Upper secondary school teachers’ information seeking : A study of Social science teachers’ information seeking in their professional role

The aim of this thesis is to examine Social science teachers infor-mation seeking in their professional role.The focus in this study has been on what sources the teachers use for information seeking, examine and analyze their information practices and how they state their reasons for using different in-formation sources, and finally how these teachers experience con-ditions related to information seeking and how these conditions in-fluence their information seeking.This study is based on four semi structured qualitative interviews. The empirical material from the interviews has been compared to earlier relevant research and analyzed with a theoretical frame-work, which includes conceptions from a sociocultural perspec-tive, a matrix over different kinds of information sources devel-oped by Höglund och Persson and McKenzie’s model of infor-mation practices.The results of this study are:- These teachers use both formal and informal sources and external and internal sources. Digital sources are important and these have consequently been added to Höglund och Persson’s original matrix from 1985.- Information practices tend to overlap each other, for example ac-tive seeking (more specific and prepared information seeking) and active scanning (less specific), which are the two most common information practices among the teachers. Lack of time, accessibil-ity and private practices are examples for using or not using infor-mation sources.- Claims to be up to date, attitudes towards school library, aspects related to criticism of the sources, “information overload”, col-leagues and available resources are some conditions that influence the interviewed teachers’ information seeking in their professional role.Program: Bibliotekari