Stealth Information Literacy

I was cleaning my office today when I came across an intriguing pile of scrap paper. Apparently, at various points previous I had scribbled some random ideas on PostIt notes, torn notebook paper, and used envelopes. I’m guessing that I didn’t have much time to do anything with these ideas, so I did the next logical thing and penned a few sentence fragments to my future self.

One idea that I found (truth be told: this one was typed) was the result of a conversation that I had with Robin Bergart (a colleague of mine) about embedding information literacy skills into the curriculum. At the time (2007) Robin had spent an entire semester coming to watch me teach my course (Information Management). She sat with the students, listened to the lectures (and watched them surf Facebook during class). She was curious to see how IL skills were taught when the librarian had complete control over the course content and delivery (admittedly, a fairly unique situation).

Interestingly, one of Robin’s conclusions was that the IL instruction was successful because students didn’t realize they were learning it (ironic, no?). Because the IL tasks were indistinguishable from the regular demands of the course, students didn’t even recognize their IL learning until we asked them about it at the end of the semester. When we attempted to put our rough thoughts on paper we called it ”stealth information literacy”: 

Stealth information literacy uses a subtle approach to teaching information literacy skills that uses cognitive modeling, observational learning, and the use of rich examples, anecdotes, analogies and learning activities to incorporate but do not focus directly on information literacy skills. Stealth information literacy is highly intentional, but can also be spontaneous and can respond to ‘teachable moments’ in the classroom.

Obviously, it wouldn’t hurt to nail the definition down a little more (and to clarify the pedagogical lingo), but I still think it’s an interesting concept. I scanned the rest of our document and noticed this thought-provoking paragraph (you can thank Robin for the fancy words):

“Make no mistake: we are making a strong claim here. We contend that most information literacy instruction as taught by librarians does not succeed in engaging and challenging students. Worse, we are often guilty of turning students off by our pedantic, methodical approach to teaching. We make erroneous assumptions about what students already know, we simplify search, and other information literacy skills for them, and we unwittingly send the implicit message that what we have to offer is rote, routine, stultifying and not very challenging or interesting. The stealth approach to information literacy strives not to cover information literacy skills in the classroom, but to provide opportunities for students to uncover and discover for themselves the resources they will need in the classroom and beyond.”

As I reflect, this sentiment smarts a bit, but I don’t believe that’s how we intended it. If we want to improve our ability to communicate and model IL skills in each teaching environment, maybe it’s time to consider the stealth approach.

Hiring Decisions – The 7 Greats

I’ve been reading Thomas Friedman’s The World is Flat (and yes, I know the book was published a few years ago now). The book describes the challenges (and opportunities) of living in an increasingly globalized (flat) world. I was particularly taken with Friedman’s description of the type of people who will thrive in this new global economy (he calls them “the untouchables” in Chapter 6).

According to Friedman, people who possess the abilities you see below are best equipped for the new world. As I read through his ideas, I wondered what it would be like if we used this list as a “want ad” for the type of people we want to attract to the academic professions (librarianship, education professionals, etc.). Here is Friedman’s list (obviously, I’ve adapted this slightly a bit). See what you think:

• Great collaborators. We want people who can initiate, participate and orchestrate varying levels of coordination across a diverse collection of resources and people.
• Great synthesizers. We want people who can see connections between seemingly disparate bits of data, or methods, and make intuitive leaps in integration.
• Great explainers. We want people who can appreciate the complexity around them, but explain it with simplicity. We need teachers and translators—and teachers as translators.
• Great leveragers. We want people who recognize the impact of technology and leverage it to redesign entire systems and methods of operation.
• Great adapters. We want people who are versatile and continually push themselves to gain new competencies. We want generalists who can apply a broad scope of knowledge.
• Great personalizers. We want people who demonstrate radical commitment to their responsibilities and are unafraid to exercise their personal creative expression.
• Great localizers. We want people who are aware of global trends, technology and capabilities and adapt them to local communities.

What would academia look like if we attracted more people with these seven “greats”? I think we’d see some real changes….

Linked

I first picked up this book because I thought this book was about the world’s most prevalent network: the internet. However, I soon realized that the scope of this book was much bigger. To be sure, Barabasi uses the Internet (one of his primary research subjects) throughout the book, but this book is mostly about the development of network theory – and I do mean theory.

In particular, Barabasi discusses how social networks develop, how diseases spread, how innovative ideas are adopted, how food chains are interconnected, and how the internet functions. (It feels like Malcolm Gladwell’s Tipping Point but with more scientific observation). Interestingly, it appears that there are common elements of network behaviour in each of these scenarios. While I can’t get as excited about math and physics as Barabasi – and he does get excited – I do appreciate his attempt to present the history of network research as a series of stories rather than as a textbook. Sometimes stories just work better–actually, probably most times.

Summary v. Analysis

For the course I teach (MCS*2020) I require students to write a business report on an information management/information technology topic. Over the past few semesters I’ve found that students are quite good a summarizing information, but they lack the ability to analyze. Collecting a series of articles on biometric security is one thing, but sifting the good arguments from the bad, or applying the arguments to a different context are challenging tasks.

I’ve been searching for months for a good in-class activity that will illustrate the key differences between summary and analysis. Early attempts to explain the difference between summary and analysis were less than sucessful (I used PowerPoint, I tried YouTube, etc.),  but last semester I tried something new.

I found the following article on file-sharing, an activity that they are quite familiar with:

Bowie, N. E. (2005). Digital rights and wrongs: Intellectual property in the Information Age. Business and Society Review, 110(1), 77-96.

This article examines the ethical reasons (excuses?) that students often give for file-sharing (you have to hit them where it hurts). I split the article into five smaller sections and had them analyze Bowie’s points in small groups. First, their job was to summarize what Bowie said (i.e., list the key points), then I asked them to analyze the argument (is it strong or weak? why?). The group discussion that followed was much more interesting – and most of them got the difference between summary and analysis.

I think this strategy engaged the class because the students hold relatively strong opinions about file-sharing. From my perspective as instructor, it’s a perfect topic because it touches on some of the key themes of the course (intellectual property, technology, information, etc.). Of course, I had to remind them that their analysis of the arguments (as students) would likely differ from the analysis of record executives (who have more at stake) - which launched another interesting discussion on perspective and context. Much, much better.