Primary School Children's Interaction with Library Media: Information Literacy in Practice

Abstract

In the context of a study of professional development in relation to information literacy, children at four primary schools were observed as they worked with a variety of media in various curriculum areas. The challenges they encountered are discussed against the bund of the teachers' understanding of information skills and resource-based learning.1

Educators and librarians have acknowledged that the skills that constitute information literacy are becoming crucial to everyday life. However, it is suggested by some that students in general are not being equipped to meet those demands in the 1 990s any better than they were in the 1980s. For example, since 1981, when Marland published Information skills in the secondary curriculum, there have been many initiatives to develop and promote the teaching of information skills in schools. Much of the widely disseminated research prompted by that report and reviewed by Rogers (1994), confirms that the original working party recommendations remain relevant today. Indeed, Rogers quotes extracts from British government reports which suggest the overall picture in schools has not changed significantly at all.

The fact is that library and study skills have been taught in schools for nearly a hundred years, but many students still cannot easily find and critically use information. In some schools, information literacy is enhancing teaching and learning, but the information age has yet to reach others. Information technology and pressures on library resources and services can, in this context, be seen as a catalyst for critically examining teaching techniques necessary for fostering information literacy.

Poor performance in finding and using information has in the past been attributed to a lack of explicit classroom attention to the cognitive aspects of the task (e.g. Irving, 1985; Kuhlthau, 1987). Yet the thinking underlying information literacy may be hidden from teachers and few studies illuminate process issues from the viewpoint of the students themselves. Further, whereas twenty years ago we focused on getting our most able students to think critically and do "research projects" at school, we now face the challenge of helping our least able students to solve information problems efficiently. Consequently three factors are of central concern in developing information literacy. One is the nature of information literacy itself, the second is teachers' understanding of that concept and the third relates to the conceptions of inexperienced information users.