Curriculum Mapping and the Framework for Information Literacy in Higher Education: Threshold Concepts for Information Literacy

It's hard to do curriculum mapping without knowing what we aim to infuse into the curriculum. The ACRL's Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education outlines the "threshold concepts" we believe that both librarians and instructors want MU students to learn, regardless of major.

Authority is Constructed and Contextual

Information Creation as a Process

Information Has Value

Research as Inquiry

Scholarship as Conversation

Searching as Strategic Exploration

This 10-minute presentation from the May 2015 Celebration of Teaching event at MU is organized around "Scholarship as Conversation" concept, but it includes several other related concepts derived from the Framework. The intended audience is instructors in all disciplines.

Create link here to Rachel's Celebration of Teaching PowerPoint "Why Research Is a Series of Biergartens" stored in Sharepoint, and the corresponding script.

• Authority in the academic research community is derived from a researcher's longtime work within communities of scholarship (earning advanced degrees, contributing to conferences, writing and reviewing peer-reviewed articles). Librarians can direct you to authoritative writings.
• There are different kinds of authority. In addition to scholarly authority there is societal position (e.g., public office or title), or special experience (e.g., participating in a historic event, member of the profession or trade that deals with the subject at hand)
• The type of authority needed in a source depends on what one is trying to do. A student researching public reactions to a court case will seek out eyewitness accounts, newspapers, social media, etc. A student researching the legal precedents for the same court case will seek out articles in scholarly and professional journal articles.
• Scholarly authority is fairly narrow (e.g., Ph.D. in Microbiology) and is not transferrable to other fields (e.g., Political Science) without a separate process establishing authority in the new field.

• What makes a peer-reviewed journal article different from a magazine article is the process of creating the article - who writes it, who checks/reviews it, how they evaluate it - not the format (print or electronic)
• Most information-creating processes are iterative. That means the researcher will often "circle back" to revisit or revise an earlier part of the research after (s)he has found additional information.
• Many scholarly disciplines talk about "primary" and "secondary" sources, but what those terms mean, precisely, varies by discipline. The differences between primary and secondary sources, however, always include differences in the processes that produced the source, and/or how it is used by researchers.

• Publishers and other businesses charge for useful information. Libraries buy it and make it available to their users. Contracts govern how libraries may do this.
• Writers have some control over the copyright to their work, but there is usually some form of negotiation involved.
• Academic writers need to write and receive credit for their work by being cited. Citation counts are part of what university administrators look at when making decisions about the value of professors' work.
• Plagiarism is an ethical problem with reproducing ideas without citing and has to do with who gets credit. 
• Copyright is a legal problem with reproducing words/media without the permission of the copyright holder and has to do with who gets paid.
• Within academic work, fair use can reduce some copyright restrictions, but not all academic use is fair use.

• Research moves forward when researchers read/hear one another's work and build on it further
• Scholarly conversation takes place within universities, at conferences, by informal writing and talking among people working in the same area (now mostly online via private emails and public blogs and other forums), and by the more formal means of publications
• In a publication, the conversation is documented by citations to others' work. 
• In much online work, the conversation is documented by links to others' work.
• Scholarly conversations typically develop their own vocabularies (jargon) and their own taken-for-granted ideas. It is normal to feel intimidated and challenged when entering a new community's conversation (attending a conference, reading academic articles, etc.) - or even participating in a conversation with people who are deeply involved in a hobby, sport, etc.

• It's important to know where to look (databases, web searches)
• It's important to know how to trace citation trails backward and forward (via citation indexes)
• It's important to know how to word queries in online searches so that the best results will be produced
• It's important to know which search fields to use when more than one is available
• It's important to know that the search process is usually messy.