Reflections on how librarians teach information literacy

Abstract

This book will help librarians to reflect on and improve their teaching to meet the contemporary needs of their learners and develop the information and digital skills of students. Librarians who teach don’t need reminding of the many definitions that exist for information literacy from ALA, ANCIL and CILIP as examples. Equally important in current library instruction is the JISC definition of digital literacy: “equipping students to live, learn and work in a digital society” (JISC, 2019). As information literacy instruction does, the contributions in this book transcend subject discipline. Rather than prescribing one single ‘best’ way of teaching, the book presents a range of pedagogical approaches, giving librarians a menu of options to experiment with to suit them, their topic, their institution and its learners. This book has practical advice on how to help students learn new skills from library instructional sessions.

Keywords

• Library instruction; information literacy; teaching; pedagogies