TRANSFER’S ROLE
IN THE ‘BIG IDEAS’
OF INFORMATION
LITERACY
M A RY B R O U S S A R D
LY C O M I N G C O L L E G E
WHAT IS ‘TRANSFER’?
• “The effective application of knowledge and skills gained in
one context in a new and different context.”
-The Greenwood Dictionary of Education (pg. 361)
WHAT IS ‘TRANSFER’?
WHAT IS ‘TRANSFER’?
Near Transfer
vs.
Far Transfer
LIBRARIANS’ OBSESSION WITH
LIFELONG LEARNING
“Information skills are vital to the success of lifelong
learning, employment, and daily interpersonal
communication of any citizen, such as when a person
needs information about health services for someone
in his/her care, or a student requires specific
information to complete an assessment.”
-Lau, IFLA’s “Guidelines on Information Literacy for Lifelong Learning”
LIBRARIANS’ OBSESSION WITH
LIFELONG LEARNING
“LIFELONG LEARNING”
TRANSFER
CONCEPTUAL TEACHING
Bibliographic Instruction
Information Literacy
CONCEPTUAL TEACHING AND ACRL’S
FRAMEWORK
“At the heart of this Framework are conceptual understandings that
organize many other concepts and ideas about information, research,
and scholarship into a coherent whole. These conceptual
understandings are informed by the work of Wiggins and McTighe,2
which focuses on essential concepts and questions in developing
curricula, and also by threshold concepts3 which are those ideas in any
discipline that are passageways or portals to enlarged understanding
or ways of thinking and practicing within that discipline.”
-ACRL’s Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education
CONCEPTUAL TEACHING AND ACRL’S
FRAMEWORK
“At the heart of this Framework are conceptual understandings that
organize many other concepts and ideas about information, research,
and scholarship into a coherent whole. These conceptual
understandings are informed by the work of Wiggins and McTighe,2
which focuses on essential concepts and questions in developing
curricula, and also by threshold concepts3 which are those ideas in any
discipline that are passageways or portals to enlarged understanding
or ways of thinking and practicing within that discipline.”
-ACRL’s Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education
BIG IDEAS
• Ideas at the heart of expert understanding
• A way to deal with too much information to cover
• Useful for both novices and experts
• Inherently transferable
RETHINKING INFORMATION LITERACY
“Information literacy is the set of integrated abilities
encompassing the reflective discovery of information,
the understanding of how information is produced
and valued, and the use of information in creating new
knowledge and participating ethically in communities
of learning.”
-ACRL’s Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education
RETHINKING INFORMATION LITERACY
“Information literacy is the set of integrated abilities
encompassing the reflective discovery of information,
the understanding of how information is produced
and valued, and the use of information in creating new
knowledge and participating ethically in communities
of learning.”
RETHINKING INFORMATION LITERACY
“Information literacy is the set of integrated abilities
encompassing the reflective discovery of information,
the understanding of how information is produced
and valued, and the use of information in creating new
knowledge and participating ethically in communities
of learning.”
METACOGNITION
“The act of thinking about thinking [… including] the use of selfmonitoring to adapt and apply strategies to solving new problems.”
-The Greenwood Dictionary of Education (pg. 219)
METACOGNITION
METACOGNITION
STRATEGIES
• Reading Strategies
– Questioning
– Activating Background
Knowledge
– Using sensory images
– Predicting
– Determining Main Ideas
– Using fix-up options
– Believing/Doubting Game
– Synthesizing
• Writing Strategies
– Notecards
– Drafts
– Mind maps
– Outlines
– Freewriting
– Journaling
– Note taking
– Annotated bibliographies
– Lists
DISPOSITIONS
• Generative
–Curiosity
–Goal pursuit
• Disruptive
–Impulsiveness
–Distractibility
DISPOSITIONS: CURIOSITY
CUEING, SUPPORT, EXTENDED AND
DELIBERATE PRACTICE
LIBRARIANS
• No more silos
LIBRARIANS
• Work in reflection
LIBRARIANS
• Do it ourselves
LIBRARIANS
• Collaborate:
– Embedded librarianship
– Tutorials
– Curriculum mapping
– Co-designing/assessing
LIBRARIANS
• Think strategically
FURTHER READING
• Bean, John C. Engaging Ideas:The Professor's Guide to Integrating Writing, Critical Thinking, and Active
Learning in the Classroom. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1996.
• Brent, D. "Transfer, Transformation, and Rhetorical Knowledge: Insights From Transfer Theory."
Journal of Business and Technical Communication 25, no. 4 (2011): 396-420.
• Kuglitsch, Rebecca Z. "Teaching for Transfer: Reconciling the Framework with Disciplinary
Information Literacy." Portal: Libraries & the Academy 15, no. 3 (July 2015): 457-70.
• Lloyd, Annemaree. "Information Literacy: The Meta-Competency of the Knowledge Economy?
An Exploratory Paper." Journal of Librarianship and Information Science 35, no. 2 (2003): 87-92.
• Moreillon, Judi. Coteaching Reading Comprehension Strategies in Secondary School Libraries:
Maximizing Your Impact. Chicago: American Library Association, 2012.
• Wiggins, Grant P., and Jay McTighe. Understanding by Design. Alexandria,VA: Association for
Supervision and Curriculum Development, 2005.
OTHER READINGS MENTIONED
• Hafer, Gary R. Embracing Writing: Ways to Teach Reluctant Writers in Any College Course. San Francisco:
Jossey-Bass, 2014.
• Fiorella, Logan, and Richard E. Mayer. Learning as a Generative Activity: Eight Learning Strategies That
Promote Understanding. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2015.
• Flower, Linda et al. Reading-to-Write: Exploring a Cognitive and Social Process, 3-32. New York: Oxford
University Press, 1990.
• Fulwiler, Toby. College Writing: A Personal Approach to Academic Writing. Portsmouth, NH:
Boynton/Cook, 1997.
• Pacello, James. "Integrating Metacognition into a Developmental Reading and Writing Course to
Promote Skill Transfer: An Examination of Student Perceptions and Experiences." Journal of College
Reading & Learning (College Reading & Learning Association) 44, no. 2 (2014): 119.
• Maier, Johanna, and Tobias Richter. "Fostering Multiple Text Comprehension: How Metacognitive
Strategies and Motivation Moderate the Text-belief Consistency Effect." Metacognition and Learning 9,
no. 1 (2014): 51-74. doi:10.1007/s11409-013-9111-x.