new teaching staff about the importance
of collaborating with the teacher librarian
• encourages the teaching staff to invest time in
cooperatively planning and teaching with the
teacher librarian
• actively seeks outside school funding
possibilities that can be used to supplement the
library resource centre budget
• seeks feedback from staff about their
impressions of the quality of library resource
centre services
• works with the teacher librarian to develop
his/her personal professional development plan
Principals and teacher librarians can
have a powerful impact on the
environments in which teaching
and learning occur
A close alignment among
principal & TL visions is
important
TLs need broad based
support and will suffer if seen
as part of factional politics
TLs must be credible and act
as change agents
TLs who seek support of a
senior mentor are likely to
expand their influence
Gain Broad Staff Support
• Staff support has to be won because staff
influence the principal!
How can success be
measured
By agreeing about what is
important….
Policy
Benchmarking best practice
Suggested Benchmarks:
Whole School Focus
• The school has a set of information
policies in place
• The school has adopted an information
technology plan
• The school has an Internet portal.
Learning is the dominant consideration in
its design and maintenance
Suggested Benchmarks:
Whole School Focus
• The school has benchmarked information
competencies that are expected of students
at key points in their school career
• Information skills are taught/learned across
the curriculum and in the context of authentic
content learning
• The process of learning from information - of
constructing knowledge - is always the focus
of teaching and learning.
Suggested Benchmarks:
Principal Focus
• The principal demonstrates information
leadership
• The principal fosters knowledge management,
requires timely information for corporate
decision-making, and provides the resources to
make this possible
• Information leaders (ITC coordinator, teacher
librarian) are members of the key curriculum
committee
Suggested Benchmarks:
Teacher Focus
• The school supports the professional
development of staff with respect to information
literacy
• Teachers demonstrate that they are excellent
learners
• Teachers talk, dream, plan and teach as a team
rather than as a group of individuals
• Teachers seek evidence that students are
constructing their own meaning
Suggested Benchmarks:
Teacher Librarian Focus
• A significant percentage of school funds are
budgeted for the provision of information
services
• The school understands and defends the role of
the teacher librarian, as articulated in policy
documents
• The school requires that the teacher in charge of
information services be a qualified teacher
librarian
Suggested Benchmarks:
Student Focus
• The school requires students build electronic portfolios of
evidence of their level of information literacy
• The school monitors the information work demands that
are placed on each student. Careful scrutiny is applied
before students are requested to locate information
outside school
• Reporting on student achievement focuses on how the
student is maturing as a learner
• Teachers encourage student collaboration in many
aspects of their learning
Suggested Benchmarks:
Student Focus
• Learning contexts are varied & involve students in the
meaningful use of a wide range of information resources
• When students are required to undertake homework that
involves a step(s) in the information process, teachers
consider issues of social justice, equity, & the domestic
demands placed on students
• Students are encouraged to provide constructive feedback
to teachers with respect to information based learning
tasks
• Students are involved in self-assessment
Final thoughts:
Communicate the vision
Be strategic
Insist on policy
Play the teacher card
Focus on learning not on the technology per se