EDUC61711 Digital, Media and Information

Literacy

Week 3: Cognitive authority and academic texts (OR: “what you’re doing when you write an essay”)

Aims of presentation

• This presentation has two (related) objectives.

• I want to use the writing of an academic essay as a particular context, in which we can think about how cognitive authority, information landscapes and literacy interact

• But because this is also a setting you are actively working in: it becomes also a practical guide to how to do these tasks well.

So learn these lessons well, and be more likely to graduatewith a good mark :-)

Some MA DTCE graduates, Dec. 2013 —>

Note also that this presentation contains a few tasks marked ‘Stop and Think’. You will get much more out of this if you do,indeed, stop and think before moving on.

Writing essays…

STOP & THINK…

…why do we ask you to writeassignments of various kindsas part of your degree studies?

(as with all these tasks, there is no‘right answer’ that I expect you tofind… the point is to reflect on yourown feelings about the question)

If you think there are obviousreasons, note them down, but tryto think of other reasons too.

• Obviously the essay can be seen as a product.

• It is a way of assessing whether you have met the specified learning objectives of the course and, thus, whether you should pass the course.

• We do this through the mechanism called ‘the grade’ (or ‘mark’).

• This is known as summative assessment; and normally (though not always) takes place at the end of the course.

• BUT — there’s much more to it than that…

• How about looking at the essay from the other side — from your side?

• What do you get out of it?

• If you didn’t come up with any answers in the stop & think task that were focused on what you get out of it — have another think for a moment

The essay as a processYou can also see essay-writingas a process that improves your own ability to understand the connections and arguments in afield of study.

Through answering questions oraddressing an issue, you exploresomething, and the essay is thesummary of your exploration.

So we could see the essay as akin to a map of some kind.

But this is not a map created after some aimlesswandering through an information landscape.

The exploration is directed by the assignment specification. The ‘map’, therefore, is one focused on a specific subject area,emphasising specific elements as appropriate.

• Whatever form the assignment takes (answer a question? address an issue? explore a context?)…

• …you need to state a position, then that position should be justified.

• In other words, you need to convince a reader of your work that the position you are taking is valid and credible.

STOP & THINK…

…about cognitive authority for a moment

What we are talking about here — demonstratingcredibility and the validity of a position — is the samething as when you have to assign that credibility to whatyou read (online or off).

As a student on this course — how can you demonstrate this?

Key points raised in this file:

Masters’ level study is about findingyour own routes through the landscape

Citation of authors justifies your conclusions

Good essay structure also plays a part

Formative v summative assessment: the roleof feedback

Play the audio file

(8:45)

Academic malpracticeIt is important to talk about this…

BUT: too often, the subject is raised inpurely negative ways, in the form of warnings and threats of punishment……leaving students feeling as if theyare only one misstep away from academic execution and, thus, rather paranoid and fearful.

STOP & THINK…

Let’s start with your own view of the issue then…

What do you think constitutes “academic malpractice”, and — importantly — why?

And if you can, address the question of why with reference to what we’ve already discussed in thispresentation e.g. cognitive authority, formative assessment.

• Broadly, there are three forms of malpractice that I am going to discuss in the remainder of this presentation:

1.Plagiarism (including ‘auto-plagiarism’)

2.Impersonation

3.Falsification of data

There may be more. If on the previous slide you came up with another, don’t discount it. But I’ll focus now on these three.

(Cheating in exams would be another, but as we don’t use exams on the MA: DTCE, I won’t address that one.)

PlagiarismFormally, plagiarism is defined as the passing off of anotherperson’s words as your own.

Informally — “copy and paste” syndrome…

This chapter will critically review a broad range of literature that has engaged over the last 40 years with the quest to define and then deliver forms of ‘information literacy’ (IL). When the term was first used in the 1970s, authors such as Zurkowski and Burchinal used it to refer to the enhancement of information management skills, and saw formal education as the route by which IL would be enhanced in the general population, to help countries continue to meet economic goals in the digital age. However, Cees Hamelink (1976) defined IL as skills and awareness that needed to be developed, not in, but by populations, in order that they could defend themselves against de-skilling, and develop collections of informational resources that could counter those pushed at them by dominant interests. The chapter will review how the notion of IL has developed from these original seeds, and become institutionalised around the notion of information retrieval and consumption, rather than the broader notion of information practice and empowerment. The relevance of this for e-learning lies in the area of professional development, and how e-learning technologies can be structured in different ways. Some permit the kind of critical enquiry into how they impact on work practices (whether teaching, or otherwise); but others are more directive, and help reinforce a limited view of IL and its cognate, ‘digital literacy’, one which is purely competency-based and does not capture the full range of how learners and teachers alike need to engage with e-learning and the experiences it offers.

…from the book you mayhave read…

Some permit the kind of critical enquiry into how they impact on work practices (whether teaching, or otherwise); but others are more directive, and help reinforce a limited view of IL and its cognate, ‘digital literacy’, one which is purely competency-based and does not capture the full range of how learners and teachers alike need to engage with e-learning and the experiences it offers.

…into your essay, withoutattribution.

The point about attribution is essential, because it is of course fine to quote the words of other authors in academicwriting.

Indeed, it is an essential aspect of good quality writing.

These people are just a selectionof the many authors whose wordsand ideas I have used in my books, for example(l-r: Habermas, Hamelink, Gramsci, Bruce,Andretta, Bakhtin)

But to show my debt to them, I cite them, like this…..

Look at the document provided in Blackboard about citationpractice and conventions, for more guidance here.

The relational frame is the most significant vis-à-vis IL pedagogy. Bruce et al suggest that the relational frame brings together, at least, the content and learning to learn frame (2006, 42): “learning in this frame is understood as coming to discern things in new or more complex ways”, and learning occurs when variation in ways of understanding or experiencing are revealed. This will “expand focal awareness” (Andretta 2007b, 156); put more simply, it will give learners something new to think about. Personal constructs may, as noted above, lead to them rejecting the new information; but personal constructs can themselves be the focus of teaching in the relational frame.

The second part of Bruce et al (2006, 43-55) describes some case studies of relational IL teaching…

(Susie Andretta’s words: not mine)

• Thus, citation is how you show your familiarity with the information landscape.

• Taking someone else’s words or ideas and passing them off as your own is actually detrimental to learning. It gives us no idea what you know or don’t know.

• This apart from it being basically dishonest.

• If you use the words or ideas of another author — CITE THEM. It’s a simple rule…

This also applies to auto-plagiarism — copying from work youmay have done in the past. It’s fine to cite yourself — we do it all the time. This is from my2014 book:

Yet this is difficult to translate into practice, even in countries which are sympathetic to these goals. Once again, common themes emerge worldwide (Whitworth 2010, 317-8):

“Ponjuan (2010) makes the general point that any national IL policy is challenging to implement because very few countries have experience working with the library and information science field as well as educational communities like teachers: the links between these different groups are weak in most places. Consequently, IL is rarely recognized at the highest political level, being “subsumed within an ‘information society’ agenda focusing primarily on the promotion and development of ICT skills and infrastructure” (Russell and O’Brien 2009, p. 102: see also Whitworth 2009).”

Note also the secondary reference, or‘quote within a quote’ (see the accompanyingPDF for more guidance on all this)

These words were previously used in a 2010 paper

If you simply re-use material that you have written before, perhaps in your former studies or for a different essay on theMA: DTCE…

…we cannot properly judge your learning on this course, andhow well you are meeting the learning objectives, understandingthe landscape etc. If you are ever in any doubt as to how you should be referringto your own previous work or the work of any other author — ASK YOUR TUTOR.

These kinds of things are what we are here to help you with!

ImpersonationPretending to be someone else is obviously a serious bit of malpractice…Hard work to sustain throughout a wholedegree, but this is one reason why we insiston web-cams for distance learners. However, this also covers the use

of ‘essay banks’ — places from which youcan buy a pre-written essay, or paysomeone to write one for you.

Is it necessary here to go into detail about why this is malpractice?

Falsification of data

• You might think this cannot apply to you, but you will be doing your own small-scale research in the MA: DTCE.

• In a recent case, one student claimed to have done interviews for a pilot study yet words she attributed to her respondents were found to have been auto-plagiarised from an essay done for another institution…

• Once again, then, we could not give her credit for meeting the learning objectives of that course unit (one of which was demonstrating the ability to gather data).

• As I said — it is not the intention of the last few slides to scare you…

• …merely to promote good practice and help you see why these things are looked on harshly.

• Having been teaching for 15 years now I believe most malpractice is caused by not leaving yourself enough time to do the work…

• Which is why good time management is an important aspect of academic literacy.

Know when your deadlines are…

…what time you have available to work (particularly important forpart-time students)…Keep a

diary…

…and if you are getting into difficulties,tell your tutor. We will always try to extend consideration.

Academic literacy…• Remember the point that ‘literacy’ is often

context-specific, to do with learning forms and modes of expression in a particular context

• Yes, some people are innately more ‘literate’ than others, but literacy also can be learned and practised.

• This presentation has introduced you to some basic points about academic literacy; how to express yourself effectively in this context.