**Apologies for cross-posting**
Tipping the scales: tackling information obesity to ensure productive and sustainable information resources
A joint UKeiG/BDA Knowledge Management meeting
to be held at the
British Dental Association, 64 Wimpole Street, London W1G8YS
Tuesday, 29th June 2010, 9.30 – 16.30
Course Outline
"Information obesity" describes a condition whereby available information resources are not being used in a productive and sustainable way by individuals or communities. Like physical obesity, it is not just the result of consuming too much, but is linked to declines in the information's quality, and individuals’ and communities’ awareness of problems which arise through over-consumption. Fitness and (mental) exercise also come into play. The consequences of information obesity may be severe if left unchecked; it will lead to a decline in our ability to manage knowledge, both in our communities and our workplaces.
As a teaching strategy, information literacy (IL) can partly help to combat the condition. However, as traditionally defined, IL does not address the ways in which the structure of organisations and our own innate cognitive biases prevent us acting as independent and self-aware evaluators of the information we find. This course will help participants understand these biases and how, through work at the community level, they may be overcome, in order that we start using information to sustain ourselves and our communities, and not just consume it unthinkingly.
This one-day course will include time for plenty of discussion and practical activity. Participants will be encouraged to share their experiences with others and also to build a network of practice after the event. Sessions will include:
· Identifying information obesity: structural, individual and community-level explanations
· How information literacy helps: and how it is limited
· Cognitive biases, and why they matter
· How organisations affect the way we think
· The holistic approach to IL: subjective, objective and inter-subjective value
· Problem-based learning; student- and community-led research projects
Who should attend?
Anyone working with information in formal, non-formal or informal education, who has an interest in enhancing their teaching of information studies and/or knowledge management, to students or to colleagues as part of their professional development work. This includes:
· information professionals;
· teachers/lecturers at any level of education;
· managers (particularly, but not only, those with responsibilities for information and knowledge management and dissemination);
· other stakeholders in education.
Course Presenter:
Dr Andrew Whitworth is the Programme Director for the MA: Digital Technologies, Communication and Education at the University of Manchester. He has published widely in the field of information literacy including the 2009 book with Chandos, "Information Obesity". His "Media and Information Literacy" course at Manchester was recognised by the LLIDA (Learning Literacies for a Digital Age) project as an exemplar of learning literacies education.
To register your interest in this meeting, reserve a place, or request further details, please email [log in to unmask] or visit the UKeiG website at www.ukeig.org.uk
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UKeiG is a Special Interest Group of CILIP: the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals.
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