technology in information literacy: an appeal

By Meredith Farkas 3/17/20053 Comments

I’m going to be doing a presentation on information literacy in a few weeks, and I’m planning on looking at how new technologies can be used in information literacy instruction. I was thinking of looking at screencasting/flash tutorials (using camtasia, captivate, etc.), podcasting, wikis, blogging, rss, social bookmarking (del.icio.us, FURL, etc.), or anything else that I can’t think of at the moment. I’ve been reading Weblogg-ed a lot lately and all this stuff gets me so excited! I love the technology, but seeing how people are using it in education really makes me crazy. It makes my head spin (in a good way)! If any of my readers have any insights into the practical applications, have used these tools to instruct patrons at your library, or know of libraries that are doing it please comment on this post or contact me. Thanks!

Last updated on 3/17/2005

Meredith Farkas

Meredith Farkas is a faculty librarian at Portland Community College in Oregon. From 2007-2021, she wrote the monthly column “Technology in Practice” for American Libraries. Meredith was honored in 2014 with the ACRL Instruction Section Innovation Award, in 2008 and 2011 with the WISE Excellence in Online Education Award and in 2009 with the LITA/Library Hi Tech award for Outstanding Communication in Library and Information Technology. She has been writing the blog Information Wants to be Free since 2004.

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3 Comments

Chad

3/17/2005, 3:01 pm

Hi Meredith. It sounds like you are planning a very interesting presentation. I have been using a blog to complement my instruction/information literacy efforts for about a year. My Business Blog has been an effective tool in providing access to resources outside of the classroom. Because I can post resources on the blog, I can address more about information literacy in the library instruction sessions. Given that most of the sessions that I teach are limited to 50-60 minutes, the blog is a great way to point students to resources or concepts that I did not have time to cover in class. It is also a great way to make sure students/faculty are aware of new resources, and the blog is also a wonderful resource to promote library materials and services. Good luck with your presentation.
tangognat

3/18/2005, 11:18 am

This is more of a case of a library vendor using technology for instruction, but refworks has

Ivan Chew

3/21/2005, 9:44 am

For the 9-11 anniversary in 2004, the libraries in my region started a blog (just one) as a way to engage the public to think about related issues like peace, racial harmony, citizenship etc. We also used the blog to publish related booklists. There was quite an active discussion going on for one of the blogpost (where as asked for people to tell us what 9-11 meant to them). We had a photo contest and the winners were posted on the blog. See http://thinkabout911.blogspot.com