Finding clever ways to engage students (specifically college students) when teaching information literacy skills can be a tough feat. One of the easiest methods for teaching evaluation methods in the classroom is to use current events in the news. This gives students the opportunity to share what they think on a topic, what information they have obtained, and how that information has helped in forming that opinion.
Emily Gover, an in-house librarian for EasyBib, recently wrote a blog post on how librarians and faculty can use the current election season to teach students evaluation skills – a very important piece of information literacy.
Emily Gover says in her blog post, “The election season is a great opportunity to introduce the importance of evaluation skills to students. Specifically, we can stress the importance of understanding facts, propaganda and bias… and how all three play a huge role in advertising (and sometimes reporting) of the campaigns.”
She also highlights a few great resources offered by Infotopia to aid in using the election to teach information literacy skills. It’s important that students understand the importance of evaluating information – especially in regard to selecting the next president.
Click to read her full post and begin developing the information literacy skills of your students today!
