The Dawn of Information Literacy

The Information Services Environment Relationship and Priorities

Back in March, I posted about Information Literacy in the 21st Century. I began wondering about the origins of the term. I have been promoting the importance of information literacy, but find that many outside of the library field are not familiar with the idea. I think it is important for information professionals to understand its development so we can better explain its value.

The term "information literate" seems to go back to 1974, when Paul Kurkowski discussed the partnership between libraries and private companies in the information industry. In "The Information Services Environment Relationship and Priorities," Zurkowski explained the need for readily available information to be balanced with capitalist venture. He held that the private sector and libraries could play mutually supportive roles and work to achieve an information literate society. In such a society, people would understand how knowledge is given form as "information," the tools for sharing the information, and how to leverage that information to propel a democratic society.

"Zurkowski’s voice was prophetic." He recognized that, "people were encountering an increasing variety of information-seeking procedures." They had multiple means for accessing information in diverse resources, yet most did not understand or properly use tools for gaining access (Badke, 2010). Zurkowski set the agenda for the future by saying, '[M]ore and more of the events and artifacts of human existence are being dealt with in information equivalents, requiring retraining of the whole population.”*  Of course, in 1974, Zurkowski was not addressing the information explosion that would occur two decades later when the desktop computer became a home staple and the World Wide Web dawned. His analysis of information partnerships and the information literacy need becomes even more important in today's information economy.

Zurkowski aimed to achieve an information literate society by 1984. Perhaps others did not fully understand his radical vision. Perhaps the Internet revolution has made that goal much more difficult to achieve. It is still a worthy goal and information professionals need to speak up about its importance. Our cause has roots and history that we can use to promote our agenda. What would it take to achieve an information literate society today?

* Badke, William. Foundations of information literacy: Learning from Paul Zurkowski. 2010 Available: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/293703989_Foundations_of_information_literacy_Learning_from_paul_zurkowski [accessed May 20 2018]

Databases and the Research Process

We begin in databases for student research. Why use a database?

• Sources have been vetted. (i.e. They have been checked by experts for accuracy and reliability)
• Many sources in databases are not available on the Internet. They are behind a paywall.
• Databases have been purchased with student projects in mind. (i.e. I purchase what I know they need)
• Sources within the database are often written on a student level, with varying lexiles (readability) for varying student needs.
• Databases provide multiple types of sources in a neat package, including magazine articles, reference books, academic journals, videos and audios
• College-bound students will use databases for academic research. Acquainting students with database use now will save them from head-ache, heart-ache and possibly failure post-secondary school.

I've created several YouTube videos to help my students with database searching, combining information about planning for our search (which I discussed in my last blog post) with the beginning of the actual research process. Some learners may absorb information better from a video than lecture style in the classroom; they may benefit from a video that they can replay several times. This is a sample of one of my database training videos on YouTube.

Students learn about authority as part of their 9th grade English research project at my high school. Databases help ease them into understanding what a good source looks like before we unleash them on the Internet. (In my next post, I will talk more about Internet searching and high school students.) We require students to find one database article, one book source. (Yes, they actually need to touch a printed book), one Internet source, and one source of their choice. Their free choice is often a second database source as information in the databases on their subjects is plentiful and easy to find in comparison to finding a good Internet source via Google.

Where a college can have dozens of databases for student use, with many specific databases for varied majors and professions, high school databases are more limited. We use several including varied EBSCO databases, varied Galenet databases, and SIRS. Students must learn which databases suit their needs, gaining an understanding of how information is organized and shared. The goal is for students to understand that information comes from somewhere. I find that few students think about sources before they reach me. In the 21st century, information is just at their fingertips. I want students to realize that people give information form in their writing, video creation, and through images. People have varied expertise. Sources are of varying quality. You must carefully choose what kind of source you should use to support your point as a researcher or when you need to make critical decisions.

All-in-all, databases provide a container for information in various forms. While a pay-database contains information with varied degrees of authority, information has been reviewed prior to inclusion in the tool. While anyone can post anything on the Internet, databases are more selective, providing a good starting place for kids to think about information quality, quantity, and usefulness.

The Compassion Economy

The New Year is always a good time for reflection on yourself and the world around you. I have been thinking a lot over the past few years about my work, its meaning to me, to those around me, and to the world. Today I address the role of, and try to assign new meaning to, being a librarian, archivist, or museum professional in 2016.

Information and cultural heritage professionals have been grappling for about a decade now over what it means to be part of the following:

• the knowledge economy
• the information economy
• the creative economy (See bottom of page for definitions of each)

I propose that there is another economic role for professionals in our line of work. We are part of the "compassion economy." My idea of this economy is one in which we aim to help others with the effect of helping ourselves. (I was struck by a recent TED radio hour talk that dovetails nicely with this idea.)

As a fourth year teacher-librarian in a public high school, who is also working to attain a post-grad degree in education, I have recently learned a lot about the process of learning. There are few jobs that I know of that require the kind of compassion that one must muster to be surrounded by 1200 teenage students day in and out. We deal with hormones, insecurities, family problems, socio-economic issues, and feelings of confinement with a burgeoning desire for adult freedom. ("I can do whatever I want! I'm 18 now you know!!) As a librarian, I do not usually assign grades. I (mostly) do not have a set curriculum to teach. My job centers around compassion and I would like to suggest that if you are a librarian of any sort, an archivist, or if you work in a museum, your job centers around this too.

Not the school where I teach, but a nice one nonetheless

We live in a time when information is exploding. As information professionals, we help others gather the data they need in this information economy. We have knowledge about how to get more knowledge, and we have collections at our disposal to help us impart that knowledge to others. These same collections help young entrepreneurs change our world in creative ways, taking old ideas and giving them new life. Furthermore, our newly developed understanding of the need to supply makerspaces for patrons and museum-goers, and our resolve to design exhibits and programs that encourage questioning, relate to the role we play in the creative economy. Whereas in the past we cared for collections, steered users to catalogs, and left them taking away what they would, today we encourage discussion right in our institutions. We look for feedback on social media. We want our patrons to be part of our institutional family and not merely visitors to our professional worlds.

Despite all this, I have begun thinking that we librarians, archivists, and curators can see ourselves as a hub for compassion above and beyond all else.

• We give people the learning tools that they need to make the world a better place (economically and socially) - the knowledge and know-how.
• We can also give people the emotional tools they need to make the world a better place - the can-do attitude and sense of place and belonging necessary for personal and professional betterment.
• We are part of an individual's support team, helping them grow, assisting them in numerous ways to help them reach their full potential.

Students work in our library Makerspace

But we do this job not for  purely altruistic reasons as the moniker "compassion economy" might suggest. Our work is also self-seeking. Museums, libraries, and archives make this world a better place because of our collections, know-how, and ability to reflect the success and failures of our past. Society needs to have access to these things so that humanity may pick itself up by its boot straps, as it were, and propel itself to greater things. We understand that the intellectually designed artifacts created by human beings are improved from diversity and our sensitivity to it. Understanding of individual achievement leads members of civilization to build on the work of others. As professionals, by supporting creation and by showing "compassion" for all people who have potential to build upon old ideas, librarians, archivists, and museum professionals are helping to build the future.

***

For the knowledge economy See:  (http://web.stanford.edu/group/song/papers/powell_snellman.pdf)

For the information economy see (http://www.asis.org/Bulletin/Dec-94/branscom.html)

For the creative economy see the always very interesting Richard Florida http://www.huffingtonpost.com/richard-florida/creativity-is-the-new-eco_b_1608363.html

See also:

Debjani Kanjilal, Azam M. Bejou & David Bejou. (2012). “Compassion: The Missing Link in Economics and Management.” Journal of Relationship Marketing.

TED Radio Hour.  Just a Little Nicer. NPR.  (podcast) December 4, 2015.

Wuthnow, Robert. (1991) Acts of Compassion: Caring for Others and Helping Ourselves. NJ: Princeton University Press.

We Will Be Remembered through What We Post

In this social media driven decade, the way we will be remembered may be reflected in what we post. What we project to the world online today will likely be the information about us that is easiest to gather in the future. Therefore, we must be aware that who we are, at least as far as history is concerned, might be molded by the Internet. In my view, our public face is being melded with what should be a more private side and the reality of our lives is perverted by an online public image. It is up to individuals to consciously create their own personal brand, or suffer the consequences of allowing others to attempt to reconstruct our lives through our random posts and musings.

On the Internet, what we record becomes part of a permanent record of our lives. Today, most people leave behind a great documentation footprint through digital means. It wasn't that long ago when most people did not leave much documentation behind for the world to see. Even 20th century lives are reconstructed from sometimes hard to find sources. We are lucky to find records that tell us about someone's pre-21st century life - handwritten correspondence, diaries and the like formed the personal papers from an earlier period.

A note that a friend penned to me in high school. We would
have been horrified to post these thoughts for others to see.

Remember hiding your diary under your mattress so your younger sister wouldn't find it? Remember passing private notes to friends in class? Today, young people are less likely to draw that line between public and private. Do you have something to say to a friend? Tweet it to the world; put your inner most thoughts in a blog. It's a very different world from the one I grew up in and society has a different mindset from the society in which I was trained as an archivist in the 1990s.

In this second decade of the 21st century, individuals can have more power over how they are remembered. The proliferation of the public records people create by interacting with their government and public groups online are augmented by those writings and postings which strike my generation as more private in nature. Many call this the "age of oversharing." Perhaps after a decade of this, we as individuals need to step back, take a hard look at our sharing habits, and curb our communication. While those sharing information online (the content creators) are sharing more and more, archivists are working to understand more fully the rapid transition our society has made in personal documentation, and we are considering what aspects of it are important to our profession.

Regular readers of this blog know my deep fascination with diary writing in particular. A recent article in the  Huffington Post discussed how the act of diary writing itself is changing and how there are many people who now write diaries for public consumption in a way that hasn't been done in the past. "On some level, when we vent, we want to be heard -- if only by our future selves. Why else would we choose such a permanent format for sorting out our thoughts?" [Crum. These are My Confessions: What Diary Keeping Means in the Age of Oversharing. ] Yet, venting for our future self in a personal journal is very different from online venting. I think this point needs to be more deeply considered by information professionals on every level.

• What online personal content should be worthy of "permanent" status?  And controversially:
• What content should be created? Do information/cultural heritage professionals have a role to play beyond gathering content? Should we also be helping individuals manage their online documentation and help curb the creation of unending documented random thoughts?

A particularly poignant and perhaps egregious example of the way we broadcast without forethought is evident in a high profile 2013 Twitter scandal.  Certainly, Justine Sacco wanted to vent when she wrote the tweets that eventually led to her dismissal from her high powered job, but did she really want to be heard?

As a teacher / librarian / archivist, this issue has an important place in my life. Every day, I watch students create content that shouldn't be shared. I realize the permanence of the words they place online. They do not. I realize how their content is affecting society and can affect their lives. As a mentor, I have a responsibility to help them fully understand how information impacts them. As an archivist, I believe that it would be to the profession's benefit to spread this message to a greater populace. Is the information we are spewing worth the computer space we are using? Computer space is cheap, but the never ending bombardment of gossip and misinformation is not, in my opinion.

We once documented our thoughts for ourselves, to share with a friend in a letter, or in well-thought out speeches. Today, as content creators, a quick thought easily flies out our fingers onto a screen and into what we may perceive as a void. "[the sharing of] our once-discreet musings could be seen as narcissistic -- a strategic move in a quest for validation...But it’s something else, too. When such observations are compiled into a work of art, they become an honest reflection on how we absorb and produce information." [Crum]

Certainly, there is a benefit for informational professionals and historians to have so much now available to us. If archivists can successfully save what is being broadcast, and if we can successfully preserve and provide access to it, we will have an abundance of material to examine, consider and study. Perhaps we will have a rich view of early twenty-first century life and a rich view of how we use information. We will be able to study society through a combined public and private lens that past historians could only have dreamed.

However, I wonder if alternately, this bombardment of information provides an inaccurate understanding of how individuals really function. Does all this information accurately reflect our communities? What role can ideas of personal branding and full understanding of an online image play in protecting documentation that accurately projects our own lives and our times? Can, and should, information professionals craft a salient message to help protect the value of good information versus bad (if indeed there is such as thing as good versus bad information at all)?

The Age of Contested Knowledge

This week, I had the pleasure of listening to presentations from two local academic librarians. The librarians were visiting my high school to teach our seniors about college level research. They explored databases and discussed peer reviewed research with the students. They explained why "Google it" is not an acceptable academic search strategy. The information that the librarians provided was not unique, but it is something that students do not easily accept. Why? "Google it" seems easy. "Google it" helps us re-confirm what we already believe. "Google it" shows us what information is most readily available, not necessarily what is correct. Also this week, I listened to an National Public Radio podcast entitled "Why We Doubt Scientific Findings." A phrase stood out for me -- "the age of contested knowledge" -- and tied directly to what I see happening in the classroom. With a nod to Diane Rehm, this post discusses and questions the role of librarians and archivists in this new information age.

Rehm's program discussed how the world of information has changed. How people get their information has changed. There has been a disintegration of the old "gatekeepers" of knowledge. In my opinion, as librarians we have a responsibility to spread our own knowledge of information. People once saw libraries as the way to enter the gates and access information. Today information is at everyone's fingertips and most do not recognize the true value of a librarian's training.  "Gatekeeper" is too restrictive a word for what we do now. We need to re-brand ourselves as information "guides.

Information in Today's World

Rehm's program included science reporters and scientists discussing the way people gather and process scientific studies. The beginning of the show was most interesting to me from a professional standpoint, as it discussed general practices of information gathering:  The following parts of the discussion stood out to me:

• Information that we accept today often reflects our world view. "[People] often find exactly what they already believe." 
• People have a daily confrontation of their belief system with/against science. Science (information) was once much less readily available
• There is a norm of false balance. Some things are presented as two sided, when they aren't controversies at all. 
• Information is evolving. People sometimes point to new understandings to show why all information can't be trusted, rather than exploring how the new information evolved.
• A lot more risk analysis is demanded of us than in the past.

The Role of the Librarian

The information puzzle

People have many more outlets to get information. Do they know what the "good" sources are and why they are good? How can we better explain this? This is one reason why good school libraries and librarians are so important. We need to help our young people understand sources so that when they are adults, they can better navigate channels of information. A knee-jerk reaction to information that seems to challenge our world view should be replaced with a healthy skepticism and thoughtful evaluation of sources. Information is a giant puzzle whose pieces sometimes fit neatly together. Other times, there are gaps between pieces as we wait for bridges in knowledge to connect diverse ideas that are all grounded in truth.

As information evolves, people need to learn to step into the conversation. The college librarians talked about becoming part of the conversation; the need to gain a basic understanding of the subject and its issues before jumping in and making conclusions. It is up to individuals to educate ourselves on the basics of issues. How can librarians help with this? I'm thinking of displays in my school library that introduce a topic with which students may be unfamiliar. Additionally, maybe archivists can more prominently display and explain original sources from which secondary arguments are based. Can all of us work to make sure that when people "google it" primary sources float to the top? Can we even develop partnerships with companies such as Google to make this happen? My students are amazed when I show them scholar.google.com. Their eyes seem to say, "Wow! Google even distinguishes between different types of information sources. Maybe Ms. Mannon isn't lying to me after all!" How can we make the separation between information channels more visible and understandable?

On Rehm's program, journalists discussed how responsible professionals can help people see caveats in studies. How is the latest study different from the last one? How have things changed? Librarians can help people be part of that conversation. What tools can we create to help people see the changes? "Most people don't keep delving [to gain a greater understanding of an issue.] They will take the headline...they will take the first paragraph..." How can we help them delve?

Finally, "a lot more risk analysis is demanded of us." Despite this, from my experience as a librarian, I see that we are less likely to analyze information. Everyday, we need to ask if the information that is handed to us is good information.  It is harder and harder for us to evaluate knowledge due to the abundance of information. One of the main reasons that I decided to accept a job as a high school librarian was what I was seeing happening with information and its effects on people. He who yells the loudest should not be believed simply because he is yelling. How can librarians better help people evaluate information? How can we help them believe that they even want to be better evaluators?

From Where Does Information Come?

My archivist colleague Kate Theimer at ArchivesNext made a fabulous speech for the American Historical Association that she shared in her blog.  A Distinction Worth Exploring: “Archives” and “Digital Historical Representations addresses the context and provenance of archives in their various forms. This post should be required reading for all archivists and historians. Furthermore, it can lead to to a larger discussion of the creation and context of information in general and how such information should be understood and evaluated by the general public. This is an idea I've been tossing around for some time and I felt that Kate's article helped open the door to my thinking a little bit.

Informational resources were once precious. Once upon a time, not that long ago, the encyclopedia salesman convinced us that owning a set of Brittanicas was a key to knowledge. It was an expensive purchase. If we were lucky enough to afford it, that relatively small set of books was treasured. It had its very own bookcase that was given a prominent space in the house. Kids would rely on it for homework and entertainment. (I remember plastic sheets between thin pages of the anatomy section that showed us cross-sections of the human body that somewhat satisfied curiosity.) Britannica was a name to be trusted. We believed that if it came from Brittanica, it had to be good information. We did not have to rush to the public library immediately when something needed clarification, yet we knew that the information in the Encyclopedia was finite and sometimes we needed to seek more. The encyclopedia was our very own clarification tool. And because it was a well-thought out tool, it would refer us to the places that had more information on our subject. We would even stumble across references to "archives" between the Encyclopedia's pages.

Today, the encyclopedia as a tool of information is relatively ignored. We can hop on the Internet to "find things out." Many believe that one of the top five Google hits must have what we need. If the title of the first web site brought up in Google's findings doesn't match what we think we need, we just move to the next resource on the list. Do we care who posts our answers there? Does the general public care if the information came from the primary source or from someone 100 times removed? Does it matter if it's a blog or a "digital historical representation"? Does it matter if a Wikipedia article was put together by a group of experts or seemingly educated hobbyists? Most of the information placed on the Internet is not well-conceived.

It is an important part of an archivist's job to make sure that our little corner of the digital world is "well-thought out" and promoted. Digital projects like DPLA and the ones mentioned in Kate's article must be brought more boldly to the general public's attention.

While it is very important for the archivist to help the historian understand the different aggregates of archives, it is equally important for the archivist to help the general public understand these distinctions. Kate Theimer asks, "how much do historians know about archives and what more would be helpful or necessary to assist in their work." She also asks what can historians tell the archival profession about how digitization has changed their work so that we can better assist them? I ask, how much does the general public understand about primary sources? What can THEY tell US about how they gather information in an online environment so that we can better help them get the reliable answers to assist  their learning.

Anecdotally, I know that people will "Google" a question or keywords rather than stopping to think what place might most logically have information. For example, based on personal observation, I believe that if the average person visits the Museum of Fine Arts, sees a work by John Singer Sargent and wants to learn more, that person will more likely Google "John Singer Sargent" than look for more information about him within the museum walls. The Internet has become The Encyclopedia Brittanica without the idea that the encyclopedia is finite and there is more information elsewhere. The larger problem is that we can carry the encyclopedia in our pockets now. We turn off our brains sometimes and just reach for what is easy and known.

Archivists have always had to explain what they do, but now it is even farther removed for a new generation. Many think that if it is not on the Internet it doesn't exist. I will argue that it is very important for archivists to bring educators into a dialogue. What do teachers, on all levels, know about archives and archivists? How can we help explain to a new generation of students that understanding from where our information comes is very important.? As Kate says, " Digital technology has increased the user base for archival resources, meaning that the connection between our historian users and archivists is more diluted than it was in the past." I would like to add that the connection between archivists and the general public is more diluted too. Very soon, our younger generation may have no perception of any archives at all. We are not just explaining the term "archives" anymore, we are also explaining the idea of the record creator in a way that we never thought we would have to explain. We need to explain that computers are not all knowing. There are people behind their processes and the information that they give us. 

Individuals need a deeper understanding of from where information comes to become good citizens. Very soon, it will be very difficult to help citizens untangle the world of archives so that they can also be good historians. I worry about not only where that will leave archives, but also where that will leave society. 

What is Information? Getting High School Freshmen Prepared for Inquiry

Tomorrow I begin a week of presenting an introduction to information to high school freshmen. I will teach the same 45 minute introduction for almost every period of the school day for all of our freshmen English classes. This is exciting! When I did this Introduction to Information unit for the first time last year, I could see lightbulbs going off over heads all day long. I remember the boy who sat down with headphones. I asked him to take the headphones off and he scowled at me. Then he listened. Then his eyes lit up. Then he participated. He told me about the records he's seen that belonged to his grandfather. He stayed after to tell me more about his family. And, I remember the boy who was interested in my old class photo in which students held a "no hunting" sign before them. I explained that I didn't know why the sign said that. The boy told me. He then told me about conversations he had with his neighbor about World War II and hunting. These boys showed how interesting and personal sharing information can be.

In this blog today, I am sharing my outline for my class. I hope that an introduction to the wide-world of information is something that becomes a core part of every American high school curriculum. We will begin each class tomorrow with an assessment of students research skills using "Trails Nine" so that I may better tailor information lessons to suit the needs of students. The last half of class includes the following:

What is information?

Introduction

Good morning. You are here today to learn about what information is. It seems like a pretty simple thing, right? 

I have worked as an information specialist for my whole career. I have been a public librarian, an archivist, a museum assistant, and cultural heritage consultant. I have worked professionally in museums, libraries, and archives. I have also brought my library skills to my work in town governments a science lab and a law firm.

[Show photos of places I’ve worked]

Did you hear anything besides “library” that got your interest? Did you know that “librarians” might work in places like the ones that I listed and showed?

Just to round out my background for you, I am also a published author and a professional public speaker. I speak about preserving family memories, historical records in communities, and using social media effectively for business.

All of these things that I do are considered part of the “library sciences.” Libraries are all about information – inside and outside of the library building. My job is to help you to find the information that you need, wherever it might be, and to evaluate it to see if it is good information or bad.

Visualization

Picture your first visit to the library or an early memory of a library. What did you see, smell and hear? Hold onto that memory.

Share my story about the old library in 5^th grade – Mrs. Hoffman.

Now think about your library memory. Does anyone want to share an early library memory? [If no response, prompt – What does a library sound like to you? What does a library look like to you? What do you do in a library? – pick a student to answer]

A library offers a sense of place. It should be a safe, neutral place to learn, discover, and work your mind.

What is Information? (i.e. Why is this room called an information Center?)

From Miriam Webster:

1: the communication or reception of knowledge or intelligence

2. a (1) : knowledge obtained from investigation, study, or instruction

My definition of an information resource (what we use here in this room)

Information Resource – A document or other man-made item that communicates knowledge about an event, place, living being or object, or that conveys ideas about any subject.

Can anyone think of a time when they got bad information? Did they know that it was bad right off the bat or did they need to think about it? Did bells go off in your heads “Warning, warning, this information may not be true!” That’s what I want your head to do whenever someone tells you something - whenever you read something.  Evaluate the source and seek the truth through common sense and research.

What information can you get from images? Using your imagination - fiction and nonfiction can mix. Example of "Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children"

Knowledge is power

Election quotes – which are true?

[show video clips of presidential candidates. How do you know what to believe?]

http://youtu.be/lQzZdyzDZVY

http://youtu.be/L6b9F9IiAZw

Knowledge comes from what others teach you and what you learn yourself.
Support the Learning Lab!

Elements of Information

Written information – primary versus secondary sources

[show source samples from my personal collection]

Unwritten information – spoken - oral history, shared knowledge versus gossip, propaganda

We can reach out to get that kind of help too by making calls to specialists or by employing social media strategies

Information is a foundation of community and culture

What information is important to you? What if someone twisted the truth. How would you feel? Why is factual information important? (the secret of why I became a high school librarian – to help you learn to decipher infor

What makes you part of certain communities beyond just being there? What makes you a Mannon? What do you give to your high school and take away from it that makes you part of this community?

Tools in the Library for Finding Information

Flip chart – ask students to list the tools that they know

Then, library tour (to stretch our legs!)

Books – fiction versus non fiction versus reference. Not everything from books is available online.

PAC – Public Access Computer

Computer area – for access to Internet and specialized databases
explain difference. Explain search engines.

Express machines, color printer

Exhibits

Games table

Copiers, etc.

Give information handout

You are an important part of this space. During your four years here:

·      You will help mold the info center to be what we want and what we need. What information grounds us and makes us feel like part of a community? – our exhibits and the room itself will reflect that “sense of place”

·      Bring in and emphasize the information that will help us be a strong community

·      Come here to discover, learn, research

·      Come here to share information and ideas – with me, with teachers, with other students

Holistic Information

So has anyone called it this before?

"Holistic Information" (my term? at least in this sense? my definition): The healthy taking in and dissemination of knowledge or intelligence; A comprehensive understanding of how the use and misuse of communicated intelligence can affect one's life.

This was a core part of my week. I was charged with offering an information literacy lesson to a health class. (Perhaps because it was for health class that the word "holistic" is sticking with me.) One of the most fascinating things about my new position as a high school librarian is the diversity of classes I have the opportunity to teach. The lesson for health class was meant to show how we should be careful of advertising promises and information tools. The lesson preceded a mental health unit as a way to show how our evaluation of information can have positive and negative outcomes on our understanding of our world and thus on our overall outlook on life.

Though I don't usually share the particular lessons I do on my blog, I thought that this one in particular might interest readers. It shows the value of thinking about libraries, archives and museums as an information field. It shows how as professionals, we have a lot to offer beyond our traditional roles. I thought I'd share some ideas from the class and to show how I am using my new role to help people think more about different types of information, how we use information, and how we should use it.

We began with a discussion with what is information and then discussed how we get it. We talked about books and magazine, the Internet, word-of-mouth, media, billboards, objects, and archives... One student talked about getting information through discovery - by manipulating data and things on one's own. YES! (Perfect thinking leading to the "learning lab" we hope to create at school.)

I told the teens to question everything and to ask the following questions any time they are getting information: What are they telling me? Are they selling something? Who is selling this or telling me this? Do they have a vested interest? Why are they pitching it this way? [is there an angle? Should I believe them?] What’s right for me?

Attempting to relate this directly to them and to make it contemporary, I began with the misinformation about the Boston Marathon bombings. I talked about the early misinformation regarding the capture of the bombers. At the time, I had misgivings when the news media announced that they had suspects in custody.  It didn't sound right. Things didn't add up. I showed the students what had come through on Twitter in my feed regarding the news. It was contradictory and passionate. Everyone was jumping on the bandwagon. We are all guilty of that sometimes. My next slide showed an official update saying that indeed no arrest had been made. It basically told us, "Calm down everyone. By spreading misinformation you can mess this whole investigation up."

• We discussed ads. Why is Vitamin Water called Vitamin water. Is it good for you? Why or why not? 
• How does that Brooke Shields Calvin Klein ad from my childhood relate to the Hollinger jeans ad now? (Sex sells from generation to generation.) We also dug deeper. The discussion included an article from my friend Judith Ross, discussing the dangers of distressing blue jeans. The process of sandblasting to create that look is extremely harmful to the workers who create those jeans. Should this go into our decision making process about what we wear? How deep should we dig to find out about
  
  the products we buy? Should we judge them by how they look on a friend? Is just knowing that they look good on us enough? Perhaps it is, but if we do care about how products are made, should we seek this information? 
• We talked about Made in America and what that means. Is it important to understand that "Made in America" does not necessarily mean it is 100 percent made in America? We need to understand that many companies walk a fine line to get that label.
• We picked apart a sneaker ad to figure out who the manufacturer was trying to get to buy this footwear. We decided that it was Justin Bieber fans. In fact, all five classes I taught immediately said Justin Bieber even though he was not mentioned in the ad. That's pretty powerful stuff. We looked at a one star review of the sneaker and a five star review. We read them carefully. One of them was calling the high top a "running shoe." It seemed like it wasn't talking about that shoe at all. Did the students know that some people get paid for writing ads? What should we believe? How can we pick apart information to see what is false information?
• Colleges were a big part of our conversation. Are these 15 year-olds already thinking about college? Where do they want to go and why? What goes into our decision about college? Location, major, size, future opportunities, cost... How are colleges manipulating their decisions through ads? We talked about a few ads. One read: "My purpose To Make a World of Difference." What exactly does that mean? Does it mean anything? Does it mean different things to different people? Are they playing on passions? (of course)

Finally, we discussed the Internet and social media. We discussed putting out information about ourselves as well as taking in information.

• What is the value of Google? What are the drawbacks? Does Google do everything it claims to do? Is the use of Google black and white? Is it a good or bad tool? It is good in the right situation, but we must constantly evaluate the information it gives us and be aware of its flaws AS WITH EVERY INFORMATION TOOL. Why do we use proprietary databases at school? What other places can give us information? Did the students know that Google tries to tailor ads to us based on the information we are giving it? We are their product.
  
• What role does social media play? We should use the right tool for the right job. I asked how the students use Twitter and then showed how I use it to talk to colleagues around the world and not to my friends. (That's what texting and Facebook are for?) We talked about the role Twitter played in the Egyptian Revolution and what a powerful tool it can be. Ah...and then snapchat. The app that lets your posts "disappear." This is very big in many of their worlds. We did a little "close reading" -- really paying attention to key words -- to see what snap chat says about itself:

We left with these main lessons in mind:

INFORMATION IS NOT BLACK AND WHITE

•Liking something doesn’t mean it is right for me

•We may like some things about something and not others. It may be the right product or tool for me OR there may be something better

•The information we get about something often depends on the source

•Sometimes sources purposely hide information

•Always evaluate information for yourself!

Great week in the classroom for the Holistic Librarian! Any questions? ;)

The Information is in the Details

Have we lost our curiosity?

I remember the red. We sat on the floor -- 20 five and six year olds -- staring up at the pull down screen. The film projector whirred and clicked behind us, the light from the image catching the dust in the air. It was my first time. REVOLUTION. AMERICA. RED COATS. Funny outfits. Fascinating outfits. They were a long way way in time from my saddle shoes and yellow yarn hair ribbons. They were a long way in space too. My Long Island home seemed very far from this New England.

The second time...that I remember at least...my fifth grade teacher suggested that I go visit a mansion for sale in her neighborhood. "It's old. I think you'll like it. Ask your parents to take you." Not surprisingly, it was the details of the library in that old house that I remember. Books lined every wall. Columns punctuated corners. There was light streaming in from the windows at a perfect angle for any reader lucky enough to sit in the lemon yellow reading chair in the corner. The smell of mold permeated. "That is the smell of old," I thought. "People lived here and now they are gone. Who got to read in that chair?"

Slowly throughout my childhood I took in the details. The dust catching the light of the movie projector was the same dust that got caught up in the sunlight of the old house. It was the same dust I saw when I hung upside down on my parents bed to look at the ceiling. Books were everywhere. (It helped that mom brought me to the public library every week to help develop my healthy appreciation of books.) Reading was everywhere. I read signs and cereal boxes. Signs of life and ideas were everywhere. Someone had written a symbol in the wet cement of my childhood driveway when it was first poured. It was there before my family. "Why did someone put it there?"

The details of the pines at Lake Massabesic in Manchester, NH
are inspiring. It's the details that awaken our curiosity.

My curiosity drove me to look for the information in the details. Curiosity lead to more curiosity and eventually discovery. But now, I am beginning to wonder, is our first stab at life in the 21st century killing our curiosity? Do we notice the details any more? Have our kids ever noticed the details? I watch people walk by informative signs every day. I watch readers power through or struggle with passages without picking up another resource that helps explain the parts that are not understood. I watch spring flowers pop and hear the birds chirping. I stop to listen and look for more. The information is in the details. The learning is in the details. Do other people stop to look and listen?

Information resources can be like the whipped cream on top of the sundae. It adds a little extra something sweet. OR, information resources can be the chunks of chocolate deep within the ice cream of that sundae. When you dig, you find something extra special.

I think that we may be forgetting this. I think that many of us are not teaching our kids this. My kid is creating creative videos and doing a lot of writing on a tablet these days. Despite how awesome it is that she is creating, we require her to come up for air to go for nature walks, play ball, visit a museum or just play outside. I may be one of the biggest fans of digital information tools and social media that I know, I am still concerned about losing "real life" and a real sense of history to it. I am worried that my kid does not get enough of it.

I think that we are forgetting that it is worth digging beyond the surface sweetness to find the true nuggets that make our lives meaningful and connect us to our communities of the past, present, and future. In my field, "who lived here before me?" is only adequately pondered when striving to take in the details. I don't care who built this house if I just live here. That is, many of us don't care who lived here unless the basement floods. Then we wonder, "what crazy person built the home on a flood plain?" Instead, I'd rather ponder the question every day. "Who looked out these windows before me? Did they hear the birds singing too? Were they the same kinds of birds?"

To understand information and its value as a whole, one needs to be curious about the details. We gain that curiosity by paying attention. We are taught to pay attention by our encounters in life. If our children bury their noses in iPads all day, they don't get a chance to encounter life. What information are we then losing? What sense of purpose are we losing?

Understanding My World through Curiosity

Curiosity is part of human nature. We can feed our curiosity
and build our understanding of the world by pursuing
information in a wide variety of formats and fields.

While listening to NPR this morning, I was intrigued by a story about the Mars rover that is set to touchdown on Monday morning EST, next week. Aptly named, "Curiosity," the rover will expand our understanding of the universe, life and the context of our lives in that universe.

Adam Steltzner, the entry, descent and landing team leader for the rover mission, was highlighted in the radio program "Morning Edition." Below, I've pasted some copy from the Crazy Smart:When a Rocker Designs a Mars Lander story transcript. Steltzer discusses his teen years when he was a less than stellar student and was told by his Dad that he wouldn't "amount to anything but a ditch digger...." 

Finding Purpose In The Stars

But then something happened. As Steltzner tells it, he was on his way home from playing music at a club one night when he became fascinated with the stars, especially the constellation of Orion.

"The fact that it was in a different place in the sky at night when I returned home from playing a gig, than it had been when I'd driven out to the gig," he said. "And I had only some vague recollection from my high school time that something was moving with respect to something else, but that was it."

As crazy as it sounds, that experience was enough to motivate him to take a physics course at the local community college. That did it. He was hooked.

The fog of sex, drugs, and rock and roll lifted. He had to know all about the laws that govern the universe. The rocker wound up with a doctoral degree in engineering physics.

"I was totally turned on by this idea of understanding my world," Steltzner said. "Engineering gave me an opportunity to be gainfully employed [and] really understanding my world with these laws and equations that governed it."

Finding Purpose in Life through Information

Earlier this week, on my new office door in the school library, I posted two signs. One says, "Libraries are in the curiosity business." The other says, "Curiosity and creativity are cousins." As I looked for ways to describe my library vision to my students, the word "curiosity" has come up again and again. I realize that, no matter what lights a spark for a person, it is that person's curiosity about the subject that will propel them to learn more about it. 

I asked a teen who was helping me shelve books this week what his areas of interest are. He told me that he likes working with motors. I told him about my husband who recently took apart bits of his motorcycle and rebuilt it. I told him about the plane that he is building. He began asking questions. He was curious. I was working to make the connections between bits of information that he might be able to use to better understand and appreciate his world. I am prepared to help him find books on the subject during the school year should the opportunity arise.

The idea of finding a subject that would "motivate" a rocker to become an engineer and that would "hook" him, has inspired me. How do I get across the idea that information is fun? How do I motivate teens and help them realize that research can be a key to finding purpose in life? Maybe as an information specialist I am not motivated to take apart an engine, but I am excited by someone else's excitement about it. I am excited about finding the information that will help someone succeed. I am excited about connecting a person to the information that helps one better understand himself and his world in any productive way that is possible. 

With expertise in archives, my understanding of my world is usually guided in some way by my interest in primary sources. How do people leave their marks on society? How do we share our thoughts and ideas? How do others use our thoughts and ideas? What do we learn from one another? How do we pass on our knowledge and the culture that we develop from it? How does material culture reflect our attempts to understand who why are and why we are here? How have others helped mold my world? What have earlier communities set up for me so that I can make my own mark on society?

I am fascinated about how we each "understand" our place differently. Yet, sense of place, sense of purpose, and sense of self can be found in any study of culture, science, arts, or mathematics... Despite the diversity of information, it is all is connected. "Understanding my world" involves finding a pursuit that leads one down a path guided by curiosity. 

The Diary Project Continues - An Archivist in the Classroom and Close Reading

Me in my emptied office before new carpeting.
New carpeting went in last week!

As I slowly slip into the world of a high school librarian / information specialist, I have been spending many summer days getting ready for September. Today I had a really fantastic experience that may interest the readers of this blog. This week, I am taking classes in "Common Core" and "Close Reading" strategy. (Stay with me non- school people. I promise this will connect to my common archives and cultural heritage writing subjects.)

Common Core is a new standard that aims to prepare students for the future. I won't belabor this. You may choose to check out the web page about it, but suffice it to say that the goal of this initiative is to set clear expectations for student achievement.

Close Reading is a way to analyze text that helps students to be better observers and to gain more confidence in "unpacking" information. The end goal is to make readers into better interpreters and to allow them to draw better conclusions based on facts.

The teachers who presented the class on close reading repeated a few times that the ideas behind this strategy are very different from the methods with which most teachers in the room were comfortable. To me, though, this idea is very familiar. Close Reading relies on noting very basic things about the text - punctuation, word repetition, capitalization, verbs, strong words, mention of colors or feelings, etc.etc. When one reads a text in this way, one begins by leaving behind any context one may have. The reader looks for the straight up, plain, facts, observing what is on the page rather than one's feelings about it or interpretations. That comes later.

I felt myself fluttering inside as I heard about this "strategy" because I realized that this is what archivists often do when working with documents. We often do not know the context of materials in our care and we must work to understand it. We do not assume that what is in front of us is something that we have seen before in some other form. Each collection brings something new that waits for discovery and we must start from this idea of observing the text and pieces before we continue.


My 1882 diary is the most straightforward example I can use of this idea. I had a diary in front of me. It had a date. It had some names. It mentioned the state of Maine over and over. It mentioned a train crash. It talked about the weather. It talked about a shop....I did not know what any of this meant at first. I just picked out the clues (my observations) and then used those very basic observations to tease the text for meaning. 


There was a lot that I didn't understand, at first. For example, I didn't know if the author was a man or a woman. The person mentioned someone named Nell an awful lot. (Nell turned out to be the diarist's wife...see my older posts for more on that.) The writer mentioned a marriage, but I realized that perhaps "marriage" wasn't being used in the way that I understood it, since it was just mentioned in passing in one sentence and wasn't given the weight that I would expect such an event to be given. (I eventually learned that "marriage" was indeed a wedding, but I had to be willing to just observe that word and not attach my own understanding of meaning at first. In the 19th century, many terms were used differently.) It is only by relying on my observation that I could eventually determine what was important and what would lead me to a proper conclusion. In the end, as I've shared before on this blog, I did indeed learn the identity of the writer based on these clues.


At a break in class today, I told our instructor (one of our high school AP English teachers) that this strategy is very familiar to me. I explained about the diary and about my work as an archivist. He asked me to stand in front of the group and give a testimonial - to tell the others about my diary. I will be sending its transcript to our English department


So, here I am at the beginning of my journey as a high school librarian. Before today, I was excited about a whole range of possibilities related to what I MIGHT be able to offer to my school. I now have something very specific on the table. I am indeed excited to connect my outside experience to a public school need in a very direct way. I am also excited to give my diary an even bigger role than I originally planned for it. This diary is on a great journey and it's taking me along for the ride. 

Hidden Communities

I've previously discussed on this blog the value of considering communities for archives. I have also discussed documenting the underdocumented. And I discussed documenting the underdocumented, again. Communities are the informal and formal groups to which we belong. Some communities are obvious to us such as our family community, our geographic community, our religious community, and our ethnic community. Some communities we are less likely to acknowledge, consider, or know about. It is a challenge to those who are attempting to collect the evidence and stories of humanity to identify these hidden communities. It is worthwhile to consider them for the purposes of collecting (as in formal repositories) and for purposes of telling our own personal stories (when preserving family memories or working as citizen archivists or cultural heritage collaborators.)

I am going to use an example of a hidden community of my own. About a decade ago, I found out that I have Celiac Disease. I exhibited signs for about twenty years, but did not know that it was wheat, barley and rye that made my head cloudy and my emotions intense. My Celiac community was hidden to me. Had I known about it earlier, I would have had access to more information that could have made my life much easier. Celiacs had been sharing what they were discovering about the disorder. Doctors were working with patients to help them. No one from this community to which I belonged was helping me. They did not know that I existed. I didn't know that they existed, until one day a colleague mentioned that her daughter had Celiac and told me about how she dealt with that from day-to-day. A few years later when I set off on a pursuit to "cure" myself, bells about the conversation I had with my librarian friend years earlier rang in my head. Her sharing of her unique personal experience helped me discover that I too had Celiac. Her information dissemination raised my awareness of something previously foreign to me. Within that information I found something hidden about myself. I continually explore my personal relationship with the disorder. I write about it. I talk about it with people I meet in person. It is something that I live with every day.

However, most people do not know that I have Celiac. You can't tell by looking at me that I need to stick to a special diet. My membership in the Celiac community is hidden to most people. Yet, I have lots of information to share. I can tell people that Celiac effects one out of every one hundred people. I can tell you that its symptoms are diverse and not necessarily what you might expect. I may even help others discover that they too have Celiac. My information can help them better prepare to live a new lifestyle. I can help put them on a path toward better health. Indeed, I have helped a number of people this way.

So, what does this have to do with archives? Information sharing is the name of the game. Your hidden stories have a lot to offer to others. The stories of others can also affect you. Aiming to document hidden communities can advance our civilization, save someone's life, make someone happier, make us more understanding and smarter. This is the role of archives. This is a challenge for our society. What knowledge do we need to record that is currently not being recorded? What communities should we identify and what knowledge do they hold that should be preserved and disseminated? Consider what aspects of you and your communities are not so obvious. Make sure they are not neglected in documentation efforts.

Why Value Archives?

It seems appropriate to address the topic of why we should value archives on Freedom of Information Day 2010. Freedom of Information Day celebrates open access to government information in a democratic culture. According to the American Library Association, the date is marked on the birthday of James Madison "who is widely regarded as the Father of the Constitution and as the foremost advocate for openness in government."

This week also marks "Sunshine Week" celebrating our right to access information in a free and open society. This initiative was begun in 2002 by newspaper editors in response to efforts of the Florida state government to make numerous exemptions to public records laws and thus to information's accessibility. The week is now celebrated nationwide in the United States and seeks to bring light to issues blocking freedom of information.

So, in celebration of these marked occasions, we must remember how archives help facilitate our freedoms by making government actions and decisions visible to the public. Archives secure our rights, keep our government systems running efficiently and openly. They hold liable those who may oppress us and devalue human rights, and ensure continuity in our government and social systems. Archives give us primary information about events so that we can better evaluate truth for ourselves, rather than solely through the lens of another interpreter.

However, the information archives offer us and archives' benefits extend beyond government records. Archives support research, inquiry, and lifelong learning. They encourage us to study ourselves, and to find value in what we do and who we are. They help us form a national and global identity and can help us secure a personal identity. They offer insight into how our ancestors live and how diverse cultures live so that we can evaluate our own role in society. Archives build a shared sense of purpose, forming valuable communities that strengthen pride and serve as society's building blocks for mutual appreciation, understanding, and peace. They encourage education and inquiry, while facilitating cultural entertainment and tourism. Archives preserve cherished memories and allow us to build on past successes while evaluating past failures to move society forward.

I am the granddaughter of holocaust survivors. As such, I always remember that the first thing oppressors do is try to peel away the identities of the oppressed so victims lose their sense of self and are devalued by society. While we may hold ideas about ourselves closely in our hearts, tangible documentation helps secure our identity, values and connections to a community. (Randall Jimerson addresses this in his book "Archives Power: Memory, Accountability and Social Justice" and brings the point home most clearly in discussions of George Orwell's writings.)

For all these reasons and more, I work to preserve cultural heritage and I recognize that through my work I have a public responsibility. Through my actions as an archivist, and in my writings about archives, I explore how we can best maintain an accurate documentary record and how we can promote the value of archives to the general populace. I hope that others will grow a greater appreciation for archives. We often take open access to information for granted. Above all, we must never forget how archival documents ensure our freedom. If we allow others to take away public control of information, we lose not only our ability to seek truth, but are in danger of losing our own sense of identity -- the greatest freedom of all.