The 3 Directions: Situated Information Literacy

Situated information literacy: history instruction at a high school early college

“…For situated information literacy 295 Situated information literacy theorists, this is a false or misleading ideal (see Farrell, 2012 for a more extended discussion and proposed reconciliation between generic and situated information literacy instruction). Rather, situated information literacy values the complex practices involved in transitioning from novice to experienced worker or member of the disciplinary community (Lloyd, 2005(Lloyd, , 2007(Lloyd, , and 2011Nichols, 2009). In other words, on the whole, both professors emphasized assignments and assessments that gave students feedback on the quality of their participation in a community of practice (situated information literacy), rather than assessing students according to an individual skills framework (generic information literacy).…”

Situating information literacy in the disciplines

“…Such an educational context obviates the need to work with disciplinary faculty to extend the reach of librarians into disciplinary curricula. Nichols (2009) has applied the concept of situated cognition to information literacy instruction from a disciplinary perspective, noting that "the most important task of an undergraduate student is to learn to be a member of the discipline community, to tap into the knowledge and practice embodied in that community" (p. 528). In order to accomplish this, Nichols posits that there are "3 directions" that a student must take in his or her education to acculturate into a discipline: movement toward disciplinary production, toward learning about their subject, and toward participation in a scholarly or professional community.…”

“…Such an educational context obviates the need to work with disciplinary faculty to extend the reach of librarians into disciplinary curricula. Nichols (2009) has applied the concept of situated cognition to IL instruction from a disciplinary perspective, noting that: RSR 43,2…”

“…Once we have elicited and made explicit the tacit disciplinary information practices faculty desire for their students, the next step is to work with disciplinary faculty to design situated learning opportunities within their curriculum. A number of authors in the LIS field have offered suggestions for how to leverage the power of formal higher 329 Situating information literacy in the disciplines education learning environments to facilitate embodied skill acquisition by analyzing skill acquisition into stages or phases of development (Nichols, 2009;Thompson and Lathey, 2013). While it would be a mistake to universalize such theories and argue that embodied disciplinarity is best acquired in some sort of mechanically staged process, our model rests on the belief that such approaches are heuristically helpful to educators looking to design curriculum.…”

Situated Cognition Principles Increase Students’ Likelihood of Knowledge Transfer in an Online Information Literacy Course

“…Nichols (2009) discussed the teaching of information literacy behaviours through situated cognition strategies and identified themes in students' transitions from action to cognition and participation in which actions (e.g., searching and taking notes) progress to cognition direction (i.e., becoming more knowledgeable about a subject) and leading to participation in the academic community and engaging in successful scholarly communication. This article furthers the aims of the proposed model Nichols (2009) presented because it provides more concrete evidence due to research design moving from case studies to a randomized controlled trial.…”