Information Literacy Course Content at UCBA

This content helps students learn how to critically analyze sources to make informed decisions on credibility and appropriateness. The activities can be used with groups or individuals, as a stand alone activity, or as a research assignment component.

Learning Outcomes: 

• Define authority based on the influencing factors of context and community of expertise
• Evaluate a source's credibility by considering authority, type of source, creation process, purpose, and/or point of view
• Recognize a given scholarly work may not represent the only, or even the majority perspective on the research topic

Use in Canvas: As part of an ungraded or graded introduction to library research or specific research assignment

Worksheets: Students can download accessible Word document worksheets to a device

Instructions:

• Watch Evaluating Information Sources video (3:17 minutes)
• Complete Evaluate Source worksheet
• Discuss worksheet results (e.g. Discussion Board, Flipgrid) or include as component of research assignment
  • Given the source requirements (if applicable), what is the best type of source for the research question? 
  • How will you use this source in your research assignment?
  • What value does this source add to your research assignment?
  • What do you need to know about the source to determine if it is credible?
  • Does the information relate to your research topic and/or answer some aspect of your research question?
  • Is the information up-to-date, current, or does it never go out-of-date?

Resources Needed:

Shared in Canvas Instructions:

• Contact your Library Faculty Liaison to have the module shared in Canvas
• Refer to instructions (sent with confirmation) to import module into course

Canvas Common Instructions:

• Login to Canvas and go to the Commons
• Search for "Identifying Scholarly Articles"
• Choose Import/Download
• Choose course to import module
• Select location within course
• Assign points (optional) for comprehension check

Note: Library modules can't be nested within an existing module that an instructor has created for their course. The library module has to be stand-alone or the individual pages within the library module need to be moved to an existing module in the course. 

Instructions:

• Watch Identifying and Reading Scholarly Articles video (10:45 minutes includes pause time for worksheet completion)
• Review Reading Scholarly Articles handout (supplemental)
• Use any search tool to find one scholarly journal article using example research topic or question  
• Complete Scholarly Article Analysis worksheet
• Discuss worksheet results (e.g. Discussion Board, Flipgrid) or include as component of research assignment
  • What is qualitative research?
  • What is quantitative research?
  • How do you define expertise?
  • Is there any reason to question the credibility of this research?
  • Were there any voices left out of this conversation?
  • Are there some aspects of this research topic that aren't represented in the article?

Resources Needed:

Instructions: choose from the Op-Ed Experts or Google Scholars activity

• Follow instructions found on activity web page
• Watch Understanding Expertise (4:08 minutes) and Assessing Expertise (2:39 minutes) videos
• Review Expertise Matters handout (supplemental)

Credit: R Detmering, A Willenborg, and T Holtze | University of Louisville Libraries

Resources Needed:

Instructions: 

• Follow instructions found on activity web page
• Watch Lateral Reading video (3:33 minutes) 
• Review Evaluating Online Sources Through Lateral Reading handout (supplemental)

Credit: R Detmering, A Willenborg, and T Holtze | University of Louisville Libraries

Resources Needed:

Instructions: 

• Follow instructions found on activity web page
• Watch Identifying Misinformation (2:37 minutes) and Real News vs Fake News (3:19 minutes) videos
• Review Fake News & How to Identify It handout (supplemental)

Credit: R Detmering, A Willenborg, and T Holtze | University of Louisville Libraries

Resources Needed: