Category Archives: learner as producer

Designing Interactive Pedagogies of Play Through Metaliteracy

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Trudi Jacobson and Tom Mackey co-authored the chapter Designing Interactive Pedagogies of Play Through Metaliteracy for a new book edited by Marietjie Havenga, Jako Olivier, and Byron J Bunt. The open access volume entitled Problem-based Learning and Pedagogies of Play: Active Approaches Towards Self-Directed Learning is published by AOSIS Scholarly Books. As noted in the synopsis: “The focus of this book is original research regarding the implementation of problem-based learning and pedagogies of play as active approaches to foster self-directed learning” (https://books.aosis.co.za/index.php/ob/catalog/book/409).

According to the abstract for Trudi and Tom’s chapter:

This chapter explores interactive pedagogies of play (PoPs) through the theory and practice of metaliteracy. As a holistic pedagogical framework for developing reflective and self-directed learners in collaborative social environments, metaliteracy supports individuals to become active knowledge producers. The structure of the metaliteracy model includes interrelated roles, domains and characteristics that reinforce the scaffolding of play- and problem-based learning in multimodal contexts. The core components of metaliteracy are applied in practice through a set of flexible and adaptable goals and learning objectives. Through this analysis of metaliteracy concerning PoPs, we will describe interactive meaning-making in pedagogical situations involving collaborative problem-based learning (PBL) in four courses at both foundational and advanced levels of the college experience.

https://doi.org/10.4102/aosis.2023.BK409.

We are thrilled to be a part of this exciting new open access book with such excellent editors and authors. It was a great experience to apply metaliteracy to this new context of pedagogies of play. The examples we provide from our own teaching in the Writing and Critical Inquiry course at The University at Albany and in the Digital Media Arts courses at Empire State University demonstrate how applicable these ideas are to a wide range of pedagogical contexts. Let us know what you think about this new application of the metaliteracy model and feel free to try it out in your own teaching!

-Trudi and Tom

Jacobson, TE & Mackey, TP 2023, ‘Designing interactive pedagogies of play through
metaliteracy’, in M Havenga, J Olivier & BJ Bunt (eds.), Problem-based learning and pedagogies of play: Active approaches towards Self-Directed Learning, NWU Self-Directed Learning Series, vol. 11, AOSIS Books, Cape Town, pp. 43–70. https://doi.org/10.4102/aosis.2023.BK409.03

Looking for Workshop Ideas About Metaliteracy?

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If you are interested developing workshop ideas about metaliteracy or would like to participate in a metaliteracy workshop asynchronously, check out this latest presentation! On Tuesday, September 5, Trudi Jacobson and Tom Mackey facilitated an interactive workshop entitled Adapting Metaliteracy OER to Multimodal Teaching and Learning Practices as part of their honorary appointments as Extraordinary Professors at North-West University (NWU). This virtual event was recorded and is now available to watch at your own pace. The ideas presented in the slideshow are easily adaptable to different learning scenarios and it is fine to follow along with the video as an asynchronous workshop participant! Feel free to apply the slides to your own setting (as long as you cite the source) and be sure to let us know if you have any questions! We would love to hear your feedback! -Trudi and Tom

Metaliteracy Featured in Virtual Prestige Lecture at North-West University in South Africa

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As part of their honorary appointments as Extraordinary Professors at North-West University in South Africa, Tom Mackey and Trudi Jacobson delivered a new Prestige Lecture about Metaliteracy and Multimodality. The slides, audio file, and video recording for this lecture entitled Combining Metaliteracy and Multimodality to Develop Metaliterate Producers are now available. This newest Prestige Lecture is based on the second chapter from Tom and Trudi’s book Metaliteracy in a Connected World: Developing Learners as Producers that was published by ALA Neal-Schuman in 2022.

Look for Trudi and Tom’s follow-up workshop entitled Adapting Metaliteracy OER to Multimodal Teaching and Learning Practices on September 5 at 9am EDT.

Prestige Lecture to Feature Metaliteracy and Multimodality

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Registration is now open for a new Prestige Lecture by Tom Mackey and Trudi Jacobson entitled Combining Metaliteracy and Multimodality to Develop Metaliterate Producers. This online event scheduled for August 17, 2023 at 9am EDT is part of their honorary appointments as Extraordinary Professors at Research Unit Self-Directed Learning, Faculty of Education, North-West University, South Africa. This Prestige Lecture is based on a chapter from their latest book Metaliteracy in a Connected World: Developing Learners as Producers published by ALA Neal-Schuman. In early September, Trudi and Tom will present a follow-up workshop entitled Adapting Metaliteracy OER to Multimodal Teaching and Learning Practices (additional details about the workshop to follow in a later post).

To learn more about the upcoming Prestige Lecture and to register, review the poster for the event:

prestige-lecture-17-aug-2023Download

Metaliteracy Presentation at OLC Accelerate Explores Online Courses in the Digital Media Arts

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How does metaliteracy support creative and collaborative learning in fully online courses? This year’s Online Learning Consortium’s Accelerate 2022 conference featured a presentation by Tom Mackey about applying metaliteracy in Digital Media Arts courses at SUNY Empire State College. The presentation, entitled Effective Strategies in the Digital Media Arts to Inspire Creativity and Collaboration examines how metaliteracy influenced the development of several online courses that envision learners as knowledge producers. According to the abstract for this presentation:

Online courses in the Digital Media Arts offer effective models for designing innovative learning activities in a wide range of disciplinary settings. Several courses in the Digital Media Arts at SUNY Empire State College, such as Digital Storytelling, Ethics of Digital Art and Design, and Information Design have been developed to include open educational resources (OER) to replace textbooks. In addition, openly-available digital resources have been curated in these courses to support individual and collaborative learning activities for producing original and remixed information. 

As part of this presentation, the learning outcomes for each course are shared along with specific pedagogical strategies that have proven to be effective in each class. These techniques are transferrable to a wide range of modalities and disciplinary settings beyond those described. The presentation includes several digital media projects produced by students as well as feedback from learners about the experience.

If you have questions about these fully online courses taught by Tom Mackey at SUNY Empire State College, feel free to reach out any time.

Metaliteracy Book Reviewed in College & Research Libraries (C&RL)

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How do practitioners in the field respond to our latest book Metaliteracy in a Connected World: Developing Learners as Producers? To find out, read a book review by Cal Murgu, Instructional Design Librarian at Brock University, St. Catharines, Canada in College & Research Libraries Vol 83, No 5 (2022).

According to the author of this newest review:

In Metaliteracy in a Connected World, Thomas Mackey and Trudi Jacobson make a strong case for the adoption of the metaliteracy framework, a pedagogical model that seeks to empower learners to be reflective and informed consumers and producers of information in an increasingly connected (digital) world. This monograph builds on Mackey and Jacobson’s previous efforts, spanning two decades, to normalize metaliteracy as the framework for teaching and learning in libraries.

(MURGU, 2022, P. 863)

Murgu highlights the theoretical chapters (1,2 and 6) as well as those focused on practice (3, 4, and 5). He is especially interested in the way the book applies the metaliteracy model to open pedagogical settings as defined in chapters 3 and 4. This latest review joins the insights offered by Jodie R Heap from Staffordshire University in a review in the Journal of Information Literacy.

We appreciate this interest in our latest book and welcome your insights about how metaliteracy is applied in a wide range of disciplines and pedagogical settings.

Tom and Trudi

MURGU, Cal. Metaliteracy in a Connected World: Developing Learners as Producers. Thomas P. Mackey and Trudi E. Jacobson, eds. Chicago, IL: ALA Neal-Schuman, 2022. 232p. $64.99 (ISBN: 978-0-8389-4944-3). Special issue of C&RL, edited by Nicole Pagowsky, [S.l.], v. 83, n. 5, p. 863, Sep. 2022. ISSN 2150-6701. Available at: <https://crl.acrl.org/index.php/crl/article/view/25597/33504>. Date accessed: 18 Sep. 2022. doi:https://doi.org/10.5860/crl.83.5.863.

Third Academic Minute Program about Metaliteracy

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The June 27, 2022, Academic Minute program featured Trudi Jacobson, and, of course, metaliteracy. The episode is entitled, Students Reflect on their Roles and Responsibilities as Wikipedia Editors. It is the first in a week of episodes by professors and instructors who teach using the Wiki Education initiative. Although the program airs on a number of National Public Radio (NPR) stations, it is produced here in Albany, NY at WAMC. This makes Trudi’s affiliation, which is listed as North-West University (NWU) in South Africa rather than the University at Albany, seem a bit odd, but in order to appear on the program, one needs to be actively affiliated with an institution of higher learning. Trudi is Distinguished Librarian Emerita at The University at Albany, SUNY and both she and Tom Mackey were appointed Extraordinary Professors at North-West University (NWU) in South Africa, soon after presenting a metaliteracy Prestige Lecture as well as keynotes and workshops there in 2019. As part of their honorary appointments, their latest Prestige Lectures at NWU continue in a series this year and next.

This is the third Academic Minute episode that features metaliteracy. Tom Mackey recorded the first, Metaliterate Leaners, which aired on May 18, 2020. Trudi’s first was Renewable Assisgnments, Wikipedia, and Metaliteracy, from December 15, 2021. As indicated by the name of the series, these are quick listens. You might want to give them a try if you’ve not already heard them. This newest episode includes quotes from two students who made connections between their work as information producers on Wikipedia, metaliteracy and learning.

Feel free to use these short clips as part of your teaching practices related to metaliteracy!

-Trudi

New Metaliteracy Book Reviewed in the Latest Journal of Information Literacy

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Now that Metaliteracy in a Connected World: Developing Learners as Producers has been published, what do the critics think? We were thrilled to read this review of our new book written by Jodie R Heap from Staffordshire University in the latest issue of Journal of Information Literacy, one of the premiere journals in the field!

According to Heap’s book review of Metaliteracy in a Connected World:

The flow of the text works well to introduce the reader to the concepts surrounding metaliteracy and then proceeds to provide evidence and a variety of examples of metaliteracy in action within Higher Education settings. The reader is supported in their understanding of how application of the metaliteracy framework and concepts could vary depending on the course. The activity section deserves particular appreciation —it provides various examples through which the framework could be applied, a useful scaffolding tool which not many texts offer.

(Heap, 2022, p. 131)

The reviewer provides an analysis of all six of the book’s chapters and argues that “It offers a useful jumping off point for both teachers and librarians in exploring the application of metaliteracy in the classroom” (Heap, 2022, p. 132).

We appreciate this review of our latest metaliteracy book published by ALA Neal-Schuman and look forward to seeing how it is received by authors and practitioners in the field and beyond. If you are aware of other reviews, feel free to send them our way!

Tom and Trudi

HEAP, Jodie R. Book review of Mackey, T., and Jacobson, T. 2022. Metaliteracy in a connected world: Developing learners as producers. Journal of Information Literacy, [S.l.], v. 16, n. 1, p. 131-132, june 2022. ISSN 1750-5968. Available at: <https://ojs.lboro.ac.uk/JIL/article/view/BR-V16-11-1>. Date accessed: 20 june 2022. doi: https://doi.org/10.11645/16.1.3217.

Metaliteracy Explored in New Open Praxis Article about Digital Storytelling

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Circular diagram of the metaliteracy model.

What is the connection between the metaliteracy model and digital storytelling? Read the new article entitled Integrating Metaliteracy into the Design of a Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) Course in Digital Storytelling (Mackey & Aird, 2022) just published in Open Praxis.

According to the new article co-authored by Dr. Thomas Mackey and Dr. Sheila Aird:

This paper describes the redesign of Digital Storytelling as a Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) course that was taught in fall 2020 and spring 2021 at SUNY Empire State College. Metaliteracy is integrated into the learning design of this fully online course to enhance the virtual international experience. This pedagogical model encourages metacognitive reflection and the production of digital narratives as individuals and in collaboration with peers.

(Mackey & Aird, 2022)

An earlier version of this paper was presented by Mackey & Aird at the ICDE Virtual Global Conference Week 2021: Upskilling and upscaling for quality Open, Flexible and Distance Learning (OFDL) in October 2021. The paper was then preselected for publication in Open Praxis, the peer-reviewed journal published by the International Council for Open and Distance Education (ICDE). To learn more about this digital storytelling collaboration, explore the Global Digital Stories blog managed by the two authors.

Mackey, T. P., & Aird, S. M. (2022). Integrating Metaliteracy into the Design of a Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) Course in Digital Storytelling. Open Praxis, 13(4), 397–403. DOI: http://doi.org/10.55982/openpraxis.13.4.442

American Library Association (ALA) eLearning Solutions Features Metaliteracy Webinar

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Registration is now open for an interactive webinar about metaliteracy offered by the American Library Association (ALA) eLearning Solutions continuing education program. Trudi Jacobson and Tom Mackey will facilitate this live event entitled Teaching with Metaliteracy: Developing Learners as Producers on July 14, 2022 at 1:30 pm CDT (2:30pm EST). Participation in this 90-minute webinar will lead to a certificate of completion.

According to the description for this workshop:

Participants in this event will go through the core components of this holistic framework, including learning domains, learner roles, characteristics, and the reinforcing goals and learning objectives. The instructors will explain the relationship between metaliteracy and the ACRL Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education. Participants will explore options for learning design that will meet the needs of their students and start a plan for incorporating metaliteracy in their formal or informal teaching. The instructors will provide opportunities to discuss and adapt the metaliteracy goals and learning objectives to multiple disciplines and settings.

(Webinar Description)

The webinar is based on Tom and Trudi’s latest book for ALA Neal-Schuman, Metaliteracy in a Connected World: Developing Learners as Producers, and will illuminate ideas from the text.

We look forward to seeing you at this next metaliteracy virtual event! If you have any questions in advance, be sure to let us know!

Trudi and Tom