Knowing How Your Students Know (And Helping Them Know Better) Learning College Day, 2006 Troy Swanson

Session 6, 3:45 p.m. Oh, Man!

Info Economy & Necessary Skills Peter Drucker (Post-Capitalist Society 1993) indicates that the knowledge economy needs individuals that can think across disciplines. This would require “a methodology for problem definition—even more urgently perhaps than it requires the currently fashionable methodology for ‘problem solving. It requires systematic analysis of the kind of knowledge and information a given problem requires...”(p.193)

Basic Problem The Amount of “Information” is doubling less than every 18 months. The Internet is more than 17 times the size of the library of Congress. Students need to make judgments about information Are we preparing them to do this?

Range of Information Tools Average Moraine Student MVCC Library Catalog 75 suburban libraries 100+ Academic libraries 40 Databases Google, Yahoo, Ask.com Google Print, Google Scholar Government research tools, etc Wikipedia

Novice vs. Expert Novice Knows comparably little about topic Unaware of existing sources, experts, or search tools Has little to no experience interpreting metadata (publication, type of information, etc) Does not make Predictive Judgments Expert Internal Knowledge-base Has expectation for existing knowledge Collects Most Information from colleague or citations When searching, evaluates results with past knowledge using metadata (publication, type of information, etc) Makes Predictive Judgments

Novice & Expert Expert can more clearly articulate an Information Need Expectation for level of credibility for desired information Recognition of possible points-of-view to consider Definition of various topics that might be relevant to the topic Consideration of timeliness of needed sources Use this understanding to select tools to use to search for desired information

Two Key Areas to Consider Knowledge Orientation of Students “...what individuals believe about how knowing occurs, what counts as knowledge and where it resides, and how knowledge is constructed and evaluated” (Barbara Hofer, 2004) A conceptual understanding Information Literacy Skills MVCC General Education Objective: locate, use, and evaluate information An observable skills set

Knowledge Orientation Nature of Beliefs Self Reinforcing Established Early in Life Classroom Setting Not Conducive to Change Lisa Bendixen (UNLV) Simple Knowledge Certain Knowledge Omniscient Authority Quick Learning Fixed Ability

Information Literacy Skills That Tell Us About Information Value Information: how do we choose between sources? Purpose of Information: do we recognize different types of information? Evaluate Information: can we judge the usefulness of a source once we have it?

So, Let’s take a test No pressure

Score Your Test Strongly Agree = 5 Agree = 4 Neither = 3 Disagree = 2 Strong Disagree = 1 We will go over the IL questions

Knowledge Orientation Scores Structure 2.313 Certainty 3.202 Source 2.601

Info Lit Scores Value 1.568 out of 3 Purpose 1.25 out of 3 Evaluate 1.3.13 out of 3

Students who have a more complex knowledge orientation are more likely To spend more time on school work To not dodge difficult problems To stand on their own opinions To recognize who their own beliefs impact their learning To understand different types of evidence in sources

What can we do? Problem Structure Well structured vs Ill-structured Low vs High levels on Bloom’s taxonomy (challenges of No Child Left Behind) Create assignments that challenge students to examine their own beliefs.

Works Cited Bates, M., (1989). The design of browsing and berrypicking techniques for the online research interface. Online Review 13, (5): 409–10. Bell, D. (1973). The coming of post-industrial society: a venture in social forecasting. New York: basic books. Bendixen, L. and Rule, D. (2004). An integrative approach to personal epistemology: Educational Psychologist. 39, 1, 69-80. Drucker P. (1993). Post-Capitalist society. Harpercollins. Hofer, B. (2004). Introduction: paradigmatic approaches to personal epistemology. Educational Psychologist 39, 1-3. Kuhlthau, C. (1993). Seeking meaning: a process approach to library and information science. Norwood, NJ: Ablex Publishing. Rieh, S. (2002). Judgment of information quality and cognitive authority in the Web. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology. 53(2): 145-161. Schommer-Aikins, M. (2004). Explaining the epistemological belief system: introducing the embedded systemic model and coordinated research approach. Educational Psychologist. 39, 1 19-29. Wilson, P. (1983). Second-hand knowledge. Westport, CN: Greenwood Press.