Education and Information Technologies 3 27±40 (1998)
Information literacy: innuendo or insight?
AVRIL LOVELESS
School of Education, University of Brighton, Falmer, Brighton, BN1 9PH, UK.
E-mail: [email protected]
DAVID LONGMAN
USIE, University of Sussex, Falmer, Brighton BN1 9RG, UK.
E-mail: [email protected]
There is discussion about the de®nition of literacy in the `Information Age' and
the nature of the experience, skills, knowledge and understanding that teachers
will need to develop in continuing professional development. This paper discusses the context of policy and curriculum discussions; critiques an approach to
information literacy; outlines the use of a framework of `good practice' in using
information technology in the classroom and illustrates the re¯ection of these
ideas in a research project. It proposes that information literacy for teachers is
more than competence and capability in information retrieval and presentation,
but requires awareness of the ideological, cultural, epistemological and pedagogical practices in which these capabilities are developed. # 1998 IFIP, published by Chapman & Hall Ltd
KEYWORDS: Information technology; information literacy; teacher education;
literacy; visual literacy; access project.
INTRODUCTION
This paper is intended to be a contribution to the debate about the future of information technology (IT) in education and particularly within the primary school and
classroom. Since this paper was ®rst proposed there has been a change of government in the UK. The Labour Government since May 1997 has placed `education,
education and education' in a central position in its policy priorities. The White
Paper Excellence in Schools (Department for Education and Employment 1997f), a
consultation document, and more speci®cally the consultation paper Connecting
the Learning Society (Department for Education and Employment 1997a), highlight
information and communications technology in the proposal for a `National Grid
for Learning' as a means to develop society through education and life-long learning. From a teacher training perspective the questions we must ask are: what
1360±2357 # 1998 IFIP, published by Chapman & Hall Ltd
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understanding, what skills, what knowledge should the newly quali®ed or serving
teacher have about IT?
For the teaching profession in the UK changes in practice have been marked in recent years. The curriculum is now regulated by central government (in England and
Wales). There is more curriculum planning at the school level and teachers have
developed a more team-oriented, whole-school approach to the curriculum. Teachers are subject to much greater and more intense external scrutiny and the measurement and assessment of professional competence for all teachers, not just initial
trainees, is well established (Department for Education and Employment, 1997b). In
particular, this will soon include a nationally de®ned core curriculum for IT in teacher training programmes.
There are two stimuli for change in our practice with IT. The motivation brought on
by renewed Government initiatives for development of an infrastructure that will enable educational activity; and the motivation to interpret a core curriculum for IT in
terms of good practice for teacher education and for the classroom. This takes
place in a context of widespread concern about educational standards and achievement and, in the particular case of IT, a context in which successive reports continue to ®nd that IT remains relatively marginalized in the school and classroom
(Department for Education and Employment, 1997c, 1997e; Her Majesty's Inspectorate, 1995).
There are dangers in a headlong rush to embrace IT based on simple acceptance of
the claims made for its potential to challenge and extend teaching and learning. Teacher educators then run the risk of developing models of practice based on too uncritical a view of evidence or of theoretical understanding about how pupils learn
with IT. We need to explore the nature of the links between claims about the educational bene®ts of IT and the practice to which newly quali®ed teachers should, ideally, aspire. A more detailed consideration of the construction of those abilities
during initial teacher training is needed (Selwyn, 1997).
In this paper we address this concern by introducing a discussion about classroom
practice, and make use of Alexander's (1996) model that differentiates two levels at
which classroom practice can operate. We approach this through a discussion of an
approach to the idea of `information literacy' and return to some of the questions
raised. We then discuss the model and consider some of the implications for teacher training. Finally, we offer an illustration of how the perspective developed here
has been used to frame the research agenda for a digital arts project.
The policy context in England and Wales
A new practical emphasis on literacy, numeracy and IT skills is more prominent in
English teacher education since May 1997. This has included the introduction of
new standards for teacher education by the Teacher Training Agency (TTA), the
body responsible for funding and regulating teacher training (Department for Education and Employment, 1997b). These standards describe what a newly quali®ed
Information literacy: innuendo or insight?
29
teacher should know about mathematics and English, and how to teach these subjects. The standards also incorporated the proposal that all newly quali®ed teachers should reach Level 8 in the National Curriculum for IT capability by
September 1999. There is insuf®cient space to explore the details of this requirement but here is the Level 8 statement:
Pupils select the appropriate IT facilities for speci®c tasks, taking into account ease of
use and suitability for purpose. They design and implement systems for others to use.
They design successful means of capturing and, if necessary, preparing information for
computer processing. When assembling devices that respond to data from sensors,
they describe how feedback might improve the performance of the system. They discuss in an informed way, the social, economic, ethical and moral issues raised by IT.
This is the description of the attainment to be expected of a 14±16 year old working
to the highest level. In addition, newly quali®ed teachers must understand the contribution that IT makes to their subject specialism. A recent consultation exercise
carried out by the TTA aims to provide a teacher training curriculum for IT to take
effect from September 1998. This will specify the `essential core of knowledge, skills
and methods which all trainees must be taught and should be able to use in their
teaching' (TTA communication, 24 July 1997). It is likely that this new curriculum
will, on the one hand, be more helpful by providing more detail, but on the other
will remain contested to some degree simply because the impact of IT is changing
all the time.
Even as we write the simple terms of the debate are changing. For example, the newer and more current phrase is now `information and communication technologies
(ICT)' (but we use IT throughout this paper) and instead of `information literacy'
the new consultation paper published by the Labour Government Connecting the
Learning Society advances the term `network literacy' (Department for Education
and Employment 1997a). Their de®nition of this term is, in our view, telling:
[Network literacy is] the capacity to use electronic networks to access resources, to
create resources, and to communicate with others. These elements of network literacy
can be seen as extensions of the traditional skills of reading, writing, speaking and listening. This is of central importance and provides a link with the Government's focus
on improving standards of literacy (Section 21, p. 10).
This de®nition is not straightforward. One obvious problem is that it is so narrow
(it excludes, for example, the entire ®eld of simulation and modelling); another is
that it rather tends to emphasize an operational view of literacy. Note too the link
with tradition as if to emphasize continuity. A further problem is that the three elements of the de®nition (`accessing', `creating', `communicating') are rather different
kinds of processes, requiring different approaches, different kinds of knowledge.
Balance among these elements of network literacy cannot be assumed, e.g. it may
be easier, more pragmatic, to have a large effect on `accessing', but more dif®cult to
have a similar effect on `creating'.
Our paper addresses a basic dilemma about the increasing momentum towards integrating IT into everyday classroom practice. On the one hand IT is promoted in
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ways that urge its high value economically, socially and educationally; on the other
hand we are still struggling to understand the choices we have to make about which
are the most effective and educationally worthwhile directions to take.
Much research into the effectiveness of IT makes claims based on very specialized
conditions, i.e. intensive funding, selective control over the contextual conditions
of its use in the classroom, and unusual, atypical concentrations of activity. This is
not true of all research in this area of course, e.g. the strong naturalistic tradition in
classroom research has provided many exciting insights into real pupils and teachers working with IT (Somekh, 1993). At the same time we are left with the sense
that many claims for the pedagogic value of IT are in the end a kind of innuendo that
the learning outcomes claimed for IT (almost always positive) will prevail under ordinary classroom conditions (Watson, 1993).
LITERACY IN THE `INFORMATION AGE'
A discussion of the development of teachers' information literacy should acknowledge that it is embedded in culture, epistemology and pedagogy. The culture of IT,
i.e. the perceived images and purposes of the use of IT in our society, billows into
the classroom with the children, trailing links between their home, school and
street experiences. Teachers too bring their professional culture into school ± what
are teachers for in the Information Age? The epistemology that underpins the use of
IT in education is about how IT can represent ways of knowing within subject domains ± from the mathematics of fractal geometry through hypertextual narratives
to digital arts. The pedagogy of IT is the practical expression of culture and understanding through the development of ways of teaching (organizing, managing and
structuring learning tasks) and through theories about learning.
MODELS OF INFORMATION LITERACY
Niederhauser (1996) describes the need for educators to re-assess what it means to
be literate in our society. He proposes a view of an information society that demands critical thinking and problem-solving skills of the individual members of society. Training structures need to be reformed and resourced to provide teachers
with the opportunity to develop basic technological skills, subject knowledge and
collaborative ways of working in order to integrate IT in the curriculum.
There are similarities between these aims and the description of `IT capability' in
the National Curriculum in England and Wales (National Curriculum Council, 1990):
knowledge about IT applications and about IT tools; the skill to use appropriate IT
skills effectively; an understanding of the new opportunities IT provides; and knowledge of the effects and limitations of IT. The National Curriculum view of information literacy describes the ways in which IT ± characterized by the storage,
organization, processing, representation and transmission of data ± is expected to
enable the learner to identify and access information; organize it for analysis and
present outcomes to an audience in an appropriate manner.
Information literacy: innuendo or insight?
31
Niederhauser's view of the process of change is essentially a `top±down' model of
teacher education, in which the provision of resources and the design of courses to
integrate IT skills into the curriculum is supposed to bring about change. In addition, the model he offers has features of technological determinism in which `advancements in electronic technology' drive the `information revolution'. The
solution seems simple ± teach the teachers, and they will then be equipped to help
their pupils ride the wave of progress. This appears to be, for example, the view of
Anthea Millett, Chief Executive of the TTA in the UK. She suggests that in order to
promote the use of IT by the teaching profession we need to show teachers `super
programs that go to the heart of what they are trying to do and then say to them:
``Do you like this software? We will show you how to use it.'' ' (Times Educational
Supplement, 18 October 1996).
This approach is reminiscent of Street's (1993) distinction between two models
of literacy: the autonomous and the ideological. In an autonomous model of literacy competences are thought of as separate from the situations in which they
are learned and used. These capabilities of technical skill, thinking and problemsolving are treated as if they can be learned and taught independently of the cultural context. In opposition to the autonomous model of literacy, Street puts forward the ideological model. This view recognizes that literacy is not a
generalized, culture-free process, but a set of speci®c practices embedded in particular social contexts. An ideological model would highlight the culture-speci®c
view of information literacy, recognizing the range of contexts in which learners
experience IT ± from the anxiety of parents ®lling their children's bedrooms with
`edutainment', to the ways in which young people appropriate IT resources to
their own club cultures. We would argue that it is this perspective that should
guide our understanding of how information literacy arises and develops ± within
society and policy making, within the home and school environments, within
classroom activities and within the individual's experience of a subject and construction of knowledge.
CRITICAL THINKING ABOUT IT: CULTURE, SUBJECT KNOWLEDGE AND
PEDAGOGY
Culture
We argue that the ideological model of information literacy is an important one
because it offers the possibility of a critical approach. There must be a debate
about issues relating to the social and economic potential of IT to empower or
constrain learning; about its potential for the construction of images of human
and arti®cial intelligence; about the role of IT in the representation of knowledge
and about the challenges to teachers in the development of teaching strategies
and skills.
Of course, culture includes the artifacts of our activity. For teachers this means
handling a vast array of different kinds of materials, and one of these is IT. But using
such artifacts, however, is not simply a matter of skill. Cole (1996) argues that cul-
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ture is the use of artifacts but artifacts are not simply material things, the hardware
if you like, they are also ideas, histories and practices. Applying this to the present
discussion Cole's analysis leads us to see that when we learn to use IT in the classroom we are not simply acquiring skills; we are also acquiring rules, routines and
images about what we are doing. These complex social processes form an important
constitutive part of our practice with IT.
Literacy and numeracy are at the top of the educational agenda in the UK (see, for
example, Department for Education and Employment 1997d). This re¯ects perceptions of the `information society' that are associated with images not only of a literate and numerate population, but of economic progress, the quality of life,
modernity, intelligence, cultural change and power (Bowers, 1988; Matthews, 1992;
Beynon and Mackay, 1993; Chandler, 1995). Such perceptions, however, are not
straightforward and the debates about these images and their relative importance
are far from closed. Critics of the idea of an `information society' challenge the implicit link that is often made between information processing and knowledge or understanding (Roszak, 1994). The image of `economic progress' is used to both attack
educational practice and to justify curricular reforms yet the relationship between
education and economic well-being is far from clear (Apple, 1996). Furthermore, an
information society creates its own kinds of pollution (Shenk, 1997).
In the UK context, now that the National Curriculum has been established, pedagogy itself is challenged by those who would limit the control of methods of teaching and learning by the classroom teacher (for example, the emphasis given to
`direct instruction' as a teaching method in the Department for Education and
Employment (1997b) circular). Finally, analysts of discourses of power in the classroom force us to consider the ways in which IT might reinforce and exacerbate social inequalities (Fisher, 1993; also Bernstein, 1996, provides a relevant analysis of
such discourses).
IT is not a neutral object that enters the classroom unannounced and makes no disturbance (for example, Bowers, 1988). There is already a considerable culture at
work that provides images about the meaning and purpose of IT, e.g. that IT makes
you a better=more successful=more beautiful person or that IT is a pernicious and
dehumanizing experience. A culture, however, is not a homogeneous thing and so
the spread and force of cultural images about IT are likely to vary on other dimensions such as gender, social class and ethnicity. In other words, the experience of IT
as a cultural activity is likely to be diverse and different, advantageous to some, disadvantageous to others.
Subject knowledge
At the level of particular activities, the properties and characteristics of IT can give
insight into the nature of the subject focus itself, changing the experience, construction and representation of knowledge. Mathematical and scienti®c ideas and relationships can be modelled and presented in a variety of ways, from fractal geometry
to Fermat's last theorem (Casti, 1997). Digital data can be used as a medium to re-
Information literacy: innuendo or insight?
33
present, manipulate and transmit meaning in the visual arts (Loveless, 1997; see
also Mitchell, 1994). The process of writing and crafting a text, from mark making
and editing to restructuring and publication can be supported and extended, perhaps transformed (Landow, 1992, 1994, 1997).
Some observations about the impact of IT on our notions of literacy
Much that has been written about the impact of new technologies on literacy suggests that although there are continuities with our `traditional' notions there are
also fundamental differences (for example, see Landow, 1992, 1994; Lanham, 1993;
Ong, 1982). However, the National Curriculum for English gives little recognition to
these shifts of process and skill. Apart from the standard all-inclusive caveat that
pupils should be given opportunities to develop and apply IT, curriculum documents for English refer to IT as little more than a tool for getting information. There
is scant recognition that how English is used or understood might be different in
the context of a new kind of language tool.
Nevertheless, we are forced to recognize that the function and relevance of print itself is giving way to an increasingly `audio-visual' environment in which the boundary between traditional symbols of literate activity and modern electronic means of
communication and dissemination is altogether less clear. For example, we can no
longer set aside television as a nice but non-essential extra in the classroom; neither
can we ignore the properties of such mundane instruments as the telephone, not
normally regarded as a technology of literacy. The convergence of the telephone,
television and the computer through the common medium of binary bit-streams simultaneously enables the development of language in new directions and challenges our deep assumptions about the role of the printed and written word in
teaching and learning.
One problem is that even as we remark upon the perceived problem with standards
of literacy in our educated young the very de®nition of literacy is changing. At a simple level we can see how the widespread use of American spell-checkers and even
grammar-checkers can intensify, if not cause, such changes in `standard English' in
the UK. But beyond these details the very notion of a narrative is also challenged by
the presence of digital media and their manner of enabling intertextuality and multimedia representations. We are now no longer limited by the physical constraints of
the page and its implied linearity. Hypertextual environments, of which the World
Wide Web (WWW) is the most well known example, lead us to new kinds of use for a
word in which it is also an active link to another text, another image, another sound.
Where once we judged the quality of a product by `internal' criteria, such as narrative structure, well formed sentences, clarity of expression, we now see looming on
our pedagogic horizon the idea that we must view such creative products in other
terms:
. . .our sense of what `publication' means is bound to change. We will be able to make
our commentary part of the text, and weave an elaborate series of interlocked commentaries together. . .. It seems reasonable to assume that as the de®nition and nature of
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`publication' changes, our system of academic rewards and punishments will change as
well. If we keep an eye on these changes, they may change for the better (Lanham, 1993,
p. 22).
We already see these kinds of changes in®ltrating our activities. Style guides written
for the production of WWW materials sometimes discuss good and not-so-good
ways to construct sentences. For example, hypertext links should be positioned in a
way that is conducive to the reader's eye or the sentence structure should try to
take account of the fact that the reader might have arrived at a certain point in the
text from an external link (see Berners-Lee, 1995). Thus perhaps we ought to judge
the quality of the writing (in a WWW page) in terms other than the `traditional values' of good style because `good' style in the context of the WWW includes notions
about well formed approaches to the presentation and positioning of hypertext
links.
Yet at the present time there is little guidance for teachers on these kinds of issues,
if for no other reason than that few teachers have yet to experience these changes
for themselves. It is not easy for educators to have an opinion about whether one
collection of hypertext materials is better than another, worth a grade `A' or a grade
`B'. What we do know is that the very standards by which we evaluate the quality of
an educational product are changing rapidly as the tools and technologies of literacy provide ever more capability for dissolving the traditional lines of demarcation between the visual, musical and the literary arts. Why not click on the Mona
Lisa's smile for a tour through the history of smiles, to visit a gallery of smiles, to explore the function of the smile in comedy, the biology of laughter or the psychology
of grins?
Of course we can fall back on established analytical categories such as relevance
and appropriateness. We can argue that a hypertextual link should not be arbitrary,
that links should be based on meaning. The extreme case of a WWW document
where every word, every image (or part of an image) is a link to something else
should still conform to such standards. The links you make should be relevant,
meaningful, and should not throw the reader into an ocean of fragmented information. However, so few of us are used to the conventions of electronic reading and
writing that `meaning' and `relevance' are easily obscured by the strangeness of
these conventions.
Pedagogy
Having acknowledged the wider context in which the use and purpose of IT is perceived, it is important to consider the ways in which IT is taken up and experienced
within classrooms and schools. Demands are made of teachers' pedagogical practices and questions raised about their `®tness for purpose' (Alexander et al., 1992)
when IT can be used to support a range of learning experiences from individualized
instruction to collaborative learning (National Council for Educational Technology,
1996; Scrimshaw, 1993, 1997). In planning and developing teaching strategies,
teachers need to consider the learning demands of the activities (this is true of
Information literacy: innuendo or insight?
35
course for any classroom teaching, e.g. see Galton, 1995) and in particular the role
that IT might play in supporting or changing ways of learning (Kemmis et al., 1977;
Crook, 1994).
A FRAMEWORK FOR `GOOD PRACTICE'
Our aim in the discussion of the notion of information literacy is to raise questions about the purposes for which we use IT in our classroom work; how
these ideas translate into `good practice' in the classroom, how we might identify effective teaching, and how in turn new teachers can be educated into
their use.
In this paper we use Alexander's (1996) model of general pedagogy to describe the
concept of `good practice' to think about the purpose and meaning of our work in
teacher education. An important theme is that `good practice' is an aspiration as
much as an achievement; about dilemmas more than certainty, compromise rather
than consensus:
. . .good practice, created as it is in the unique setting of the classroom by the ideas and
actions of teachers and pupils, can never be singular, ®xed or absolute, a speci®cation
handed down or imposed from above in the manner charted in the Leeds research. . ..
[It] is plural, provisional and dynamic: there are thus as many versions of good practice
as there are good teachers striving to attain it (Alexander, 1996, p. 71).
Alexander's model consists of ®ve dimensions or `considerations' (see Fig. 1).
There are two important points to make about this model. Firstly, `good practice'
relies on an interaction and balance between all ®ve dimensions. Mere `practice'
is a re¯ection of the political and pragmatic dimensions only. Secondly, the ®ve
considerations are not equivalent ± there have to be reasons for preferring one
course of action over another. Thus in Alexander's model values are central and
are expressed in real classroom situations. Empirical considerations are a critical
adjunct to matters of value and belief, to enable us to distinguish between the
strengths and weaknesses of different classroom strategies but in order for classroom teaching to be effective we must have a notion of what it means to be educated.
This framework can be applied to the use of IT in the classroom. It can be argued
that the current situation in schools generally re¯ects `practice' rather than `good
practice' (Watson, 1993; Loveless, 1995). Political considerations lie in the expectations and pressures upon teachers to use IT in response to requirements of the National Curriculum, the demands of parents and the political policies to promote
technology in schools. Pragmatic considerations can be seen in terms of what is
manageable with particular resources and classroom constraints and the skills and
competency models of initial teacher education.
Beyond this level of simple practice, however, it is important to consider what it
means to be educated in a world of IT-based communication and interaction.
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VALUE CONSIDERATIONS
Beliefs and values shaping views
of childhood and the child’s needs,
of society and its needs, and of
knowledge, which inform a coherent
view of what it is to be educated.
EMPIRICAL CONSIDERATIONS
Evidence about the effectiveness of
practice: about the capacity of
particular teaching strategies to
deliver learning in accordance with
a coherent view of what is to be
educated.
GOOD PRACTICE
CONCEPTUAL CONSIDERATIONS
A comprehensive map of the essential
elements of teaching, learning, and the
curriculum, and of the relationship
between them.
PRACTICE
POLITICAL CONSIDERATIONS
Expectations and pressures from within
the professional hierarchy, and beyond it
from parents, community, employers and
politicians.
Figure 1.
PRAGMATIC CONSIDERATIONS
An awareness of the opportunities
and constraints of particular school
and classroom settings.
Model of good practice (from Alexander, 1996)
HOW WE REFLECT THESE IDEAS IN OUR RESEARCH: THE BRIGHTON MEDIA
ARTS PROJECT
Access: the Brighton Media Arts Project is addressing these issues in the context of
art education and the use of IT in Primary education. The project, which is a collaboration between the University of Brighton, the Arts Council of England, South East
Arts and Lighthouse, the Brighton Media Centre, was prompted by concerns that
`political' and `pragmatic' considerations were driving both policy and planning in
schools, without full attention being given to the broader context in which children
and teachers used IT in the creative visual arts. In Alexander's terms, IT in the creative visual arts was seen to be stuck at the level of `practice'.
Information literacy: innuendo or insight?
37
The nature of the experiences and knowledge that teachers need to develop are
being investigated in three areas:
(1) ®eldwork in classrooms to observe and question teachers on their beliefs and
theories about teaching, learning, IT and art education;
(2) the design of initial teacher education subject and professional courses; and
(3) the development of curriculum materials that re¯ect the characteristics of
the digital medium and the cultural environment in which they will be used.
Value considerations are being addressed by exploring the cultural environment in
which IT is used in the visual and performance arts and contributes to the experience of childhood in the age of the computer, ®lm and TV screen. The development
of visual literacy in the twenty ®rst century is embedded in the contexts discussed
above. The characteristics of IT and the unique qualities that it brings to artistic
knowledge are highlighted.
Digital data is a new medium that enables not only the simulation of traditional physical processes, such as painting, drawing and photography, but also the construction and communication of visual representations in new ways. Although mostly
hidden from the user, computational tools mathematically manipulate, transform
and process numeric values in order to communicate meaning in a visual language.
The display and transmission of visual ideas on screen and over networks, rather
than in ®ne print, opens up new ways of interacting with visual art that alter the relationship between the artist and the viewer of the image.
The emphasis on the process of transforming data and the potential for transmission and exchange, rather than capture and printing, as in photography, has been
described as electrobricollage:
. . .fragments of information that circulate in the high speed networks now ringing the
globe and that can be received, transformed and recombined like DNA to produce new
intellectual structures having their own dynamics and values (Mitchell, 1994, p. 52).
Observable practice in the classroom for students and practising teachers provides
the sources for our empirical considerations. The context, content, planning and
management of the use of IT in the visual arts is being evaluated in terms of the requirements of the National Curriculum, the teaching strategies used, the learning
outcomes for the children and their understanding of the processes and products
of the activities. Teachers' experiences, interests, con®dence and needs are also
being evaluated in order to develop models of staff development and support.
It is clear that teachers' views of the role of IT in supporting learning in art education are in¯uenced by their theories and beliefs of the nature of the subject, of children's learning, of the place of IT in education and society, and of the pedagogical
practices that express these theories and beliefs. An important outcome of this research will be the description of the conceptual considerations of the relationship
between teaching, learning and the curriculum for art education. This will then inform the production of support materials that exemplify `good practice'.
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Loveless and Longman
CONCLUSIONS
However, we see these outcomes as problematic because we are aiming at a moving
target: the interaction between what is immediately practical in the classroom, the
rapidly changing cultural context in which IT differentially affects pupils' lives, and
the wider horizon of technological possibilities that inform our imagination, all give
our conceptual considerations a provisional quality. Although Alexander does not
apply his framework directly to the issue of effecting change and development from
`practice' to `good practice' we argue that it is through empirical considerations of
evidence and evaluation that we can move from an uncritical to a critical pedagogy
of IT.
A framework for `good practice' in the use of IT in education is complex and dif®cult to implement. The different aspects of the framework will in¯uence and compromise each other and, as Alexander (1996, p. 68) notes, educational practice is
about `dilemma no less than certainty'. Our aim is to acknowledge the tensions
raised by the aspiration for `good practice' in a rapidly changing environment. The
debate about the nature of 'information literacy' must re¯ect and take account of
the challenges and uncertainties of the situations in which children and teachers
learn.
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