Johnston and Information Literacy

This article was the toughest of this week for me to appreciate since I never felt very aware of what exactly the module used consisted of and how exactly it was used.  Obviously the study's aim is to explore broader questions like the strengths and weaknesses of online vs in-person training and the importance and possiblity of teaching information literacy, but because the conclusions drawn were from this one specific module, it was difficult for me to feel very strongly about any given finding.  The beginning of the article is something of an overview of the research field this article falls in, almost a bit of meta-research.  Not being in this field as an academic per se (that is, not doing research or expecting to do research not directly impacting post-academic professional skills I hope to acquire) I was a bit lost with the specific references, essentially coming away with the idea that two main dichotomies being researched are generic vs specfic education and online vs in person, with the jury being out on whether face to face or online educational resources might be better.

On that note, the article suggests near the end that as some students seemed to prefer face-to-face and others preferred online learning environments, ideally both should be used.  Theoretically, this would allow everyone to get what they want, with the weaknesses of each approach cancelled out by the strengths of the other.  However, it isn't so clear how implementable this would actually be--dedicating resources to both approaches and making each work together compatibly is undoubtedly not a simple thing to do.  Also, logistics dictate that certain groups, like the distance learners, would not be able to make use of face-to-face instruction anyway, meaning that not all students in the same course would get the same opportunity.  It's interesting to think about: many online degree programs or courses seem to be expressly that, not "online optional."  I wonder if this reflects the challenges of supporting and melding both face-to-face and online teaching options.

Regarding the surveys, I felt the sample size (25) was a bit small to be terribly compelling.  I would also like to know more about the options of "strongly agree, somewhat agree, neutral..." and so on tend to be so popular in surveys like this, including most UM course surveys.  I for one think the concept of "strongly agreeing" is highly subjective at best, and often have an extremely difficult time deciding whether I strongly or somewhat agree with various items.  Often, even though I definitely agree, I am somewhat less than fervent about my opinion, so I opt for "somewhat agree" just because the question is about an item or aspect I find less than fascinating.  I also wonder for the question "is info literacy important" how clear a concept of "information literacy" students had.   "Information literacy" is a somewhat recently popularized term by information scientists and people who study it and have a clear conception of what precisely it means.  Depending on how strong survey respondents' conception of the term is, and even more importantly whether they have a similar conception is important.  If people don't know or agree on exactly what "information literacy" means, its difficult to take anything concrete away from their opinion about it.