21st Century Learning and Information Literacy

Friel, Holly

Breivik, Patricia Senn. (2005). 21st Century Learning and Information Literacy. Change, 37(2), 20-27.

Summary:

Former SJSU Library Dean Patricia Senn Breivik’s article focuses on information literacy, which encompasses critical thinking, computer literacy, media literacy, visual literacy, and more.

Breivik explains that the rapidly increasing availability of information as provided by Internet access, cell phones, and other forms of media has not translated into a more educated or better-prepared population, hence the need for explicit information literacy instruction.  According to Library of Congress, “only 17% of resources are indexed by any single popular search engine, and 83% of the sites that are indexed contain commercial content, compared to the 6% that are educational or scientific.” This article was published in 2005; the statistics are probably even worse today as creating websites and uploading digital content has only become easier and more ubiquitous in recent years. Breivik argues, “It has become one of education’s greatest challenges to teach students the skills needed to test the reliability, currency, and relevance of the information they find.”  

Review:

I appreciate Breivik’s points about the need for explicit information literacy teaching and that these  skills should not be taught as a stand-alone subject, nor should all of the responsibility for teaching them fall on the librarian’s shoulders.  Instead, each discipline should determine what information literacy skills are needed for that subject area, and these skills should be explicitly taught and used in each class.  While Breivik’s article is ten years old, it has some very interesting points and also directs readers to The American Association of School Librarians (AASL) & Association of College & Research Libraries (ACRL) national standards for information literacy skills.Although the title includes “21^st century skills,” I did not see these referenced explicitly.