Information Literacy Group Research Articles

Journal of Information Literacy: A Bibliometric Study

Journal of Information Literacy is the Journal published by CILIP information Literacy group. The present study was undertaken to analyze the bibliometric attributes of the journal with respect to growth of articles, authorship patterns, length of articles etc. Total 239 articles were published in the journal from year 2015 to 2022. These were downloaded from the official site of the journal and analyzed. It was found that average 30 articles are published in each volume of the journal. Single author publications were also dominant in the journal.

Frames, models and definitions

See RECORDING.
 This keynote is both a practical and strategic view of information literacy from my perspective as a Senior Lecturer in Educational Development at City University, London and Chair of the UK’s Information Literacy Group.
 I’ll reflect on the experiences I have had since leaving the library profession and moving into the field of educational development, which involves working with faculty to enhance teaching and learning and to develop their curricula. Since taking on this role I have had rich conversations with academic staff about all aspects of information literacy, often under other guises. I’ve recently undertaken a small-scale study to understand their approach to thinking about the related concepts of digital literacy and open practice and I’ll discuss some findings from this research. Faculty express concerns about how to create independent learners in the age where information is abundant, but knowledge is still scarce and privileged. Those who complete my module on the same topics have reflected on the plethora of terms and frameworks which are designed to support them which in fact sometimes leave them further confused. I’ll also draw on a recent chapter I wrote (Secker, 2018) on the trouble that terminology can cause, when we try to collaborate with both academic staff and with colleagues in other areas of learning support.
 The second part of my keynote will focus on the efforts of the UK’s Information Literacy Group (ILG) to broaden the definition of information literacy and to try to get the concept recognised outside the library. In many ways there are parallels between the work I do at an institutional level and the efforts of the group to raise awareness of information literacy more broadly. In April 2018 the ILG launched a new definition of information literacy and much of the efforts of the group have been to build links with organisations and people outside of the library sector. For us to achieve true universal information literacy, as Paul Zurkowski first envisaged, (Zurkowski, 1974) I will argue information literacy needs to become an ongoing concern or everyone who works in education, government, the media or who cares about social justice.
 I’ll end by considering the challenges and opportunities that collaboration presents whether it is librarians, academics and other professional staff in education or policy makers and other organisations working with those outside the library world. Collaboration is vital for information literacy to become truly embedded into all aspects of formal and informal learning and to achieve the goal of universal information literacy that Zurkowski first envisaged. However, we still have a big task ahead of us to achieve this. I will attempt to consider the lessons I’ve learnt from working in this field for over 15 years, and advocate for a vision of information literacy that extends far beyond the library community. I’ll draw on the work and the framework in developed in 2011 (Secker and Coonan, 2013) to explore how we can rethink information literacy and provide a framework for supporting learning in the digital age.

Exploring the everyday life information needs and the socio-cultural adaptation barriers of Syrian refugees in Scotland

PurposeThis paper presents the research findings of the “Syrian New Scots’ Information Literacy Way-finding practices” research project, funded by the Information Literacy Group of the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals. The purpose of this paper is to explore the information needs of “Syrian New Scots” (the preferred name for refugees in Scotland), their habitual and adaptive information literacy practices and the barriers and enablers they encounter within their new socio-cultural setting via their interactions with people, tools and processes.Design/methodology/approachPrimary data were collected via interviews with three Local Authority Leads for Syrian Resettlement and focus groups with Syrian New Scots in three geographical locations in Scotland: two rural areas and one urban. Syrian research subjects were also involved in a drawing exercise that helped to contextualise the findings.FindingsThe main information needs expressed by participants revolved around the learning of English language which was linked to addressing health-related information needs, well-being and community engagement. All participants also highlighted the issue of socio-cultural differences in fulfilling everyday life information needs (such as health and housing). Information provision to Syrian New Scots requires a more structured process that acknowledges personalised information needs and it is tailored to the different stages of the adaptation process. The findings suggest that the “ways of knowing” that Syrian refugees bring with them are converging information experiences of past and new knowledge structures gained via different socio-cultural and migration experiences.Originality/valueThe research findings of this project will be of interest to local and regional support organisations and community volunteer groups who contribute to the social well-being and social integration of Syrian refugees. In addition, they may be of interest to public libraries due to their role as centres for educational and cultural orientation sessions, and as places of support for newly settled Syrian refugees and the communities that embrace them.

Innovation and play to enhance learning in academic libraries An interview of Andrew Walsh

Andrew Walsh visited Helsinki in March 2017 and organized a workshop “Making educational escape room style activities” for Finnish library professionals together with The Finnish Research Library Association (STKS) and its Information Literacy group. The day was full of fun and expertise.

Working in partnership to embed Information & Digital Literacy Skills into TeenTech events and Awards to empower pupils, teachers and librarians

This paper discusses the partnership that Cilip’s Information Literacy Group (ILG) in the UK has been developing over the last 18 months with TeenTech, an award winning, industry led initiative that focuses on helping teenagers understand the career opportunities available within Science, Education and Technology. It focuses on the role of the ILG’s School Representative as co-ordinator of a team of school librarians and university specialists who were tasked with; supporting the group’s new Information Literacy Award creating resources and opportunities to encourage teacher and pupil use of libraries, and with supporting pupil development of information and digital literacy skills within the area of science, engineering and technology across all of the award categories.

Information literacy in Scotland: challenges and opportunities

Copyright for the article content resides with the authors, and copyright for the publication layout resides with the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals, Information Literacy Group. These Copyright holders have agreed that this article should be available on Open Access. “By 'open access' to this literature, we mean its free availability on the public internet, permitting any users to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of these articles, crawl them for indexing, pass them as data to software, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without financial, legal, or technical barriers other than those inseparable from gaining access to the internet itself. The only constraint on reproduction and distribution, and the only role for copyright in this domain, should be to give authors control over the integrity of their work and the right to be properly acknowledged and cited.”

Go Digital Newcastle:

Copyright for the article content resides with the authors, and copyright for the publication layout resides with the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals, Information Literacy Group. These Copyright holders have agreed that this article should be available on Open Access. “By 'open access' to this literature, we mean its free availability on the public internet, permitting any users to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of these articles, crawl them for indexing, pass them as data to software, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without financial, legal, or technical barriers other than those inseparable from gaining access to the internet itself. The only constraint on reproduction and distribution, and the only role for copyright in this domain, should be to give authors control over the integrity of their work and the right to be properly acknowledged and cited.”

Welsh Information Literacy Project: closing conference

Copyright for the article content resides with the authors, and copyright for the publication layout resides with the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals, Information Literacy Group. These Copyright holders have agreed that this article should be available on Open Access. “By 'open access' to this literature, we mean its free availability on the public internet, permitting any users to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of these articles, crawl them for indexing, pass them as data to software, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without financial, legal, or technical barriers other than those inseparable from gaining access to the internet itself. The only constraint on reproduction and distribution, and the only role for copyright in this domain, should be to give authors control over the integrity of their work and the right to be properly acknowledged and cited.”

SMIRK – developing a new mobile resource from an existing project

Purpose – The purpose of this case study describes the process of designing and building SMIRK, a mobile information literacy and communication skills package. It describes the original package, SMILE, and the problems in its use and development. SMILE is not suitable for use on all mobile devices, so it had to be adapted and rewritten to meet our users’ needs. The selection of a software package and the practical issues involved with building the new product is outlined. Plans for future development and use in the university environment are described. Design/methodology/approach – The problems with the original package are described, and the requirements for a new version are listed. The software selection process and factors affecting it are outlined. Practical issues in the build are described and solutions presented. Findings – This paper presents the use of software designed for the creation of small mobile sites in a new “nested” way to provide a larger, easy to use mobile site. Research limitations/implications – The use of the existing and new sites is examined by the use of Google analytics, and feedback is collected using Google forms. This can be used to inform further development of the sites. SMIRK will be made available as an open educational resource (OER), and its reuse will be monitored using Jorum analytics. This should help inform the wider OER community in the field of information literacy. Practical implications – SMIRK will be embedded in virtual learning environment modules to support face-to-face training in information literacy and communication skills. This will be presented as a set of deep links directly to small information units which can be used by students on their smartphones or tablets. Social implications – SMIRK is available on the open web, so anyone can use it. It has been publicised at the Scottish information literacy group which contains members from all library sectors, so we hope that it will be used in further education (FE) and possibly secondary schools to provide a set of transferable skills. Originality/value – This case study describes a novel way of using Dreamweaver’s JQuery mobile function to create a new online product to support information literacy and communication skills training in the academic environment.

Graduate information literacy in online education using the embedded librarian model

Copyright for the article content resides with the authors, and copyright for the publication layout resides with the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals, Information Literacy Group. These Copyright holders have agreed that this article should be available on Open Access. ‘By 'open access' to this literature, we mean its free availability on the public internet, permitting any users to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of these articles, crawl them for indexing, pass them as data to software, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without financial, legal, or technical barriers other than those inseparable from gaining access to the internet itself. The only constraint on reproduction and distribution, and the only role for copyright in this domain, should be to give authors control over the integrity of their work and the right to be properly acknowledged and cited.’

LILAC 2014 Conference report: a student’s perspective

Copyright for the article content resides with the authors, and copyright for the publication layout resides with the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals, Information Literacy Group. These Copyright holders have agreed that this article should be available on Open Access. ‘By 'open access' to this literature, we mean its free availability on the public internet, permitting any users to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of these articles, crawl them for indexing, pass them as data to software, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without financial, legal, or technical barriers other than those inseparable from gaining access to the internet itself. The only constraint on reproduction and distribution, and the only role for copyright in this domain, should be to give authors control over the integrity of their work and the right to be properly acknowledged and cited.’

Welsh Information Literacy Project: Phase 4 2013/14

Copyright for the article content resides with the authors, and copyright for the publication layout resides with the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals, Information Literacy Group. These Copyright holders have agreed that this article should be available on Open Access. “By 'open access' to this literature, we mean its free availability on the public internet, permitting any users to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of these articles, crawl them for indexing, pass them as data to software, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without financial, legal, or technical barriers other than those inseparable from gaining access to the internet itself. The only constraint on reproduction and distribution, and the only role for copyright in this domain, should be to give authors control over the integrity of their work and the right to be properly acknowledged and cited.”

Event report: Writing research proposals and publications

Copyright for the article content resides with the authors, and copyright for the publication layout resides with the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals, Information Literacy Group. These Copyright holders have agreed that this article should be available on Open Access. “By 'open access' to this literature, we mean its free availability on the public internet, permitting any users to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of these articles, crawl them for indexing, pass them as data to software, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without financial, legal, or technical barriers other than those inseparable from gaining access to the internet itself. The only constraint on reproduction and distribution, and the only role for copyright in this domain, should be to give authors control over the integrity of their work and the right to be properly acknowledged and cited.”

Longitudinal update:

Copyright for the article content resides with the authors, and copyright for the publication layout resides with the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals, Information Literacy Group. These Copyright holders have agreed that this article should be available on Open Access. “By 'open access' to this literature, we mean its free availability on the public internet, permitting any users to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of these articles, crawl them for indexing, pass them as data to software, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without financial, legal, or technical barriers other than those inseparable from gaining access to the internet itself. The only constraint on reproduction and distribution, and the only role for copyright in this domain, should be to give authors control over the integrity of their work and the right to be properly acknowledged and cited.”

Confidence as an indicator of research students’ abilities in information literacy:

Copyright for the article content resides with the authors, and copyright for the publication layout resides with the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals, Information Literacy Group. These Copyright holders have agreed that this article should be available on Open Access. “By 'open access' to this literature, we mean its free availability on the public internet, permitting any users to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of these articles, crawl them for indexing, pass them as data to software, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without financial, legal, or technical barriers other than those inseparable from gaining access to the internet itself. The only constraint on reproduction and distribution, and the only role for copyright in this domain, should be to give authors control over the integrity of their work and the right to be properly acknowledged and cited.”

Supporting research at the Faculty of Medicine:

Librarians providing information literacy training to Imperial College London’s medicine faculty have set up a successful working model implemented by the Imperial Library Medicine Information Literacy Group (MILG). MILG was created to improve and develop library services to support the Faculty of Medicine at Imperial College and to overcome the many challenges librarians face when attempting to provide information literacy training. These challenges include keeping up to date with new developments in their subject area, maintaining effective liaison with their faculty, updating their own skills and ensuring that they provide relevant and informative training sessions. MILG’s achievements include a successful, coordinated approach to liaison which has led to information literacy training being embedded into the curriculum of the Faculty of Medicine. The group has also developed working practices that allow its members to maintain and update their skills through professional development and “train the trainer” sessions. MILG members maintain current awareness within their subject area through the use of resource champions and make use of the latest technologies when they are training. The group uses a variety of methods to improve both the quality and relevance of the information literary training it provides. This involves adapting training to meet the changing needs of the medicine faculty and developing new ways of staying in contact with library users such as the Imperial Library medicine blog. This article outlines the work of MILG and explains how the group’s development has enabled its members to better coordinate library services across six campus libraries. This working model has already been successfully adapted by other library teams within Imperial College London and could be adapted to meet the needs of librarians outside Imperial.