13th Conference on Professional Information Resources

Autor: Ralph Catts, University of Stirling, United Kingdom

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Abstract:

The development of professionals equipped with the skills to participate in the information society and the knowledge economy is a challenge for all in higher education. This workshop aims to bring together faculty staff and academic librarians to discuss their experiences with motivating students to use information and to develop information literacy skills as an integral part of the everyday academic experience.
The workshop will be facilitated by Dr Ralph Catts, who has substantive research and practical experience in the development and assessment of information skills in higher education. The workshop structure will enable participants to gain hands on experience with the incorporation of professional information skills into higher education curricula. A panel discussion will illuminate the perspectives of librarians and teacher on information use, and will uncover the current situation in embedding information literacy programmes into higher education curricula, using examples from the Czech Republic. Current concepts about generic skills and international trends in implementing information literacy standards will then be introduced by Ralph Catts.

Participants will be provided with the recommendations from a Czech enquiry into information skills in higher education and will be presented with a model action plan designed to help them to start up a project to enhance information skills within higher education programmes. In particular, suggestions for librarian and teaching staff cooperation will be identified.
The workshop concludes with a team assignment that will focus on discovering examples where the information literacy is or can be embedded in teaching and assesment tasks. This will be introduced by the facilitator with an example from Australia, which participants can explore to identify how information literacy can be embedded within a module focused on the professional content of a higher education course. This will be followed by the application of the procedure to teaching curricula selected by participants from their own teaching programmes. The results of analysis by a small team will be discussed and the workshop facilitator’s insights and comments will provide participants with a framework for further action.

The workshop is organized in cooperation with the Library of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic and IVIG.

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