The pathfinder: enemy of information literacy?
A recent post on the AASL blog has me thinking about pathfinders today. You know what pathfinders are, right? Those lists of resources that librarians make for every research project that is done in the library. The author of the post wonders if we aren’t sending students mixed messages when we talk about how they need to learn searching strategies and then be able to evaluate the information they find, but turn right around and hand them a list of “approved” resources to use. Why should they bother to learn anything about searching or evaluating information when they know that we’re going to tell them where to find the stuff they need? In a world of infoglut, I’m not sure that we are doing them any favors.
The author also mentions that she has started using a wiki site for her pathfinders and allowing teachers and students to help in their creation. Joyce Valenza has blogged about this idea also. While I love the collaborative aspect of all stakeholders contributing to a wiki pathfinder, I’m wondering now – are we leading our students down the wrong path? Post your thoughts in the comments.
Image citation: Chopwell-path to the river. Uploaded on March 24, 2008 by immarkcz. Attribution-Noncommercial-Share alike license.
June 26th, 2008 at 7:52 am
Hi Mary,
I think what I try to do in these pathfinders is to make learners aware of their choices. I lead them to databases and ebooks and portal sites to model the existence of these types of resources. Once they discover these tools, they still have many decisions to make in terms of relevance, quality, appropriateness, etc. We hardly ever lead students to “approved resources” in our high school. We value student problem solving and decision making. As for teaching about searching, once they are in tools like Literary Resource Center, there are so many searching decisions to make! We are merely modeling genre choices to prepare these learners for an even larger information landscape.
joyce
June 26th, 2008 at 9:44 am
As Joyce noted above, we have to teach the students how to evaluate websites before we can expect them to find appropriate and reliable sites on their own. At middle school they definitely need this guidance. Many still believe that no matter what they find on the web, it’s correct. The teacher has probably discovered some very valuable websites that the students will find helpful and informative. Nettrekker is such a powerful search engine for students not web savvy. High school students probably are better equipped to make better choices than the younger ones.
June 26th, 2008 at 11:24 am
@Joyce
As is the case with many instructional strategies and tools, pathfinders are used in different ways by different people. Your example shows how pathfinders can and should be used to open intellectual avenues to students. In the hands of others, I’m afraid that they can become barriers to student discovery and exploration. This is what we must guard against. Thanks for commenting. It’s an interesting conversation.
@Cheri
You’re right – students do need to know how to evaluate information they find on the web. My point is that we should be careful not to let our pathfinders become a restriction, rather than something that guides them in their exploration of sources. It’s kind of like when a teacher tells students they have to have one magazine article, one book, and one web site in their list of works cited. I know that the teacher is trying to encourage students to use a variety of sources, but by putting artificial requirements in the project, students aren’t learning how to do authentic research where they use the best sources for their topic – no matter what format they are in. I understand that younger students need more structure, but the freedom to make some of their own choices needs to remain as well.
Thanks for commenting to continue this conversation!
June 27th, 2008 at 10:31 am
I use the pathfinder as a starting point–a reminder to not forget the printed sources and on-line databases and a few web-sites to get them started. What generally happens–they wikipedia or google there resources anyway.
Based on observations at my school and conversations with the computer instructors, they don’t have time to even go over web evaluations. I need to find some way to have this taught either in the classroom or when the kids are with me for research purposes.
Because time is often limited. Teachers want the pathfinders as time-saving mechanism. How the kids get the information is not as important as students getting and presenting the information find.
Hmmmm….maybe some new collaboration ideas need to be put in place?
June 27th, 2008 at 7:33 pm
Dana – Time is always seems to be a problem. The fact is that we make time for the things we value, so how do we get teachers to understand and value the concept that students need searching and evaluating skills in order to deliver the content understanding that they (the teachers) are after?
Thanks for helping us continue thinking about this.
June 30th, 2008 at 12:55 pm
I heard Eric LeMoine from Oregon talking about this in his session this morning at NECC — he drew an interesting comparison — saw pushing links to students as the SAME as using resources pulled by the librarian. He really did not see that as undermining instruction in information literacy (his broader topic) since, as he said, students will still have to sort, filter, and make sense of the information — “still a big mountain to climb,” he said, even when those sources have been identified.
July 7th, 2008 at 9:39 am
Hi Wendy – That is an interesting comparison and reminds me that when we first started teaching librarians in my district how to add these resources to their web pages, we called it “creating an online cart.” Thanks for the comment!
July 14th, 2008 at 8:49 pm
Hi Mary–
Wow, how did I manage to miss your blog? This is a real find!
I wanted to respond, since you linked to my bit on the AASL blog! (grin)
Joyce, as usual, is thinking WAY ahead of me! Searching extensive database (not to mention portals!) can be every bit as overwhelming and non-productive as searching the web as a whole. Students still need to use their skills selectively.
I liked that, toward the end of the year, my “web” section of the pathfinders contained fewer specific sites, concentrating more on portals. When we DO provide a lengthy list of sites (as I do with Middle Schoolers), it’s very important to emphasize they are not extensive, and students need to use them as a starting point.
I think what started my whole train of thought was a quote from a student in an article about the problems college freshmen were having doing research and recognizing authoritative sites. He said something like, “I just wish they’d give us a list of sites they approve,” and I thought, “Here’s a kid who grew up on Nettrekker… or pathfinders!”
Anyway, interesting discussion! And your blog’s now in my reader!
d
July 15th, 2008 at 12:07 pm
Hi Jeri – Thanks so much for your comment. For many years, I’ve advocated the idea of letting students use any web site they want – as long as they complete an evaluation on it that is turned in with their paper/project. Most teachers, however, would rather students stick with the list that we give them. At some point, though, we have to begin weaning them off our list and providing experiences that will require them to evaluate their own sources of information.