information literacy you are the expert! maureen henninger [email protected]

Information literacyyou are the expert!

Maureen [email protected]

SLAV, Information literacy 2005 ©Maureen Henninger 2

The 7 faces of information literacyThe 7 faces of information literacy

1. Using information technology for information retrieval and communication

2. Finding information located in information sources 3. Executing information processes4. Controlling information5. Building up a personal knowledge base in a new area

of interest 6. Working with knowledge and personal perspectives

adopted in such a way that novel insights are gained 7. Using information wisely for the benefit of others


Conference themesConference themes

The effectiveness of collaborative partnerships Collaborative learning & teaching teams

ICT supported learning Designing interactive digital learning products Communication skills

Is this the 8th Face of information literacy?


Your comfort zone under attackYour comfort zone under attack

YOURCOMFORT

ZONE

RSS

Version 989.3.9.7

blogs

Web?Database?

Subscription?

interdisciplinary work

constantly changing

technologies

complexities of information environment

team work expectations

uncertaintymulti-skillsrequirement

new technologies

cross-functional projects


complexities of information environment

new technologies

YOURCOMFORT

ZONE

interdisciplinary work

constantly changing

technologies

team work expectations

uncertaintymulti-skillsrequirement

cross-functional projects


An information ecologyAn information ecology

‘An information ecology is a system of people, practices, values, and technologies in a particular environment’

(Nardi and O’Day, 1999)

TranslatorsFacilitatorsTeachersMediators

teacher-librarianskeystonespecies


Communicating our expertiseCommunicating our expertise

Quality ‘stuff’ Finding Sifting Filtering Disseminating

Peter Steiner (1993). The New Yorker, 69 (20) p. 61


Cyber somewhereCyber somewhere

The Web Approximately 6-8 billion documents Collected into directories Indexed by search engines

The invisible Web Approximately 550 billion documents Stored in databases NOT indexed by Web search engines


What are the tools?What are the tools?

Two general categoriesSearch engines

General Specialised (by subject)

Directories General (catalogues of resources) Specialised (subject gateways) Directories of directories, databases


Directories vs search enginesDirectories vs search engines

Catalogue of resources created by humans

Most popular are commercial, eg. Galaxy, Open Directory

Use for broad subject treatment

Often indiscriminate in quality

Database of keywords created by computer robots

Huge databases — Google points to 8+ billion documents

Use for unique documents, highly specific information

No quality control


Search enginesSearch engines Only two major general ones

Google and Yahoo End of 2003 AltaVista and AlltheWeb

purchased by Yahoo Killed off April 2004

Minor ones, e.g. HotBot , MSN and Teoma

Specialised ones, eg. RocketInfo, GoogleNews (news), AskJeeeves

for Kids, SportQuest, Topica (discussion groups)


Trusted, value-added resourcesTrusted, value-added resources

Evaluated resources Similar to an academic library Selection criteria for inclusion e.g. BUBL, Infomine

Resources with added metadata for detailed searching, e.g. author, ERIC subjects

Subject gateway Specialised collection Selected by subject experts Evaluated & annotated resources Similar to an art library e.g. Artifact


What are you looking for?What are you looking for?

Searching for specific information or documents

Looking for general information ‘Just browsing’ ‘I need a fact’ Monitoring


Searching for a specific documentSearching for a specific document

Tools publisher’s site; a search engine

Examples A homepage

Use Google to find Artifact, which is part of the Resource Discovery Network in the U.K. – use I'm Feeling Lucky!

The Australian report “Rural Teacher Education" Use Yahoo

"rural teacher education" AND inurl:au Limit the search to pdf format


Traditional vs search engine searchingTraditional vs search engine searching

Traditional database searching Relied on ‘exact match’ strategies

Boolean operators Proximity operators Content in specific fields

New algorithms being developed by search engines Fuzzy logic, clustering, vector analysis Google’s ‘page ranking’ based on citation

searching


Best results with search enginesBest results with search engines

‘Conceptualise’ your search Use whatever advanced searching techniques are

available (more on this later) Boolean operators (but be prepared for them not

to be accurate) Proximity operators (phrase searching only) Field searching, e.g. in the title, in the site, url

Why use advanced searching techniques To get more precise/relevant results Techniques are used in database searching


Search exampleSearch example

1st set of concepts 2nd set of concepts 3rd set of concepts

Australian policy Australia Australian government

Chinese policy China Chinese government

reducing government policy policy

global warming reducing reducing

global warming global warming

I need information on Australian or Chinese government policy for reducing global warming

Searching with each set of concepts would return different documents


Searching with YahooSearching with Yahooglobal warming australia china policy 115,000

"global warming" australia china policy

102,000

"global warming" AND (australia OR china OR chinese) AND (policy OR policies) not accurate results

480,000

intitle:"global warming" intitle:australia OR intitle:china policy not accurate results

414,000

450,000

intitle:"global warming" intitle:australia policy 54


Best technique with YahooBest technique with Yahoo

Use the basic search for simple Boolean statementsintitle:“rural teacher education” site:auintitle:"search engines" intitle:research site:edu

Use the advanced search for Restricting file format Mixing operators

WARNING!

I am still trying to figure out what Yahoo does!


Searching with GoogleSearching with Googleglobal warming australia china policy 228,000

"global warming" australia china policy

157,000

"global warming" australia OR china OR Chinese policy OR policies

864,000

"global warming" ~policy ~australia OR ~china

1,100,000

allintitle:"global warming" ~policy ~australia OR ~china

4

intitle:"global warming" intitle:~policy intitle:~australia OR intitle:~china

648

intitle :"globa l warming" ~Austra lia OR ~China -inurl:com

10,700


Current search syntaxCurrent search syntaxSearch engine

Simple search

Advanced search

Boolean Nesting Proximity Truncation Field search

Google

Yes

Yes

OR AND is automatic

No

" "

No ~ for plurals & synonyms

intitle: allintitle: inurl: link: site: filetype:

Yahoo

Yes

Yes

Maybe?? OR AND is automaticNOT

No

" "

No

intitle: inurl: site: url:


Specialised search enginesSpecialised search engines

AskEric (education) AskJeeves for Kids Bartleby (reference books) Biographical Dictionary OneKey (“Google for kids”) PeachPod


ExampleExample

Use OneKey to find Web information on Australian rainforest frogs

allintitle:~frog ~australia rainforest


Browsing, general informationBrowsing, general information

Tools Directories, subject gateways

Examples General directory

Use Open Directory to find information on dinosaurs Directory of evaluated resources

Use BUBL to find Web resources on dinosaurs


Specialised education gatewaysSpecialised education gateways

AwesomeLibrary EDNA Educator’s Reference Desk European Schoolnet GEM MarcoPolo SOSIG: Education


Selected directories of gatewaysSelected directories of gateways Australian Subject Gateways BUBL Link BIOME PINAKES WWW Virtual Library


ExamplesExamples

1. Use MarcoPolo to find algebra lesson plans for 6-8 grades students

2. Use the WWW Virtual Library to find an information literacy subject gateway


Monitoring - keeping upMonitoring - keeping up

News search engines eg. RocketInfo Journal scans eg. Ingenta Subject gateways

often have the “latest news” Education monitoring services

Australia.edu Blogs and RSS


Blogs & RSSBlogs & RSS

Disseminate information quickly Help prevent information overload Blogs

‘web page containing brief, chronologically arranged items of information’

Information Literacy Weblog Library Weblogs

RSS (Real Simple Syndication) A distribution tool Feeds tool


‘Surface’ Web static Web documents - html format

‘Deep’ or ‘invisible’ Web Digital material search engines do not or can not index

database-driven html documents ephemeral content eg. current news grey literature eg. technical & government reports non-html formats eg. pdf files database content

The ‘deep’ or ‘invisible’ Web


Examples of educational databasesExamples of educational databases

AskERIC CHID (Combined Health Information

Database) Education-line (electronic texts in education

& training) Home Economics Database World Data on Education (UNESCO)


ProblemProblem

Suppose you want authoritative information about Australian natural resources Search for “natural resources

database” Australia on Google

Results — list of 2,080

Which is the ‘best’ one?

If you knew of ANRO

Use Google’s I’m feeling lucky


Discovery & accessDiscovery & access

A two step process

1. Finding a database which may have the required information

2. Formulating, issuing and refining a search query in the database


Directories of searchable databasesDirectories of searchable databases

Academic Info BUBL Collection of Special Search Engines Direct Search Infomine Internet Public Library Invisible Web (Intelliseek) DADI (Les bases de données gratuites sur

Internet) Librarians' Index to the Internet


ExampleExample

Authoritative information on amphibians Use AcademicInfo to find an appropriate

database(amphibia OR frog) AND database

ORuse the index Sciences > Environmental Studies > Biodiversity > Databases


What the search engines are doingWhat the search engines are doing Contracting to index database content

Yahoo includes Library of Congress, UCLA Cuneiform digital

library, OAIster (Open Archives Initiative) project, National Science Digital Library

Integrates content with visible web results Google includes

OCLC’s WorldCat, IEEE Abstracts, PubMed General, various publishers

Separate service, Scholar


ScholarScholar

Seems to emphasise science & technology

No definition of “scholarly” Provides citation indexing, ie. who

has cited the item Many results are ‘citations’

You may not be able to read the document if you don’t have a subscription


Scholar’s interfaceScholar’s interface Basic search

intitle: allintitle: author:

Advanced search As above, plus Publication Date ranging


Articles about information literacy and school libraries by Tood, Moore or Bruce written since 1998

intitle:"information literacy" "school libraries" author:todd OR author:bruce OR author:moore


Keystone speciesKeystone species

Maintain and build our literacy Move out of your comfort zone Monitor trends, explore, experiment,

dare, play seriously Communicate our expertise

information literacy you are the expert! maureen henninger [email protected]

Documents