Effects of a virtual learning environment on librarians’ information literacy and digital literacy competences

Abstract

The continuing professional development of librarians is a requirement imposed by the permanent progress of the knowledge society. In this context, Universidade Aberta (Portuguese Open University) offers a post-graduate course in Library and Information Sciences for librarians. Being an elearning course based on a Learning Management System (LMS), it is expected that the course not only develops information literacy (IL) and digital literacy (DL) skills but also allows for the deepening of these skills due to the learning environment itself. The aim of this study was to analyze students’ perception in relation to their competences in IL and DL and the articulation between their development and the virtual learning context. The adopted methodology was a case study, through the application of a questionnaire, to students from the 2012 to 2015 editions of the course. The results show that at the end of the course, students consider having significantly improved their IL and DL skills, which directly influences their daily work practices.