Chapter 6 Summary

In summary, this chapter has investigated the use of some literacy practices as defined by SCONUL in their Pillars (1999 & 2010) by novice undergraduates entering Higher Education for the first time. It reports on novice learner demonstration of literacy practices during a literacy

intervention. The intervention takes the basic components of each pillar as described by SCONUL in their model and uses three written essay submissions and ipsative feedback to aid student engagement and understanding of the role of the tutor preferred literacy practices for academic study and writing.

Chapter 6 has presented findings from an analysis of specifically how students used particular practices, described by SCONUL in their Seven Pillars Model, during a literacy intervention as part of a module. In sections 6.1, 6.1.1 and 6.1.2 a baseline biography was presented, showing the previous non-traditional study of the respondents and their family backgrounds in terms of academic qualifications. This showed a limited success at GCSE level and a lack of respondent clarity over whether their parents had formal higher level qualifications. The above documentary analysis presented in sections 6.2, 6.3 and 6.4 has considered three written outputs produced by the sample respondents during their first semester of study whilst undertaking a formal structured literacy intervention.

Section 6.2 presented findings from review of respondents’ comments in the interview transcripts and documentary analysis of their first essay submission. The first document analysis in section 6.2 shows respondents demonstrating little understanding of the essay question or of formal academic literacy practices with little evidence of engagement with academic resources. Despite guidance by tutors in lectures, seminars and on-line forums in how to use SCONUL Pillar practices, respondents did not use these approaches. When faced with an unfamiliar task of academic writing, respondents described experiencing feelings of panic, anxiety and fear. They then sought support from somebody, either a peer or family member. Following support respondents then approached the written task. They misunderstood the essay question, engaged in google searches for information on incorrect topics and didn’t use Harvard referencing as requested. Consequences of this were identified as a lack of development in literacy practices and submission of academic written work that had it been a final submission would have failed against the grading criteria.

Section 6.3 explored respondents’ responses to undertaking their second formative written essay following ipsative feedback on their first formative attempt. Respondents described immediately commencing work on their written task without reverting to panic, anxiety and fear. The second documentary analysis in section 6.3 showed that following formatively assessed literacy activities there was an increased attempt by respondents to use SCONUL Pillar defined information literacy practices e.g. understand the question, key word searches and use of references coupled with cut and paste activities.

Although not yet using information literacy as defined by SCONUL (1999 & 2010) or Bruce (2006), respondents do use basic information strategies such as key word searching. However respondents not understanding or identifying links between SCONUL Pillars suggested a lack of ‘knowing what they do not know’ which impacted on their information literacy activities. As discussed in chapter 4, the SCONUL present the Seven Pillars model as a ‘three dimensional building’ containing what SCONUL describes as discrete and independent sets of competencies (see Figure 3-1 SCONUL Seven Pillars). What is emerging through the analysis of the written documents and respondent comments is evidence of a weak respondent understanding of each of the individual pillar practices which in turn impacts on respondent ability to make connections between practices within a pillar, and across pillars. This in turn impacts on respondent academic study and writing.

The third and final documentary analysis presented in section 6.4 shows respondents beginning to demonstrate initial engagement and use of information literacy practices and a desire to understand how these practices should be used. In particular respondent use of citations and references improved significantly in the last written submission following successive immersive literacy intervention activities related to this particular academic convention.

What has emerged from the analysis of Chapter 6 is that respondents did not initially make use of available formal support and were not deploying practices described in the SCONUL Pillars. Respondents also had much in

the way of formal literacy practices support provision available externally to the module team, such as advanced induction sessions and activities available through library staff, but did not access it until required to do so as part of the literacy intervention. What is particularly interesting about this data is that despite being made aware of the importance of using literacy practices as described by the SCONUL Pillars and how to obtain support, respondents do not independently seek out the support offered and appear to be seemingly unaware of the literacy practices required for academic study and written work.

The picture presented by the above analysis is partial as whilst outcomes of transitional points can be seen in the documents, e.g. not using citations, experiences and choices made whilst in betwixt spaces was not visible. I was keen to explore possible reasons underpinning respondents’ approaches to their written work and engagement with literacy practices within an academic study and writing context. Through use of dimensional analysis for understanding and describing respondents’ experiences Chapter 7 uncovers rich dynamic interactions underpinning the respondents’ experiences and actions. The following chapter presents an alternative analysis of findings through a dimensional analysis exploration of respondents’ transcripts.