Marlene Asselin, PhD

University of British Columbia

and

Ray Doiron, PhD

University of Prince Edward Island

 

 

 

      Today’s students are no longer the people our education system was designed to teach. (Prensky, 2001)                                

 

 

As more and more educators face the impact of Web 2.0 (O’Reilly, 2005), and as we see emerging what could be called a Learning 2.0 environment, it becomes urgent to extend teaching to meet the literacy and learning needs of the Net Generation (e.g. Oblinger & Oblinger, 2005). These ‘new’ learners and their expanding literacy needs have major implications for current models of school library programs which are traditionally focused on reading promotion and information literacy skills. Discussions and resources about this challenge are rapidly appearing, appropriately within Web 2.0 environments (e.g. Classroom 2.0,  iBrary,  School Library Learning 2.0, and Library 2.0). Arising from these sites is the need to critically question long held tenets of school libraries and to create a new research-based vision that will accord with the current economic and social directions driving educational change (e.g. Partnership for 21st Century Learning, 2007; Government of Canada, 2002).

 

This wiki contributes to that process by gathering resources, exemplars and ideas to support the school library community as we embrace the excting new realities of school libraries 2.0. Throughout the site, we post the voices of new learners talking about how, when and why they use digital technologies. We also propose a framework for the work of school libraries in New Times (Luke & Elkins, 1998) based on research in new literacies, new learners, and new concepts of knowledge and drawn from multiple voices and perspectives and from academic, social, economic, and public media contexts.

 

 

 

Asselin, M. & Doiron, R. (2008). Towards a Transformative Pedagogy for School Libraries.

A paper presented at the American Educational Research Association Annual Meeting, New York, NY, March 26, 2008.

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Brave New World

 

Background on the Challenges we Face in Creating Renewed School Libraries

    Did you Know? - This video presents some sobering stats on youth and their use of technolgy. It's the future, here and now.

 

    Do Schools Today Kill Creativity? - This videocast contains the closing remarks made by Sir Ken Robinson at the TED conference.

 

    Microsoft 'Surface" Technology - This videocast provides an introduction to a whole new computer interface soon to change our whole lives (again!).

 

Welcome to the Human Network - Cisco Ad

 

In its advertisement, Cisco thinks of the planet as one large, interconnected human network.

Information travels instantly to all parts of the world;

People communicate instantly with each other;

Events are celebrated locally and globally simultaneously;

Knowledge is growing cumulatively, collaboratively and exponentially faster than any of us could imagine, even five years ago.

Business is conducted globally; markets are conceptualized as global; travel is interconnected; and world cultures are connecting and mixing more than they ever have.

 

People are not passive consumers of knowledge and information, but actual creators and distributors of new knowledge,

knowledge that is drawn from multiple text forms, multiple media formats and multiple perspectives and experiences.

This vision of a global human network raises many issues as we move forward in libraries.

 

The World Digital Library - Video

 

This is not a world without books.

This is not a world without libraries.

In fact, it is a world where libraries and people are fully integrated.

Cultures and languages are not barriers to learning.

Texts are multi modal/dimensional - visual, aural, print - the Book as Experience.

Libraries are not just places; they are an infinite number of learning spaces.

 ua

 

And it forces us to re-examine libraries and see them not just as places; they are spaces ---- virtual and real --- an infinite number of networked, learning spaces.

They are spaces that respond to the local learning and living needs of people and provide access to the global human network.

 

A Middle School Library on Teen Second Life - Video

 

 

 

 

 

New Literacies, New Learning and New Libraries

 

 

 

Who are the Learners of the Net Generation?

    Meet the New Learners - Students Today - a video

 

    Characteristics of the Learners of the Net Generation  Slideshow

 

    Chart for:  How They Learn and Their Identity

 

 

 

 

    Meret            Hannah          Kaitlyn             Alan

 

 

 

 

What are the literacies learners need today?

  Literacies needed by the Learners of the Net Generation

                                                                    -Slideshow

 

  Overview of New Literacies - a video

 

  Information Literacy Weblog - a great source of innovative ideas for teaching critical & information literacy.

 

  21st Century Literacies - A large set of teaching and learning strategies covering multiple literacies.

 

  Connectivism: A learning theory for the digital age. Gerorge Siemens posits a new theory connecting technology and creativity.

 

  What is new about the new literacies of online comprehensiion? - an excellent article by Donald Leu and several colleagues.

 

 

 

 

 

 

What is Learning like for the Net Generation?                                     

 

 

    The Web 2.0

                Understanding Web 2.0 - a video summary

 

                What is Web 2 0? Kathryn Greenhill - a slidecast

 

                Learning for the Net Generation. Article by Don Tapscott

 

                EduSpaces: The world's largest social networking site about education and learning

 

 

    Learning on the Internet  

                The New Literacies Sampler - an e-book by Knobel & Lankshear with many clear examples of teaching and learning new literacies.                                                                                                 

                How to Find a book  An online tutorial on searching for resources from the Prescott Campus Library

 

 

    Library 2 0 Cookbook - A common sense guide to new technologies

 

 

    2 Thrive in the 21st Century - This short video summarizes what new learners need to thrive and be successful.

 

    The New Workers -

                I am Knowledge Worker 2.0

 

                A Net Generation Worker - In this Video, one young women shares her ideas and experiences about work in the future for the Net Generation.

 

 

 

 

How Do We Teach the New Learners?

Slideshow 2

 

Our conclusions present a blueprint for educational change that is rooted in a set of transformative pedagogical principles that reflect a revisioned school library program (see Table 2). These principles can be categorized as:

(1) “what we teach” (the areas of knowledge, skill and attitude we must teach if new learners are to succeed); and

(2) “how we teach” (the approaches that capitalize on the learning styles and learning values of new learners.

 

While several of the principles may seem similar to traditional pedagogies developed for school library programs, they can no longer be seen as the “added-value” of having an effective school library, but as pervasive and ubiquitous to how we conceptualize and operate an effective “new”school library. We must use these principles to help us move away from the limiting metaphors of the past where we saw the school library as the “hub” or “heart” of a school; it is better thought of as the “brain” and the “nerve centre” of the school where learners gather in a “learning commons” built around inquiry, creativity and interconnected and interdependent communities. At the very least, we propose that these principles and the framework be used as a means of re-assessing and revising the school library.

 

When we teach the new learners:

 

(1)   We focus on teaching learners ‘how to learn’. More than ever, we must be focusing on developing in learners strong knowledge-building/creative skills and equip them with diverse and flexible competencies which they will need to live and learn throughout their lives. Naslund & Gustini (in press) provide excellent examples of how to use blogging, social networking and other Web 2.0 tools to engage learners in learning how to learn in digital contexts.

 

 

 

            Teaching Children to Learn - a book by Robert Fischer

 

 

(2)  We build collaborative, connected learning situations. We must create learning opportunities where learners work locally and globally with other learners to build new knowledge and access current and past knowledge. For example, we work together and build a class wiki on Animals of North America where we all contribute, link to authorities on the topic, interview virtually animal experts and pull together the existing knowledge on our topic using available online multi-media products while creating our own.

 

     NEXUS: Learning through connecting

 

 

     Connecting Schools and Communities

 

 

     Connected Classroom - a video

 

 

(3)   We capitalize on new learners’ social conscience and global perspective. Herein lies a great potential for engaging learners in making a difference in the world. We only have to look at the impact YouTube and other digital tools are having on issues such as in the current American Presidential race to learn that today’s youth are using new technologies to make a statement, lobby for change and wake people up to what is happening around them. We need to move away from the static social studies project where each student picked a country and “researched” it and give our learners meaningful tasks built around their global consciousness.

 

     Tapping the Power - a video

 

     Kids Speak out - a video

 

 

     CyberFair - Preparing for the Future - a video

 

(4)   We assign learners more control in their learning within a clear set of parameters. As educators, we find this particularly difficult. We tend to want learning to look the same yielding a common product at the end (a written essay on our favourite political leader for example). We would be better to set clear parameters for a task and let learners choose the ways and means to create a product that represents what we expected. For example that essay would be prepared digitally with links to political leaders’ policy statements, personal websites and video clips of recent speeches.

 

            Teaching and Learning with the Net Generation - article: Barnes, K., R. Marateo, and S. Ferris. 2007. Teaching and learning with the net generation. Innovate 3 (4).                      

                                                                                                                                                                    http://www.innovateonline.info/index.php?view=article&id=382

 

            New students, new tools, new possibilities: Creating digital learning environments. This NewBay Media e-book provides many ideas for teaching new literacies.

 

(5)   We use multiple and varied resources in teaching and learning contexts. If new learners are multi-modal in their learning styles, then they will gravitate to the resources that are first of all, most easily accessible, and that have the richest multimedia formats. Viewing images and reading texts are balanced as the key literacy processes used to study information and create new and varied texts. Doiron & Asselin (2005) provide examples of using a wide range of resources to build literacy and develop inquiry.

 MultiModal Learning & Literacy - This research project has many examples of using multiple resources in different ways.

 

             Multimodal Learning - This chapter summarizes the use of muliple resources in multiple contexts.

 

 

 

(6)   We teach learners the ethical issues associated with information use and knowledge building. Critical literacy should be the pervasive them that runs through all our work in the school library. We must use the medium itself, to teach learners to critique that very medium. Good examples are found in McPherson (in press) with activities (a) Investigating junk mail; (b) Reading media photographs; and (c) Deconstructing YouTube.

 

 

 

 

      Critical Literacy - This movie was created by pre-service teachers exploring what we need to teach youth today.

 

 

 

 

(7)   We teach learners to respect the work of others and to act responsibly as information literate citizens. The internet and the Web 2.0 environment seem like a free range where everything is there for the taking. Learners must come to understand at an early age that they have responsibilities as they take from and contribute to the expanding internet. What are intellectual propriety rights? What does open source mean? What should I be telling about myself? An information literate, global citizen must live and work in this world with respect and responsibility.

 

    Creative Commons - Full website with information and resources for establishing copyright.   

 

    Ten Common Copyright Myths - clear list of common issues in copyright.

 

New School Libraries for the New Learners

 

 

School Library Mash-up by Sharon Doyle & Lillian Trousdell. This Mash-up (created with Animoto) summarizes the key principles for New School Libraries.

 

A Librarian's 2.0 Manifesto

 

What would a 2.0 library look like? - This weblog gives a great overview of traits of 2.0 library.

                                                          Although it addresses libraries in general, there are many applications to school libraries.

Learning for Librarians - a video tour of San Jose program

 

 

Special Issue of School Libraries Worldwide, 14:2, July 2008