From Literacy to Information Literacy: Reading for Understanding in the Real World

Abstract

Good readers evaluate as they go along, open to triggers and alarms which warn that something is not quite right, or that something has not been understood. Evaluation is a vital component of information literacy, a keystone for reading with understanding. It is also a complex, complicated process. Failure to evaluate well may prove expensive. The nature and amount of information on the Internet make evaluation skills ever more necessary. Looking at research studies in reading and in evaluation, real-life problems are suggested for teaching, modelling and discussion, to bring greater awareness to good, and to less good, readers.