Below are just a few active learning exercises that we can utilize in your classes! Please be in touch with the instruction team to discuss details and brainstorm further, depending on your assignment(s).
For more examples of ways to infuse the ACRL Information Literacy Frameworks Activities into your classes, see: https://lib.westfield.ma.edu/SCORE_PD/IL_Infused_Course_Activities
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Activity Title: Research Topic Concept Mapping
Description: Using pen and paper or online concept mapping tools, students are asked to make a mind map of their research question -- they can include relevant synonyms/keywords, related concepts and topics, etc. Students will be asked to use their mind maps to consider related or adjacent topics and make connections between different aspects of the topics that they're researching. After some time doing this individually, students will be asked to share concept maps with a partner for their feedback.
Relevant Framework: Research as Inquiry, Scholarship as Conversation
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Activity Title: Three Minute Essays
Description: Students will be given an index card or a sheet of paper and instructed to respond to a prompt for three minutes. When they are finished, there is a class discussion about the prompt. Possible prompts include: "What was your last trip to the library like?" or "In libraries, we often say 'information has value.' What do you think we mean by this? What does it mean to you?"
Relevant Framework: Flexible! Can cover many different Frames depending on the chosen prompt.
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Activity Title: Research Zines
Description: Students will be given supplies to make their own one-page books (or zines), with some prompts for their content. Students will be asked to dedicate at least one page of their zine to their preconceived notions of research. Students can add to their zines as we go through the class time, taking notes or writing down ideas that come to them. Zines are usually collected for assessment, but students can make photocopies.
Relevant Framework: Research as Inquiry, Searching as Strategic Exploration, Information Creation as a Process
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Activity Title: Sorting Machine Activity
Description: This activity works particularly well when students need to tell the difference between different types of sources, like primary/secondary or scholarly/popular. The object of the activity is to sort relevant materials into piles for each of the source types. Students will be given a physical resource, and asked to pass it in one direction for each of the types without speaking to their classmates. They are given two minutes to do this task, and are asked to evaluate each item that comes to them and to not trust their classmates' previous judgements. Afterwards, we recap the activity and materials as a class.
Relevant Framework: Information has Value, Research as Inquiry
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Activity Title: Information Cycle Activity
Description: Students are presented with a list of sources related to a particular event (creation of a work of art, publication of a research study, etc). Students work in groups to identify the chronological order in which these sources were published and for each publication identify the type of source (newspaper, magazine, scholarly journal, encyclopedia, etc.)
Relevant Framework: Information Creation as a Process, Scholarship as Conversation
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Information Literacy & Student Success
Blake, Joni, Melissa Bowles-Terry, N. Shirlene Pearson, and Zoltan Szentkiralyi. "The Impact of Information Literacy Instruction on Student Success: A Multi-Institutional Investigation and Analysis." Greater Western Library Alliance (2017). https://scholar.smu.edu/libraries_cul_research/13/
Burgoyne, Mary Beth, and Kim Chuppa-Cornell. "Beyond Embedded: Creating an Online-Learning Community Integrating Information Literacy and Composition Courses." The Journal of Academic Librarianship 41, no. 4 (July 2015). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.acalib.2015.05.005
Catalano, Amy Jo and Sharon Rose Phillips. "Information Literacy and Retention: A Case Study of the Value of the Library." Evidence Based Library and Information Practice 11, no. 4 (2016). https://doi.org/10.18438/B82K7W
Folk, A.L. "Reframing Information Literacy as Academic Cultural Capital: A Critical and Equity-Based Foundation for Practice, Assessment, and Scholarship." Association of College & Research Libraries 80, no. 5 (2019). https://doi.org/10.5860/crl.80.5.658
Laskin, Miriam, and Lucinda Zoe. "Information Literacy and Institutional Effectiveness: A Longitudinal Analysis of Performance Indicators of Student Success." Hostos Community College (2017). https://academicworks.cuny.edu/ho_pubs/60/
Riehle, C. and S. Weiner. "High-Impact Educational Practices: An Exploration of the Role of Information Literacy." Faculty Publications, UNL Libraries. https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/libraryscience/360/
Robison, Mark. "Connecting Information Literacy Instruction with Transfer Student Success." Reference Services Review 45, no. 3 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1108/RSR-10-2016-0065
Samson, Sue. "Information Literacy Learning Outcomes and Student Success." The Journal of Academic Librarianship 36, no. 3 (May 2010). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.acalib.2010.03.002
Soleymani, Mohammad Reza. "Investigating the Relationship Between Information Literacy and Academic Performance Among Students." Journal of Education and Health Promotion 3 (2014). doi: 10.4103/2277-9531.139677
Critical Thinking & Information Literacy
Goodsett, Mandi, and Hanna Schmillen. "Fostering Critical Thinking in First-Year Students through Information Literacy Instruction." College & Research Libraries (January 2022). https://doi.org/10.5860/crl.83.1.91
Collaborations between Librarians & Faculty
Adams, Nancy E., Maureen A. Gaffney, and Valerie Lynn. "The Role of Evidence-Based Practice in Collaborations between Academic Librarians and Education Faculty." portal: Libraries and the Academy 16, no. 4 (2016).
Dawes, Lorna. "Faculty Perceptions of Teaching Information Literacy to First-Year Students: A Phenomenographic Study." Journal of Librarianship and Information Science 51, no. 2 (2019).
The Framework
Miller, Marty. "Chapter 14: Framing the Visual Arts: The Challenges of Applying the Research as Inquiry Concept to Studio Art Information and Visual Literacy." In Disciplinary Applications of Information Literacy Threshold Concepts, edited by Samantha Godbey et al. ACRL, 2017.
Rapchak, Marcia. "That Which Cannot Be Named: The Absence of Race in the Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education." Journal of Radical Librarianship 5 (2019).
White, Anna M. "Reddit as an Analogy for Scholarly Publishing and the Constructed, Contextual Nature of Authority." Communications in Information Literacy 13, no. 2 (2019).
Threshold Concepts
Meyer, Jan H.F., and Ray Land. "Threshold Concepts and Troublesome Knowledge (2): Epistemological Considerations and a Conceptual Framework for Teaching and Learning." Higher Education 49, no. 3 (2005): 373-388.
