Welcome to the Real World: Showing the Value of Information Literacy Beyond the Classroom

Abstract

College students have a hard time seeing the connection between information literacy and their life after graduation. Showing how information literacy skills are relevant to the work of engineers requires new pedagogies. One such pedagogy is problem-based learning (PBL) where a real-life situation is introduced and students use information literacy skills to complete the assignment. Students will gain essential knowledge while seeing how those skills fit into the engineering design process. This paper will describe problem-based learning as it can be applied to information literacy in engineering classes. The author"s experience in using PBL to teach information literacy in a freshman design class is also described.