Students need tools for managing the sheer quantity of information, and they need to become proficient at searching the Internet, organizing files, and using standard computer applications for research. At Vistamar these skills are taught and practiced using professionally screened electronic texts and academic databases. But computer-based skills are not enough. The judgment and sense of context required to make good decisions about information can only be learned in dialogue with teachers. Consequently, the faculty shares collective responsibility for teaching information literacy and management skills throughout the curriculum, in the classroom as well as in the computer lab or the library.

The librarian serves as a team leader, working with teachers to provide a wide variety of resources that support the curriculum and to coordinate their use for inquiry and research. The teachers utilize consistent formats across the disciplines for organizing and citing information. They also employ shared points of reference and conceptual frameworks, such as timelines, maps, diagram formats, terminology, and procedures to provide students with consistent tools for organizing data and seeing relationships across subject boundaries.

Objectives:


• the ability to establish a critical perspective with respect to any type of information
  
  
• techniques for testing the relevance and reliability of information
  
  
• an understanding of how facts can be related and manipulated
  
  
• internalized frameworks for organizing and managing information
  
  
• advanced research skills
  
  
• high personal standards of academic integrity and on-line etiquette