Dear Allyson
What a great principal - he has it right and has given you heaps of time to prepare.
If I were you I would tell the principal that, as preparation, I had talked to the
teachers and
between us we had decided that the students needed to know how to search the
Internet using Google
Advanced Search in order to find the answers to a set of pre-determined questions
about the
Iditarod. (That gives you a goal with an assessable and measurable outcome.)
Invent a few of these questions so that you can demonstrate how you would use them
to teach how to
identify keywords from the questions and use these in the appropriate search
fields. (I believe we
need to acknowledge that Google is the search engine of choice in homes and so we
need to teach the
children how to use it effectively.)
Then I would step them through using Google Advanced using an interactive
whiteboard or a computer
connected to a digital projector so that all can see, starting with some familiar
questions such as
"Where is XYZ school in _____, NJ?" Or "What is on at the movies in ______?" The
purpose of this
part is to identify the best words to put in the search fields. "Will using this
word in the search
field help us get the information we want?" Then do a demo with an Iditarod
question with the class
contributing keywords. After each contribution, do a search and note the number of
results and
explain that the key is to get as few pages to select from as possible.
Having gathered a group of possible sites, I would then teach the children to
select one using the
URL details to determine which might be the most authoritative, and then scan the
menu to see if the
site is likely to answer their question. If the site appears to have the
information they want,
teach them to do a quick evaluation of the site for authenticity. There is a great
rubric for this
age at http://lrs.ed.uiuc.edu/students/rtrieger/rubric.htm although I would adapt
this to include
"How old is the information?" perhaps instead of "Did I learn something new?"
I would teach them to bookmark the site to return to it, in preparation for the
next lesson which
would focus on taking notes from the site. (Shows there is continuity and
connection to the
lessons.)
All that would be done as a whole-class demo although if there was time I'd let
them have a go as
couples to research a particular question. I am a great believer in collaborative
learning at this
age, having couples or small groups assigned one question each so the answers can
be pulled into
one presentation - better to learn by doing one thing really well than being
overwhelmed by too much
to do anything well.
I think the key thing to understand is that information literacy is not the same as
ICT literacy and
that it is about being able to locate, select, evaluate and use information from
any source,
whatever its format. There is a great presentation on Information literacy -the
most basic of
basics by Mike Eisenberg at
http://uweoconnect.extn.washington.edu/publicmbeinfolit/
Good luck - I wish I had had an opportunity like this
Barbara
Barbara Braxton
Teacher Librarian
COOMA NSW 2630
AUSTRALIA
E. barbara.288@bigpond.com
Together we learn from each other
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