From "The Spectrum of Apple Flavors" to "We are all Zebras: How Rare Disease is Shaping the Future of Healthcare," we find colorful visual displays of information and data used to persuade, inform and delight their audience-readers. Most infographic assignments result in loose collections of related facts and numbers, essentially a collage or poster. Student create displays of unrelated factoids and spurious data correlations and they "ooh" and "ahhh" at beautiful nothings. However, the visual and textual elements of an infographic can culminate in a coherent multimodal argument which prompts inquiry in the creator and the audience.  In order to teach infographics as a claim expressed through visual metaphor, supported by reasoning with evidence in multiple modes, instructors employ a sequence of interventions to invoke the relevant skills and strategies at appropriate moments.  Composing and critiquing infographics can enhance understanding of both the content and rhetoric, since people analyze, elaborate and critique information more deeply when visual and textal modes are combined (Lazard and Atkinson 2014).This pedagogy of reading and writing multiple literacies can be adapted to other multimodal products. For an overview, refer to "Recipe for an Infographic" (Abilock and Williams 2014) which is also listed in the references for this module. We recommend that you experience this process yourself as you teach it to students.   

From "The Spectrum of Apple Flavors" to "We are all Zebras: How Rare Disease is Shaping the Future of Healthcare," we find colorful visual displays of infGrotewold, K. (2020, August). Framework for analysis of visual information. In Assessing Visual Materials for Diversity & Inclusivity. https://www.oercommons.org/courseware/lesson/69336/. Licensed as CC BY-NC-SA   

This is a chart of instructional teaching strategies for use by librarians teaching information literacy. It is aligned with the ACRL Framework for Information Literacy for use in higher education classrooms. The examples include flipped, online, and in-person lesson ideas.

he Inheritance is a video game that uses storytelling to teach the ACRL framework Information Creation as a process. The game can be an engaging way for librarians to teach the abstract concept. The objective is not only about reaching the end of the game safely, but also, about gathering the necessary items along the way to solve the mystery. You will have a checklist of items that you must gather in order to make it through the game. We used Twine, an application made for game creation, to visualize our concept. This game gets quite complex as you go, so it is recommended that you keep a piece of paper on hand to track your progress. Also, if you do not make it through the game on your first play-through, it is recommended that you try again! Finally, if you choose to listen to the narration clips throughout the game, it enhances the immersive experience. Overall, have fun playing our game! The goal was to allow the user to enjoy the process, rather than putting so much emphasis on reaching the end. Now you can simply download the zip file, open it, and click on index.html. Created by students in ISI 6372 Information Literacy at the University of Ottawa, Winter 2020.

Use this resource to introduce the idea of authority and scholarly conversation, and how that relates to student work.

The idea of Threshold Concepts has been widely discussed in higher education for more than a decade. As defined by Jan H.F. Meyer and Ray Land, a threshold concept “can be considered as akin to a portal, opening up a new and previously inaccessible way of thinking about something. It represents a transformed way of understanding, or interpreting, or viewing something without which the learner cannot progress”.  (Meyer, J., & Land, R. (2003). Put another way, threshold concepts are the core ideas and principles in any discipline that often become second nature to experts, but may be completely foreign to the novice. And yet, without an understanding of these core concepts, learners cannot progress in further learning in any given subject area. As with all academic disciplines, threshold concepts exist in the area of Information Literacy; grasping information literacy threshold concepts is essential for students to become effective researchers.In 2015, the American Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) replaced their Information Literacy Competency Standards, with a “Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education”. The Framework is organized into six Frames, each anchored by an information literacy threshold concept and supported by a set of knowledge practices and dispositions. These six information literacy threshold concepts include:Authority is Constructed and ContextualInformation Creation is a ProcessInformation Has ValueResearch as InquiryScholarship as ConversationSearching as Strategic ExplorationBased on the research studies and experiences of academic instruction librarians who see first-hand the challenges students experience when conducting college-level research, the new Framework was developed to support information literacy instruction in the digital age. The literature suggests that most students entering college are unprepared for the rigors of academic research. (Head, A. J. (2013). If students can gain an understanding of these six threshold concepts, they will likely be better researchers and generally more successful in their academic work.What are the implications of this huge paradigm shift in college-level research instruction for school librarians? Simply put, school librarians have a wonderful opportunity to prepare students for college level research by systematically teaching information literacy threshold concepts in grades K-12. A scaffolded information literacy instruction program focused on threshold concepts along with standards and skills could help pave the way for students to be effective college researchers. With an estimated 30% of US college and university students dropping out after their first year, preparing research savvy students for the demands of college assignments could have a significant impact on student success and ultimately on college graduation rates.  Instructional ObjectivesBy the completion of Module 1, students will be able to identify a threshold concept from their field or discipline and design a learning activity that could be used to teach this concept.By the completion of Module 2, students will be able to identify one or more stumbling blocks that students encounter when conducting academic research, and describe how a better grasp of one of the six ACRL Information Literacy threshold concepts could help overcome this research barrier.By the completion of Module 3, students will be able to create a lesson plan for a K-12 classroom which teaches or reinforces the threshold concept “Research as Inquiry”. 

According to Project Information Literacy, defining and narrowing a topic is the most difficult step for beginning undergraduate researchers. This concept mapping lesson is designed to reinforce the idea that when students are writing academic papers or creating class projects they are engaging in a scholarly conversation.

Students develop their reading, writing, research, and technology skills using graphic novels. As a final activity, students create their own graphic novels using comic software.

The Types of Information lesson is mapped to the Information Creation as a Process Frame and introduces various types of information in relation to typical research questions. Characteristics of information are discussed including what criteria can be used to identify popular, professional, and scholarly materials.

This resource is a guide on how to use Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools while undertaking university study and research.

It explores the multifaceted role of AI in research planning, content creation, evaluation, and publication. It delineates the benefits, risks, and ethical considerations of utilising AI tools in various stages of your study and research, emphasising the importance of critical evaluation and responsible use. From leveraging AI for brainstorming research ideas to evaluating AI-generated content and navigating legal and ethical complexities in publication, this resource offers a comprehensive guide for students and researchers to harness the potential of AI while navigating its limitations and ethical challenges.

An overview of how to use Films on Demand.  All videos are close captioned.

Created by a librarian and science communication professional for COVID Alliance Senior Support team of New Hampshire, an all volunteer effort supporting long term care and other senior residential facilities during the COVID-19 pandemic. This tool provides communication tips and links to resources for understanding and responding to vaccine hesitancy. Useful for any courses dealing with this topic or with misinformation and trust, such as librarianship, information literacy, public health, and behavioral science.

With the vast amount of information that can be found as quickly as a mouse click, it is easy to think that all information is free. However, information and access to it is paid for by someone and is not all created equally. In this lesson, students will explore the value and cost of information and learn how to make wise information decisions.

The web gives us many strategies and tactics and tools, which, properly used, can get students closer to the truth of a statement or image within seconds. For some reason we have decided not to teach students these specific techniques. As many people have noted, the web is both the largest propaganda machine ever created and the most amazing fact-checking tool ever invented. But if we haven't taught our students those capabilities is it any surprise that propaganda is winning?

This is an unabashedly practical guide for the student fact-checker. It supplements generic information literacy with the specific web-based techniques that can get you closer to the truth on the web more quickly.

This is an unabashedly practical guide for the student fact-checker. It supplements generic information literacy with the specific web-based techniques that can get you closer to the truth on the web more quickly.

We will show you how to use date filters to find the source of viral content, how to assess the reputation of a scientific journal in less than five seconds, and how to see if a tweet is really from the famous person you think it is or from an impostor.

We’ll show you how to find pages that have been deleted, figure out who paid for the web site you’re looking at, and whether the weather portrayed in that viral video actual matches the weather in that location on that day. We’ll show you how to check a Wikipedia page for recent vandalism, and how to search the text of almost any printed book to verify a quote. We’ll teach you to parse URLs and scan search result blurbs so that you are more likely to get to the right result on the first click. And we’ll show you how to avoid baking confirmation bias into your search terms.

"Web Search Strategies" introduces the best ways to use search engines to find information on the web. The video uses real-world examples that illustrate ways to reduce useless results

A short introduction to wikis focused a group of people that plan a camping trip using a wiki.