Readings on Information Literacy and Teaching

Anyone who has taught a course knows that finding readings outside the textbook is 1) expected; 2) necessary; and 3) iffy. They are expected because a textbook can only do so much and is often forced to summarize topics that can be enhanced by further reading. They are often necessary because teachers may require students to not only read, but also to reflect on those readings as part of the course requirements. Iffy because a teacher can spend a lot of time organizing the best reading list, only to have the students pay scant attention, either because they deem the articles non-essential or out-of-date, or because reading them is just one more time management factor in their busy student lives

Introduction

While I've been "involved" in information literacy ever since I arrived at Indiana State University in 1985, it seems as though I've always been explaining the ways libraries do things and trying to help others make sense of it. I've been doing all the readings about Generation this and Generation that, which is all well and good. From the academic standpoint, what I'm seeing is the need for more and more collaboration between librarians and teaching faculty, including convincing the teaching faculty that, if they want college students to use 'library resources', they need to make very specific requirements, including specific reading assignments, lists of reference books to go to for certain types of answers, etc. and the continuing need to make sure the teaching faculty understand the crucial role they play in 'getting information literacy' across

The Instructional Menu

Esther Grassian's and Joan Kaplowitz's wonderful text, Information Literacy Instruction: Theory and Practice, devotes a chapter to the "Instructional Menu", referring to the many 'modes' we use to try to get 'information literacy' across. Chapter nine highlights the pros and cons of the instructional modes included. But, how often do instruction librarians tie the mode to the type of activity, either consiously or subliminally? Since information literacy is not done in a vacuum, usually the purpose of putting information literacy skills to use is because the person has a goal in mind. In academia, that goal is usually an assignment. Most often information literacy instruction is tied to that traditional, and tired, manifestation, the 'research paper.' But we know that there are many different sorts of assignments, some because of the academic discipline, some because of the level of student, and some because a teacher and a librarian have worked together to format a new assignment. The instructional menu below has grown in the years since the Grassian/Kaplowits text have been published. The author of this article began a conscious effort to identify as many research/writing, etc. activities as she could. The result has been fun. See what you can do with this list. If you can think of other items to include in either column, please let the author know

Relationships Between Job Design, Job Crafting, Idiosyncratic Deals, and Psychological Empowerment

Although much is known about employee empowerment and work designs, numerous companies and management practitioners struggle to implement empowerment initiatives effectively because it is not known which approach best facilitates individual levels of psychological empowerment. Traditional job design theory focuses on the role of managers and portrays employees as passive grantees of empowerment. Employees may influence their own empowerment by taking an active role in work design. The primary purpose of this correlational study was to examine whether job crafting or idiosyncratic deals are more or less empowering than job design and how work locus of control influences these relationships. It was hypothesized that job crafting would be the strongest correlate with psychological empowerment. A quantitative cross-sectional survey was designed with measures adapted from existing instruments. A sample of 150 adults, drawn from various industries in the United States, completed a voluntary, online survey. Data analysis, which used Pearson correlations, revealed that job crafting had a stronger relationship with psychological empowerment than did idiosyncratic deals and management-driven job design for employees with high internal work locus of control. Findings from this study may help organizational leaders understand how employees with high internal tendencies are psychologically empowered when actively engaged in designing their own work. Employees may then feel empowered to advance the company\u27s social agenda and make personalized contributions to the greater society, essentially becoming goodwill ambassadors for the organization

Celebrating 20 Years BIUE: A Quick Look Back and a Fast Look Forward

In 1987, Indiana University - Bloomington librarians Emily Okada and Mary Popp had an idea, called together other librarians, and the Bibliographic Instruction/User Education (BIUE) of the Indiana Library Federation (ILF) was born. Initially, BIUE was created to: 1) Increase awareness of user education as an essential library service and play an active role in the development of Indiana Library Federation policies promoting user education; 2) Provide a forum for broad discussion of user education issues within Indiana Libraries; 3) Provide opportunities in which library workers from all types of libraries and from throughout the state of Indiana can share user education ideas, materials, and solutions; and 4) Help practicioners develop, improve and promote user education by providing information, skills, and tools

From Hospital to Home to Participation: A Position Paper on Transition Planning Poststroke

Based on a review of the evidence, members of the American Congress of Rehabilitation Medicine Stroke Group’s Movement Interventions Task Force offer these 5 recommendations to help improve transitions of care for patients and their caregivers: (1) improving communication processes; (2) using transition specialists; (3) implementing a patient-centered discharge checklist; (4) using standardized outcome measures; and (5) establishing partnerships with community wellness programs. Because of changes in health care policy, there are incentives to improve transitions during stroke rehabilitation. Although transition management programs often include multidisciplinary teams, medication management, caregiver education, and follow-up care management, there is a lack of a comprehensive and standardized approach to implement transition management protocols during poststroke rehabilitation. This article uses the Transitions of Care (TOC) model to conceptualize how to facilitate a comprehensive patient-centered hand off at discharge to maximize patient functioning and health. Specifically, this article reviews current guidelines and provides an evidence summary of several commonly cited approaches (Early Supported Discharge, planned predischarge home visits, discharge checklists) to manage TOC, followed by a description of documented barriers to effective transitions. Patient-centered and standardized transition management may improve community integration, activities of daily living performance, and quality of life for stroke survivors while also decreasing hospital readmission rates during the transition from hospital to home to community

Impact of socioeconomic status on cancer incidence and stage at diagnosis: selected findings from the surveillance, epidemiology, and end results: National Longitudinal Mortality Study

BACKGROUND: Population-based cancer registry data from the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) Program at the National Cancer Institute (NCI) are mainly based on medical records and administrative information. Individual-level socioeconomic data are not routinely reported by cancer registries in the United States because they are not available in patient hospital records. The U.S. representative National Longitudinal Mortality Study (NLMS) data provide self-reported, detailed demographic and socioeconomic data from the Social and Economic Supplement to the Census Bureau's Current Population Survey (CPS). In 1999, the NCI initiated the SEER-NLMS study, linking the population-based SEER cancer registry data to NLMS data. The SEER-NLMS data provide a new unique research resource that is valuable for health disparity research on cancer burden. We describe the design, methods, and limitations of this data set. We also present findings on cancer-related health disparities according to individual-level socioeconomic status (SES) and demographic characteristics for all cancers combined and for cancers of the lung, breast, prostate, cervix, and melanoma. METHODS: Records of cancer patients diagnosed in 1973–2001 when residing 1 of 11 SEER registries were linked with 26 NLMS cohorts. The total number of SEER matched cancer patients that were also members of an NLMS cohort was 26,844. Of these 26,844 matched patients, 11,464 were included in the incidence analyses and 15,357 in the late-stage diagnosis analyses. Matched patients (used in the incidence analyses) and unmatched patients were compared by age group, sex, race, ethnicity, residence area, year of diagnosis, and cancer anatomic site. Cohort-based age-adjusted cancer incidence rates were computed. The impact of socioeconomic status on cancer incidence and stage of diagnosis was evaluated. RESULTS: Men and women with less than a high school education had elevated lung cancer rate ratios of 3.01 and 2.02, respectively, relative to their college educated counterparts. Those with family annual incomes less than $12,500 had incidence rates that were more than 1.7 times the lung cancer incidence rate of those with incomes$50,000 or higher. Lower income was also associated with a statistically significantly increased risk of distant-stage breast cancer among women and distant-stage prostate cancer among men. CONCLUSIONS: Socioeconomic patterns in incidence varied for specific cancers, while such patterns for stage were generally consistent across cancers, with late-stage diagnoses being associated with lower SES. These findings illustrate the potential for analyzing disparities in cancer outcomes according to a variety of individual-level socioeconomic, demographic, and health care characteristics, as well as by area measures available in the linked database