LibGuides: How to Design a Library Research Assignment: Critical Thinking

Critical thinking and Information Literacy

Information Literacy is the ability to efficiently navigate information resources in order to identify credible sources relevant to a research question and use those sources to inform and engage one’s own thinking. The skills necessary to become information literate are analogous to those skills required of someone who employs critical thinking.

The "Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education" (from the Association of College and Research Libraries) contextualizes information literacy into the following six "frames" presented in alphabetical order.

Authority is constructed and contextual
Information resources reflect their creators’ expertise and credibility, and are evaluated based on the information need and the context in which the information will be used. Authority is constructed in that various communities may recognize different types of authority. It is contextual in that the information need may help to determine the level of authority required.
Information creation as a process
Information in any format is produced to convey a message and is shared via a selected delivery method. The iterative processes of researching, creating, revising, and disseminating information vary, and the resulting product reflects these differences.
Information has value
Information possesses several dimensions of value, including as a commodity, as a means of education, as a means to influence, and as a means of negotiating and understanding the world. Legal and socioeconomic interests influence information production and dissemination.
Research as inquiry
Research is iterative and depends upon asking increasingly complex or new questions whose answers in turn develop additional questions or lines of inquiry in any field.
Scholarship as a conversation
Communities of scholars, researchers, or professionals engage in sustained discourse with new insights and discoveries occurring over time as a result of varied perspectives and interpretations.
Searching as strategic exploration
Searching for information is often nonlinear and iterative, requiring the evaluation of a range of information sources and the mental flexibility to pursue alternate avenues as new understanding develops.

"The ACRL Framework is called a framework intentionally because it is based on a cluster of interconnected core concepts, with flexible options for implementation, rather than on a set of standards or learning outcomes, or any prescriptive enumeration of skills.

Two added elements illustrate important learning goals related to those concepts: knowledge practices, which are demonstrations of ways in which learners can increase their understanding of these information literacy concepts, and dispositions, which describe ways in which to address the affective, attitudinal, or valuing dimension of learning."

"Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education", American Library Association, February 9, 2015.
ttp://www.ala.org/acrl/standards/ilframework (Accessed July 8, 2021)
Document ID: b910a6c4-6c8a-0d44-7dbc-a5dcbd509e3f

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Critical thinking and Information Literacy