To adequately teach these skills requires little more than a commitment from the teacher or curriculum monitor. It is a matter of framing assignments in the appropriate manner -- instead of simply requiring a: Research Paper on an Aspect of Costa Rica, work in a preliminary annotated bibligoraphy section that requires the appropriate vetting and analysis of the sources; require several types of sources, and explain why. Above all, since the research indivates that the major reasons student's fail to use robust informational resources is time management and self-management (read -- laziness and taking the shortcut), it is important to instruct on how to do research, how not to plagiarize, and what the actual point of primnary and secondary research are to the process of self-actualization and broad knowledge. These same studies show that if students are given relevancy as part of their explanation, they are more likely to acquire the necessary skills required (Turusheva, 2009).
The urgency and importance of this topic cannot be overemphasized. Global competency requires the ability to understand, analyze, and synthesize voluminous amounts of disparate material -- regardless of one's discipline, and form an interdisciplinary understanding for modern business and economic needs. To compete in this new world, whether the student is from San Francisco or Sao Paulo, requires information literacy so that they can do more than allow. So, the solution -- easy on paper, more difficult to implement. We know global competency through information literacy is required, but it is a clear cultural shift in pedagogical thinking. We also seem to believe that students everywhere deserve the very best in opportunities to succeed. Thus, the key is introducing this type of thinking as early as preschool (Maria Montessori did it a century ago, why not today). Then, as a regular part of the curriculum, interact often with the librarian to introduce methods of searching, analysis of data, and robustness of information. It is not as difficult as we might think, it just takes some creative effort.
We cannot say we have not been warned, the writing is on the wall -- or more precicely, all over the monitor in the structures and patterns of prior centuries "Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it," (Santayana, 2010).
REFERENCES
Badke, W. (2009, July/August). How We Failed the Net Generation. Retrieved September 7, 2010, from BNet Publications - Technology: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_hb3328/is_200907/ai_n32423867/
(2003, January). Seven Faces of Information Literacy. Retrieved September 9, 2010, from Bestlibrary.org: http://www.bestlibrary.org/digital/files/bruce.pdf
Jackson, A. (2009, December 22). GLobal Competence: The Knowledge and Skills Our Students Need. Retrieved September 9, 2010, from Asiasociety, org: http://asiasociety.org/education-learning/partnership-global-learning/making-case/global-competence-knowledge-and-skills-ou
Russell, P. (2009, May). Why Universities Need Information Literacy Now More than Ever. Feliciter, 55(3), 62-79.
Santayana, G. (2010, January). Famous Quotations. Retrieved September 2010, from ThinkExist.com: http://thinkexist.com/quotation/those_who_do_not_learn_from_history_are_doomed_to/170710.html
Towards an Information Literate Society. (2003, September 20). Retrieved September 9, 2010, from UNESCO: http://portal.unesco.org/ci/en/files/19636/11228863531PragueDeclaration.pdf/PragueDeclaration.pdf
Turusheva, L. (2009). Students' Information Competence and its Imprtance for Life-Long Education. Problems of Education in the 21st Century, 12(12), 126-32.
There are a number of sources on globalism, among which the following see the larger tie-in between the negative environmental effects one nation may have on another, or on the planet as a whole. See: Joseph Nye, "Globalism vs. Globalization," (April 15, 2002), The Globalist. Cited in: http://www.theglobalist.com/StoryId.aspx?StoryId=2392. Novara, et.al. (2003). "Globalism/Antiglobalism," in Polyarchy: Essays on Statism," Cited in: http://www.polyarchy.org/essays/english/globalism.html. Politically, see: Manfred Steger, Globalisms: The Great Ideological Struggle of the 21st Century. Rowman and Littlefield, 2008; Culturally, see: Jan Pieterse, Globalism and Culture: Global Melange. Rowman and Littlefield, 2003; a cultural critique at: Tyler Cowen, Creative Destruction: How Globalization is Changing the World's Cultures. Princeton University Press, 2004; and, an introduction to environmental globalism in: Clark Miller and Paul Edwards, eds., Changing the Atmosphere: Expert Knowledge and Environmental Governance. MIT Press, 2001.
See a number of creative lesson plans and suggests at: http://www.shambles.net/pages/learning/infolit/infolitlp/;
http://www.sldirectory.com/libsf/resf/libplans.html; both sites include a number of ways to make learning information literacy fun.
