Information Literacy Project at Miguel Angel Asturias Academy

By Laura George

 

Over the last four years Librarians Without Borders (LWB) has partnered with Miguel Angel Asturias Academy to help build a library for the students and staff at the school. With help from sponsors and the LWB’s student groups the Asturias library is currently home to 3089 books. These books include fiction and non-fiction titles, as well as text books and reference materials.

The library is a fairly new addition to Asturias and many of the teachers are still testing ways in which they can incorporate library resources into their class lessons. An Information Literacy team comprised of seven members was appointed to work on this project.

The focus of the Information Literacy Project is to promote the development of students’ and teacher’s ability to best utilize library resources. This includes speaking to teachers and presenting them with programming ideas that connect the library with the school curriculum. It also focuses on familiarizing the students with the materials available in the library and the system used to organize the books. This year the team is working to educate the students on the new lending system that LWB is currently working to implement.

The InfoLit Project is comprised of 3 sub-projects:

(1) Information Literacy Package

This project builds off of previous years’ work to develop the Library programming recommendations for Asturias guide. Last year’s participants developed an overview of the suggestions LWB participants had for the school. This year’s focus is determining what the teachers and library staff would like to see promoted at the library. This information will be included it in the programming document along with library programming ideas.

(2) Library Day

This is the second year that LWB has delivered Library Day to the children at Asturias. Last year it was a tremendous success. Library Day is a single day where each class from the school will be brought to the library to engage in fun activities that promote information literacy, self-directed learning, and use of the library.

(3) Lending Instruction

The purpose of this project is to design and present an instructional session for students that raises awareness of the new lending system LWB is implementing in the library. Currently students are not able to take materials out of the library, but that will change with the implementation of this new system. These sessions are intended to prepare the students for this new service. The sessions cover how to check materials in and out of the library, as well as how to care for the books when they are checked out of the library.

It will be a busy couple of weeks, but we are all looking forward to working with the students and learning from the teachers. Stay tuned for updates on these projects!