INFORMATION LITERACY AND DESIGNING NATIONAL GUIDELINES

Margarete BowerChemistry Library

What is Information Literacy?

Middle States Commission on Higher Education

In Characteristics of Excellence in Higher Education (2006)

A set of skills that “relate to a student’s competency in acquiring and processing information in the search for understanding . . .” (p.42) regardless of the methods by which the information is sought.

Association of College and Research Libraries

In Introduction to Information Literacy on the ACRL Information Literacy web site (updated March 20, 2007)

“Information literacy is the set of skills needed to find, retrieve, analyze, and use information.”

These skills include the ability to:

Determine the extent of information needed

Access the needed information effectively and efficiently

Evaluate information and its sources critically

Incorporate selected information into one’s knowledge base

Use information effectively to accomplish a specific purpose

Understand the economic, legal, and social issues surrounding the use of information, and access and use information ethically and legally

Information Literacy Competency Standards (ACRL, 2000)

Why now?

Changing information environment

Accrediting agencies

Accountability to funding organizations

Middle States Commission on Higher Education

http://www.msche.org

Accrediting unit of the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools (PA, NY, NJ, MD, DE, DC, Puerto Rico, Virgin Islands)

Publications Characteristics of Excellence in Higher Education (2006)

http://www.msche.org/publications/CHX06060320124919.pdf Developing Research & Communication Skills: Guidelines for Information

Literacy in the Curriculum (link to executive summary of handbook) http://www.msche.org/publications/devskill050208135642.pdf

Association of College & Research Libraries(ACRL)

A division of the American Libraries Association (ALA) ACRL web site http://www.ala.org/acrl Information Literacy web site

Under Issues and Advocacyhttp://www.ala.org/ala/acrl/acrlissues/acrlinfolit/informationliteracy.htm

Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education (2000) Under Standards and Guidelines

http://www.ala.org/ala/acrl/acrlstandards/standards.pdf

http://www.ala.org/ilcomstan.html

Standards Toolkit On the Information Literacy web site http://www.ala.org/ala/acrl/acrlissues/acrlinfolit/infolitstandards/

standardstoolkit.htm

Subject Specific Guidelines

American Chemical Society

ABET (accrediting agency for engineering programs)

American Society for Engineering Education

Special Libraries Association, Chemistry Division

ACRL Science and Technology Section

American Chemical Society (ACS)

Committee on Professional Training (CPT)

Undergraduate Professional Education in Chemistry: Guidelines and Evaluation Procedures Draft version of revised document (Feb. 2, 2007)

http://acswebcontent.acs.org/education/cpt/acs_draftguidelines.pdf

Chemical Information Retrieval

A topical supplement to the ACS CPT Guidelines from Spring 2003 http://www.chemistry.org/portal/a/c/s/1/acsdisplay.html?DOC=education\cpt\ts_cheminfo.html

or http://preview.tinyurl.com/23yt2v

Lists information skills a student graduating with a bachelor’s degree in chemistry should have.

Special Libraries Association (SLA)Chemistry Division Ad Hoc Committee on Information Literacy

Chemistry Division web site

http://units.sla.org/division/dche/

Information Competencies for Chemistry Undergraduates: The Elements of Information Literacy

http://units.sla.org/division/dche/il/cheminfolit.pdf

ACRL Science and Technology Section (STS)

STS web site Under About ACRL and Sections on the ACRL web site

http://www.ala.org/ala/acrl/aboutacrl/acrlsections/sciencetech/sts.htm

Information Literacy Standards for Science and Engineering/Technologyhttp://www.ala.org/ala/acrl/acrlstandards/infolitscitech.htm

Information Literacy as a Liberal Art: Enlightenment Proposals for a New Curriculum

Shapiro, J. J., Hughes, S. K. in Educom Review, v. 31, no. 2, March/April 1996.

The information literacy curriculum includes:

Tool literacy - The ability to use print and electronic resources including software.

Resource literacy - The ability to understand the form, format, location and access methods of information resources.

Social-structural literacy - Knowledge of how information is socially situated and produced. It includes understanding the scholarly publishing process.

Research literacy - The ability to understand and use information technology tools to carry out research, including discipline-related software.

Publishing literacy - The ability to produce a text or multimedia report of research results.

(As summarized on the ACRL Information Literacy for Faculty and Administrators web page)

Assessment Classes and individuals

Pre- and post-tests Self-assessment Assignments Online quizzes and exercises Portfolios

Project SAILS Standardized Assessment of Information Literacy Skills

https://www.projectsails.org/

Project SAILS

Developed at Kent State University

Knowledge test that focuses on information literacy skills

Based on the ACRL Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education

Multiple choice questions

Web-based test

Measures skills of groups of students

Accounts for the relative difficulty of the questions

Results are reported by major and class level

Benchmarking data for comparison to other institutions

Currently testing discipline specific modules for biology, communication studies, education, and history

University of Pittsburgh has used the test with groups of communications and engineering students

Designing Information Literacy Classes

Chemistry Organic chemistry laboratory class

Engineering Information Skills for Engineers

Organic Chemistry Laboratory Class

Second semester of the organic chemistry sequence

Mostly second year students, not all chemistry majors

One week each semester plus some summer classes

Approximately 350-400 students and 40-50 classes per year

Assignment has changed over the years to make use of new information resources Chemical Abstracts in print Science Citation Index/ Web of Knowledge Beilstein

Helps to fill the American Chemical Society requirement for instruction in information retrieval and database searching

Instruction and assignment must meet the needs of chemistry majors and be appropriate for students who will not take more chemistry courses

Mix of broader information and literature concepts and more detailed instruction in a specific chemistry database

Cooperation between the Chemistry Library and department in dividing the instruction responsibilities

Librarian meets with the professor and teaching assistant to determine the goals of the instruction session Different types of scientific literature and articles Parts of a scientific journal article Peer review Difference between the library catalog and an

indexing/abstracting database Awareness of Chemical Abstracts/SciFinder Scholar Instruction in use of Beilstein with hands-on experience Assignment to practice the skills used in class Students should come to the library

Designing the assignment Use the most common search methods

Structure drawing Exact search and substructure search Reaction search

Should relate to topics covered in the laboratory course Choose a molecule and reaction they will study in another

laboratory class Read a Beilstein record correctly Interpret a citation to the literature correctly Use the library catalog and e-journal list to determine if the library

owns an article located by a Beilstein search

On class day: Teaching assistant talks about the scientific literature, types of

journal articles, and peer review in the pre-laboratory lecture Each laboratory section comes to the library for 45 minutes

during their laboratory period Librarian covers:

Indexing databases and catalogs Importance of Chemical Abstracts/SciFinder Scholar Choosing an appropriate database Instruction in use of Beilstein

Students receive assignment to be completed later

Assessment Completed assignments are reviewed to identify areas of

difficulty Changes can be made to wording of the assignment questions

or areas of emphasis in the instruction sessions Assignment is used for several semesters and then reviewed for

a change in topic

Information Skills for Engineers (ISfE)

Developed by Kate Thomes, ULS Engineering Librarian

Cooperated with two faculty in the Chemical Engineering and Bioengineering Departments of the School of Engineering

Assistance from the offices of Instructional Development and Measurement and E

Based on national standards for information literacy ACRL – Association of College and Research Libraries Middle States criteria ABET

Goals

Identify and teach a set of skills needed by professional engineers for finding and using information

Develop training materials and delivery mechanisms to teach these skills

Assess students’ progress as a result of the training

Use the assessment to modify and improve future training

Training developed for two classes

Foundations of Chemical Engineering Second year undergraduate students 51-63 students

Bioengineering Intramural Internship Third year undergraduate students 20-32 students Working with faculty in research labs

Librarian created a set of Objectives for Information Skills for Engineers based on ACRL, ABET, and Middle States

Upon graduation from the School of Engineering students will be able to: Determine the nature and extent of information needed for a

project Access information effectively and efficiently Evaluate and understand the information Use information ethically Use research to create new knowledge (This higher level skill was

not addressed directly in this pilot program.)

3-5 specific examples were added under each category

Fall 2005

Instruction presented by librarians in the classroom

Fall 2006

Instruction presented in a series of modules created using BlackBoard software

Seven modules focused on topics for engineering research and information sources

Librarian made a presentation in the Chem Eng class before each of two lab report assignments

Librarian made one presentation in the Bio Eng class to introduce the modules

Modules for Information Skills for Engineers

Search Tools for Engineering Information

Suggested Library Research Process

Research Databases for Engineering Information

PittCat: The ULS Online Catalog

Types of Engineering Information

Critical Evaluation of Information

Ethical Use of Information

Assessment

Initial Survey Pre-test before the first instruction session 65 items based on the SAILS survey, but including items specific

to engineering

Post-test Survey was repeated at the end of the course to assess

students’ progress in the selected information skills

BlackBoard modules included self-tests for students Faculty or librarian had to provide feedback

Assessment results did show improvement in student scores ChemE Pre-test Mean: 48.3

Post-test Mean: 52.51 BioE Pre-test Mean: 51.06

Post-test Mean: 54.28

Number of students scoring >80% also increased ChemE: 22% to 65% BioE: 38% to 75%

Questions were added to get feedback from students about the BlaclBoard modules

Future developments

Revise the module quizzes so they don’t need faculty effort to grade them

Revise the modules to be more interactive and challenging

Present additional skills and information through modules

Analyze the pre- and post-test results to reduce the number of items in the test