- Strategies for Embedded Information Literacy Instruction for English Language Learners
Clara Y. Tran, Stony Brook University, and Selrnsy Aytac, Long Island University
Slides to Strategies for Embedded Information Literacy Instruction for English Language Learners
Write-up by Stephanie Margolin
We might see ELL students in our IL classrooms, but few of us have the requisite special training or strategies to help make our time with these students as effective as possible. My impression, listening to this talk, is that much like universal design strategies, the ideas presented here potentially benefit all students, native speakers and ELL alike.
Some ideas:
• Help students with vocabulary, especially library jargon
• Teach how to effectively scan
• Think about digital storytelling, video and other interactivity, which can be easier to slow down or watch more than once
• Scaffolding is helpful
• Become more familiar with students’ background knowledge
o Ask students questions like
Have you ever heard of….?
Can you give an example of …. [from your country/culture]?
• K/W/L chart
o Before: what you know (K) and want to know/learn (W)
o After: what you have learned (L)
• Visual aids
o E.g. for citations, demonstrate the “anatomy” of a citation, using different colors
o “Realia” — bring samples of real objects (periodicals, books, etc)
o World Wall — recognize new vocabulary
• Handwriting can be hard for (ELL) students to read, so print things
• Flipped classrooms — students read the material (or watch a video) first, at their own pace, and come to class with questions
• Lots and lots of handouts
We closed the session in near silence, as we participants folded paper to make an origami fortune teller (also known as “cootie catcher”). Each section of our completed project had a different library word printed on it. It was nice to end with a few minutes of quiet reflective time, and to be reminded that that is helpful for our students, too.
During the Q/A period, several participants shared a common assignment that often brings ELL students to the reference desk: Find a book to read about U.S. history (or NYC history). This question is hard for reference librarians because it is so general. It can be helpful to know that students will be reading this book and presenting a book report on it. This might also be an opportunity to reach out to the ELL teacher who is making the assignment to put together an appropriate collection of books to which students can be directed.
- Dis/Information Nation: Voter Personas and Dis/Information Literacy in the 2016 Election and Beyond
Iris Finkel, Hunter College and Lydia Willoughby, SUNY New Paltz
Write-up by Anne Leonard
The presenters talked about their use of a role-playing game in library instruction. The objective of this game is to determine how information functions in the article you are assigned. The presenters used material from the open textbook Web Literacy for Student Fact-Checkers, available at webliteracy.pressbooks.com. To identify viral content and hot dis/information topics, the presenters used Buzzsumo.com, a site that measures traffic and engagements through social media platforms and with links to the original source, making it easy to identify the most shared stories. We then played a round of the game. Each participant was assigned a story to read. We each filled out a persona worksheet and introduced our personas – many were very different from ourselves! Next we all presented our perspective on the articles in the voices of our personas, expressed our thoughts on how much we trusted the news source, what we already knew on the issue, how we believed the government agencies at fault SHOULD be handling the issues. We completed an evaluation worksheet, and then reflected on the experience of reading the article “in character,” including how we perceived the language and images chosen to manipulate the reader, how rigorously we questioned the motive of the publisher, and whether or not we looked for blatant and obvious propaganda. We then discussed how to use this game in a one-shot instruction session. We raised questions about how to encourage students to invent a persona and discourage stereotypes – perhaps by selecting from a deck of cards, or picking someone known to them. The presentation is online at bit.ly/disinfonation
