Sample Selection

The process of selection had several stages in order to select a group from the school’s teacher population of 99people. This began with an analysis of staff to identify those with and without experience of information literacy and a history of collaborative work with the librarian. It was based on my personal reflections and influenced by the analytical structure of the development planning process that codes items as roots or links believed to be strong or weak (Hargreaves and Hopkins 1991) (Appendix Five). This was an important exercise in reflection to determine a range of characteristics in the sample. For instance in relation to the following question:

61

Q. What does it mean to be information literate and is it changing in the new technological environment?

It was important to ensure a cross-section of people in terms of age and experience as this involves discussion of what information literacy means and how it has changed over time. There could be differences in perception between someone who has been teaching for thirty years compared to two years and I wanted to allow for that range of view to be expressed. Equally with the following question:

Q. How can teachers and librarians work together to raise information literacy levels? This needed responses from people with experience of collaborating with the librarian, particularly in the area of information literacy but also from those who have very little direct experience of such a collaboration to identify difficulties that may exist. In a sense the analysis provided a snapshot capturing a pattern of relationships with the librarian at one moment in time (Appendix Five). It provided a starting place to consider how different voices might contribute to the research questions.

The analysis has identified those with strong and weak information literacy roots coupled with strong and weak collaboration links in relation to the librarian. The definitions for these are:

 Strong information literacy roots: a record of jointly working with the librarian including planning, team teaching and assessment/evaluation tasks that have had a strong information literacy focus; or a reputation for work in the school that focuses on developing this in the curriculum, pedagogy and in colleagues’ teaching practice.  Weak information literacy roots: may use the library for project work with some input

from the librarian on mechanics of how to search for information; or has little or no formal contact with the library on information literacy.

 Strong collaboration links: works or has worked closely with the librarian on some aspect of teaching and learning which may or may not include information literacy.  Weak collaboration links: little or no record of working with the librarian on any aspect

of teaching and learning.

The grid (Appendix Five) has a seventh column which identifies other factors which may also indicate a potentially valuable contribution could be made to the research questions such as:

 Long experience

 Newly Qualified Teacher status

 Personal, Learning and Thinking Skills developer – led work in core subject

 Musical Futures – this has a particular approach to information seeking which moves the locus of control from the teacher to the student so that they research and learn how to play an instrument in small groups (Price and D’Amore 2007).

62

A comparison between newly qualified teachers and teachers who have been in the profession a long time might reveal differences in approach to both topics because of age and experience. Long term members of staff will have seen the proliferation of support staff roles and therefore the range of potential collaborators increase tremendously in the last ten years in schools. Similarly their perspective stretching over a longer period of time will have seen how a subject has changed, the introduction of technology and its increasing use by teachers and students. Younger members of staff will have grown-up and been teacher trained with technology as an assumed part of their culture. Experience of the Personalised, Learning and Thinking Skills curriculum and Musical Futures pedagogy may prove relevant because it includes a focus on inquiry learning. This audit proved to be a valuable evaluation exercise for reviewing the work of the library, although inclusion in a particular category is not an indicator as to the quality of that experience, simply a measure of participation.

A further analysis was made of all those who have strong collaboration experience with the librarian using a four box grid to identify whether this was related to information literacy or for other reasons (Appendix Thirteen). This also proved a useful evaluation illustrating that a third of the staff has strong collaboration links with the librarian. For the purpose of this research, it identified strong information literacy collaborators, so that some could be invited to participate. A cross-section of staff was identified as an ideal sample and of these twelve was interviewed:

63

Teacher Subject Information Literacy

Collaboration Relevant Characteristics

A History Weak Weak NQT

B Science Strong Strong

C Religious Education Strong Strong Advanced

Skills Teacher

D Mathematics Weak Weak

E Art Weak Weak Head of Dept.

F History Strong Strong

G English Strong Strong Advanced

Skills Teacher

H Music Strong Strong

J I.C.T. Weak Weak

K Drama Weak Weak Head of Dept.

L Science Strong Strong Asst. Dep.

Head

M Design & Technology Weak Strong Head of Dept.

Y Religious Education Strong Strong Pilot

Z English Weak Weak Pilot

Figure 3.1 Sample Range (Pilots in blue)

The sample was highly selective and engineered to provide a cross-section of experience and it is comprised of staff who were willing to give their time and articulate their beliefs and

opinions. These characteristics might mean those who are more sympathetic to the library are in the sample but there have been clear steps to ensure a cross-section. Some subjects are not represented: Geography, Economics, Physical Education and Dance, in part because of departmental politics but this is also a reflection of the limited time available.

In document Information literacy and the secondary school (Page 63-66)