Lifelong Learning Conference 2008

Information Literacy Symposium

The Graduate Information Literacy Program at the Australian National University and services to higher degree research students: recognition and challenges

Jim Berryman
Australian National University

The Graduate Information Literacy Program (GILP) was created in 2001 to provide postgraduate students with the information searching, information management and information technology skills required to complete a postgraduate or higher research degree at the Australian National University (ANU). Since its inception, GILP has built a distinctive program to support the learning needs of postgraduate students. In 2006, the Carrick Institute recognised the ANU’s leadership in this area by awarding GILP a Carrick Award for programs that support student learning. Information literacy is fundamental to the development of critical thinking and lifelong learning at the ANU. GILP training helps students develop a combination of information technology and information retrieval skills, which enables them to evaluate critically the academic and general information resources available to researchers in the face of rapidly changing technologies. To this end, GILP provides online training, small group workshops and one-to-one help to develop the broad spectrum of skills needed to support higher degree students. This presentation provides a summary of GILP’s achievements to date, focusing on some of the key strengths recognised by the Carrick Institute. In particular, it will focus on how GILP has supported the information literacy needs of two important student groups: returning (“mature age”) and international students, especially from developing countries. The presentation will also consider some of the broader challenges that lie ahead for information literacy programs in the tertiary education sector. These include changes in student/academic demand for information literacy services and evolving technology affecting traditional academic resources.

Fostering lifelong learning through information literacy education: Exploring conceptions in different disciplines and framing pedagogies for lifelong learning

Sheila Webber and Bill Johnston
University of Sheffield; University of Strathclyde

Information Literacy (IL) has been acknowledged as a key element of lifelong learning (Candy et al., 1994). The aim of this presentation is to explore the lifelong learning dimensions of pedagogies for IL in different disciplines. Our starting points are the categories of pedagogy for IL identified in a research project funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC). We will look at them in relation to: a.Candy Report’s attributes and qualities of the lifelong learner in relation to the ideal structure of the undergraduate curriculum described in that report. b.The competing models of lifelong learning identified with OECD and UNESCO respectively. The AHRC project investigated conceptions of UK academics in four disciplines: Marketing, English, Chemistry and Civil Engineering. It is notable that some conceptions of teaching IL focused on the requirements for the students’ course of study, whilst others focused on supporting students both in their course and for their life beyond university. For example, in marketing one conception of pedagogy for IL was Helping students understand how information literacy is critical to them, for marketing and life whilst another was of Upgrading students’ information toolbox at an appropriate point (of the course). We will reflect how these differing approaches relate to different aspects of Candy’s model/structure. Similarly, some conceptions focused more on students’ development as people and citizens (thus with more connection to the UNESCO view), and others on students’ development as practitioners. The discussion will be augmented by evidence from the literature and the authors’ experiences of implementing IL in the University curriculum, including Webber’s work as a CILASS (Centre for Inquiry-based Learning in the Arts and Social Sciences) Fellow at the University of Sheffield.

Candy, P., Crebert, G. and OLeary, J. (1994) Developing lifelong learners through undergraduate education. Canberra: Australian Government Publishing Service. National Board of Employment, Education and Training Report; 28. http://www.dest.gov.au/sectors/training_skills/publications_resources/profiles/nbeet/hec/ developing_lifelong_learners_through_undergraduate.htm

A bunch of IRISs: Teaching of information literacy skills for life long learning

Ilze Jonikis, Jennifer Golding & Michelle Mahoney
University of Western Australia

Information Literacy lies at the core of lifelong learning. It empowers people in all walks of life to seek, evaluate, use and create information effectively to achieve their personal, social, occupational and educational goals. It is a basic human right in a digital world and promotes social inclusion of all nations. The Alexandria Proclamation on Information Literacy and Lifelong Learning, IFLA, 2005 The world of work is constantly changing and no matter how well prepared a graduate may be through their studies lifelong learning will be required to manage these constant changes. Flexible Teaching and Learning at UWA, CATL, 2005 In 2004-2005 the Library carried out assessments of existing information literacy teaching within the faculties of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences, Natural & Agricultural Sciences, Life & Physical Sciences and Economics & Commerce. Through this process it became clear that, despite an active information literacy programme, many first year students were not receiving any information literacy instruction, the content and quality of existing coverage was inconsistent and duplication was an issue for many students. The solution was the development of the IRIS programme for first year students: a series of online units with the common name Introductory Research and Information Skills. The first unit to be launched was Arts IRIS in 2006 with an enrolment of more than 1200 students. Science IRIS (FLPS & FNAS) followed in 2007 with a similar enrolment. Business IRIS is due to be launched in 2008. The Units are compulsory within their Faculties, self-directed and delivered online through WebCT. They are based on a strong pedagogical framework, which maps learning outcomes against standards developed by CAUL. The IRIS programme has received approval in the wider university community and presents an example of effective sustained collaboration between academics, librarians and other University support staff, combining the distinctive skills, knowledge and perspectives of each. The paper will focus on the collaborative development, implementation and evaluation of the IRIS’s and implications of the programme for the life long learning of graduates. It will outline the quantitative and qualitative methods taken to evaluate of the Units. In addition, it will explore the content variations required for the different disciplines and how this content can be shared via a learning objects repository. Differences to be explored include the Arts IRIS model of immediate access to all content and a single assessment compared with the Science IRIS approach of sequenced content release and intermediate assessments before the final assessment is released.

Information literacy: Past success and future needs for undergraduate health practitioners

Madeleine Shanahan & Wendy Forrest
RMIT University

The applications of Information Literacy (IL) to the processes of Evidence-Based Practice and lifelong learning are no more obvious than in the area of health. This presentation will outline the results from research projects conducted or finalised at RMIT University in 2007. Two of the projects reveal improvements in the information literacy skills and understandings of students from programs within the School of Medical Sciences, who undertake embedded learning and teaching activities and associated assessments or evaluation of learning outcomes. While the results which will be presented are pleasing and provide informative current experiences from which the academic community can benefit, the needs of the students as graduates should also be considered. The results from a third research project exploring the accessibility of professionally relevant information resources to health practitioners reveals a complex web of levels of access, supports and barriers. This finding indicates that students move from a richly resourced and easily accessible information world as university students, into very different information worlds as graduate health practitioners. The impact this may have on developing lifelong learners capable of contributing to the evidence-based environments they will be working within, will also be discussed.

Developing graduate attributes for lifelong learning – how far have we got?

Barbara de la Harpe & Alex Radloff
RMIT University; Central Queensland University

Ensuring that graduates leave university with well developed attributes that prepare them for employment and for lifelong learning is now well established as a desirable outcome of higher education worldwide. Australian universities have typically responded by developing a list of graduate attributes such as communication, team work, critical thinking and information literacy as part of their strategic plan and making it available on the university website. Further, they have engaged in activities aimed at integrating the teaching and assessment of attributes as part of course and program development processes and through strategic initiative projects. How successful have institutions been in their endeavors to ensure that their graduates have the attributes needed for work and for life? Based on our experiences and the literature it appears that to date outcomes across the sector have not been very promising and that the identification and in particular, the integration, assessment and ways of evidencing attainment of graduate attributes, have posed significant challenges for universities. In this paper we explore why this may be the case. We suggest that a key factor missing in the work to-date is recognition of the need to address academic staff beliefs and attitudes about graduate attributes and the impact of these on their motivation and ability to engage in this work. We propose a systematic way to get academic staff to work together to share and compare their beliefs and attitudes, to reflect on these and the implications for their own practice in developing graduate attributes, and to engage the sector as a whole in considering how best to support academic staff in this work. Only when academic staff are engaged in institutional initiatives aimed at developing graduate attributes for lifelong learning will integration initiatives be successful and sustainable in the long term.

Enterprise, empowerment, and higher education: Lifelong learning from the generic vocational skills

Bill Johnston
University of Strathclyde

Generic skills, and terms like key skills and graduate attributes, are useful in highlighting aspects of curriculum which may improve student employability in the knowledge economy, and challenge disciplinary conventions and boundaries in an information society. Notions of personal development and empowerment are enshrined in educational thinking, and provide a valuable focus for public understandings of the nature and purpose of universities, and their contribution to lifelong learning. However, it is arguable that nations, states and educators have tended to treat vocational generic skills and personal development as separate entities, serving different aims and constituencies, albeit sharing, to an extent, an adult learning pedagogy. In this paper I shall focus these constructs by setting them in dynamic relationship:

• Vocational Skills V Personal Development perspectives on lifelong learning, and mapping them against competing policy positions
• OECD V UNESCO perspectives on lifelong learning.

I will take the recent experience of Scotland as a broad, illustrative backdrop to consideration of lifelong learning as a unifying concept for education, empowerment and enterprise in society. Scotland, a nation historically associated with European Enlightenment, Industrial Revolution and the British Empire, is reforming its’ public sense of statehood, and relations within the UK, Commonwealth, EC, and globally, through a political debate between devolution and independence, whilst simultaneously seeking economic regeneration through explicit education and enterprise strategies. Finally I will question the contemporary orthodoxies which present education as a precondition of economic success, and redefine universities as providers of relevant knowledge packages and information skills. To this end I will posit an alternative vision of mass higher education engaging all citizens in a lifelong learning society.

Information literacy as a framework to foster lifelong learning.

Chrys Gunasekara & Sue Collins
Queensland University of Technology

A key dilemma faced by academics and information professionals is that we attempt to foster lifelong learning at a time when students are coming to grips with the basic discipline of learning in a tertiary education context, and working through life choices about the purpose of their study and the extent to which they will engage with this learning journey. This paper reports on a collaborative project to address this dilemma. At the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) an academic and a liaison librarian used the standards of the Australian and New Zealand Institute for Information Literacy (ANZIIL) as a framework to develop lifelong learning capabilities within Business curricula. The project represented a significant break from previous approaches. The first section of the paper sets out the context of lifelong learning at the QUT. This is an espoused graduate attribute and one that, hitherto, was fostered largely through adjunct inputs from library professionals. This is followed by a description of the project aims and methods. In essence, the project involved the application of operations management principles and techniques by students working in small groups to analyse selected aspects of the operations of real world businesses. The ANZIIL Standards were used to structure the learning tasks and learning outcomes, which included guided reflective practice. The project was conducted over a twelve week period, which allowed ample time for pre/post evaluation of information literacy, as well as preparation of students through specific knowledge inputs that were provided in lectures and in tutorials. The third section of the paper reports on the results of the project. The project was successful in raising students’ awareness of the ingredients of lifelong learning, as well as improving information literacy outcomes overall. The final section of the paper discusses issues and outcomes of the project, and reflects on the conditions required for an integrative approach to embedding lifelong learning principles to be effective.

Evaluating information literacy and its application to clinical decision making

Cheryl Perrin, Delwar Hossain and Kaye Cumming
University of Southern Queensland

Information literacy has been identified as an essential graduate attribute by all faculties of the University of Southern Queensland. In response the department of Nursing and Midwifery has embedded information literacy instruction into the first year of their new curriculum. Embedding these skills into the curriculum however will not necessarily ensure the nursing graduates will be able to apply literacy skills to the provision of high quality ecidence based health care. For this to occur information literacy skills gained in the classroom must contribute to sound clinical decision making based on best practice evidence. This paper will discuss the findings of a three phase research project designed to (1) evaluate the entry level information literacy skills and confidence of first year nursing students, (2) determine if the students skills and confidence had improved post information literacy instruction and (3) evaluate if students had transferred and begun to apply information literacy into beginning level clinical decision making. Data were collected for the first two phases using pre and post information literacy instruction questionnaires. The final phase of data collection will be completed via focus groups conducted after the nursing students have undertaken a second semester first year clinical based course.

Reflective Online Searching Skills: an information literacy learning object

Lynn McAllister and Sylvia Edwards

The Reflective Online Searching Skills (ROSS) environment was developed as an online learning tool to help students develop their skill and knowledge in online searching.  In 2007, the ROSS environment was embedded in two first year units, in Science Faculty and in the IT faculty. The presentation will talk about ROSS as an evolving teaching tool which is continually being developed based on the student experience and in consultation with the unit coordinators.

Setting a strategic direction for information literacy at The University of Western Australia

Pam Barnett, Ruth Browne, Carol Hicks, Philomena Humphries & Felicity Renner
University of Western Australia