Information Literacy

An important elements of Canadian Studies is "information literacy." Information literacy is a relatively new aspect of post-secondary education. It deals with the ways in which we find and use information. In high school or perhaps at university, you were taken on a library tour. The ability to find information in the library is an important element of information literacy, but it is about much more than that. You have likely noticed that today so much information is available on any given topic that it can be overwhelming. To take just one example, a key word search on a web site like google.ca can produce hundreds of hits, so many that it is impossible to examine all the sources this one search can provide. One of the skills we need to master as members of a university community is how to deal with this surplus of information and how we separate useful or important sources from those that do not require our attention. One objective Canadian Studies courses at Mount Allison is to consider this issue. You can find more information on information literacy at: http://www.mta.ca/library/info_literacy.html