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Community of Practice of School Libraries towards a proposed Library and Information Literacy Program

Carlo Zebedee R. Gualvez, RL, LPT, MLIS

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Background of the Problem

Redefining

Eisenberg and Berkowitz’s Big 6 Skills

Kuhlthau’s Information Seeking Model

Irving’s Information skills, etc.

Rise of Information Literacy Standards

Information Age

A Nation at Risk: the imperative for Educational Reform

Came from

as a person who has an integrative encompassing reflective discovery of information, understanding of how information is produced, uses an information in creating new knowledge and participating ethically in communities of learning (ACRL, 2016)

The library had always been in existent in the past years long before the rise of the information age.(Click) Libraries role that time is to store and preserve different histories and records of a civilization. However, on the rise of the demands in information in these age, the libraries are forced to redefine (Click) their role unto the society. One of the innovations and changes was the rise of the concept (click) of Information Literacy (IL) skills as a critical skill in the 21^st Century.(click) Information Literacy is defined by the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) as a person who has an integrative encompassing reflective discovery of information, understanding of how information is produced, uses an information in creating new knowledge and participating ethically in communities of learning. But before the ACRL arrived with that improved definition, it came from the educational reform report of the late US President Ronald Reagan entitled A Nation At Risk. From that educational reform is the rise of the different Information Literacy Models three of which is the Eisenberg and Berkowitz’s Big 6 Skills, Kuhlthau’s Information Seeking Model, and Irving’s Information Skills. But the most memorable IL model that the implication of Libraries started, came from Kuhlthau’s in which he mentioned the term “library skills” as a primary component of Information Literacy. From that point forward, different Information Literacy Standards started to rise. Two of the most widely-used Information Literacy Standard is the American Association of School Librarians (AASL) and the previously mentioned organization which is the ACRL. This two organization came from the United States.

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Background of the Problem

We have an established

It is prescribed in the following

Librarians and Library Administrators

This will be beneficial to the following people…

Students

Teachers

School Administrators

Currently we do not have an established Information Literacy Standard that can be compared with the AASL and ACRL standards in the Philippine Context. However, the closest established document or curriculum that Filipino Librarians do have is the Media and Information Literacy. It is currently offered as a Core course in Senior High School. It is an 80-hour course that has the same goal with the Information Literacy Standard abroad—that is to produce learners with the skill of identifying, locating, using, and evaluating information. Even though IL skills are only formally stipulated as a skill for the students in the course of MIL, the skill was already long been integrated in the Grade 1-10 Information Literacy Program in some private schools. The librarians are the one who are teaching the said skills among the students. The Rationale came from two perspectives. Number one from the Law which is the Republic Act 9246 or the Philippine Librarianship Act of 2003. In which one of the said duties and responsibilities of a librarian as a profession is to render reference assistance among the library clients. This was empowered and re-emphasized in the creation of the Standard for Philippine School Libraries, in which it stated in the Services Standard (Standard V), that the librarians are required to inculcate information literacy skills among the students. The second basis for teaching IL skills unto the students lies in the concept of accreditation for Schools. Since having an accreditation gives a school certain level of benefits and higher educational status or prestige in the educational landscape, key schools are accomplishing the requirements to meet the criteria of local or international accreditation. One of the area in accreditation is the Library that is area 4 for PAASCU Accreditation. Part of which of the requirements for the area of the Library, specifically in PAASCU, a library and information literacy session. Looking at the different researches in the field of librarianship regarding Library and Information Literacy Program, the usual problems that continuously reoccurs in the literature talks about teacher-librarian collaboration, curriculum linkages of the program, and the varying Library and Information Literacy Program for schools. Curriculum linkages and LILP variations are present since most of the researches and LILP developments especially in the Philippines uses community needs assessment as a primary basis for creating an LILP. Furthermore, researches suggest that there are schools in the Philippines who lack a formal Library and Information Literacy Program or worse, none. This problems leads to varying skill level competencies for the students specifically in private and public schools, since there are lack for standardized tools for giving such service.

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Gaps of the Study

Gaps that will be addressed in this study…

There are no actual Applications of the Rationale, Theories, and models of Library and Information Literacy Program, particularly in the Philippines. Most of it came from the United States.

Library and information Literacy Program from different School Library are usually varying from Topics, Skills, and Methodologies.

Teacher-Librarian Collaborations, Curriculum Alignment, and creating standard guidelines on LILP are the usual problems that continually rearises in different researches.

Most of the schools in the researches, lacks a formal Library and Information Literacy Program.

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Thesis Statement

There is a need to develop an effective Library Information Literacy Program and this can be done through recognizing the Community of Practice (CoP) of distinguished School Libraries.

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Objectives of the study

General Objective:

Develop a Library Information Literacy Program which is aligned with the different IL standards, K-12 curriculum, and Community of Practice of different School Libraries

Specific Objectives

Identify the community of practice of school libraries in implementing their respective Library Information Literacy Program
Identify and address the different challenges faced by the librarians in implementing their respective Library Information Literacy Program

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Statement of the Problem

To what extent do the librarians teach the different IL skills and topics included in the different IL Standards?
What is the community of practice of school libraries in implementing their respective LILP in each school year?
What are the different challenges that the librarians faced in implementing the LILP?
What LILP can be proposed based on the results of the study?

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Theoretical/ Conceptual Framework

As the paradigm of the study, the proposed IL program for the different school libraries lies first in the benchmarked existing Library Information Literacy Program of the participating schools. The LILP of the selected schools will give the study base line data on the objectives, skills, the topics that are being taught to the students, the teaching methodologies of librarian, the different assessment techniques in assessing the learned skills of the students, and the procedures and practices in implementing it. These elements will be useful as benchmark of the current study to create the proposed outcomes of this research. These are followed by the ACRL Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education to identify the skills needed from the learner, followed by the challenges and problems that the librarians’ face in implementing their respective LILP. These includes the wide-array of problems that includes scheduling the LIL Sessions, classroom management skills of the librarians, skill proficiency of the students, and other related challenges and lastly the DepEd K-12 Curriculum of English and Filipino which will be used to determine the grade level of each skill that will be introduce to the students. This is important to ensure that each skill taught to a particular grade level is useful at the time it will be given to the student.

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Theoretical/ Conceptual Framework

As the paradigm of the study, the proposed IL program for the different school libraries lies first in the benchmarked existing Library Information Literacy Program of the participating schools. The LILP of the selected schools will give the study base line data on the objectives, skills, the topics that are being taught to the students, the teaching methodologies of librarian, the different assessment techniques in assessing the learned skills of the students, and the procedures and practices in implementing it. These elements will be useful as benchmark of the current study to create the proposed outcomes of this research. These are followed by the ACRL Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education to identify the skills needed from the learner, followed by the challenges and problems that the librarians’ face in implementing their respective LILP. These includes the wide-array of problems that includes scheduling the LIL Sessions, classroom management skills of the librarians, skill proficiency of the students, and other related challenges and lastly the DepEd K-12 Curriculum of English and Filipino which will be used to determine the grade level of each skill that will be introduce to the students. This is important to ensure that each skill taught to a particular grade level is useful at the time it will be given to the student.

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Methodology

Descriptive Research Method

Respondents

PAASCU accreditation certification of level 3 and 4 within the National Capital Region offering K12 curriculum

Librarians, preferably, the chief librarian or any licensed librarian who is in charge of conducting or implementing the LILP of the library

Research Design

Research Instrument

Survey Instrument

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Methodology

Data Gathering Method

The research instrument was created using Google Form and the link was sent via email to the respondents. The instrument includes an informed consent form which includes the instructions for answering the instrument, the purpose of the research, the risks involved, and the confidentiality of their answers. Moreover, the researcher remained online on different social media accounts to address clarifications and questions of the respondents regarding the instrument

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Methodology

Data Analysis

Descriptors	Range of Values
A great deal of Extent	4.5-5.0
Considerably Extensive	3.5-4.4
Moderately Extensive	2.5-3.4
Slightly Extensive	1.5-2.4
No Extent	1.0-1.4

Descriptors Used for Information Literacy Skills

Descriptors Used for Application of Characteristics of Best Library and Information Literacy Program

Weighted Mean was utilized to analyzed the data from the instrument

Descriptors	Range of Values
Very relevant	4.5-5.0
Moderately relevant	3.5-4.4
Neither relevant nor irrelevant	2.5-3.4
Moderately Irrelevant	1.5-2.4
Very Irrelevant	1.0-1.4

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Results and Discussion

Information Literacy Skills targeted by each Program.

Themes of Table

Community of Practice of School Libraries in LILP

Challenges Face by the Librarians in handling LILP

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Results and Discussion

Information Literacy Skills targeted by each Program.

Information Literacy Skills	Weighted Mean	Descriptor
Skill 5: Ethical Use of Information	4.44	Considerably Extensive
Skill 2: Access to Information Sources	4.34	Considerably Extensive
Skill 1: Recognition of Information Needs	4.27	Considerably Extensive
Skill 4: Effective Use of Information	4.17	Considerably Extensive
Skill 3: Evaluation of Information Sources and Output	4.17	Considerably Extensive

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Results and Discussion

Community of Practice of School Libraries in LILP

Components of LILP	Weighted Mean	Descriptors
Component 1: Mission, Goals, and Objectives	4.51	Very Relevant
Component 6: Communication and Advocacy	4.35	Moderately Relevant
Component 2: Planning	4.30	Moderately Relevant
Component 5: Pedagogy	4.30	Moderately Relevant
Component 3: Administration and Leadership	4.29	Moderately Relevant
Component 4: Program Sequencing	4.25	Moderately Relevant
Component 7: Assessment and Evaluation	4.22	Moderately Relevant

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Results and Discussion

Challenges Face by the Librarians in handling LILP

Challenges	Number of Responses (f)	%
Lack of training in teaching Information Literacy for Librarians	10	67%
Insufficient number of staff to conduct an IL Session	10	67%
Rapid changes in lessons and skill competencies.	6	40%
Reluctance of librarians and faculty in collaboration	6	40%
Misconception of students on information literacy skills.	5	33%
Lack of regular review of Library Information Literacy Program	4	27%
Unintegrated IL Program unto the curriculum	4	27%
Limited access to school curricula and other pertinent documents	3	20%
Lack of support from parent organization through policy	3	20%
Un-accommodated students in IL Sessions due to many enrollees.	2	13%
No coordination of practices in different libraries in IL	2	13%
Limited IT resources to aid the teaching.	2	13%
Lack of Proper Scheduling.	2	13%
Lack of computer skills among the librarians.	1	7%
Lack of support from parent organization financially and materially	1	7%
Limited Information Literacy Session	1	7%

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Findings of the study

Librarians

They already embraced their roles in advocating the said skills since all school libraries has a written LILP within their schools

Inconsistencies seen in terms of teaching IL Skills across grade levels

It was also found out that the librarians gave more depth on the skills that relate to library skills and give shallow contents on information and study skills.

In terms of managing the program, they excel in establishing the mission, vision and goals of the program

Commendable

Needs Improvement

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Research Instrument

Librarians

Needs Improvement

They rarely review international standards on IL (e.g., ACRL IL Standard) in determining the ideas that they need to teach unto their students and in terms of implementing the program. They usually resort to the needs of their respective community.

They heavily rely on students’ scores and grades to measure the effectiveness of the program without the use of other instruments. Moreover, they also showed discrepancies in providing varying forms of evaluation of student learning.

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Research Instrument

Librarians

Usual Challenges Encountered

The need for a training in teaching IL competencies

Human resource insufficiency in managing the program especially in the schools with a number of three (3) librarians and below

School librarians are not keen on sharing their IL program practices to their co-school librarians

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Conclusion

Philippine school librarians from highly accredited schools are embracing the critical role of teaching IL to their students with their evident IL services in their respective schools. However, they are having a hard time to provide quality IL services among the students because of different challenges they are facing.

Moreover, they have totally abandoned the idea of a one-shot library session and embraced a progressive, longitudinal and multiple IL sessions.

In terms of teaching, due to unfamiliarity in different guidelines in IL, they only provide in-depth teaching in library skills. Making the sessions heavily rely on library instruction. They rely unto subject teachers in teaching study skills.

Even with them exerting active efforts to communicate their concerns regarding the IL Program, the faculty and teaching staff might be uncooperative and hesitant to work with them leading to numerous problems such as unaligned IL Program in the curriculum.

Librarians themselves are having a hard time to collaborate with each other.

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Results and Discussion

Utilization of Results on the Proposed LILP

Key Results	Feature of the Proposed Library Information Literacy Program
A few 1-2 staff is not enough to provide a quality Library Information Literacy Program	Two (2) to four (4) set of librarians was recommended to ease the workload of a librarian in teaching ten (10) grade levels with reconsiderations for libraries with few numbers of librarians (See Statement of Responsibility).
Majority of the school libraries do their IL sessions in a regular longitudinal quarterly session.	The lessons and IL sessions was divided into four (4) sessions in each school year to have a discussion and activity about IL Skills (See Appendix)
Inconsistent provision of IL Sessions among Grade 1 to Grade 10 students.	All grade levels from Grade 1-10 had a four-quarter lesson on the proposed program to address these inconsistencies.
ILP of schools gives high regards on the use of information retrieval tools inside the library and does not give emphasis on different study skills. The programs was not also integrated unto the curriculum.	Information literacy skills was addressed in balanced manner in the proposal. It tackled all the required five (5) information literacy skills prescribed by the different standards and guidelines.

	Additionally, Filipino and English study skill-alignment was done on all of the lessons (See Content Skills and Grade Level Lessons) to ensure that library skills, information skills, and study skills are provided in the program and modules.

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Results and Discussion

Utilization of Results on the Proposed LILP

Key Results	Feature of the Proposed Library Information Literacy Program
Librarians are not fond of checking and complying with different information literacy standards in designing and implementing their respective information literacy programs. They prefer bottom-up design of LILP in which community analysis becomes the sole basis and lacks regular review of the program.	The program was aligned with the different local and international standards and guidelines on information literacy. The format and elements present on the program were also based on the ACRL Characteristics of Programs of Information Literacy that Illustrate Best Practices: A Guideline. To ensure that the librarians will comply on the said standards, the said standards and guidelines was set as a reference for future revisions. (See Statement on Approval, Review, and Revisions)
Librarians uses only limited type of assessment to assess the learnings of the students.	The program utilizes different forms of evaluations to assess the learned skills of the students ranging from quizzes, written works, and oral presentations with inclusion of rubrics (See Evaluation of each lessons).
Librarians only relies with the gradings of the said quizzes on credited subjects to assess the effectiveness of the program.	The criteria for pass and fail were set on the evaluations being provided for each lesson. Moreover, a perceived effectiveness or a survey by the students on the effectiveness of the program was set as a summative evaluation of the program. (See Evaluation)

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Recommendation

Implementation of the LILP in this study.

Development of work plans for librarians to effectively manage the longitudinal sessions even in the midst of challenges in implementing it.

Strengthened collaborations of school librarians among the members of the academic community and even with school librarians from other schools.

Development of trainings, conferences, and workshops of different library organizations that highlights IL skills, standards, guidelines and managing a Library Information Literacy Program

As further study, the study recommends the study regarding the management and IL skills of the librarians in handling and teaching the program, students’ and teachers’ perception on IL, measurement of collaboration-readiness of teachers and librarians, and relationships and differences of such data.

Inclusion of IL Skills and teaching competency as a way of enhancing the curriculum of LIS Schools.