Collaborating in the development of learning literacies
1. Collaborating in
the Development
and Integration of
Learning
Literacies: staff,
student and policy
approaches
David Baume PhD
SFSEDA SFHEA, Fellow,
University of London
Centre for Distance
Education
Dr Jane Secker, FRSA,
FHEA, FCLIP, Senior
Lecturer in Educational
Development, City,
University of London
Jennie Blake, SFHEA, NTF,
Learning Development
Manager
The University of
Manchester Library
3. Learning Outcomes
By the end of this session, paericants will be able to
identify for their own settings:
• Likely benefits and challenges of collaborating across professional
groups to integrate learning literacies.
• Important differences and commonalities among some of the major
learning literacies, to facilitate informed co-operation.
• Principles and methodologies for collaboration across different
professional groups concerned with development and learning
literacies
• Particular ways in which academic developers can work with
colleagues from different professional groups to support improved
student learning literacies
4. The Session Plan
• Scene setting
• Three Case Studies
• World Café exercise
• Reflections
• Close
Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash
5.
6. Goals for our work on Literacies?
● We developers, all kinds of developers, are
working effectively together to facilitate the
integrated development of many kinds of
literacies including but not limited to digital,
information, library, cultural, academic,
research, numerical (numeracy, surely?),
careers
● These integrated literacies are themselves
integrated into courses – curriculum, learning
outcomes, pedagogy and assessment
7. Some issues with literacies (1)
• Literacies are capabilities – things that people can do
– not just knowledge – things that people just know
• Each have their supporters and developers,
sometimes even an association.
• Each has common features across disciplines.
• Each also lives within and around (any?) discipline
• Each may or may not be the subject of policy from
the institution / professional body
• They overlap, have features in common.
8. Some issues with literacies (2)
Each may have a tense relationship with disciplines,
being perceived variously as:
• Competitor for space in the curriculum, and/or
• An essential or valuable part of the practice of the
discipline, and/or
• Within and/or beyond the competence & purview of
the discipline academic, and/or
• Within and/or beyond the competence and purview of
the specialist developer.
9. Case Study 1: Staff Development
at City, University of London
10. • Library led collaboration across multiple professional groups,
which importantly includes our students
• Holistic & inclusive approach to providing an extended skills
programme accessible to all UoM students
• Flexible approach to delivery: self selecting or embedded; online,
face-to face or blended
• Benefits and challenges in terms of reach, ways of working,
scope and sustainability
• Biggest gain has been the growth in our credibility which now
enables us to influence at both practice and policy level
Case Study 2: Student development
My Learning Essentials
11. Case study 3: policy and
strategies
Source - Martin Beeson at QMUL Library.
• IL Policy at QMUL originated with the Library,
which includes teaching and learning support.
• The IL Policy derives in part from QMUL
employability and graduate attributes policies.
• Policy is a great start, but it’s not enough. Every
new course and every course review requires
continued attention to IL.
• Subject librarians on course teams from the start.
• Embedding IL works better than bolt-on / options.
12. World Cafe
• 3 groups: Staff Development, Student
Development and Policy Development
• 10 minutes per table, then move on
• Capture points on the Padlets
14. Staff Development on Literacies
• What is the current level of knowledge and
understanding of learning literacies at your
institution?
- Which literacies are currently taking the most the
attention?
- How are staff supported to develop their
understanding of learning literacies?
• What approaches could be employed to support
and extend work in learning literacies?
• Who will you or do you collaborate with on this?
15. Student development
• What are you doing in your institution to develop
which learning literacies in your students?Where does
this activity occur?
• Who are you collaborating with to deliver this?
• How sustainable is this approach?
• What proportion of your University's students do you
reach? How could you reach them all?
• Who else would you benefit from collaborating with?
16. Policy development
• What policy or strategy does your University have
around lirteracies? (Which literacies)?
• Does your University have policies on graduate
attributes or other things that might help?
• How are you going to make it happen?
• Who are you collaborating with to make a policy
happen?
17. What am I going to do
on Monday?
Who will you talk to?
Who will you try to work with more?
What do you want to find out?
18. Further reading
• Adamson, B. and Walker, E. 2011. Messy collaboration: Learning from a Learning Study. Teaching and Teacher Education
27, 29-36
• David Baume’s Blog Posts on Literacies, starting at https://davidbaume.com/category/literacies/
• Baume, D. and Popovic, C. (2016). 18 Futures for academic development. In: D. Baume and C. Popovic, ed., Advancing
Practice in Academic Development, 1st ed. Abingdon: Routledge, pp.293-314.
• CILIP (2018) CILIP Definition of Information Literacy: Available at: https://infolit.org.uk/new-il-definition/
• Armstrong, C. (2008). Defining Information Literacy for the UK. Library & Information Update, 4, pp.22-25.
• Jones, Rosie; Blake, J. (2013). Skills Development at the University of Manchester Library. SCONUL Focus, 58, 35–36.
Retrieved from http://www.sconul.ac.uk/sites/default/files/documents/11_10.pdf
• Moolenaar, N.M., Sleegers, P.J.C. and Daly, A.J. 2012. Teaming up: linking collaboration networks, collective efficacy,
and student achievement. Teaching and Teacher Education 28, 251-262
• Pirkkalainen, H., Pawlowski, J.M. and Pappa, D. 2017. Educators’ open educational collaboration online: The dilemma of
emotional ownership. Computers & Education 106, 119-136
• Popovic, C. and Baume, D. (2016). Introduction: some issues in academic development. In: D. Baume and C. Popovic, ed.,
Advancing practice in academic development, 1st ed. London: Routledge, p.1.
• Secker, J. (2018). The trouble with terminology: rehabilitating and rethinking ‘Digital Literacy'. In: Reedy, K. and Parker, J.
(Eds.), Digital Literacy Unpacked. (pp. 3-16). London: Facet Publishing. ISBN 178330197X Available at:
http://openaccess.city.ac.uk/20546/
• Tury, S., Robinson, L. and Bawden, D. (2015). The Information Seeking Behaviour of Distance Learners: A Case Study of
the University of London International Programmes. The Journal of Academic Librarianship, 41(3), pp.312-321.
19. Find out more
Reports, papers and these slides at:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1DtgPGbX8E-
wF5YKKd7ImUIhgIkV_93EJ
City University of London: EDM122: Digital Literacies and Open Practice
blog: https://blogs.city.ac.uk/dilop/
University of Manchester: My Learning Essentials:
https://www.library.manchester.ac.uk/using-the-
library/students/training-and-skills-support/my-learning-essentials/