What is information and critical literacy?

Most people are reasonably familiar with what is meant by study skills. By contrast, the concept of information and critical literacy is relatively new to many.

In simple terms, people are information literate if they know when they need information, and are then able to identify, locate, evaluate, organise and effectively use the information to address and resolve personal, job-related or broad social issues and problems.

The 'information' is not just about what's available through computers; it takes account of information that can be derived from many sources and many forms. There are learning objectives about asking people to get information from visual sources, such as pictures, newspapers, advertisements and TV shows, and there are objectives which deal with the way in which information is presented - as posters, booklets and drawings as well as on websites.

In this learning series, the learning objectives for information and critical literacy and for study skills are grouped in such a way as to suggest meaningful pathways to navigate through and between the objectives.

The learning material

The activities are grouped around the four main stages for effective studying and the successful processing of information. The four headings - What, Look, Choose and Tell - follow the logical steps which people take: what they need to find out about, where they should look for it, how to select the appropriate information, and finally to use it in another context by telling someone else about it or doing something with it.