Online Conference - 2004

Research - Evidence Based Practice abstracts (last updated 9 December 2003)

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Dr Ross Todd (Associate Professor, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, USA)

Dr Ross Todd is Associate Professor in the School of Communication, Information and Library Studies at Rutgers University USA.  His research focuses on: information and critical literacies; information technology and learning; using information to build knowledge and understanding; how school libraries and the role of teacher librarians may more effectively empower student learning; and building schools as effective information - knowledge sharing communities.  He has published over 120 papers and book chapters on these areas, and has been an invited speaker at many international conferences.  He is Director of Research (with Professor Carol Kuhlthau) of Center for International Scholarship in School Libraries at Rutgers University (CISSL) (http://cissl.scils.rutgers.edu) which aims to provide the international community of scholars and practitioners an arena to develop, exchange, disseminate research enhancing information for learning in school libraries worldwide. From information to knowledge: The key to constructing communities of learning and literacy (keynote paper) The dynamics of effective learning in an information age school are complex and challenging.  These dynamics centre around several key dimensions: understanding the nature of learning in diverse and increasingly technological information environments; understanding how knowledge is constructed through engagement with information; understanding how learning and literacy are effectively demonstrated.  These understandings do not happen by chance, nor simply through the provision of well organised and accessible collections of information.  Research tells us that carefully planned instructional intervention is the critical, essential dynamic to effective learning through information sources, and this involves the whole school community working as Learning-Partner-Leaders.  Hein (1991) challenges us with this provocative statement: "learners construct knowledge for themselves; each learner individually (and socially) constructs meaning as he or she learns.  Constructing meaning is learning.  There is no other kind".

This paper will draw on several research projects undertaken by Ross Todd and Carol Kuhlthau through the Center of International Scholarship in School Libraries at Rutgers University during 1993.  The first, "Information Utilization for learning through the school library" involved 40 grade 9 students and 30 grade 11 students at Gill St Bernards School in New Jersey.  The collaborative construction, and approaches to charting learning outcomes as evidence-based practice will be presented.  The second, "Student learning through Ohio School Libraries" involved 13,000 students and 880 teachers and school administrators from a large sample of schools across Ohio.  This project illustrates the learning power of effective school libraries - libraries that have an active teaching-learning agenda focusing on the development of information and critical literacies designed to improve student achievement - bring about clear learning outcomes.  The learning outcomes as identified in this project will be elaborated, and strategies for building effective information-knowledge communities will be presented, including some practical approaches to gathering evidence of learning outcomes fostered by an effective learning-centred school library.  These studies, when situated as part of the accumulating international evidence of the relationship between school libraries and learning, further contribute to the belief that if teacher librarians do not engage in a strong, focused and curriculum centred learning agenda, then school students are left behind.

Barbara Bugg (Education Resources Co-ordinator, Bayside College, Victoria)

Barbara Bugg has over 30 years experience in school libraries.  She has been a University Lecturer in Librarianship, a consultant and, predominately, a teacher librarian.  Always looking for new ideas and trying new things, Barbara has been interested and involved in information literacy skills for students.

Evidence based practice: a toe in the water This paper is designed to demonstrate that even a small step towards evidence based practice can yield positive results for the school library.  The paper is a description of an actual program that was run with great success.  The program involved two year 7 classes and was not onerous.  The program should be regarded as a little acorn from which a big oak tree might grow, given the resources and staffing of the school. 

Julie Cass (Teacher Librarian, Victoria Point State High School, Queensland)

Julie has worked as a librarian in an international publishing firm (London), at the University of Queensland libraries, and in Queensland Technical and Further Education (TAFE) libraries.  As a teacher librarian, she has worked in primary and secondary schools in Queensland and is presently the teacher librarian at Victoria Point State High School.  Julie has had a paper published in Access (Issue 1 2004) and will complete her Masters in Applied Science (Teacher Librarianship) through Charles Sturt University in 2004.

Evaluating the input of the teacher librarian in student learning This paper will focus on action research initiatives that provide evidence of the relationship between the school library and student learning in a Queensland state high school.  It will draw on a project that commenced in response to Lonsdale's (2003) report for the Australian School Library Association that identifies a need for specific evidence in the Australian context linking the role of teacher librarians to students' acquisition of information literacy skills.  The background to the project, data collection, and evaluation of associated learning outcomes directly attributed to information literacy strategies will be presented.

The project involved 29 Year 12 Business and Communication Technology students divided into a trial class of 12, with ongoing support and assistance from the teacher librarian and a control class of 17, with no teacher librarian input.  The hypothesis was that the students in the trial group would perform better on skills relating to information literacy than those in the control.  The learning outcomes as identified in this project will be elaborated, the results presented and the need for further research identified.  The paper will conclude with a reflection on progress and an indication of future directions for evidence-based practice at Victoria Point State High School.

Lonsdale, M 2003, Impact of school libraries on student achievement: a review of the research, report for the Australian School Library Association, Australian Council of Educational Research, Camberwell, Vic.

Dr L. Anne Clyde (Professor and Chair, Library and Information Science Department, Faculty of Social Science, The University of Iceland)

Dr. L. Anne Clyde is Professor and Chair of the Library and Information Science Department at the University of Iceland.  An Australian, she worked in state and independent school libraries in New South Wales, before becoming a library educator at universities and colleges in Queensland, New South Wales and Western Australia.  From the University of British Columbia in Canada (where she was an Associate Professor), she moved to Iceland.  Her books include School Libraries and the Electronic Community: The Internet connection and Managing InfoTech in school library media centers.  She is Chair of the IFLA Section of School Libraries and Resource Centres and Webmaster for the International Association of School Librarianship.

All evidence is good evidence? Evaluating the evidence in evidence-based practice Evidence-based practice in librarianship emerged in the late 1990s as a way of improving practice and highlighting outcomes that matter to the community served by the library; it focuses on using evidence from professional practice and from research to resolve day-to-day problems and to plan for the future.  Ross Todd (2001) has said that it involves "conscientious, explicit and judicious use of current best evidence in making decisions", whether that is research evidence or "meaningful and systematic evidence" gathered within the school.  This then raises the question of "What is good evidence?", particularly in relation to the research evidence.  Will any evidence do?  Is some evidence better than other evidence?  How can a busy practitioner distinguish between quality research evidence and evidence that might be unhelpful or even false?

The presentation will provide an overview of a recent research project in which I investigated the strategies used by experts in research evaluation, to evaluate research reports.  This study (the results of which will be published early in 2004) showed that even people who have a great deal of experience and expertise in the evaluation of research reports, will disagree in their rankings of research reports, to the point where what is ranked first by one expert may be ranked lowest by another.  Further, the experts may claim to be using the same criteria or the same strategies when coming to these very different conclusions.  If the experts evaluating the one research report can come to such different conclusions about it, then practitioners who are not experts in research evaluation may find the evaluation of research a confusing process.  They will need proven strategies or benchmarks or guidelines for evaluation if the evidence provided by research is indeed to be a basis for professional practice.

The research project further showed that a reasonable basis or strategy for objective evaluation of published research does not exist at present in our field.  Consequently, the second half of the presentation will describe ongoing work that seeks to establish guidelines for evaluation.  A number of models from the field of medicine and education will be discussed; while they have their limitations as models for evaluation of research in school librarianship, it is possible that they might form a base for work on the development of a model for school librarianship.  The presentation will conclude with an overview of this work as of early 2004 and an indication of future directions.

Todd, Ross (2001), 'A sustainable future for teacher-librarians: Inquiry learning, actions and evidence', Orana, November, pp. 10-20.

Raylee Elliott-Burns (Lecturer, Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia)

Raylee Elliott Burns has a background in primary teaching, teacher librarianship, and school resource centre consultancy, and currently lectures at Queensland University of Technology in the Graduate Diploma in Education (Teacher-Librarianship) and the Master of Education.  Collaborative research initiatives undertaken with QUT colleagues include Performing hybridity: impact of new technologies on the role of teacher-librarians (1999-2000) and the School Online Curriculum Content Initiative: SOCCI Market Research project for the Curriculum Corporation and the Australian Education Systems Officials Committee.  Raylee's doctoral research is concerned with the transformation of school library design processes and principles. Singing from the same hymn sheet? A chorale for diverse voices designing spaces for learning. >What does it take to develop a 'wide awake' approach to the design of spaces and places for learning?  What kinds of learners do we imagine in the design of learning spaces?  How do we balance our designing intentions among learning, resourcing and access, and the social, cultural and psychological forces at work in spaces?  How might we balance further the challenges of the geographical and the virtual?  How might designing partnerships work in pursuit of innovative, responsive, energising *"school libraries" as spaces and places?  These and other questions will be explored by the voices of educators and designers/architects around matters associated with the design of school libraries.  Technology permitting, the session plans to make available designing words and images to stimulate participant reflection and a discussion space for a 'chorale' of ideas.

* In changing times it can be argued that the school library is a contested space and that the nomenclature "school library" is a contested terminology.  School communities struggle to name, powerfully or even adequately, the purpose, character, role and place of this entity in their midst.  Diverse contexts and communities further complicate individual circumstances.  Part of the designing journey is contained in the continuing conversation with designing partners, sharing a language to sing/bring these envisioned spaces and places to life. 

Professor Ruth Small (Professor, Syracuse University, School of Information Studies, New York, USA)

Ruth V. Small is Professor, Director of the School Media program, School of Information Studies, Syracuse University, and Director of the University's interdisciplinary Center for Digital Literacy.  Ruth's research focuses on motivational aspects of information use; she received the 1997 "Highsmith Research Award" from AASL and 2001 Carroll Preston Baber Research Award from ALA.  She has served on the Editorial Boards of School Library Media Research, School Libraries Worldwide, and The Journal of Global Information Management.

S.O.S. for Information Literacy S.O.S. Information Literacy, funded by IMLS, is a Web-based, multimedia database system, providing school librarians and teachers with quality tools for enhancing and improving the teaching of information literacy skills to children in grades K-8.  All resources contained in the database will be created, submitted, and evaluated by practitioners nationwide.

Based on results of an extensive needs analysis and prototype development conducted over a two-year period, S.O.S. will house a wealth of "tried and true" teaching strategies, lesson plans, support materials, videos, and resource links, organized by subject area and grade level, and linked to the broader national information literacy and subject area educational standards.  Both school librarian-teacher collaboration and curriculum integration will be encouraged as integral to every submission to the database.

When fully implemented in 2005 as a free service for educators, the S.O.S. database will contain new and innovative ideas for teaching information literacy skills and strategies for implementing these ideas into the curriculum, based on the best practices of professionals across the country.  What makes S.O.S. truly unique is the inclusion of a variety of high quality video segments that provide teaching demonstrations of recommended strategies and lessons, created by the practitioners that submit them, as well as students' reflections on learning via those strategies.

This program will: describe extensive front-end research and development conducted to determine needs of users and how findings have been incorporated into the current development effort; provide participants with an opportunity to have a "sneak peek" at S.O.S. before its national launch in 2004-2005; demonstrate a variety of S.O.S. searching capabilities and results; provide an opportunity for participants to join the S.O.S. Pioneers, teachers and school librarians who have been invited to build the initial database over the next two years; and share plans for future extension of the S.O.S. system.

Last updated: 18 February 2004