07/4/13

What is information literacy?

 

Just what is information literacy? It is difficult to define without first looking at both words. The word information comes from the root of the process of informing. It comes from an action, not a solid object as we tend to think of information. It may be ever changing and reshaping, like the ocean, but the solid body still remains. It is difficult to engage in the process of informing without another soul. It may be a process of informing oneself, but that information came from someone else, somewhere. Information undergoes a give and a take, transferring from an individual or group to others.

My tendency is to look at literacy similar to the manner described by the Canadian Council on Learning, namely that it “includes the ability to analyse things, understand general ideas or terms, use symbols in complex ways, apply theories, and perform other necessary life skills―including the ability to engage in the social and economic life of the community.” A very interesting keyword there is social. Even more interestingly, it is included under the umbrella of necessary life skills.

Information literacy comes together in a form of social disposition. Information is transferred from person to person, under a burden of care. This process is at the very heart of what we do as teachers. It is increasingly important that we guide students in becoming part of this process. Our students live in a dynamic world with a seemingly unending amount of information available. This information can be accessed at their fingertips, yet as Will Richardson states, much of it likely “isn’t worth the bits it’s recorded on” (Richardson, 2012, p. 152).

As teachers, it is our duty and responsibility to prepare students as best we can to access all avenues of information. I fully support students having the skills that will be necessarily in their futures, even if perhaps for some the skills are used more on a personal/social level. I value my skill in being able to quickly find a recipe from a source that I trust, that is peer reviewed and rated. I don’t Google chocolate chip cookie recipe and then attempt to bake the first result. As pointed out in Vaughn and Dammann’s 2001 article, “Science and Sanity in Special Education,” there is a time savings in using research as opposed to developing a craft by oneself (p. 27). We owe it to our students to transfer the power, give them the social disposition, to increase their success in any way we can.