Search out your librarians for all the

Search out your librarians for all the best places online

In our May issue, the article ‘Still haven’t found what you’re looking for’ investigated ways to search online for information. But did we miss something? Rangi Ruru Girls’ School’s Isabel Milward thought so and contacted us to highlight an additional helping hand that’s always available to students (and teachers).

There’s a special secret sauce that can help to answer the problem of finding information online. And it sits (and stands and jumps about) in your school. We would like to introduce you to school librarians, and show you why ‘just Google it’ can be useless without them.

Librarians used to be portrayed as gatekeepers to knowledge, guardians of the big “shhh”. Today, however, they’re more like guides, navigators leading students through the labyrinths of information out on the web. Think of them as that savvy concierge in the five star hotel who knows just the right places to go to have the best night out.

Support and collaborate

School librarians are experts in helping students and teachers efficiently navigate the online world to locate age-appropriate resources, analyse, evaluate and apply ethical judgement to their use. Many are highly qualified specialists ready to support and collaborate with teachers in the delivery of their lesson, as well as inform and develop students’ online research skills.

While a search engine may be part of the research process, for school students, regardless of age, starting research using curated resources provided by the school library, chosen because they are reliable and trustworthy, establishes the essential framework of research and also negates a number of the difficulties of searching on the surface/visible web. In New Zealand Primary and Intermediate Schools, librarians can provide information literacy instruction from Year 3. Students are introduced to curated resources such as DK Find Out, World Book Online and Britannica School, begin to learn basic search skills, and start to recognise some of the features of trustworthy digital information sources. These lessons grow in scope and complexity through the years, developing basic skills for using search engines from about Year 6 onwards, and providing the building blocks upon which post primary school librarians can help students to develop more sophisticated skills, enabling them to navigate the wealth of misinformation out there and what is sometimes referred to as ‘info-flu’.

SCHOOL LIBRARIAN SALLY BROWN WITH HER RICCARTON HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS

CRAP and SIFT

They can teach students how to check websites using CRAP (Currency, Reliability, Authority, Purpose/Point of View) and SIFT (Stop, Investigate, Find, Trace) tests to help them decide whether the information they’re finding can be trusted or not, make informed decisions choices, and be effective and efficient searchers.

Many school librarians create unique collections of curated resources specifically for their students and teachers that provide resources already checked and verified. As students develop their digital literacy skills, they’re more confident and competent to make use of the suite of EPIC databases (Electronic Purchasing in Collaboration) accessed through the National Library of New Zealand, providing students access to thousands of electronic resources, from magazines, newspapers, and reference works, and teachers with quality, recent digital content, as well as sample lesson plans, interactive activities, professional articles that align with learning and teaching programmes. Of course, acknowledging where information is found is critical and students are taught about citing references and creating a bibliography or list of readings. While databases will also have a citation tool available, there are fantastic online citation tools, such as citethisforme (citethisforme.com), which also has a handy Google Chrome extension.

So, if you really want to master the labyrinth of information on the internet a good first step would be to connect with your school library and librarian, and work with them for the best outcomes for your students to manage digital information.

Article by Sally Brown, Library Manager, Riccarton High School, Tracey Hull, Preparatory School Library Manager, St Andrew’s College, and Isabel Milward, MLIS, Library Manager, Rangi Ruru Girls’ School in Christchurch.

ST. ANDREW’S COLLEGE PREPARATORY SCHOOL INVESTIGATING WORLD BOOK ONLINE WITH SCHOOL LIBRARIAN TRACEY HULL

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