Information Literacy

The Sumerians once called librarians “Ordainers of the Universe” because they put in order the early universe of knowledge. Our universe of knowledge is much greater today than it was for the ancient Sumerians, but the creation of order from the chaos of print and electronic information is what librarians still do. If you are faced by a seemingly impossible research topic, come to the Library and ask one of the SPC Ordainers of the Universe to help you refine your topic and locate and evaluate resources so that you can produce an ordered and authoritative paper.

The tutorials and guides below are a good introduction to doing research and are designed to guide you in finding and evaluating the print and electronic resources that you will find in the Library or on the Internet. I you need further assistance you can reach a Reference Librarian at (201) 915-9392 or at (201) 568-7730 for Englewood Cliffs.

Tutorials

TILT is an excellent and highly interactive tutorial developed at the University of Texas at Austin that will guide you towards effective library and electronic research.

Other Library Research Guides

For Faculty:

Information Literacy is a new term for an old concept, combining computer literacy with bibliographic instruction and critical thinking. The goal is to provide students with the information skills that are vital to lifelong learning in the Information Age.

Saint Peter’s College students need instruction to develop Information Literacy skills. Since every discipline has its own research needs and skills, the O’Toole and Englewood Cliffs Librarians are available to work with you to incorporate these skills into your courses.

The best instruction in Information Literacy takes place in the context of a class project or term paper. When students’ assignments are to simply find articles or books in the Library, they become mere scavenger hunts. Students tend to not place the article in context; hence, it does not become a piece to solve an intellectual puzzle.

The links below point to some key resources on Information Literacy. The article on "Information Literacy as a Liberal Art" is an excellent starting point and I urge you to read it. The Students' section contains an excellent tutorial from the University of Texas that could be assigned to your students as an introduction or to reinforce their skills. Links to Saint Peter's College library maps and resource guides are also included.

If you wish to schedule a class session for the Library you may either call Tom Kenny, Head of Reference Services at (201) 915-9392 or 915-9389, send him an e-mail at tkenny@spc.edu .

 articles

• Information Literacy as a Liberal Art: Enlightenment proposals for a new curriculum By Jeremy J. Shapiro and Shelley K. Hughes. Educom Review, Volume 31, Number 2, March/April 1996.
• Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education from the Association of College and Research Libraries
• Information Literacy in a Nutshell: Basic Information for Academic Administrators and Faculty from the Association of College and Research Libraries.
• Final Report of the American Library Association Presidential Committee on Information Literacy (1989)
• The Nine Information Literacy Standards for Student Learning from the American Association of School Librarians.
• Directory of Online Resources for Information Literacy Complied by Drew Smith and sponsored by the School of Library and Information Science at the University of South Florida.
• Redefining Roles: Librarians as Partners in Information Literacy Education by Helene Williams and Anne Zald.
• Information and Technology Literacy for Student Success a series of PowerPoint slides from The University of Washington.
• The National Forum on Information Literacy
• LOEX Instruction Links.
• The Effect of the Web on Undergraduate Citation Behavior 1996-1999 This Cornell study found book citations declining and Web citations quickly leading to dead links. This is a preprint of the article appearing in the Journal of the American Society for Information Science.
• Assessment at Saint Peter's College Links to the SPC Assessment Plan, Academic Assessment Survey, and Library Assessment Plan.
• How to create a link from your reading list to an article in a full-text database