Information Creation as a Process Blog Homework

Information Creation as a Process Blog Homework

Identify the format of the sources you find for your research topic (see Research as Inquiry) and articulate why the chosen formats are appropriate for the information need.

The Topic that I chose for Research as Inquiry is 'An investigation of the social networking behaviour of grade 9 high school learners at john ramsay senior secondary school'.

For the first activity they will need to listen to interviews which means podcasts may come in handy, they may also go on sites like youtube, an expert knows that no format is absolete. Content translation or from one source to the next therefore listening may help in direct translation of not just what is said but also how it is said. For this purpose podcasts are very valuable.

Books are another format that I used on this topic because I needed to get an overview of the various perspectives on social media, and how the social media effects learners lives especially as young people are very impressionable. This is what books do, they give information on various topics and gives you the certainty that it is well-researched.

How can one mention a topic on social media and not mention the 'Internet' as a source of information that is very much appropriate for this topic especially. One may take a look into this persons social history on 'Whatsapp' and identify on which side of the scale the person belongs to.

Transform the information that you have created in one format to another format, and write a reflection on what you needed to consider as you went through the process.

Various articles I read and placed on a blog. I considered writing an article about it but time is something that I took into consideration and the main idea was for the content to be made available to aid in the development of other people, and if a blog can get the job done in less time then, I felt, it is a bonus. Another thing I considered was the fact that it would have to also first be accepted by an editor and reviewed for errors. A blog is less time consuming and it doesn't ask for degrees and published work of any format can be used depending on the context. It is appropriate because the topic requires one-one-one sessions gaining persons perspectives on a certain topic, podcasts therefore serve a good purpose because one can go on such sites to listen to podcasts as a lot of information is lost in translation or from one source to the next therefore listening may help in direct translation of not just what is said but also how it is said. For this purpose podcasts are very valuable.

A List of the Sources that I used 

Youtube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QWoP6jJG3k)
I chose youtube because it is easily accessible and a lot of iformation is lost in audio, or articles because many times those formats do not account for a persons body language and in many cases a persons body language tells you alot more than what they are actually saying so in this case youtube and other video sources are very reliable and preferred.

Online Articles
Here I chose an online article to explain what is being said about Social Media and School Children just to briefly get an idea what the general feelings are surrounding the topic of Social Media having a bad affect on school children and came across the following article. https://sites.ewu.edu/cmst496-stafford/2012/06/06/the-effects-of-social-media-on-children/

Magazine Article
Why I chose this magazine article in particular is because it pertained to the topic I am investigating and accessing magazine articles are easy to access and can be obtained without the need of intermediary tools such as computers and internet. You can easily go back and forth with a magazine article and do not have to worry about 'Eskom' and 'Loadshedding'.

Blogs
Blogs can be created and accessed by anyone with internet access and a computer so when it comes to ease of access, blogs as a format should be at the top of the list especially seeing that you get many blogs that are what is termed as 'Academic Blogs'. So to the point of relevance, they can be very relevant and sometimes blogs in general can be very opiniated so it is up to the reader to maybe gather these opinions and later on form a personal one.

I transformed the latter two formats; one from magazine to blog and the other from online article to facebook page.

Find a transformed format at the following link;
https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=4981559880007748403#editor/target=post;postID=7029058265567873040;onPublishedMenu=allposts;onClosedMenu=allposts;postNum=0;src=postname

Here I transformed a magazine article into a blog.

And, secondly, I transformed another article that I found online to a facebook page which can be viewed buy following the following link; https://www.facebook.com/Social-Networking-Affecting-Schoolchildren-940842099329410/timeline/

Information Creation as a Process (Reflection)

Information Creation as a Process in my own words basically refers to the various stages and processes one goes through in order to create information. While the class was going on and Ms Shehaamah spoke about this frame my mind was running on just the various ways it overlaps with various other frames. How it overlaps with Scholarship as a Conversation is by means of taking part of the 'Conversation' one ultimately publish their researched work and add to the conversation and thus create new information.

How it overlaps with 'Research as Inquiry', one of the knowledge practices' of research as inquiry asks one to assess the gap in knowledge and attempt to fill the gap and weaknesses in existing fields and ask new questions which leads to new answers and ultimately more new questions. That is how it relates or overlaps with research as inquiry.

As Shehaamah said in class it is quite straightforward I think sometimes it is too closely linked to a second frame and this is where sometimes it becomes confusing. In the case of Information Creation as a Process it looks at almost everything we did with authority as contextual and constructed.

I think the basic idea behind this frame is to teach us that the process deserves respect and acknowledgment. It is a tedious process which requires accuracy. Information is created based on a need and purpose and researchers will do well to try and understand the purpose behind the information that was created. It is also said that experts know that it isn't the format that counts when one looks for information but rather the content of that information.

The Peer-Review Process used as an example in class on this frame teaches us exactly why we do need to respect the process of information creation. It goes through a group of experts in a field and they give advice and tips on what to change and the researcher need to go back and fix whatever requires fixing. Here it comes back to research as inquiry being iterative.

Authority is Constructed and Contextual Reflection

Whether or not information has authority depends on the context, meaning how is it use and for what purpose and by who. Information that is needed for a brief idea on a subject might require less research or might not require for instance a Peer-Reviewed journal article as opposed to a bit of information one may find using the search engine 'google'. A student busy writing a thesis might require more in-depth and thoroughly reviewed articles and books as opposed to a grade 7 learner asked to present a topic on HIV/Aids.

Authority may not necessarily be the same as expertise. An expert in a certain field may not exactly have authority in that subject. It depends on disciplinary familiarity, prestige, popularity and is a result normally of exposure (contextual). An example I think of while I'm writing this is something that occurred a while back at our church. A religious leader in our community who has a degree in theology and wrote various articles on religion came to our church and asked if he may have a few minutes to address the congregation, he was denied this request because in our Church we believe that one shouldn't go to a University to study the bible but the bible unfolds it's meaning to you by means of the 'Holy Spirit' so whatever authority he migh have in the field of religion isn't recognised by our church.

It is constructed in the sense a researcher may be told that the following sources can't be used in a course or subject based either on a curriculum that was set up or a lecturers personal preference. Up until the first semester of 2015 I didn't know or rather I was told by previous lecturers that using 'Wiki' isn't allowed and they were quite strict on that but then in doing 'ICT' as part of my PGDipLIS I was taught that it is quite fine to use 'Wiki' on occasion and that I must just focus on referencing it properly.

Here are a few links one may follow to learn more about this frame;

http://libraryguides.unh.edu/c.php?g=326931&p=2189833

http://library.albany.edu/infolit/framework

Authority is Constructed and Contextual (Teaching Scenario)

Authority is Constructed and Contextual

Learning Outcomes;

1.)    Students should be able to define different types of authority such as subject expertise (scholarship), society, position (public office or title) or special experience (participating in a historic event.

2.)    Use markers of authority to determine the credibility of sources

3.)    Recognise that authoritative content may be packaged formally or informally and may include audio, visual, and non-print sources.

Activities

1.)    After discussing the different types of authority I will divide the students into groups and then assign a particular type of authority to each group. They will then have to write 2 paragraphs in which they clearly indicate the definitions of the types of authority, and each member of a groups’ example of the type of authority.

2.)    I will hand a list of names to students as well as their biographies and students will need to tell me after a thorough discussion on the various types of authorities, they will have to write on paper which of the people on the list are authority figures, in which field, and why based on the markers of credibility are these authority figures credible.

3.)    Students will be asked to bring with them past assignments in which they fared well and focus on the reference section of essay or assignment and based on research done discuss what made them choose a particular source and the class participate in stating whether or not the sources are credible. They will then in light of the new information I presented to them regarding the manner in which content may be packaged may be formal or informal and add to the assignment. Eg. Youtube, facebook scholarly pages, professional academic blogs and so forth.

Materials

1.)    Computer with internet access.

2.)    Each student to have a pen and paper.

3.)    Past assignments of each student.

How it relates to a Knowledge Practice

1.)    define different types of authority, such as subject expertise (e.g., scholar

ship), society position (e.g., public office or title), or special experience (e.g

Participating in a historic event);

2.)    use research tools and markers of authority to determine the credibility of sources, understanding the elements that might temper this credibility;

3.)    recognize that authoritative content may be packaged formally or informally and may include audio, visual, and other nonprint sources;

Workshop

Workshops

Information Literacy Education

06/09/2015

What is a Workshop

According to an article that I found (ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/structure/training-and-technical-assistance/workshops/main.) a workshop can be defined as a single, short educational program designed to teach or introduce to participants practical skills, techniques or ideas which they can then use in their work or their daily lives. They usually share the following commonalities; small (6-15 participants allowing interaction and more focus on individual learning). Designed often for people sharing a certain trade, and conducted by people who have real experience on the subject, they’re participatory, informal, time-limited and self-contained.

Why I would give a workshop

My reason for having a workshop would be to inform people in the ‘Library and Information Services’ department about the importance of creating displays and also to assist in the creation of displays to catch and hold the attention of the people that come to the library and that it has a great and lasting effect on the person/s who were exposed to the display. For further reading on the importance and use of displays in Public Libraries read dagda.shef.ac.uk/dispub/dissertations/2006-07/External/Holdsworth_Leanne_MALib.pdf as well as star61451.tripod.com/marketingthelibrary/id4.html.

When I would offer this workshop

According to the same article referred to above (ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents-/structure/training-and-technical-assistance/workshops/main. It is the norm to offer workshops when a new concept need to be introduced, or the beginning of something new, I would however, make it part of staff training and initial staff development these would be times when I would conduct workshops so as to improve the library use of a library.

How I would conduct a workshop

I would make sure that the three stages of conducting a workshop is always in my mind’s eye whilst the idea of bringing clarity to the staff members regarding the importance of public displays of libraries is the goal. The topic and audience would be essential focus points during the planning stage, what I would look at is do the audience have an idea of what I will be discussing, what are their moods, etc. the topic also need to be relevant to libraries, and in this case it is relevant as it deals with libraries and public displays.