Know Your Information Sources (Grades 7 – 12)
Related Information Literacy Skills: Big6 #2 – Information Seeking Strategies
Purpose: To help students recognize various information sources and to apply appropriate criteria for selecting the best information source(s) for their particular research need.
Learning Contexts: The lesson is applicable for tasks that involve any type of information seeking, research, or report writing in secondary and higher education settings.
Discussion: When confronted with a research project, students are frequently either overwhelmed by or uninformed about their information source choices. Today’s students frequently equate information seeking with the World Wide Web. They do not realize that there are a wide variety of information choices available to them, each requiring different finding methods. This exercise will help students identify different sources of information, their quality and content, and understand how they are organized. By understanding the various types of information and where information comes from, students will recognize appropriate sources for specific seeking or research topics.
Sample in Context: This lesson begins with a brainstorming activity in which the instructor asks the students to identify different information sources. If the class is small, each student may be asked to give one source. The instructor and students then review the “Know Your Information Sources” handout to get familiar with the major resources. Once familiar with these major resources, students are asked to complete the “What Source Would You Use” exercise. After this initial preparation, students are then asked to apply appropriate selection criteria to their information task.
Item: Know Your Information Sources (
)
Using the “Know Your Information Sources” handout, determine the best information source(s) to use in the situations presented in the “What Source Would You Use” exercise. Upon completing the exercise, think about your own information task. As you prepare for research, think about the questions on the bottom half of the exercise sheet. Your answers will help you determine the most useful sources for locating information on your topic.
What Source Would You Use?
N = Newspaper, PM = Popular Magazine, SJ = Scholarly Journal,
R = Reference Book, B = Book, W = Web, P = Person
Hint: you may select more than one source
____ to find statistics on the number of working mothers with children under the age of five
____ to locate an in-depth article about the level of absenteeism among working mothers with children under the age of five
____ to find out information about the day care center that XYZ corporation opened in your home town
____ to learn about presentations offered at the National Association for Family Child Care Conference in July 2001
____ to find a current analysis of how working mothers in the 21st century are coping with child care issues
____ to find out how much families are paying for child care
____ to read a detailed analysis of child-care options in the workplace
____ to learn about companies that are offering child care at the workplace
Apply Your Skill:
Now let’s apply what we have learned about information sources to a specific research need.
Task Definition: As your company’s personnel director, your employer has asked you to make a recommendation on whether or not to provide a day care center at your workplace. Included in your recommendation will be a report about the current workplace situation, an examination of other case studies, and information about the advantages and disadvantages for providing day care at the workplace.
As you prepare to research, think about these questions. Your answers will help you determine the most useful sources of information on your topic.
1. Q: Who is your audience? A: Your employer.
2. Q: What types of information do you need? A: Case studies, statistics, information about whether or not day care has worked at other workplaces, survey of employee attitude.
3. Q: Has this subject been studied for a long time or is it new? A: This topic has been studied for the last 10 – 20 years.
4. Q: Who is doing research on this topic? Is there a special interest group or organization? A: Organizations of working mothers or personnel directors
5. What do you already know about this topic? Not too much, only that employees have been missing work lately due to child care problems.
Sources to use for this information task: books, articles from both popular magazines and scholarly journals, web to find organizations and their research, human sources.
