Information Literacy

One of my subjects this semester, Information Provision, is about being able to teach and to share your own knowledge with others. Information literacy is the key phrase here. It's being able to be information literate yourself, and then able to teach that knowledge on.

What is information literacy? According to the Alexandria Proclamation, which was a conference type thing, information literacy 'lies at the core of lifelong learning. It empowers people in all walks of life to seek, evaluate, use and create information effectively to achieve their personal, social, occupational and educational goals. It is a basic human right in a digital world and promotes social inclusion of all nations.' (link is here)

Librarians who are working in the information literacy field need to:

• recognise a need for information
• determine the extent of information needed
• access information efficiently
• critically evaluate information and its sources
• classify, store, manipulate and redraft information collected or generated
• incorporate selected information into their knowledge base
• use information effectively to learn, create new knowledge, solve problems and make decisions
• understand economic, legal, social, political and cultural issues in the use of information
• access and use information ethically and legally
• use information and knowledge for participative citizenship and social responsibility
• experience information literacy as part of independent learning and lifelong learning

All of these bullet points are from Australian and New Zealand Information Literacy Framework: Principles, Standards and Practice. You can find it here, it's quite an interesting read if you're into information literacy business.

It's all basically saying that it's not enough for a librarian to know how to search and do things on the Internet and help people find information; it's important that people are taught how to do these things for themselves. A librarian, it turns out, is an educator as well. Lucky I've got a Dip Ed!