Information Literacy is a huge buzz word in the education world lately. I hope that this is a fad that doesn’t die because teaching our students how to be information literate really captures one of my core goals as an instructor.

What is “information literacy?” Ask two different people and you’ll probably get two different answers. I see it as going beyond just knowing – it’s going beyond just teaching our students facts and figures. Books can do that just fine. My goal as an instructor is to get my students to understand how to USE that knowledge in this world where information is available everywhere from a variety of different sources. How do we know when information is good or bad? How do we find good information? Once we find good information, how do we make sense of it? How do we find counter-arguments? How do we appreciate counter-arguments? How do we use our critical thinking skills to really “dissect” an idea? And how do we use information so that it has practical value? To me, being information literate means that you can adequately find, evaluate, and use information. And sadly, it’s a skill that way too many undergraduate students do not have.

I was talking to one of my students who did not do so well on one of my exams. She said to me, “In my other classes, you can just read the book and do well. That’s not the case in your class.” I’m glad this student had this revelation. You mean I have to do more than just read?? I’m also somewhat disheartened by this statement because it could mean that other instructors are not doing enough to encourage information literacy skills. They are just encouraging memorization. Anyone can memorize the definitions of a bunch of terms. You don’t need an instructor to help you do that. But, an instructor – a GOOD instructor – will encourage you to make think about where the definitions of those terms came from, whether there are alternate definitions, and how this term is important in the grand scheme of things.

Yes, designing exams that assess students’ information literacy skills is difficult. But I think we are doing students a disservice if we don’t challenge them in this way. It’s easy to design an easy course. But life is not easy and college is life training. Let’s encourage students to spend more time researching, reflecting, critiquing, and applying and less time staring blankly at the textbook Wikipedia page.

What are your feelings on the subject? Weigh in on this question, or via email at OPIEWeb@gmail.com.