Call for Chapters: Teaching Students How to Think About Information by TTW Contributor Troy Swanson

Call for Chapters: Not Just Where to Click: Teaching Students How to Think About Information

Editors:

  • Heather Jagman, Coordinator of Library Instruction, DePaul University, hjagman@depaul.edu
  • Troy Swanson, Department Chair of Library Services, Moraine Valley Community College, swanson@morainevalley.edu

Publisher: Association of College and Research Libraries

The editors are seeking chapters written by librarians or faculty members focusing on theoretical approaches, projects, assessments, instructional sessions, or curricula that teach students how to think about information. This book will focus on pedagogies that challenge students to dive deeper into authority, connect to prior knowledge, and construct knowledge in a world of information abundance. This book will also include chapters that bridge the gap between the epistemological stances and threshold concepts held by librarians and that of students.

How do librarians and faculty members move college students beyond the simple mechanics of online catalogs, search engines, and subscription databases? How do we encourage students to recognize the difference in information sources themselves? How do we motivate students to explore their own beliefs and work with sources that conflict with their beliefs?

We are seeking chapters that may include:

Part 1 Bridging the Gap Between Librarians, Students and Faculty: Conceptualizing Information

  • 1.1 Librarian Epistemologies and Beliefs: How do librarians think about information and the nature of knowledge? How does this approach to knowledge impact how librarians approach the classroom and learning?
  • 1.2 Student Epistemologies and Beliefs: What assumptions do students bring to the classroom about how information and knowledge are constructed? How do these assumptions impact information literacy and their interactions with libraries and librarians?
  • 1.3 Faculty Epistemologies and Beliefs: How do faculty assumptions about knowledge impact their interactions with librarians and students? How do discipline-specific epistemologies shape faculty approaches to learning, students, and information literacy?

Part 2 Making it Work: Teaching Students About Information

  • 2.1 The Nature of Expertise, Authority and Credibility: How do we teach students to understand and value authority and expertise? What assumptions and power structures are hidden in this understanding? In what ways do we teach students to utilize authority and build their own authority as scholars?
  • 2.2 Point of View and Source Bias: In what ways do we teach students to deal with explicit and hidden biases in sources? How do we encourage students to deal with and recognize their own biases?
  • 2.3 Cognitive Biases and Belief: How do we work with students to address confirmation bias, selection bias, and hindsight bias? How do we connect information literacy to personal belief?
  • 2.4 Data, Measurement and Interpreting the world: How do we teach students to deal with data, facts and measurements? How do we teach students to interpret empirical research? How do we encourage students to compare their beliefs about how the world works with actual measurements?
  • 2.5 Journalism & Witnessing the World: How do we teach students about the role of journalism? How do encourage students to interpret and value the journalistic enterprise?

Original research that directly reports student views and/or results from studies with students will be given preference.

Proposal Details:

  • Draft Title
  • Author Info
  • 300-500 Word Abstract and Brief Outline
  • Please also include a writing sample of some form

Please submit chapter proposals and writing samples to both Editors at hjagman@depaul.edu
swanson@morainevalley.edu by June 15, 2013.