Learning and Teaching in Action

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2007 The authors292 Journal compilation 2007 Health Libraries Group. Health Information and Libraries Journal , 24 , pp.292297

DOI: 10.1111/j.1471-1842.2007.00743.xBlackwellPublishingLtd

Learningandteachinginaction

Learningandteachinginaction

Learning and teaching in action

In the last issue of this feature, Jean McNiff described how she used an action researchframework to evaluate her own teaching practiceand, in doing so, contribute to the knowledge baseof learning and teaching. In this feature, EileanCraig has continued this theme with a reectiveanalysis of her work in developing online infor-mation literacy courses to support users of theNational Health Service in Scotland (NHSScotland)

eLibrary.

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In this article, the author begins her actionresearch with a concern: the need to ensure theknowledge base of the eLibrary is fully exploitedthroughout NHSScotland. One of the proposedsolutions is to develop the online courses in inform-ation literacy. In this article, the author describeshow she and her colleagues at the KnowledgeServices Group planned, designed and evaluatedthese courses from the starting point of an iterativemodel of the information literacy skills process. Thesuccess of this project is apparent from the growingnumber of registered users on the courses and thepositive feedback received. Plans for future develop-ments include widening access to training materialsand supporting training in information literacy forpatients, carers and members of the public.

Margaret E. S. Forrest

Developing online information literacycourses for NHSScotland

Eilean Craig

Knowledge Outreach Manager, NHS Education for Scotland Knowledge Services Group, Glasgow, UK

Background

The Knowledge Services Group (KSG) of NationalHealth Service Education for Scotland (NES)outlined its strategy for the effective use of information and knowledge in everyday practice,

in the publication Exploiting the Power of Knowledgein NHSScotland

.

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The document identied the needfor co-operative working across teams, disciplinesand geographical areas. Following on from this,

From Knowing to Doing

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described several practicalmethods by which this would be achieved. One of these was the design and implementation of a suiteof tailored online training courses intended tosupport, reinforce and maintain the information

literacy skills of all staff throughout the organisation.There was a concern within the KSG that the

resources provided through the e-Library were notbeing exploited to their full extent, as registrationswith the e-Library had failed to reach expectedlevels. A study commissioned by the KSG andcarried out by Robert Gordon University

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revealed anumber of possible explanations for this, includinga lack of awareness of available resources. In train-ing sessions, some participants had stated thatthey found the e-Library difcult to navigate; othersbelieved that available resources were intendedonly for health care professionals, and yet otherswere unable to identify resources relevant to theirquestions. Conclusions from the study suggestedthat the organisation of information resources onthe e-Library needed to be improved and thatNHS staff required additional support to developtheir information searching and management skills.

Several solutions were proposed and are cur-rently being implemented. One is to group resourcesin ways which support information searching andretrieval, another is to continue the development

of a series of portals, each dedicated to a particulareld of interest or audience group. One furtherproposition was the provision of online trainingwhich would support staff, patients, carers andmembers of the public in acquiring or maintainingtheir information retrieval and management skills.The nal recommendation resulted in a decision toproduce and implement a suite of online trainingcourses.


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Preparation

Before beginning work, the projects initial task, toproduce a clinically focussed information literacyskills course, seemed relatively straightforward. Iwas condent of my own knowledge of, and abilitiesin, information literacy as this had been a focus of my library training. My qualications as a workplaceassessor and trainer, MyersBriggs

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PersonalityType Indicator practitioner, and in computingscience would, I believed, support the work involved.The library course had also included actionlearning and reective practice techniques andhad required their application on two occasions,when unfamiliar software packages were suppliedto students with the request to create a usableproduct. These assignments also demanded a

reective practice report describing the experienceof learning to use the packages, the methods usedto create the product and comprehensive evaluationsof the software used.

However, as the detailed requirements for thecourses began to emerge, they gradually becamemore complex. The brief included the directions that: courses should be self-directed and self-paced; participants should be able to pick up from

where they left off; it should be possible to complete each module of

a course in approximately 1015 minutes; completion of an entire course should require no

more than 90 minutes to 2 hours; each course should be designed around one or

two scenarios, relevant to the intended audience; Flash technology should not be used as there

are areas of the NHSScotland network which aretechnically incapable of running such software.

Literature review

As part of the planning process, a literature review

of information literacy resources was carried out.One of the reasons for this was to develop anaccessible, working denition of the term

informationliteracy

, which would be meaningful to individualsbeyond the information professions. A selection of the literature consulted in the review is included inthe References section of this article.

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An additional step was to reconsider and revisemy notes and texts from the MyersBriggs and

trainer courses. This prompted a further literaturereview, in the eld of phenomenography. Phenom-enography is qualitative research which aims atdescription, analysis, and understanding of experi-ences; that is, research which is directed towardsexperiential description.

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Phenomenography

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is concerned with the different ways in which indi-viduals experience or think about the world aroundthem. This has been applied in educational situa-tions where researchers have studied learning fromthe point of view of the learner rather than fromthat of the course provider or conductor. Awareof several techniques which can be used to maketraining sessions and courses attractive to potentialparticipants, and to address differing learning styles,the intention was to include in the courses as manyfacets of learning preferences as possible to facili-

tate learning and stimulate course participants.Having conducted the initial information survey

and read and digested as many articles from aroundthe world as possible, my attention turned to thedifferences between face-to-face and online train-ing. I had experience of the former but not thelatter and needed to nd as many tips as possiblefrom those with more experience in the area.

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An obvious rst reference was Jakob Nielsenswebsite

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to update my knowledge about theusability of websites.

Devising the shape of the course

The information literacy (IL) sources were reviewedfor common denitions or part denitions andinformation about the IL process. As a librarystudent with Queensland University of Technology,I had learned information about literacy through10 steps:

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Recognising and acknowledging the need forinformation.

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Dening the type of information required.

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Formulating a question.

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Identifying potential information sources(electronic, paper based, people).

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Accessing information sources.

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Implementing the search strategy with theidentied sources.

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Evaluating and ltering recovered information.

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Synthesising retained information with exist-ing body of knowledge.


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Sharing retained information/revised body of knowledge.

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Applying revised and expanded body of knowledge.

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However, several sources identied only sevenbasic steps.

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These appear to have assumed therst two of the 10-step process above and com-bined steps ve and six. Based on this nding, aseven-stage model of the IL process was devisedand an image created which could be used todescribe and promote the online courses andassociated IL resources. The initial version of theimage was unsatisfactory as its rectangular shapeimplied that a single journey through the stepswas all that was required to become informationliterate and to have acquired information literacyskills. The image was redesigned as a circular pro-

cess and this has evolved into the illustration shownin Fig. 1. The illustration is shown in its most basicform, omitting the iterative activity necessary atvarious points in the process.

Following the literature review and the develop-ment of a new model of the IL process, a story-board was produced to demonstrate the proposedorganisation and outline content of the course.Microsoft PowerPoint software was used to dothis, as it allows some animation which wouldsupport and display a little of the interactivityincorporated into the course. The course was to be

structured so that each module was dedicated toan individual step in the Information LiteracySkills (ILS) process.

Testing the content

The content for the rst module of the clinicalcourse was developed and two groups were invitedto test it. The groups were drawn from, andrepresented, the intended audience. During thetest sessions, it very quickly became apparent thatI had assumed a greater level of competence andcomfort with the required technology and electronictools than many of the participants had. A numberhad only point-and-click mouse skills, others hadlimited understanding of the functionality of Internetbrowsers, while others had little knowledge of basic

windows functionality. This meant that the onlinecourse would have to be expanded to address theseissues.

Web searches were carried out to identify exist-ing and accessible tutorials, and supportive onlineresources were found, which I felt would help buildthe condence of more hesitant and less experi-enced IL course participants.

The course structure was then altered to includean additional introductory module encompassingmouse skills, an introduction to browsers and anintroduction to the Internet. This has been metwith approval by subsequent course participants.

Implementation in the software

At the same time as the storyboard was beingproduced and the content developed, an investigationof potential software packages for online presentationof the course was carried out. The software selectedwas Moodle,

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an open-source package. This packagewas chosen because it is free to download, it iswidely used in educational environments in the

UK and overseas and it had been developed to apoint where it was relatively stable in IT terms.

While the main advantage of the software is thatit is available free of charge, the main disadvantageis that there was little in the way of support ordocumentation. A few investigative test sessionson the Moodle organisations server suggestedthat the package was more user-friendly thanproved to be the case when the software was

Figure 1 NES Knowledge Services Information Literacy SkillsProcess Model


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Unreliable feedback produced by the Moodle soft-ware had been confusing participants, informingthem that they had made mistakes when in factthey had answered questions correctly. As thereappeared to be no clear solution to the softwareproblem (apparently a Moodle-related program-ming bug), free-text type questions were removedfrom the courses and replaced with multiple-choice questions. Second, changes were made tothe font size on pages in the courses. The originalfont size was considered to be too large and it wasfelt that a smaller font would allow more of thecontent to appear on screen, with less need forscrolling. I had experienced difculties with pagelayout when using the programmes default set-tings, including sizing the margins around pagecontent. Reducing the font size would have no

detrimental effect on users as it is still possible toalter text-size using browser controls. Finally, theabsence of dates on the certicates of completionwas corrected by incorporating an automaticallyupdating date eld.

A second course, designed for administrative,clerical and support services staff, was launchedrecently, again with clickable links to enable thesubmission of comments and suggestions. The contentof the course is focussed around the informationinterests of a hospital chef and of a clerical ofcer.To date, the feedback received for this course hasbeen positive. There are currently 284 usersregistered with the ILS site who, according tothe site logs, are actively pursuing the courses.

Future developments

It is expected that the information literacy courseswill continue to evolve in response to the suggestionsand observations made by users and as a result of further learning and reective practice on the partof the course developer. A further course for

patients, carers and members of the public isplanned for development later in the year. This willrequire the creation of new scenarios and alterationof the language used to describe information-relatedconcepts, among other changes. It is intended thata reference group is established whose membersare drawn from organisations supporting membersof the target audience in their information searches,to guide the development of the course.

An Information Literacy Competency Frame-work for application throughout NHSScotlandand linked to the NHS Knowledge and SkillsFramework

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is currently under development andis expected to be available by the middle of 2008.A further portal is being produced for inclusion inthe e-Library website. The intention is that the ILHelp and Training portal will incorporate linksto downloadable training resources, to online train-ing and support for information users and forthose concerned with guiding others in their infor-mation literacy learning.

References

1 NHSScotland. eLibrary. Available from:http://www.elib.scot.nhs.uk (accessed 30 August 2007).

2 NES. Exploiting the Power of Knowledge in NHSScotland:A National Strategy

. Glasgow: NHS Education forScotland, 2004.

3 NES. From Knowing to Doing: Transforming KnowledgeInto Practice in NHSScotland

. Glasgow: NHS Educationfor Scotland, 2006.

4 Burnett, S., Webster, L. & Williams, D. Access to theKnowledge Base to Support Interdisciplinary Models of Healthcare Delivery

. Aberdeen: Robert GordonUniversity, 2003.

5 Myers, I. B. with Myers, P. B. Gifts Differing: Understanding Personality Type

. Palo Alto, CA: Davies-Black Publishing,1980. (The MyersBriggs Personality Type Indicator is aninventory designed to collect information about individual

preferences which enables interpretation and prediction of a persons behaviour. It also has application in identifyinglearning styles.)

6 American. Library Association. Information LiteracyCompetency Standards for Higher Education

. 2002.Available from: http://www.ala.org/ala/acrl/acrlstandards/standards.pdf (accessed 30 August 2007).

7 Big6 Associates. Information Literacy for the InformationAge: What Is the Big6?

20012005. Available from:http://www.big6.com/ (accessed 30 August 2007).

8 Boon, S. UK Academics Conceptions of InformationLiteracy

. Shefeld: University of Shefeld, 2004. Availablefrom: http://dis.shef.ac.uk/literacy/project (accessed30 August 2007).

9 Bundy, A. One essential direction: information literacy,information technology uency. Paper Presented at eLit

2003: Second International Conference on Information and IT Literacy, Glasgow Caledonian University, 1113 June

2003

. Available from http://www.library.unisa.edu.au/about/papers/abpapers.asp (accessed 30 August 2007).

10 Bruce, C. Seven Faces of Information Literacy in HigherEducation

. Brisbane: Queensland University of Technology, 1997. Available from: http://sky.t.qut.edu.au/~bruce/init/faces/faces1.php (accessed 30 August 2007).
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11 Bruce, C. Seven faces of information literacy: towardsinviting students into new experiences. Higher Colleges of Technology, United Arab Emirates 2003 Annual Conference,30 August 2003

. Available from: http://crm.hct.ac.ae/events/archive/2003/speakers/bruce.pdf (accessed 30 August 2007).

12 SCONUL. The Seven Pillars of Information Literacy

.London: Society of College, National and UniversityLibraries, 1999. Available from: http://www.sconul.ac.uk/groups/information_literacy/papers/Seven_pillars2.pdf (accessed 30 August 2007).

13 Marton, F. Phenomenography: describing conceptions of the world around us. Instructional Science

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, 177200.14 Booth, S. On phenomenography, learning and teaching.

Higher Education Research and Development

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15 Limberg, L. Phenomenography: a relational approachto research on information needs, seeking and use.New Review of Information Behaviour Research

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, 5167.

16 Lupton, M. The Learning Connection: InformationLiteracy and the Student Experience

. Adelaide: AuslibPress, 2004.

17 Richardson, John, T. E. The concepts and methods of phenomenographic research. Review of Educational Research

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, 5382.18 Webb, G. Deconstructing deep and surface: towards a

critique of phenomenography for staff developers.Different approaches: theory and practice in highereducation. Proceedings HERDSA Conference 1996,Perth, Western Australia, 812 July 1996

. Available from:http://www.herdsa.org.au/confs/1996/webb.html (accessed 30 August 2007).

19 Nielsen, J. Useit.Com: Jakob Nielsens Website

. Availablefrom: http://www.useit.com/ (accessed 30 August 2007).

20 Walker, C. The cutting edge of e-learninglessons learned.Information Specialists Group of the Australian Library and Information Association, 11th Information OnlineConference and Exhibition in Sydney, January 2003

.Available from: http://conferences.alia.org.au/online2003/papers/walker.html (accessed 30 August 2007).

21 Brown, A. R. & Voltz, B. D. Elements of effective e-learningdesign. The International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning

, 2005, 6

. Available from:http://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/view/217/300 (accessed 30 August 2007).

22 Clark, R. Six principles of effective e-learning: what worksand why. Learning Solutions Emagazine

, 2002. Availablefrom: http://www.elearningguild.com/pdf/2/091002DES-H.pdf (accessed 30 August 2007).

23 Frydenberg. J. Quality standards in e-learning: a matrix of analysis. International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning

, 2002, 3

. Available from:http://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/view/217/300 (accessed 30 August 2007).

24 Horton, W. E-Learning by Design

. San Francisco, CA:Pfeiffer, 2006.

25 Maxwell, I., Doherty, I. & Jones, N. eLearning: learningled and technology enabled. Proceedings of the Second International Conference on eLearning for Knowledge-Based Society, August 47, 2005, Bangkok, Thailand.

International Journal of The Computer, the Internet and Management

. Special issue. Available from:http://www.elearningap.com/eLAP2005/Proceeding/PP19.pdf (accessed 30 August 2007).

26 Motschnig-Pitrik, R. & Derntl, M. Student-Centered eLearning (SCeL): Concept and Application in a StudentsProject on Supporting Learning

, 2002. Available from:http://www.cs.univie.ac.at/upload/publications/00000.ICL-SCeL02.pdf (accessed 30 August 20 07).

27 Queensland University of Technology. Lecture Notes:ITP328Information Sources

. Brisbane: QueenslandUniversity of Technology, 1997.

28 Moodle. Welcome to Moodle

. Available from:http://moodle.org (accessed 30 August 2007).

29 Department of Health. The NHS Knowledge and Skills Framework (NHS KSF) and the DevelopmentReview Process, NHS Agenda for Change Project Team

.October 2004. Available from:http://www.dh.gov.uk/prod_consum_dh/idcplg?IdcService=GET_FILE&dID=13159&Rendition=Web(accessed 30 August 2007).
http://crm.hct.ac.ae/events/archive/2003/speakers/bruce.pdfhttp://crm.hct.ac.ae/events/archive/2003/speakers/bruce.pdfhttp://crm.hct.ac.ae/events/archive/2003/speakers/bruce.pdfhttp://www.sconul.ac.uk/groups/information_literacy/papers/Seven_pillars2.pdfhttp://www.sconul.ac.uk/groups/information_literacy/papers/Seven_pillars2.pdfhttp://www.herdsa.org.au/confs/1996/webb.htmlhttp://www.useit.com/http://conferences.alia.org.au/online2003/papers/walker.htmlhttp://conferences.alia.org.au/online2003/papers/walker.htmlhttp://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/view/217/300http://www.elearningguild.com/pdf/2/091002DES-H.pdfhttp://www.elearningguild.com/pdf/2/091002DES-H.pdfhttp://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/view/217/300http://www.elearningap.com/eLAP2005/Proceeding/PP19.pdfhttp://www.elearningap.com/eLAP2005/Proceeding/PP19.pdfhttp://www.cs.univie.ac.at/upload/publications/00000.ICL-SCeL02.pdfhttp://www.cs.univie.ac.at/upload/publications/00000.ICL-SCeL02.pdfhttp://moodle.org/http://www.dh.gov.uk/prod_consum_dh/idcplg?IdcService=GET_FILE&dID=13159&Rendition=Webhttp://www.dh.gov.uk/prod_consum_dh/idcplg?IdcService=GET_FILE&dID=13159&Rendition=Webhttp://conferences.alia.org.au/online2003/papers/walker.htmlhttp://www.dh.gov.uk/prod_consum_dh/idcplg?IdcService=GET_FILE&dID=13159&Rendition=Webhttp://moodle.org/http://www.cs.univie.ac.at/upload/publications/00000.ICL-SCeL02.pdfhttp://www.elearningap.com/eLAP2005/Proceeding/PP19.pdfhttp://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/view/217/300http://www.elearningguild.com/pdf/2/091002DES-H.pdfhttp://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/view/217/300http://conferences.alia.org.au/online2003/papers/walker.htmlhttp://www.useit.com/http://www.herdsa.org.au/confs/1996/webb.htmlhttp://www.sconul.ac.uk/groups/information_literacy/papers/Seven_pillars2.pdfhttp://crm.hct.ac.ae/events/archive/2003/speakers/bruce.pdf


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