Presented at LILAC 2009

1. Welcome
Introduction
Author name
Information Services
Information literacy for life-not just for
Christmas! Or even the Autumn term
Alison Pope, Information Services,
31 March 2009

3. What we used to do
• Skills were taught as part of 30 credit module
“English Legal System and Study Skills” (ELS3)
• Timetabling constraints meant that skills were
handled after Christmas: not ideal
• Module feedback showed that students felt this
was not helpful

4. Using the student feedback
• Worked with module leader to analyse student feedback
on ELS3 module
• Practical focus needed: move to workshops only
• The “Morecambe/Previn” problem: we were doing all the
right things just not necessarily in the right order!
• Consequence was that students disengaged and thought
the material we covered was disposable
• Failure to apply skills learnt to the modules and, indeed,
to employability and life

5. Opportunity to change
• University-wide emphasis on embracing the UK Government’s Skills
agenda: 2007/8 appointment of new member of University Executive
who has this as her focus.
• Law School wishes to align itself with this new initiative.
• Undergraduate award up for review and re-validation 2008/9.
• Decision taken to split ELS3 into 2 smaller modules
• This means there is now the need to use SU’s new revised learning
outcome “enquiry”
• Opportunity to create totally workshop driven module

6. What we did
• Division of the module in to 2 x 15 credit modules means that
Skills element can now be handled before Christmas.
• Listed topics to cover- not just information literacy- and tried
to put these topics into an order that meant students received
workshops at times meaningful to them.
• Huge task: need to cover specific skills at times in the
undergraduate course when these skills can be embedded in
the context of the other modules; contract, criminal law,
constitutional and administrative law.

7. Skills groupings
• Divided the skills into three types
– Learning
– Personal enhancement and employability
– Lawyering

8. Finding a place for
information literacy
Information literacy nestles within “learning” element
and is represented by the topics
• Understanding primary sources
• Evaluating secondary sources
• Academic writing
• Referencing and plagiarism

9. Other elements of the
course
• Academic writing
• Problem solving
• Interviewing
• Presentation skills
• Professional writing
• Group work
• Leadership
• Employability

10. Students as strategic
learners
Timetabling topics for points in the course when other modules would
be handling these issues
• Students cover understanding cases and statutes right at the
beginning. [Workshop in late September].
• Students cover evaluating secondary sources when they are
beginning to read around topics for tutorials. [Workshop in early
October].
• Academic writing covered when students need to begin work on a
2000 word written assessment. [Workshop in early November].
• Referencing and plagiarism covered just before hand-in date.
[Workshop in late November].

11. Students as strategic
learners
• Choice of topics around which skills workshops focus is
important
• Try to echo what is going on in the other first year
modules so that students see the inter-relationship of
skills to study
• For example, professional writing workshop looks at a
topic which is being studied at the same time in contract
law ,exclusion clauses

12. Students as strategic
learners
This idea of doing skills based work at the right time and on
the right topic is borne out by research
• Hot topics and reflective learning (Bordinaro and
Richardson (2004))
• “Just-in-time” research on the importance of timeliness
(Walker and Engel (2003))

13. Timing is crucial
• Students will engage more with a topic which is
timely
• Students will remember and re-apply more of
topic which has been studied in an integrated
way

14. The strategic framework for this
• Re-design of the module is in line with the
University’s IL Statement of Good Practice
(January 2007)
• Re-design is also in line with the University’s
revised learning outcome “enquiry” (September
2007).

15. Staffordshire’s learning
outcomes
• Knowledge and Understanding
• Learning
• Enquiry
• Analysis
• Problem Solving
• Communication
• Application
• Reflection

16. Enquiry learning outcome
Outcome Certificate Intermediate Honours
Enquiry Present, evaluate,
and interpret
qualitative and
quantitative data
Demonstrate
knowledge of the
main methods of
enquiry in (the field
of study)
Deploy
accurately
established
techniques of
analysis and
enquiry and
initiate and
carry out
projects within
(the field of
study)

17. Revised learning outcome
(undergraduate level)
Honours
Deploy accurately established techniques of
analysis and enquiry and initiate and carry out
projects within (the field of study). Evaluate
use of Information Literacy, including the
ethical use of information in (the field of
study).

18. Linking to a learning outcome
• This means that skills must be assessed.
• Specifically, information literacy work must be assessed.
• One of the new Skills Module learning outcomes says,
“To identify, retrieve and evaluate legal material for a given
purpose and to use such material appropriately.”
• Webber and Johnston (2006) say that IL should be
regarded as a graduate attribute and assessed by credit
bearing work.

19. Linking to assessment
Skills assessment involves 4 tasks
• Preparing a Powerpoint presentation on a recent legal
development
• Producing an annotated bibliography of sources looking
at the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading
Regulations 2008. This must be evaluative and include
both web-based and paper-based resources.
• Preparing a CV
• Creating a handout explaining the role of the judge in the
criminal court to a defendant.

20. Will it work?
• Students are certainly seeing that the skills we are
highlighting are important.
• Module evaluation not done yet but attendance is good
and not falling.
• Anecdotally, research done for written work is better.
• May have succeeded in getting learners to see that skills
and even information literacy isn’t just for Christmas….or
even just the Autumn Term

21. How to persuade students IL is for
life?
Contextual
– IL taught when other lifelong skills are being
learnt, e.g. client interviewing, leadership
skills
– IL is an equal part of the assessment
– IL therefore perceived as being as important
as these other professional “lawyering” skills

22. How to persuade students IL is for
life?
• Whole Skills module set in the context of
the UK Government’s Skills agenda.
• HE response to the Leitch Review (2006)
which is discussed Pope and Walton
(2009)
• This module will help you get and keep a
job.

24. References
• Bordinaro, K & Richardson, G. (2004) Scaffolding and reflection in
course integrated library instruction Journal of Academic
Librarianship Vol.30 (5) p.391-401
• HM Treasury (2006). Leitch Review. Available at:
http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/independent_reviews/leitch_review/review_
• Pope, A. and Walton, G. Information and media literacies:
sharpening our vision in the twenty first century, chapter accepted
for publication in an, as yet, untitled book to be published by
Informing Science Press early 2009
• Walker, H.M. & Engel, K.R. (2003) Research exercise: a sequenced
approach to just-in-time information literacy instruction Research
Strategies Vol 19 p.135-147
• Webber, S. & Johnston, B. (2006) Working towards the Information
Literate University In Walton, G. and Pope, A. Information literacy:
recognising the need Oxford Chandos.

25. Welcome
Introduction
Author name
Information Services
Information literacy for life-not just for
Christmas! Or even the Autumn term
Alison Pope, Information Services,
31 March 2009