eLit.pt Project

1. eLit.pt Project Information Literacy in Portugal: A perspective from European Higher Education Area Armando Malheiro da Silva Viviana Fernández Marcial Maria Manuela Gomes Azevedo Pinto Letícia Sousa Monteiro da Silva eLit.pt Project Team

2. The Project • eLit.pt - Information literacy in European Higher Education Space context : case study of Portugal information skills • Main Area:Communication and Information Sciences • Secondary area:Higher Education and Science Policies • Funding: FCT - Science and Technology Foundation (Portugal) • Principal Contractor and Host Institution: Faculty of Arts of University of Porto (FLUP) • Principal Research Unit: CETAC.media - Centre for Studies in Technologies, Arts and Communication Services

3. Team project • Armando Malheiro da Silva(Coordinator) Information Science: Faculty of Arts - University of Porto • Fernanda Martins Cognitive Psychology: Faculty of Arts - University of Porto • José Manuel Pereira Azevedo Sociology: Faculty of Arts - University of Porto • Maria Helena Padrão Linguistic: Researcher • Maria Manuela Gomes Azevedo Pinto Information Science: Faculty of Arts - University of Porto • Sérgio Paulo Ferreira Sociology: Researcher • Viviana Fernández Marcial Information Science: University of A Coruña - Spain • Letícia Sousa Monteiro da Silva (Research assistant 2007-2008: Faculty of Arts - University of Porto )

4. Epistemological and theoretical principles • FOCUS of the project • informational literacy in the Portuguese and European learning models • Starting point of our theoretical-practical model • To develop the macro level of Tom Wilson’s model • Research areas in “information behaviour” in the scope of which informational literacy belongs • Promoting a new approach where access to, the evaluation and communication of information should be integrated • an approach which projects its transversal dimension on to every aspect and situation of social life and not only on those where the subject/person interaction occurs, or in conventional services and/or technological information systems.

5. Epistemological and theoretical principles

6. Epistemological and theoretical principles MAIN DEFINITIONS: • Information Science • a social science that investigates the problems, topics and study cases related with the information / communication phenomena perceivable and cognoscible through the confirmation or not of the intrinsic proprieties of the information flow origin, organization and information behaviour (origin, collection, organization, storage, retrieval, interpretation, transmission, transformation and use of the information). • Information • Object of Information Science • information is a scientific object which entails the structured set of mental and emotional codified representations (signs and symbols) and modeled with/through the social interaction, able to be recorded in any information storage material (paper, film, magnetic tape, compact disk, etc) and, so, communicated in an asynchronous and multidirectional manner. (Silva, 2006)

7. Epistemological and theoretical principles the process of LEARNING INFORMATION LITERACY in the scope of INFORMATION SCIENCE Is related to Creation 1 Transformation 7 Search 2 Diffusion and transmission 6 INFORMATION Evaluation 3 Storage 5 Organization 4 INFORMATION LITERACY is a fundamental topic within INFORMATION BEHAVIOUR and ACQUIRE COMPETENCES AND SKILLS directly connected with

8. Epistemological and theoretical principles • Based on: • physiological motives • unlearned motives • social motives • We haveinformationGaps that could be • Spontaneous • Induced • From school (classes) • From family • From himself

9. Epistemological and theoretical principles Context of Information needs Barriers Information seeking behaviour Person Physiological, affective and cognitive states Environment Social role

10. Epistemological and theoretical principles • Information seeking behaviour cycle Chaining Starting Ending Browsing Active/continuous Verifying Differentiating Monitoring Extracting

11. Epistemological and theoretical principles Model In the “space of flows” and EHEA environment Gaps Diffusion and transmission Barriers CONTEXT (S) Information Seeking Use / Transformation Organization Evaluation Acquisition of Information competences

12. Epistemological and theoretical principles • Environment (1): • The cyberspace or “space of flows” • Impact of the Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) • The Networked society • Intranet • Internet … • e-business • e-government • e-culture • e-learning ... • Web and the complex “digital context” Digital divide Information divide - technology, resources and skills - socioeconomic (rich/poor), - racial (majority/minority), - generational (young/old) - geographical (urban/rural)

13. Epistemological and theoretical principles • Environment (2): European Higher Education Area (EHEA) • Shift of the teaching-learning process. Students actively participate/construct their knowledge • Promotion of continuous training, lifelong learning • Emphasis on the full integration of ICT in education systems, thus enabling a system of interactive learning to take root • Creation of the ECTS (European Credits Transfer System) as a new measure by which to recognize the student's academic knowledge and it brings major changes in the transmission and acquisition of knowledge. The European credits value the hours the student devotes to acquiring specific knowledge, rather than a definition based on the number of hours the lecturer teaches.. • Promotion of integrated education for the student, embracing the acquisition of generic, transversal and specific competences (knowledge, capacities and skills), in which access to and use of information is prioritized.

14. Epistemological and theoretical principles • Performing an inter and transdisciplinary approach EDUCATIONAL CONTEXT STUDENT’S INFORMATIONALUNIVERSE INFORMATION SCIENCE student’s informational behaviour and his personal and social context and demands information needs produced in the educational context COGNITIVE SCIENCES EDUCATION

15. That is at the basis of eLit.pt Model of informational literacy in the context of formal education and long-life education

16. The Research • Methodology of research • The research has the following basis: • a) It is necessary to develop a specific study in the country in order to: • determine the existence or not of several information literacy standards • assess the aptitude and attitudeof university students towards the higher education information literacy • c) The information culture is potentially different in distinct geographic areas of Portugal • d) The information behaviour is connected with expectative, needs and style of life • e) The creation of information literacy strategic program would be a warrant to an optimal way to adapt Portugal to the EHEA and to the knowledge society.

17. The Research • Methodology of research • Qualitative (Jan-Feb 2008) • to obtain precious indicators about the students’ information behaviour, expectations, needs and use of information • this indicators are being used in the design of survey • Quantitative (Apr-Oct 2008) • based on the survey results

18. The Research • Main questions that intents to answer 1st Question 2nd Question 4 2 3 1 Understand how the university students face the new competences required by the creation of the EHEA know how these students are prepared in terms of information competences prior to the university during the university frequency period at the end of the university degree

19. The Research • Study is being performed on a national scale (8 districts) Secondary schools (18) 12th-grade students + High level institutions (14) 1st cycle – 3rd and 4th semester students 9 Universities 5 Polytechnics

20. The Research • Scientific areas (Secondary schools) • Sciences and Technologies • Social Sciences • Economic Sciences • Languages and Humanities / Literatures • Arts • Scientific areas (High Level Education) • Bolonha – 1st cycle (3rd and 4th semesters) • Architecture • Biochemistry • Civil Engineering • Languages and Literatures • Administration • Nursing • Psychology

21. The Research 1st phase 2nd phase 3rd phase Survey built upon the interview results and with a national application Results analyses and model design Focus Group prepared according to an indicative Interview (qualitative)

22. The Research • In the Student’s different contexts: • School • friends group • family • study centers • tutorial services • Internet … We intend to Identify : • the influence of the different contexts • the search skills learned and not “intrinsic” • the ability to relate information from various contexts and typologies • the influence of the Internet and ICT on the informational literacy of secondary school and university students • the active or passive role of the student in the learning context • … • not excluding the traditional focus on the conventional information services – public libraries, university libraries and school libraries – an aspect integrated in the functional or mediation group

23. The Sample • 6 Secondary schools • (346 students) • 6 High level Institutions • (1242 students)

24. Questionnaire: • 54 questions • 4 main groups

25. FIRST RESULTS: • Young generation have a very high access to information technology infrastructure. Number of computers in household

26. FIRST RESULTS Places where students do their school work

27. FIRST RESULTS • Young people used frequently Internet and they prefer access to it from home. How often students access Internet

28. FIRST RESULTS Places from wich students access internet

29. FIRST RESULTS • Google is the preferred search engine (almost 100% of the sample uses it frequently or very frequently). Search engines use: Frequent

30. FIRST RESULTS • Thus, we confirm that students are using general resources, but this does not mean that they are qualified resources (ex. a digital library). This has no relationship with the absence or presence of ICT training Students with formal IT training

31. FIRST RESULTS • Students have a high number of school assignments per year Number of classes with school assignments

32. FIRST RESULTS • However only 58% of university students and 65% of high school students have the advice from the teacher regarding the information search Advice from the teacher: YES

33. FIRST RESULTS • Leisure is the major motivation for use information resources.

34. But the question is: what kind of resources are they using to prepare themselves? Wikipedia is a very demanded resource used frequently or very frequently by 56 % of high school students and by 54,5 % universities students Also teacher notes are very frequently use by 68,9% and 79,7% respectively But digital library is almost never used only 14,2% of universities and 3,6% of high school students manifested to use it Similar values appear for library web site use FIRST RESULTS

35. FIRST RESULTS Use of school library • We confirm that library use is low. At least lower than we expected. It is particularly worrying for Public Library Use of public library

36. Here we also detected different behaviour between high school and universities students: First 59,1 % of high school students indicated that never or rarely use the school library almost 50 % of university students declared going to the university library frequently. Second university students made a better use of the library resources than the other segment (ex.: use of OPAC, databases and of the documents of free access). Third it is necessary to emphasize that the values in two segments are not excellent, but nearly 90% of the high school students and 80% of the university studentsindicate that they do not have difficulties at the moment in accessing library resources. Some considerations

37. Some considerations • With regard to the students’ self-assessment, we found similar results. • Text writing and results analysis abilities are considered most important than to search information and evaluate and select results, • both considered that they have the adequate abilities to do the need tasks

38. FIRST RESULTS Number of classes with school assignments

39. FIRST RESULTS Phase considered the most important in preparing school assignments

40. FIRST RESULTS Self Assessment: ability to evaluate and select the results of an information search

41. CONCLUSIONS • Preliminary results are insufficient to draw specific conclusions and how significant they are • but ...

42. CONCLUSIONS • We are able to draw FIRST TENDENCIES: • It seems to confirm the fact that, through our theoretical model, we will be able to explain the information literacy phenomenon. Globally, we can verify that motivation defines information behaviour. • when a student has greater obligation or commitment to access information, evaluation and use is higher; • it was demonstrated throughout that there are differences in some indicators between university and high school students. • according to the eLit.pt model, and bearing in mind the results obtained, an operational action is appropriate and necessary, directed at the improvement of the general informational behaviour of high school and university students. • closer and more dynamic articulation between the formal education systemtriad (teacher, student and school library) and the informal level composed by mix groups, without forgetting the role of ICT and its influence on the students’ motivation and satisfaction, considering that we are facing a digital native generation. • even though these results refer to Portugal, we cannot talk about an isolated and individual situation because, although considering different contexts, other papers and research have shown similar results and it will be necessary develop similar projects in other countries, namely in the European area.

43. Thank you for your attention ... Website (http://web.letras.up.pt/eLit/index.htm)