4.1 Departmental-level curriculum
development and innovation. 4
4.2 Partnership with the
Library. 5
4.3 Information Literacy
Audit 5
4.4 Information Literacy
Network. 6
4.5 Evaluation and
research. 6
The Centre for Inquiry-based Learning in the Arts and
Social Sciences (CILASS) is a Centre for Excellence in Teaching and Learning
(CETL) based at the
In order to provide suitable spaces for students and
staff undertaking IBL, CILASS is establishing new learning and teaching spaces
within its hub in the University’s new Information Commons (Centre for Learning
Resources), which is scheduled to open in 2006-7. These spaces are being purpose-built to
support collaborative IBL in an information- and technology-rich environment,
and will offer flexibility in terms of configuring space differently for
different learning activities combined with access to a range of advanced
learning technologies. Additional
funding for capital investment awarded to CILASS in January 2006 will allow for
the creation of a further CILASS learning and teaching ‘collaboratory’ in a central satellite location within the
University.
This paper focuses in particular on the strategic
approach being taken by CILASS to promoting the development of information
literacy within the context of IBL.
IBL encompasses a
broad spectrum of pedagogical approaches that ground the learning experience in
a process of self-directed scholarly investigation and research. IBL approaches may be more or less structured, encompassing case- and problem-based methods as
well as small- or large-scale research projects (Khan
and O’Rourke, 2003). However, a key consideration in pedagogical design for
IBL is that learning activities need to be open-ended enough to allow for
students to engage in genuine exploration and investigation in relation to
authentic questions and issues – questions and issues to which there might well
be alternative responses and solutions. Traditionally, inquiry projects have
tended to be seen as activities that students will be ready to engage in only
when they have already acquired a certain body of knowledge in their discipline
through other means. CILASS is
exploring the use of appropriately scaled inquiry activities from Level 1
upwards, with the aim of embedding inquiry at the heart of the learning
experience at the
CILASS’s commitment to IBL
reflects the widespread move in HE over recent years
from a teacher-centred conception of the
learning process towards an increasingly student-centred model. Pedagogic research has
demonstrated that students are more likely to adopt ‘deep’ learning strategies
when they are both challenged and supported to engage actively with the
questions and problems of their discipline (e.g. Marton, et al. 1997; Prosser
and Trigwell, 1999; Ramsden 2003). Seeing learning as a process of knowledge
construction means that teaching moves away from transmission of information
towards the design of learning tasks and environments that will support
students’ active engagement with their subject (e.g. Biggs,
1999). Learning through inquiry in its many forms is, increasingly, recognised as a powerful pedagogical
strategy in this respect, and one that can be applied successfully to lower as
well as to higher levels of study in HE (Elton,
2001; Jenkins
et al. 2003). Its further benefits include the development of a wide range
of meta-cognitive and other learning skills, and the enhancement of student
motivation and commitment in relation to both the process of studying and the
discipline itself (Brew,
2001; Jenkins,
et al. 2003; Khan
and O’Rourke, 2003). At the same time, learning through inquiry is a
strategy that, in making the links between research and learning more explicit,
has the potential to strengthen the ‘teaching-research nexus’ within
universities (Elton,
2001; Marsh
and Hattie, 2002; Neumann,
1994). From this perspective, the
work of CILASS engages with Boyer’s (1987;
1990)
critique of the relationship between research and teaching in the US system and
with the international reform movement that, stemming from this critique, aims
to make student inquiry central to the undergraduate and taught postgraduate
learning experience.
The
An example from the
The CILASS vision is to develop graduates who, through
their involvement as inquirers in their discipline-based communities of
practice, gain a wide range of transferable capabilities applicable not only to
academic work but also to their future employment and lifelong learning. These include information literacy
capabilities that are essential to living and working in the ‘network society’
(Castells, 2000).
There is growing international
recognition of information literacy as a
far-reaching educational, economic and democratic issue (e.g. Candy,
2004; Johnston
and Webber, 2003; Virkus, 2003).
With its thematic focus on information literacy, CILASS aims to respond
in particular to the rapid technological changes that are taking place in the
environment for scholarly practice, and to the implications of these changes for
student-inquirers and researchers.
New digital technologies and resources that are affecting the creation,
organisation and sharing of knowledge challenge academic staff to think afresh
about disciplinary inquiry and the information-related capabilities that
students need. Recent research has revealed significant limitations in
students’ general level of information literacy (e.g. Armstrong
et al, 2001; McDowell,
2002). CILASS is strongly committed
to addressing this, especially in relation to higher-order capabilities of
relevance to discipline-based inquiry.
Information access
and processing skills such as those involved in using electronic resources to
search for information are a pre-requisite for students undertaking an IBL
curriculum. However for CILASS, it is the higher-order capabilities
associated with new conceptions of information literacy (e.g. Bruce,
1997, SCONUL,
1999) - including critical thinking, evaluation, synthesis, communication and
knowledge-creation - that provide a key focus for development activity. These new conceptions also recognise the
role of values, ethics and creativity in the use of information, and situate
information literacy explicitly within particular contexts of social
practice. CILASS aims to explore
the synergies, arguably yet to be fully harnessed in HE, between these expanded conceptions and IBL (e.g. Macklin,
2003).
In integrating information
literacy education more closely with the subject curriculum, CILASS will be
informed by, and aims to contribute to, leading-edge developments in the
pedagogy of information literacy. CILASS is especially committed to developing
an inquiry-based pedagogy for information literacy, drawing for example on
constructivist and relational approaches that invite exploration of information
literacy, and development of information literacy skills, through processes of
experiential learning, critical reflection and research. This work will be underpinned by
relevant research and pedagogical practice in the Department of Information
Studies at the University of Sheffield (e.g., Webber and Johnston, 2000,
2004;
Levy,
2000), and by the pedagogical collaborations between information professionals
and subject experts at the University (e.g. Freeman
and Parker, 2004).
CILASS’s focus on IBL and
information literacy has already impacted strongly on strategic thinking and
development at an institutional level, as reflected in the explicit commitment
to both of these areas in the University’s new Learning, Teaching and Assessment
Strategy (2005-10). Thus, in
setting out a number of key characteristics of ‘the Sheffield Graduate’, the
Strategy highlights the capacity to:
This establishes an
institution-wide agenda to provide opportunities for students to engage with IBL
and information literacy development, and provides the strategic framework for
CILASS to make a significant impact on the culture of learning and teaching
within the institution. For
example, at the same time as academic
departments are being required to formulate departmental-level learning and
teaching strategies in response to the new Strategy, CILASS is engaging with the University in a number of
ways, including provision of focused funding for development and innovation
projects at a number of levels and the establishment of professional networks
both within the University and externally.
The following sections highlight key strands of the CETL’s strategic approach to information literacy
development within the context of IBL.
The main plank of CILASS’s
development strategy is at the level of academic departments, the aim being to
maximize impact by encouraging
strategic thinking and supporting diverse disciplinary practice and
priorities. Departments are invited
to bid for funds to take forward innovation
programmes that align with CILASS’s thematic priorities, including information
literacy. During the planning and
development stages of proposals, guidance on embedding information literacy into
programmes is available from a CILASS Learning Development and Research (LDR)
Associate who has a specific remit to support pedagogical enhancement and
innovation in information literacy.
As part of this process, proposers are invited
to consider:
For example, a project being taken forward as part of
the Department of Psychology’s CILASS programme aims to build student’s
information literacy through engagement with the popular and scholarly
literature in inquiry-based activities within a first year module. The project is called “Critical
Appraisal of the Public Presentation of Psychology”. Students will be asked to identify from
the print media a report that is based upon an original psychological source
(e.g., a paper in journal, a conference presentation, a
research press release). The Department considers that because of its intrinsic
‘human interest’ content, psychology is often misrepresented or trivialized
within the popular media. Students
will be asked to engage with the Lexis-Nexis Executive database of newspaper
material in a structured tutorial environment. Trained Postgraduate tutors will provide
advice and guidance on search skills and strategies, and students will have the
opportunity to explore the resource in a mediated workshop environment. The activity will be supported by WebCT chat groups/discussion boards, and students will work
collaboratively to discuss the story and build their evaluation skills. They will then present their
interpretations of the media story to their tutor. A follow-up activity will be devoted to
finding the original source of the story via the Web of Knowledge database and
this activity will be supported by an online tutorial on using the Web of
Knowledge developed by the Library.
Students will be introduced to the strategies that are useful for
following up and locating original sources, potentially using citation
searching, and
will be encouraged to think critically about the reasons why scientific inquiry
can be can be misinterpreted in the popular media (e.g. through a focus upon
empirical phenomena rather than the hypotheses under investigation). The results of their investigations will
be discussed with the tutor and peers, with students reflecting on the process
of the search and investigation and discussing the evaluation of the authority
of the contrasting information sources.
(Jones
and May, 2006)
A further feature of the LDR Associate role is to
provide a link between academics involved in CILASS projects and the Library,
specifically to broker information literacy expertise that the Library can
provide through its own activities. The Library is a key partner for CILASS in
this respect and is taking forward a CILASS-funded project entitled SEIL:
Student Engagement with Information Literacy. Through this project, librarians
are working to support the particular information literacy needs of departmental
CILASS-funded projects. This includes, for example, the development of an
interactive model of on-line resource list creation that aims to facilitate
dynamic building of information ‘environments’ for IBL, within WebCT Vista, through the lifetime of taught modules. Another strand of the SEIL project is
furthering the development and use of the Library’s existing on-line Information
Skills module, also based on the use of WebCT Vista,
which offers a set of generic resources that can be adapted to meet the IBL
needs of specific subject areas and will also offer a vehicle for assessing
students’ information literacy development.
There are close
synergies between the information literacy focus of CILASS and the research and
teaching interests of members of the academic staff in the Department of
Information Studies at the University.
The Department is taking forward a CILASS funded project to conduct an
audit (review) of the information literacy teaching that is currently delivered
to students across all its undergraduate and postgraduate curricula. The SCONUL
(1999) model will provide the framework for the investigation and the project
aims to identify those aspects (“pillars”)
of information literacy which can be further developed in the Department.
The
intention is to identify good practice and develop a toolkit that other
departments may wish to use to carry out a similar exercise, for example as they
review their programmes against the
aspirations in the LTA Strategy and further their information literacy
activities over the strategic planning and development period established by the
new Strategy.
CILASS is planning to
facilitate a number of Special Interest Groups and networks, including in the
areas of information literacy, networked learning and the scholarship of
teaching. An information literacy
network project has recently been established, led by the Department of
Information Studies in collaboration with the Library, and funded and
coordinated by CILASS. The aim is
to provide a framework for raising the profile of information literacy within
CILASS’s IBL community, and to create an on-going
forum for discussion of strategic, pedagogical and research issues. The first event was a workshop for
academic staff who are involved in the development of
departmental LTA strategies, to generate and exchange ideas for ways in which
departments might respond to the information literacy aspirations of the
University’s LTA Strategy in the context of IBL.
CILASS is adopting an
inquiry-based approach to developing pedagogical practice and knowledge in IBL,
through an extensive programme of evaluation and
research. The evaluation approach
is impact-focused and participatory, the
fundamental purpose being to involve academic staff in exploring the impact of
their CILASS-supported initiatives on the student learning experience, and to
assess the achievement of CILASS’s over-arching
programme objectives. Theories of
Change programme evaluation methodology (Connell
and Kubisch, 1996) combined with the use of EPO (enabling, process and outcome)
Performance Indicators (Helsby and Saunders, 1993) is the approach that has been
adopted, thereby aligning with the evaluation of learning and teaching
development more generally at the University from 2006. Alongside the evaluation of development
and innovation projects, CILASS will also be carrying out pedagogical research
into IBL, including an exploration of conceptions of, and approaches to, IBL in
different disciplinary contexts.
The third strand of the evaluation and research strategy focuses on
encouraging the scholarship of teaching in relation to IBL, including through
action research. Evaluation and
research activities will include a focus on information literacy, since this is
integral to the CILASS perspective on IBL.
For example, there will be a focus on exploring students’ experiences of
information literacy development within the context of IBL, the effectiveness of
new pedagogical approaches, and the nature and pedagogical implications of
different disciplinary conceptions of information
literacy.
Information literacy is
gaining recognition in UK HE as a key area of capability for graduates within a
world characterised by ‘supercomplexity’ (Barnett,
2000). This is reflected, for
example, in the Higher Education Academy’s recent commissioning of an in-depth
review of the literature on the relationship between information literacy and
learning. Alongside the on-going shift from traditional delivery learning and
teaching modes to more student-centered approaches, information literacy is
moving up some institutional agendas as a focus for strategic and pedagogical
development. For CILASS, the commitment to IBL goes hand in hand with a
commitment to information literacy. While it is still early days, CILASS will be
providing strong impetus and significant resource over a sustained period to
further information literacy development at the
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