scholarly journals Integrating Information Literacy into the Science Curriculum

2002 ◽  
Vol 63 (2) ◽  
pp. 111-123 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cecelia Brown ◽  
Lee R. Krumholz

A science librarian and a microbiology professor collaborated to assess information-seeking, evaluating, and usage abilities before, during, and at the end of a senior-level geomicrobiology course. ACRL’s Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education was used as a guide in designing a survey and checklists to measure literacy levels. Following an initial survey of the students’ information literacy level, two instruction sessions were provided in the use of bibliographic finding tools available from the University of Oklahoma Libraries. During each subsequent class meeting, students presented, critiqued, and discussed a referred article. The cycle was repeated, and the survey was administered again at the end of the semester. The survey results indicated an 11 percent increase in information literacy, but no significant improvement in the students’ ability to present, critique, and discuss information. A model for incorporating information literacy into upper-level undergraduate science courses and an instrument for measuring information literacy are proposed.

Author(s):  
Corrado Petrucco ◽  
Massimo Ferrante

Students now have information processing behaviors characterized by rapid shifts in attention, less reflection and failure to deploy metacognitive processes, preferring activities that bring immediate rewards for their information needs, even if the quality of the information they obtain is low. Consequently, they run into significant difficulties in the selection and critical evaluation of the information they find during university learning activities. This article presents two information literacy training initiatives addressing these issues at the University of Padova (Italy): one in a course in educational technologies offered as part of a second-cycle degree program, and the other in two of the university library system's training facilities. The training workshops sought to be complementary, covering both the search engine and the library OPAC approach to information seeking.


1989 ◽  
Vol 28 (04) ◽  
pp. 285-291 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. Anglin

Abstract:The graduates and students of the School of Health Information Science (HIS) at the University of Victoria (UVic) have pioneered the Canadian sphere in health informatics since 1982. After six years of growth this co-operative education program has matured and establishment of a research base and graduate school has become a recent focus. In this context an evaluation of the HIS curriculum and co-op work experience from the student perspective was undertaken. Eighty-five persons, including 50 upper level students were surveyed. Thirty-five graduates were tracked and queried regarding their present employment, job satisfaction, future goals and perception oftheir professional status. In particular, students were queried on the retrospective value and/or shortcomings of the HIS co-op program. Their perceptions on the training that they have had or that they observe as leading to successful careers is documented. The student view on the ascribed role of ´change agent´ and concerns regarding the lack of professional identity are noted. The implications ofthese findings on the future form ofthe Health Information Science curriculum and the direction of its educational model are subsequently discussed.


2010 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-54 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marie C. Desaulniers Miller ◽  
Lisa M. Montplaisir ◽  
Erika G. Offerdahl ◽  
Fu-Chih Cheng ◽  
Gerald L. Ketterling

Science educators have the common goal of helping students develop scientific literacy, including understanding of the nature of science (NOS). University faculties are challenged with the need to develop informed NOS views in several major student subpopulations, including science majors and nonscience majors. Research into NOS views of undergraduates, particularly science majors, has been limited. In this study, NOS views of undergraduates in introductory environmental science and upper-level animal behavior courses were measured using Likert items and open-ended prompts. Analysis revealed similarities in students' views between the two courses; both populations held a mix of naïve, transitional, and moderately informed views. Comparison of pre- and postcourse mean scores revealed significant changes in NOS views only in select aspects of NOS. Student scores on sections addressing six aspects of NOS were significantly different in most cases, showing notably uninformed views of the distinctions between scientific theories and laws. Evidence-based insight into student NOS views can aid in reforming undergraduate science courses and will add to faculty and researcher understanding of the impressions of science held by undergraduates, helping educators improve scientific literacy in future scientists and diverse college graduates.


Author(s):  
Solveig Kavli ◽  
Amund Børdahl

The online tutorial Søk & Skriv (Search and Write) was launched March 2007. The site has been under continuous development, from being an online tutorial in mainly information literacy connected with academic writing, to covering broader aspects such as intellectual property rights and thorough views on ethics and academic guidelines related to student work. The original Søk & Skriv is the result from a joined project between the academic libraries of Bergen University College, the Norwegian School of Economics and Bergen University Library. To improve the product we have extended the project group with the academic writing unit at the University of Bergen. The University of Oslo library has also joined the project group, in this way the online tutorial reaches further out nationally. The point of departure for launching the new version of Søk & Skriv is based in the findings from our online survey; Søk & Skriv i et brukerperspektiv: Rapport fra spørreundersøkelsen høsten 2010; a Danish evaluation done on three different online tutorials in information literacy in Norway called Studerende, læring og webtutorials, and readings on the so called Google generation. Our findings indicate that the generation n, persons born after 1980 tend to use a small amount of time to search for information (Feiertag and Berge, 2008). Information search as sense-making Information search is understood as an action. As you go along doing your searches you must decide and evaluate whether and how the information at hand will be useful for your research (Dervin, 1999, p.745). Like Dervin we understand information search as sense-making. The source alone is not the authoritative voice, but is dependent on the student who must define the value of the text, and take a stand. This also coincides with the use of Stephen Toulmins model on argumentation (Toulmin, 2003; Rienecker 2012, pp.299-319), both in the text the students are reading, and in the text they are to write themselves. By using Toulmins model in Søk & Skriv we demonstrate a tool on how to read and evaluate the sources by questioning the sources at hand. The purpose is to enable the students to decide whether the information will be useful for their research. Students must demonstrate how (and why) the sources they find are relevant for their thesis. The aim of this article is to present the work we have done in our new version of Søk & Skriv where the goal is to get students from generation n to invest time in searching, reading, evaluating and writing; and to connect their writing with ethical use of sources. The new version of the product www.sokogskriv.no is the result of a thorough collaboration between academic writing experts and librarians.   ReferenceDervin, B.B. (1999). On Studying Information Seeking Methodologically: The Implications of Connecting Metatheory to Method. Information Processing and Management 35(6), 727-750. Feiertag, J. & Berge, Z. L. (2008). Training Generation N: how educators should approach the Net Generation. Education + Training 50(6), 457-464. Retrieved from http://www.emeraldinsight.com/journals.htm?articleid=1740424 Forras, P., Kavli, S., Mikki, S., Austrheim, G. & Elvebakk, E. (2011). Søk & Skriv i et brukerperspektiv: Rapport fra spørreundersøkelsen høsten 2010. Retrieved from http://hdl.handle.net/1956/4781 Hyldegård, J., Lund, H., Moring, C., Pors, N.P., & Schreiber, T. (2011). Studerende, læring og webtutorials: En analyse af 3 norske læringssystemer. København: Det informationsvidenskabelige akademi.


Author(s):  
Prajukti Bhattacharyya

Digital storytelling juxtaposes the time-honored teaching and learning achievements of storytelling with the modern student’s affinity for technology. Although not commonly used in college science classes, the author incorporated digital storytelling in an upper level undergraduate geology course for majors at the University of Wisconsin, Whitewater. The overarching purpose of this exercise was to integrate the affective domain of learning within the course context. Informal comments from students indicated that this goal was indeed achieved by this exercise. Students identified technological difficulties and the time commitment necessary to create digital stories as the major hurdles they faced during the exercise. In this chapter, the author describes the course design, learning objectives, educational benefits, and strategies to overcome potential challenges of incorporating digital storytelling in college level science courses.


2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 52-60
Author(s):  
Taina Kettunen ◽  
Kristina Weimer ◽  
Valtteri Vainikka ◽  
Päivi Helminen

The University of Helsinki is a multidisciplinary university with about 31 300 students and 7800 staff. Our bachelor’s and master’s degree programmes were recently redesigned and started off in the autumn semester 2017. At the Helsinki University Library, this led to the reorganization of our information literacy teaching in order to be able to connect with larger amounts of students. In autumn 2017, we launched two new MOOCs: a Finnish language one for bachelor’s level and an English version mainly for master’s level students. Currently, the MOOCs are compulsory in some study programmes and voluntary in many others. Our main goals were to make the MOOCs interactive and to collaborate with departments to get these courses integrated into their curricula at the point when students need these skills the most. This article discusses what we have learned during the process of constructing MOOCs and how we tackled the main challenges of meaningful content, integration and interaction. The MOOCs are in continuous development based on received feedback.


2016 ◽  
Vol 17 ◽  
pp. 56-68
Author(s):  
Muhammad Asif Naveed ◽  
Kanwal Ameen

This study measured information seeking anxiety among postgraduate students of the University of the Punjab, Lahore. Survey method using questionnaire was employed to conduct this investigation. The questionnaire consisting of an Information Seeking Anxiety Scale and demographic variables was administered in students, selected through convenient sampling procedure, for data collection. The results indicated that a large majority (n=207, 82.4%) of the respondents experienced more than low anxiety in the information seeking process. No significant relationship was found between age, gender, faculty and information seeing anxiety scores of these students. Conversely, there were significant differences in anxiety scores of students based on the program of study, stage of study, and computer proficiency. The results provide useful insights for guidance of information professionals dealing with reference and research services, especially those engaged in designing information literacy curricula and managing information literacy instructions.


2019 ◽  
Vol 80 (4) ◽  
pp. 212
Author(s):  
Shonn M. Haren

LIB 1500 is a three-credit information literacy course offered by the University Library at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona (Cal Poly-Pomona), which is taught by faculty librarians. The course was developed during the 2014–15 academic year and has been offered continuously since. While targeted primarily toward freshmen, in the course inevitably include a number of sophomores and upper-level students seeking to fulfill their lifelong learning General Education requirement, for which LIB 1500 is one of several options. While the development of LIB 1500 has been a labor of love, by the end of Spring Quarter 2017, those of us involved in teaching the class had noticed that the course was becoming dated and needed a complete overhaul. Therefore, during the 2017–18 academic year, librarians at Cal Poly-Pomona fundamentally redesigned LIB 1500 to reflect the threshold concepts described in the ACRL Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education. In doing so, we learned valuable lessons about course structure, applied learning, and the iterative nature of course revision.


2016 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 38-44
Author(s):  
Nadja Duffner-Ylvestedt ◽  
Johanna Rayner

Uppsala University Library offers a range of workshops and lectures for students and researchers in order to help them improve their information seeking skills, academic writing and critical scientific thinking. Our library education program mainly focuses on sources such as books or scholarly articles but students in many subject fields often face additional challenges since they have to handle large amounts of data. We identified the fact that we were hardly incorporating data management in our library education as a potential weakness.  This project was developed in order to determine if the library should get involved in teaching data literacy.The project involved gathering knowledge on how data is being taught at the university by conducting a student and teacher survey. A data module was developed and incorporated to the existing framework focusing on information literacy. The module was tested and evaluated by a pilot group of students. Our findings indicate that the University Library should begin teaching data literacy. We believe data to be one of the current challenges for Academic libraries and a key for staying relevant for students and researchers. 


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