"What's Sputnik?": Experiments with Life History in an Interdisciplinary First-Year Class.
Type of Presentation
Individual paper/presentation (20 minute presentation)
Target Audience
Higher Education
Location
Room 218/220
Proposal
Redesigning an interdisciplinary perspectives class about information and society created opportunities to engage with both current pedagogical trends and the traditional models of other fields. The two instructors, who are also reference librarians, implemented a flipped classroom model and updated the readings, with an eye toward current events. Then, using experiences with discipline-specific writing in anthropology and Writing Across the Curriculum, a small life history unit was introduced. This activity encouraged students to engage with the subject matter in a personal way, with an added goal that the students might be able to carry parts of the experience beyond the end of the semester. This study reviews the student and faculty perceptions of this assignment using standards of information literacy, focusing closely on the role of consuming and producing information, and how changes to these processes continue to have cultural meaning.
Short Description
Introducing a life history assignment to an interdisciplinary class initially filled students with dread. Yet, panic was brief, and students arrived at actual interest. This presentation describes the process of modifying life history methods and writing for an information studies class, and how it can be essential for information literacy.
Keywords
Life history, Teaching librarians, First year writing, Writing across the curriculum, Autobiography
Publication Type and Release Option
Presentation (Open Access)
Recommended Citation
Bowers, Catherine, ""What's Sputnik?": Experiments with Life History in an Interdisciplinary First-Year Class." (2016). Georgia International Conference on Information Literacy. 18.
https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/gaintlit/2016/2016/18
"What's Sputnik?": Experiments with Life History in an Interdisciplinary First-Year Class.
Room 218/220
Redesigning an interdisciplinary perspectives class about information and society created opportunities to engage with both current pedagogical trends and the traditional models of other fields. The two instructors, who are also reference librarians, implemented a flipped classroom model and updated the readings, with an eye toward current events. Then, using experiences with discipline-specific writing in anthropology and Writing Across the Curriculum, a small life history unit was introduced. This activity encouraged students to engage with the subject matter in a personal way, with an added goal that the students might be able to carry parts of the experience beyond the end of the semester. This study reviews the student and faculty perceptions of this assignment using standards of information literacy, focusing closely on the role of consuming and producing information, and how changes to these processes continue to have cultural meaning.
