**3. Literature review**

Whatever their differences in orientation about teaching and learning in the online environment, one position on which practitioners and theorists find common ground, is that learning is the primary activity taking place in the environment and should be the focus of study and practice aimed at improving the online student experience.

Ally (2004) is very clear about this. He asserts,

The goal of any instructional system is to promote learning. Therefore, before any learning materials are developed, educators must, tacitly or explicitly, know the principles of learning and how students learn. This is especially true for online learning, where the instructor and the learner are separated. The development of effective online learning materials should be based on proven and sound learning theories….

Learning strategies should be selected to motivate learners, facilitate deep processing, build the whole person, cater for individual differences, promote meaningful learning, encourage interaction, provide feedback, facilitate contextual learning, and provide support during the learning process. (p.6)

It can be argued that the definitions of information literacy outlined above, as well as the guidelines provided for doing the annotated bibliography are more biased towards articulating the tasks that should be undertaken to develop competency than to providing strategies to support learners as they set about to build knowledge and skills. Some may argue that the task-identification approach used in formulating definitions and providing

The definition that is most commonly referred to is that developed by the American Library Association (ALA). One point to be noted is the way the ALA frames its definition as an

The writing of annotated bibliographies was included in the orientation course for graduate students preparing to begin a fully online programme of study, since it embodies all the key information literacy skills and serves as an effective vehicle to allow students the

This study is based on an analysis of the annotations prepared by the students who participated in the course conducted in January 2011. The course was itself a fully online

Whatever their differences in orientation about teaching and learning in the online environment, one position on which practitioners and theorists find common ground, is that learning is the primary activity taking place in the environment and should be the focus of

The goal of any instructional system is to promote learning. Therefore, before any learning materials are developed, educators must, tacitly or explicitly, know the principles of learning and how students learn. This is especially true for online learning, where the instructor and the learner are separated. The development of effective online

Learning strategies should be selected to motivate learners, facilitate deep processing, build the whole person, cater for individual differences, promote meaningful learning, encourage interaction, provide feedback, facilitate contextual learning, and provide

It can be argued that the definitions of information literacy outlined above, as well as the guidelines provided for doing the annotated bibliography are more biased towards articulating the tasks that should be undertaken to develop competency than to providing strategies to support learners as they set about to build knowledge and skills. Some may argue that the task-identification approach used in formulating definitions and providing

learning materials should be based on proven and sound learning theories….

study and practice aimed at improving the online student experience.

To be information literate, a person must be able to recognize when information is needed and have the ability to locate, evaluate and use effectively the needed information. (1989) http://archive.ifla.org/IV/ifla70/papers/059e-Campbell.pdf While this area of skill-building has always been considered key in formal education, it has assumed special significance for online learners given the fact that for most of these learners, the physical library, with all the human resources that are an integral part of that facility, is no longer available. The one-on-one support of the human library information specialist is no longer a feature of education in the web-based environment. Further the vast increase in the quantity of accessible information on the Internet, means that an even higher level of information literacy capability is required of students if they are to be successful in their

attribute of the information literate person. Thus, it states,

information-searching, evaluating and using tasks.

Ally (2004) is very clear about this. He asserts,

support during the learning process. (p.6)

opportunity to develop those skills.

course.

**3. Literature review** 

instruction does not go far enough to address the core learning capabilities that are required if students are to function to their fullest potential as information literate persons. This issue of the need to focus on learner needs is also a concern of practitioners and analysts in the field of information literacy. The work of two analysts will be examined in this regard. Even though the context of their concern is not the online environment, their fundamental perspectives are very relevant.

Shelley (2009), even though writing about skills development in the face-to-face context, offers some thoughts that are equally applicable to the online. Making the case that "critical thinking or higher-order thinking is a crucial component of achieving information literacy", she asserts,

The concept of information literacy should go far beyond users' acquisition of banked skills. The competence to execute a keyword search in a specific database, navigate a library catalog, or memorize a certain call number does not indicate users are able to think on their feet. Users who are truly information literate have the capacities to solve problems, think independently, and they are able to structure their own research processes once they leave the classroom.

In light of the above, she recommends, inter alia, the use of strategies to stimulate students' intellectual curiosity in seeking information, motivate students to exercise systemic thinking, apply exploratory questions toward an area of interest. Shelley's work is somewhat superficial and largely prescriptive rather than analytical and evaluative. Nonetheless, it represents an important departure from the conventional task-focused approach to articulating the competencies required for developing information literacy.

Kavanagh (2011) reports on a study conducted over a three-year period aimed at evaluating the effectiveness of an information literacy module integrated into subject-specific academic programmes. This approach of integrating or embedding instruction about information literacy into a course being studied is, according to Kavanagh, regarded by library information specialists as being more effective than the generic approach. The development of a marketing plan, done as a group project, was the area of study selected. The main assessment was the development of a plan to introduce a new product to the Irish market. Each group was also required to keep a research strategy log to document the library resources used to conduct secondary market research and to find academic articles for their marketing plan. The author justifies the inclusion of the log this way:

This allowed the library team to assess each group's research process rather than its results, thereby ensuring that those groups who chose a product for which market research information was not readily available were not penalized for the unavoidable absence of market research reports from their reference list. (p.8)

A handout was prepared to assist groups in undertaking the research strategy activity. The author acknowledges that it did not have the desired effect in the first year of the project since most groups did not submit a log. Improvements were made to the tool in the second year and the submission rate in both the second and third years increased. However, in her conclusion, the author seems to suggest that the log strategy was not as successful as initially hoped for, since students continued to find the exercise difficult. It is not the purpose of this paper to assess the strengths and/or weaknesses of the strategy employed to ensure that students prepared the log. What is important here is that learners were provided

An Analysis of the Search Skills of Online Graduate Students as

**6.1.1 The quantitative and qualitative in content analysis** 

involving conditions, norms, and values. (p.126)

**6.1.2 The inductive and the deductive** 

suggests that both qualitative and quantitative techniques qualify.

quantitative or qualitative, as can … content analysis … (p.126)

He then proceeds to explain the conditions in which each applies. He states,

**6. Methodology** 

seamlessly into the other.

**6.1 Overview of research method** 

the Basis for the Development of Appropriate Instructional Strategies 217

limitation, it was also felt that doing the summary was a substantial multifaceted

Content analysis methods were employed for both data collection and data analysis. In describing the research method of the study therefore, no distinction is made between procedures used for data collection and those used for data analysis since one set flowed

A mixed-methods approach was employed in the design of this study; thus methodology combined quantitative and qualitative as well as inductive and deductive approaches.

In some circles, the issue of whether content analysis should be viewed as a quantitative or qualitative method for the analysis of text data is still an area of debate. Wesley (2011) considers it important to bring the debate to the fore and makes the following assertions:

First … no research topic is inherently qualitative or quantitative … the subject matter itself does not determine which tradition should be employed. Second, specific methodologies do not belong solely to one tradition or the other. Surveys can be

Because quantitative research involves numbers, frequencies, intensities, and other measurements of degree, it is particularly well suited to questions of How much?, How often?', and How many? By contrast, qualitative research deals best with questions

This researcher holds the view that there is value in adopting Wesley's perspective. To this end, Hosti's (1969) broad definition, as cited in Stemler (2001), was considered appropriate for this study. Specifically, Hosti viewed content analysis as "any technique for making inferences by objectively and systematically identifying specified characteristics of messages". http://pareonline.net/getvn.asp?v=7&n=17 . Reference to 'any technique'

Hsieh and Shannon (2005) use their interpretation of qualitative analysis as the backdrop for their comprehensive discussion of the approaches to conducting this form of content analysis, describing three approaches namely the conventional, the directed and the summative. It is beyond the scope of this chapter to explore this aspect of their work in any detail. What should be noted though is that these approaches are essentially enhancements of the inductive and deductive approaches that entail emergent coding techniques, with categories being identified from themes and patterns emerging from the data, and a priori

undertaking and that much can be gained by examining it in its own right.

with the opportunity to articulate and engage in acts deemed appropriate when the focus is on the process of the learning activity, rather than exclusively on its task-specific outcome.

This study was developed to assess the extent to which prospective students of the UWI Open Campus' online graduate programmes were engaging in the learning process in a manner that would facilitate their attainment of the stated outcome of producing annotated bibliographies. To this end, content analysis methods were used to analyze the annotations produced by teams of students as part of their participation in the orientation course that was developed to assist them in strengthening their competency to engage in online learning at the graduate level.
