Designing an information literacy program: Basic Elements
- 1. Designing an Information Literacy Program Natesh Subhedar DLIS, University of Delhi, 2019-20
- 2. Overview • The following slides provide rough guidelines on how to build and design your own Information Literacy program • Intended audience: Post Graduate students of Library and Information Science
- 3. Step 1: Talk about philosophy of Information Literacy • Information literacy courses aim to empower users to access, select (choose), understand and use the information resources in the maze of information • In the environment of information overload, information literacy courses are particularly relevant. They help to know the range and scope of information resources and how to select only credible, accurate ones.
- 4. Step 2: List the Contents • Introduction • Objectives • Methods of instruction • Structure & level • Course contents • Evaluation • Conclusion • References
- 5. Step 3: Objectives • Talk about what exactly you are going to cover within your topic: the breadth (range) of elements and the depth of each element • Specify the time and space coverage. E.g Recent times or last 100 years, limited to India or international, etc
- 6. Step 4: Mention your method(s) of Instruction Choose one or more from the options below: • Direct face-to-face instructional method: Lecture/ presentation, etc • Experiential instructional method: Here, the learners are actively involved in the session e.g discussing Practical examples and case studies and putting questions to the audience, conducting short quizzes • Interactive instructional method: Here, the learners are made to interact with one another and with the resources. The instructor is only the facilitator. • Independent instructional method: The learners interact with the resources more or less independent of external control of the instructor.
- 7. Step 5: What to mention in Structure & Level • Structure: Mention the intended audience, e.g post graduate students, research scholars, etc and the space coverage, e.g University of Delhi, Indian universities, etc • Level: Is the program basic level (simple concepts and popular language) or advanced (in-depth and scholarly)?
- 8. Step 5: Course Contents This is the main part of your IL programme. Please note it should be relevant and useful and take into account what the learners already know and what you what them to know
- 9. Step 6: Evaluation • You can request every programme participant to send in their feedback, with respect to your instruction method and relevance and usefulness of your course contents • You can prepare a questionnaire and give your email address • You can also administer a post-test just after the completion of your programme. • Evaluation can be long-term too, i.e., evaluating long term changes in awareness of the participants and relevance of your course contents.
- 10. Winding up • Never forget to include an Introduction and Conclusion to your IL program. • Always include references, in a standard citation style, at the end.