Library & Information Literacy Curriculum
Glossary
Analyze: to examine critically so as to identify the essential elements.
Assured experience: an activity that every student will do.
Big6tm: the information problem solving method developed and copyrighted by Michael Eisenberg and Bob Berkowitz and the foundation upon which this curriculum is based.
Big Question: the question, from which research begins, used primarily in grades K-3. Grades 4-12 use the term 'Essential Question'.
Boolean searching: using the connectors, 'and,' 'or,' or 'not,' to search for a combination of words or phrases on a computer.
Brainstorming a group or individual method for generating solution paths for problems. The goal is to produce multiple possible solutions.
CD-ROM: Compact Disk Read Only Memory; a circular optical storage medium for computers.
Collaboration: the interaction and sharing of responsibilities by classroom teachers, library media specialists, and others in planning and carrying out a unit of teaching.
Collaborative learning: the interaction and sharing of responsibility by classroom teachers, library media specialists, and others in the library media center.
Collaborative planning: involves a partnership between the teacher-librarian, the classroom teacher, and other specialists for creating and teaching curricular units which include goals and objectives, learning activities, and lesson plans.
Collaborative teaching: the actual teaching of a unit in which the classroom teacher, the library media specialist and others have assigned roles determined by the collaborative plan.
Copyright: the legal right to be the only publisher, producer or seller of a particular piece of writing, art or music no matter how it is transmitted.
Critical Viewer: a person with the skills to analyze what is seen and heard in audiovisual media. Critical Thinking: using basic thinking processes to analyze arguments and generate insight into particular meanings and interpretation.
Database: an organized collection of information designed for rapid search and retrieval (as by a computer).
Database application: a type of application that helps you keep track of lists of information. It facilitates the recall and updating of information and creation of subsets of information.
Decision-making: the process leading to the selection of one of several options after consideration of facts or ideas, possible alternatives, and probable consequences.
Digital camera: a camera in which the image is converted into bits of information that can be stored as numerical data.
Electronic information: material accessed through electronic sources such as the computer. audiotapes and video.
Essential question: the question from which research begins; used primarily for grades 4-12.
E-mail: mail sent by computer.
Fact: a statement that can be checked for correctness.
Flexible scheduling: a method of time use in which classroom and students schedule the library media center and the library media specialist rather than by set time periods.
Focus Question: a subsidiary or supporting question of an Essential Question, which helps to guide and direct student research.
Graphic organizer: a visual means of organizing information.
Hypertext link: an automatic connection from one electronic site to another.
Information based learning: learning based on information gathered by the student from a variety of sources.
Information literacy: the ability to access, evaluate, interpret and communicate information from a variety of sources.
Information strategy: a course of action, which helps resolve a question through the use of information sources. (See also search strategy).
Information systems: systematic organizations of data or information resources, i.e., Dewey Decimal System. Instructional technology: electronic tools and processes used in an educational setting to identifier, retrieve, manipulate, generate, and communicate information.
Intellectual freedom: the rights of every individual to both seek and receive information from all points of view without restriction. It provides for free access to all expressions of ideas through which any and all sides of a question, cause or movement may be explored.
Keyword search: a search that allows the user to search the contents of the indexes or articles for a specific keyword or phrase.
K-W-L: these initials refer to meta cognitive format that involves a three-part thinking process. Students respond to: 1. What they Know; 2. What they Want to know; and 3. What they have Learned. This process activates previous knowledge, provides a purpose for investigation, summarizes what has been learned.
Logical operators: the terms 'and', 'or' and 'not' used to specify relationships between keywords. See Boolean searching.
Mapping: an organized visual representation of ideas that are viewed graphically as a whole.
Matrix: a note-taking form utilizing boxes on a page in which pictures and/or words are places. The matrix is used to record information and depict relationships between pieces of information.
Multimedia: a combination of more than one media type or dissemination of information, i.e., text, graphics, video, audio and animation.
Navigate resources: to make one's way through various information sources.
Note-taking: the recording of keywords or key phrases in the student's own words to the greatest extent possible. Note-taking rarely involves writing whole sentences except to use as a direct quote.
Online resources: sources of information accessed by computer through the Internet.
OPAC: Online Public Access Catalog, the electronic card catalog through which a collection of resources is accessed.
Primary Source: a firsthand or direct source; not involving an intermediate agency.
Product: the end result of a task often in the form of a presentation in written, oral, or artistic form.
Resource-based learning: student learning that is accomplished by consulting many resources rather than a single source such as a textbook to answer a question or form an opinion.
Rubric: a method of organization, often a visual tool that allows the evaluation of a piece of work by comparing that work to a predetermined set of requirements.
Search engine: a site on the Web that offers comprehensive databases of other web sites Secondary source: the next step away from primary sources; second hand information.
Super3tm: an information problem solving method consisting of the steps: plan, do and review OR beginning, middle and end.
Synthesis: the highest level of Bloom's Taxonomy. It requires combining information from many sources to create new meaning.
Task: the information problem.
Technological literacy: having the skills necessary to access and process information in voice, video, or data formats using a variety of technologies such as CD-ROM, laser disk, on-line networks, etc.
Venn diagram: a diagram using two intersecting circles to represent sets and their relationships. The diagram is named for the creator, John Venn (1834-1923, English logician). It is used as a preliminary to developing search strategies using Boolean logic.
Webbing: a technique for establishing clear goals for research by defining and limiting the direction the research takes. The web becomes the student's guide to locating significant information. It is also helpful in writing outlines, as the web is, in effect, a research outline.
Whole language: holistic approach for developing literacy by integrating oral and written language experiences into literature and content areas. Spoken language, reading and writing are learned simultaneously.
World Wide Web: a non-linear, graphic repository of services, utilities, and resources available on the Internet.