Information Literacy Trekking: Showing Students Source Variety

Type of Presentation

Individual paper/presentation

Conference Strand

Media Literacy

Target Audience

Higher Education

Second Target Audience

K-12

Location

Ballroom A

Relevance

In an increasingly complex technological world, students in first-year college writing classes often begin their research processes by taking their phones out and seeing what the internet has to say about their chosen topics. While many classes might journey to the library to learn about different types of sources, such as journal articles accessed via databases, many students still seem bonded to using whatever google spits back, which becomes even more fraught as the first information they see on Google search is now compiled by AI. As writing instructors, we were concerned that our first-year writing students were not using the campus resources to the fullest extent, which could be a missed opportunity for future writing occasions within their majors.

Proposal

In an increasingly complex technological world, students in first-year college writing classes often begin their research processes by taking their phones out and seeing what the internet has to say about their chosen topics. While many classes might journey to the library to learn about different types of sources, such as journal articles accessed via databases, many students still seem bonded to using whatever google spits back, which becomes even more fraught as the first information they see on Google search is now compiled by AI. As writing instructors, we were concerned that our first-year writing students were not using the campus resources to the fullest extent, which could be a missed opportunity for future writing occasions within their majors. To broaden students’ experiences with outside sources and the library as a resource space, we created an outside source activity that both asks students to collect a specific variety of outside sources and to reflect on their experiences with this activity. While collecting a variety of sources might be a typical activity, our variety is quite larger than many collections. We asks students to select their topic, such as pet adoption, and then they must find sources of the following types: a journal article from a library database, an item that needs to be ordered through interlibrary loan, an e-book, a hard copy book from the stacks in the library, a published interview from a website or podcast, an organization’s website, a recommended item from a librarian, and then a wildcard digital source that is a different category of the student’s choosing. After the students collect the sources, they respond to guided reflection questions that help students think about how they have broadened their idea of what outside research could include. Students complete the assignment having trekked through their campus library’s resources and improved their understanding of source variety. Session attendees will receive copies of the assignment.

Short Description

This presentation shares a research assignment that broadens students’ experiences with different types of sources. After the students collect the sources, they respond to guided reflection questions to help them think about expanding their idea of what outside research includes. Students complete the assignment having trekked through their campus library’s resources and improved their understanding of source variety. Session attendees will receive assignment copies.

Keywords

source variety, library resources, reflection

Publication Type and Release Option

Presentation (Open Access)

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

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Feb 7th, 9:45 AM Feb 7th, 10:30 AM

Information Literacy Trekking: Showing Students Source Variety

Ballroom A

In an increasingly complex technological world, students in first-year college writing classes often begin their research processes by taking their phones out and seeing what the internet has to say about their chosen topics. While many classes might journey to the library to learn about different types of sources, such as journal articles accessed via databases, many students still seem bonded to using whatever google spits back, which becomes even more fraught as the first information they see on Google search is now compiled by AI. As writing instructors, we were concerned that our first-year writing students were not using the campus resources to the fullest extent, which could be a missed opportunity for future writing occasions within their majors. To broaden students’ experiences with outside sources and the library as a resource space, we created an outside source activity that both asks students to collect a specific variety of outside sources and to reflect on their experiences with this activity. While collecting a variety of sources might be a typical activity, our variety is quite larger than many collections. We asks students to select their topic, such as pet adoption, and then they must find sources of the following types: a journal article from a library database, an item that needs to be ordered through interlibrary loan, an e-book, a hard copy book from the stacks in the library, a published interview from a website or podcast, an organization’s website, a recommended item from a librarian, and then a wildcard digital source that is a different category of the student’s choosing. After the students collect the sources, they respond to guided reflection questions that help students think about how they have broadened their idea of what outside research could include. Students complete the assignment having trekked through their campus library’s resources and improved their understanding of source variety. Session attendees will receive copies of the assignment.