DISCUSIÓN

librarians to lead them in this important initiative to prepare students for life-long learning and information literacy.

The information literacy concept is to prepare students for lifelong learning in an information society. Librarians want to bring about learning in students, and this teaching role provides them with an opportunity to demonstrate an information literacy approach to life. The challenge, therefore, is to use teaching methods and approaches that model information literacy practices (Hinchliffe, 2002: 95 - 96). This is another opportunity for librarians to be aware of the students‟ limitations and needs.

It is the opinion of the researcher that the librarian has a very important role to play, in helping students to recognize accurate and complete information, identifying potential sources of information, organizing and evaluating information, it cannot operate in isolation of other competencies that are necessary to make a person fully information literate. The shared goal of the university ought to be producing information literate graduates and faculty. The first task for the librarian therefore is to sensitize the faculty on the importance of information literacy skills, which are ideally transferable in any situation. So before the information literacy sessions can begin, the librarian needs to be proactive. Being so, the librarian needs to provide training to the lecturer. The librarian of course invites the lecturer to make arrangements for a lecture or hands-on presentation. In this way the librarian believes that it is essential for the lecturer to know what the student must know in order to be information literate. For some lecturers it is a first and for many a refreshing exercise.

A librarian needs to be open, approachable, friendly and interact with both the student and the lecturer. It is clear that regular informal contact with the librarian increases the serendipitous information gathering particularly about the library and information services (Wilson, 1977: 698 - 701).

3.16 Approaching the problems with solutions  

 identify the student‟s literacy needs,

 assist students who did not understand, and

 solicit the help of students who did understand to assist their peers.

The development of responsive facilitation techniques, including the ability to assist performance and to conceptually connect student and librarian, is of benefit to both parties as individuals and members of a group (Nations-Johnson, 1993: 7 - 8).

There are a few ways of approaching the presentation. There are the on-line tutorials and the information literacy instruction course. Where the lecture format is used as a training method, there is higher retention of concepts. By contrast, the online tutorial and guided hands-on lead to a higher retention of mechanical skills. The hands-on approach to instruction requires more resources and time for coaching. However the combination of both methods is worth investing in as it encourages students to adopt self-reliant search behaviours, develop a positive attitude and a strong motivation for students to continue to learn and practice their skills on their own (Ren, 2000: 323 - 326).

At the same time, it is alarming that a surprisingly significant number of first year students, are also in need of basic IT skills to enable them to exploit the electronic resources in the library, as well as writing of assignments. Once again the information literacy course includes assistance. With the necessary IT skills, their writing and presentation skills of their assignments could improve and lecturers could expect better results.

With all of above one can see why the integrated information literacy course is best, because effective teaching involves a change from presentation of information to student construction of meaning. Active learning experiences can help students become critical thinkers and problem solvers (Higgins & Cedar Face, 1998: 29). This could happen when both the librarian and lecturer are involved.

Doskatsch (2003: 112 - 113) goes further in stating that librarians need to respond to challenges by helping the academic create learning environments that require students to be actively involved in filtering, critically analyzing and synthesizing

information from a wide variety of information sources and formats outside the traditional lectures and set texts and books of readings. The librarian can contribute to the re-engineering of the teaching and learning environment:

 Resource discovery to support curriculum development;

 Facilitating the integration of information literacy into curricula by developing in collaboration with the faculty a range of online learning resources;

 Acting as intermediaries/facilitators to support access to resources and services in a complex information environment;

 Enabling simple, easy to use and direct access to resources and services;  Ensuring that librarians are part of curriculum development committees.

In order to improve learning opportunities for the students, the librarian and the lecturer develop and implement an assignment-specific extended instruction session with the focus on identified objectives pertaining to the discipline. This approach to library instruction is the departure from the traditional bibliographic instruction sessions. This instruction session is not limited to a single class period, students actively engage with the material through hands-on exercises and a focus on the discipline is enhanced. The librarian and lecturer begin the collaboration by identifying the objectives in relation to the course objectives. The primary objectives identified should be:

 The ability to identify and to define a research topic

 The ability to identify resources appropriate for the assignment

 The ability to critically evaluate these resources and to syntheses this material effectively

 The reduction of library anxiety

The first three objectives are designed to focus on subject-specific and practical skills. The fourth objective addresses the concerns of students‟ comfort and self- confidence levels in using the library resources to complete their research assignments (Paglia & Donahue, 2003: 322).

After identifying the objectives for the sessions, both librarian and students will develop a partnership with the assignment in mind to demonstrate what they have learned.

According to Phillips & Kearley (2003: 352 - 353), the structure of the sessions would be based on the ACRL Information Literacy Standards, so that students go through the research sequence to:

 Investigate a research topic for possible information sources  Search for information about a topic

 Locate the information within the UWC library  Evaluate the quality of information located; and

 Utilize that quality information in a paper, speech or project.

According to Paglia and Donahue (2003: 327) true collaboration draws on the expertise of each of the partners and the possibilities for creating genuine teachable moments are great. Judd & Tims (1996: 21 - 30) and Tims & Judd (2001: 157 - 162) believe the best option or method for information literacy is course-integrated methods using a team-teaching approach with students and collaborative teaching efforts that strive to impart not only bibliographic knowledge, but also critical thinking and literacy skills (Henninger & Hurlbert, 1996; Sterngold & Hurlbert, 1998). Many academic librarians perceive a credit course as a viable option for teaching such skills. Davidson (2001: 162 - 163) concluded that credit-bearing courses do provide an important method for teaching library and research skills, and that a strong instructional program should provide this opportunity. Donnelly (2000: 59 - 72) believes the availability of a credit course demonstrates the campus commitment to information literacy and can change the way students perceive the library. Donnelly also pointed out that giving academic credit is the way in which higher education legitimizes learning; the way by which students are told that certain skills and knowledge are important. For Angeley & Purdue (n.d.), information literacy credit courses are taught as a linked or a cluster course to a discipline course. This type of instruction has created opportunities to collaborate with the faculty from all disciplines, ensuring that course content and research methodologies are aligned. These information literacy instruction sessions are also designed with the academics in the disciplines to ensure relevance and appropriateness for a particular research assignment.

As this study chronicles the librarian-lecturer collaboration at UWC in the development and teaching of information literacy instruction, building a successful

information literacy infrastructure begins by creating a foundation of strong librarian- lecturer relationships in conjunction with faculty development programs. Building relationships with faculty is the critical component in creating an environment that fosters collaboration between the librarians and teaching faculty for information literacy instruction.

However, to be able to build this collaborative foundation with the faculty, librarians must overcome the obstacle of reaching faculty who operate from a culture define by narrow content focus, autonomy, time constraints and resistance to change (Haynes, 1996:195). The librarian faces challenges in initiating collaborative relationships with faculty as faculty‟s established perceptions of the library, their attitude toward librarians, and their own research expertise, influences the information literacy instruction of their students.

While librarians may be hard pressed to identify faculty willing to participate in personality measurement, librarians are using a number of relationship building strategies including formal communication, campus involvement, and informal contacts.

At UWC the CHS librarian have initiated formal communication with the faculty through liaison. These liaisons create a space for discussing information literacy. The Library-CHS faculty committee meetings were another platform to open dialog with academic department chairs and coordinate liaison activities. The librarian also agreed to meet on a formal scheduled planning meeting with the lecturers coordinating the first year students to plan information literacy activities. Some of these lecturers preferred to use written communication to ask for assistance in some of their trainings or teachings from the librarian.

For the librarian the faculty visitations worked the best. The one-to-one and face-to- face visitations have many advantages. Here the lecturer can identify which library services is important and what to expect from the librarian. The librarian could also identify what was important to her as well as to what to expect from the lecturer. Both could determine what the outcomes of the student‟s programmes should be.

One of the quickest ways to become allied with the faculty is by identifying initiatives of the faculty and asking the question “how can information literacy help these projects?”

Less formal methods to attract the faculty‟s attention for information literacy programs include having librarians gain the support of campus administrators, participate in campus initiatives and open themselves to opportunities for informal contact with the academic.

Again the librarian can identify initiatives, projects or programmes on campus and also asking the question of how can information literacy help or play a role. Involvement in campus projects creates further opportunities for informal interaction between librarians and the academics.

Contacts can also be made through networking at campus events and social gatherings. For the librarian these informal contacts are often how collaboration with the faculty on information literacy instruction is initiated. Whenever and wherever possible, the librarian always utilized both formal and informal channels of communication in order to further the library‟s information literacy goals.

Technology also played its part. The librarian has used technology issues to further the library‟s information literacy program. Innovative lecturers have collaborated with the librarian in the creation of instructional website tailored to their courses. This happened after teaching their distance students her information literacy program.

The librarian would provide information literacy workshops for the whole faculty, for those who cannot make it, departmental workshops. The librarian found that this increased the lecturer‟s understanding of the importance of integrating information literacy into their courses. The librarian witnessed a change in the academics‟ attitude towards the librarian (s) as a result of the „information explosion‟ caused by the Internet. The Internet creates demand for instruction for both academics and their students. Technology can lead to faculty development opportunities for the librarians. By improving the computer skills of the librarian, the librarian established

herself as a technology assistant in both lecturer development and in turn students‟ information literacy.

The librarian-lecturer relationship is built by the meetings, informal contacts and offering faculty development opportunities. Through these development sessions, not only are the lecturers exposed to the librarian‟s information literacy goals, but also welcomed into developing richer relationships with the librarian.

Through relationships built with the CHS faculty through formal and informal communication, informal contacts and the flexing of technological strength, the librarian has created faculty-wide information literacy initiatives. These successful initiatives included plagiarism workshops, critical thinking, information literacy classes, but most important of them all involves collaboration between the librarian and the lecturer(s) and all this to encourage the lecturers to integrate information literacy into the students‟ curriculum.