Information Literacy Seven Corners: Improving instruction by reviewing how librarians, faculty culture, professional literature, technology, and today’s college students converge

This article reviews library and education literature, as well as the author’s personal observation of undergraduate information literacy (IL) instruction sessions, and provides a range of ideas and suggestions for ways in which librarians can increase the effectiveness of IL instruction sessions. The author asserts that there are five major influences that present challenges and opportunities to librarians who wish to increase authentic collaboration with faculty for course-integrated instruction that more fully addresses the higher-thinking skills true information literacy requires. In today’s world of expanded electronic access to information and the impact ubiquitous Internet searching has had on students entering or returning to post-secondary education, new strategies must be employed to facilitate instruction that goes beyond procedural skills – the conceptual aspects of information literacy and critical thinking must come to the forefront of library and classroom instruction