Informationskompetens : En fenomenografisk undersökning av skolledares uppfattningar om informationskompetens

The aim of my “two years master thesis” was to examine school administrators perceptions about important information literacy skills that the students should be able to control, perceptions about what role the teachers and the librarians have in teaching students information literacy and perceptions about the collaboration between these groups. My questions have been: Have the school administrators reflected upon the conception of information literacy? What conceptions do school administrators have about important information literacy skills that the students should be able to control? What role do they consider the teachers and the librarians to have in making all students information literate? How do they consider the collaboration between the teachers and the librarians work? What role do they consider themselves to have on a management level to make all students’ information literate? I used a phenomenographical method and carried out six qualitative interviews with school administrators from five senior high schools in the municipality of Gävle. Both public schools and independent schools were included in the study. Most of the school administrators considered information literacy to be the same as criticism of sources, which they also considered as one of the most important information literacy skills. Only one of the school administrators thought that information literacy is about arranging the information. All of the school administrators thought that the teachers have the main responsibility for the education in information literacy. The librarians were by the school administrators considered not to be used at their full potential and the perceptions about the librarians tasks was that they were to be a guidance in databases, tempt students in to reading by talking about books and ask students critical questions through the information literacy process. The school administrators thought that the collaboration between the teachers and the librarians was satisfying. All of the school administrators thought that they should provide the right conditions for collaboration between the groups, but that the school administrators should not run the project. One of the reasons why the school administrators in my essay focused on criticism of the sources and not on the arranging of information can be due to that information literacy is vaguely described in the school curriculum. A conclusion in the study is that the school administrators have insufficient knowledge and insight in how the collaboration between the teachers and the librarians work and that the school administrators do not allocate enough time for the teachers and librarians to collaborate