Framework

//Can we start by outlining a structure? What do we think people need to know about finding information, validating information and using information?// AB Framework**


 * //Defining a project context or product criteria comes before accessing information to be used (doing is easy, planning is not)//**

Just to get us started herewith a contribution. The really exciting thing about working as a group is the difering perspectives that we'll get to the problem and the solutions to it in terms of a suitable course outline.

The way we had thought that this might work is that a trial course could be presented to teachers at an in-service and piloted in a few schools before being rolled out across the authority.


 * The problems**

Skills are not being imbedded as they are not revised and reinforced across departments. Pupils see these skills as something they use in English or when the librarian is in charge of the class.

Core skills are only taught in S1. Due to the fact that they are not taught and reinforced across the school in every year group and in every department, pupils loose these basic skills.

Universities complain that pupils have a poor grasp of the research process, they are unable to skim, scan and take notes, they plagiarise with no thought of the possible consequences, and they likewise have no concept of how and why they should acknowledge information sources, furthermore they do they know how to assess the credibility of websites and their authors.


 * A way forward**

Unless the issue of pupils’ Information Literacy becomes a whole school effort then we will continue to send youngsters out with inadequate skills. Not only are their skills inadequate to cope with the demands made by universities and colleges but they are also inadequate to cope with the demands of everyday life. As an authority we should be looking to put the best practice in place for providing young people with life-long Information Literacy skills.

I hope that the group will be able to:

1. Determine which skills are critical 2. Find a way of presenting these to teachers so that they become part of the repertoire of skills that teachers together with school librarians teach and reinforce so that we are ALL emphasising the same skills in the same way.

3. Thinking specifically of the skills required to undertake successful research, I would like to suggest the following be included.

3.1 Steps in the research process

Setting the parameters via questions - mindmaps Defining the topic Searching for suitable material both in print and on the web - hierarchy of use of resources Locate material within library or web Evaluating sources – print and web Seek out (skim and scan) the relevant material in terms of answers to questions - Evaluate Take notes and write up Presentation skills

3.2 How to choose the key words which facilitate pupils searching whether print or web

3.3 The copy/paste scenario and ways of recording info so as to avoid this

//CW//