A case study of faculty attitudes toward collaboration with librarians to integrate information literacy into curriculum
Date Issued
2008
Date
2008
Author(s)
Cha, Tien-Yu
Abstract
One of the major goals for the higher education sector is to equip students with information literacy (IL) skills and eventually to empower them with the capability of “learning to learn”. The most effective way within the LIS field to impart IL skills to students has been indentified to be by deeply engaging them with knowledge about the subject-specific course via faculty-librarian collaboration. Success depends on the faculty attitudes toward the collaboration with librarians in IL education. Therefore, it is imperative to understand the perspectives of the faculty regarding this issue.he purpose of this study was to explore faculty attitudes toward collaboration with librarians in integrating information literacy into their courses in order to foster a successful IL program in the future. Qualitative and quantitative approaches were employed to investigate faculty attitudes at Feng Chia University. Semi-structured interviews were conducted to identify the relevant variables. A self-developed survey instrument was adopted for further investigation through statistical inference.indings show that faculty consistently agree on the importance of IL competency for students. It was ascertained that faculty understand the effectiveness of integrating IL into their courses. In addition, they were willing to facilitate students’ IL skills through their courses. However, there were many issues concerning the implementation of IL education in their classes, including how teachers regard the appropriateness of using IL in a specific course, and a holistic IL curriculum design at the department level. Furthermore, students’ attitudes toward subject matter in general also affected faculty willingness to implement IL instruction. egarding ACRL IL Competency Standards, Standard Two ranks first when considering teaching IL skills in the subject-specific courses. Nevertheless, no significant differences were found between Standard Two, Standard Three and Standard Five.he Faculty demonstrated positive attitudes toward collaboration with librarians. Partnership was more favorable when utilizing strategies in developing students IL skills in their courses, while different attitudes were revealed between teaching higher order thinking skills and lower order thinking skills. Furthermore, age differences were observed in faculty perception on collaboration. Four concepts including Librarian Domain Knowledge, Librarian Professionalism, Curriculum Strategies, and Student Learning were identified as factors influencing collaboration by using factor analysis. It was found that Student Learning and Librarian Professionalism affect faculty most in their partnership attitudes toward IL integration strategies.ased on the results, five suggestions were made as follows: 1. Institutional policy should lay the foundation for a collaborative climate in IL education; 2. The library should develop strategies in collaborating with faculty in IL programs as well as in communicating with academics; 3. Instructional design should be included when incorporating IL into the curriculum; 4. Criteria for assessing student learning outcome should be developed jointly with faculty; 5. The librarians need to continually enhance their professional knowledge.
Subjects
information literacy
curriculum
collaboration
academic libraries
Type
thesis
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