In response to Michael Stephen’s column “The Livelong Day“. I noted that information literacy teaching needs to start before college if we want students to graduate the skills they need for a lifetime:
It is interesting that students graduating from universities and colleges are not equipped with the information literacy skills they need once they graduate, but it is not surprising. When I took my searching classes in the Library Technician Program at Seneca College I had this aha! moments when I finally learned how to find the information that I needed. I kept wondering “why did someone not teach me this before?”
I think that to lack of information literacy skills in university and college graduates goes back to the K-12 level where the disconnect between the library and the classroom starts. Some teachers have the assumption that students should just naturally know how to search and evaluate resources. This is not true!
Classroom teachers, university and college professors and (school/academic/public) librarians need to start to bridge the gaps between the ‘traditional’ teachers and the librarians who know how to teach the information literacy skills which will serve students for a life time.
Andrea's Library Thoughts 