Farley W. Jenkins, MLISLibrarianWest Georgia Technical Collegefarley.jenkins@westgatech.edu(770) 537-6066

Evidence-Based Practice in Information Literacy Instruction

Or

Tales from Libraries Seeking their Student’s Attention

LITERATURE REVIEW

“To be information literate, a person must be able to recognize when information is needed and have the ability to locate, evaluate, and use effectively the needed information.”

—ALA, 1989

What is Information Literacy (IL)?

Function of academic libraries since 188160% of ILI literature has academic libraries

focusGrowing in importance

Information Literacy Instruction (ILI)

Guide for academic ILIBroad set of student learning outcomesFocused on total student development

ACRL Standards

Measures progress towards ACRL standardsAllows apples-to-apples comparison

Standardized Assessment of Information Literacy Skills (SAILS)

Undergraduate information-seeking behaviorBudget and other resources are limitedPolitical status of the library

Challenges

Course-integrated ILICredit-bearing courses taught by librariansSeries of guest lectures and drop-in sessions

Methods

Trained librarians to conduct their own research

Gave librarians freedom to pursue their studies

Results used to improve every function of library

National Library of Medicine

Numerous ILI sessions in multiple education courses over the course of 2 years

Focus on evidence-based practiceILI test scores improved by 20%Student-Teaching probation decreased from

20% to 0%

University of New Mexico

Mentored undergraduate researchLibrarians serve on standing committeesNumerous group and individual ILI sessions

and research consultations

Purdue University

After taking a credit course in library research:79% continued to use methods and sources93% felt more confident in research

Louisiana State University

Taught course on Digital Information LiteracyAsked to teach courses on Critical and Ethical

Use of Digital Information and Social Science Research

National-Louis University

Multiple credit-bearing ILI courses is idealOnline laboratories are less resource-

intensiveAs much ILI as politics and economics allow

Analysis

Or

That’s all fine in theory, but…

CASE STUDY

West Georgia Technical CollegeEnrollment of 7,331Most popular subjects are allied health

sciences, business, and information technology

The Institution

To increase ILI sessions to 10 per semesterCurrently teaching about 5 sessions per year

The Directive

Produced a series of 5-minute videosVideos can be watched in order to provide a

virtual ILI session

Online Videos

Presented apart from in-course sessionsGiven monthly at different dates and times

Drop-in Information Sessions

Flyers placed on bulletin boards in student areas

Email marketing to faculty

Outreach

Still too early to tellMethods will be adjusted according to

measurable outcomes

The Results

Or

You Gotta Start Somewhere

SUGGESTED READING

Hollister, C. V. (2010). Best practices for credit-bearing information literacy courses. Chicago: American Library Association.

ILI Case Studies

Bell, S. J., & Shank, J. D. (2007). Academic librarianship by design: A blended librarian's guide to the tools and techniques. Chicago: American Library Association.

Instructional Design

Association of College and Research Libraries. (2000). Information literacy competency standards for higher education. Chicago: American Library Association. Retrieved April 1, 2012, from http://www.ala.org/acrl/standards/informationliteracycompetency

Chevillotte, S. (2010). Information literacy. In M. J. Bates (Ed.), Encyclopedia of library and information sciences (3rd ed., pp. 2421-2428).

Corrall, S. (2008). Information literacy strategy development in higher education: An exploratory study. International Journal of Information Management, 28(1), 26-37.

Daugherty, A. L., & Russo, M. F. (2011). An assessment of the lasting effects of a stand-alone information literacy course: The students' perspective. The Journal of Academic Librarianship, 37(4), 319-326.

Mery, Y., Newby, J., & Peng, K. (2012). Why one-shot information literacy sessions are not the future of instruction: A case for online credit courses. College & Research Libraries. Advance Online Publication. Retrieved March 29, 2012, from http://crl.acrl.org/content/early/2011/08/26/crl-271.full.pdf+html

Walstrum, M., Garcia, L., & Morisson, R. (2011, March). From embedded to integrated: Digital information literacy and new teaching models for academic librarians. Paper presented at the ACRL 2011 Conference, Philadelphia, PA. Retrieved March 30, 2012, from http://www.ala.org/acrl/sites/ala.org.acrl/files/content/conferences/confsandpreconfs/national/2011/papers/from_embedded.pdf

Journal Articles

Questions?

Education is not the learning of facts, but the training of the mind to think.

—Albert Einstein

Thank you!