KEY TOPICS

• Pedagogy and MIL
• What is metacognition?
• Metacognition and MIL: making the link

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

After completing this unit, teachers will be able to:

• Develop pedagogical strategies appropriate for students of MIL
• Identify and develop metacognitive strategies for students

PEDAGOGICAL STRATEGIES

• Consider the following MIL skills that are essential to media and information literacy:
  • Task definition
  • Information search
  • Location and access
  • Analysis of messages and information
  • Assessment of context for messages and information
  • Use of information
  • Synthesis
  • Evaluation

  Identify the ways in which students can develop and demonstrate these skills in your classroom. Describe specific pedagogical strategies or activities that make this possible.

• Develop a lesson plan or outline for a curriculum unit that incorporates these strategies and activities. Consider developing a stand-alone lesson/outline in MIL, or a lesson/outline that integrates MIL into an existing course. Identify the key considerations/accommodations that teachers need to make in order for students to successfully demonstrate these skills.
• Considering the communication model outlined in the previous unit, explain and justify the roles that the media, libraries, archives and other information providers will play in your lesson/unit outline. What role(s) will you assume as teacher? What role(s) will be available to your students? How will these roles enhance the learning process?
• In order for students to experience success as learners, knowledge of metacognition and metacognitive strategies is important. Metacognition can be defined as ‘cognition about cognition’, or ‘knowing about knowing’. It can take many forms and includes knowledge about when and how to use particular strategies for learning or for problem-solving. In practice, these capacities are used to regulate one’s own cognition, to maximize one’s potential to think and learn, and to evaluate proper ethical/moral rules (adapted from Wikipedia)
• Examine the list of skills for MIL that appears above. For each MIL skill, list and describe a metacognitive strategy students could use to support their learning experience. For example, task definition could be supported by the use of a concept map, while analysis of messages and information could be supported by a diagram that labels various parts of an information text, accompanied by critical questions
• Select several activities from a module of your choice. Identify the skills that students require to complete each activity. What role can metacognition play in the transfer of learning from this activity to students’ involvement with the media and other information providers outside of the classroom?
• Refer to Module 1, Unit 4 on pedagogical strategies for the teaching of MIL. In the context of your own curriculum, select a specific strategy and adapt or develop it for your students. How does this approach integrate communication theory and MIL into the learning experience? How does this strategy link to your specific curriculum expectations? How will students know if they have been successful? (i.e. where does this strategy fit in, terms of a programme for assessment and evaluation?)
• Consider the role of libraries and museums in developing MIL skills. Design an activity that illustrates how a specific pedagogical strategy could be used in one of these environments. Consider the unique features that are part of these environments and that can influence the teaching and learning experience in a positive way
• Based on activities from one of the modules in this curriculum, or from your own work, explain the ways in which an MIL curriculum provides opportunities for differentiated instruction and learning (i.e. kinesthetic learning, visual learning, auditory learning, etc.)