The University of Tennessee
School of Information Sciences
AUTOMATION OF SCHOOL
LIBRARY MEDIA CENTERS:
A STUDY OF CHILDREN'S SUCCESS AS USERS
A Theoretical Discussion Paper
by
Amy McCurdy
For
Information Sciences 520
Spring 1999
Document sections:
Abstract
Introduction
The Move Towards Automation
Review of the Literature
Opportunities for Pairing Library and Classroom Learning
Conclusion and Implications
Works Cited
Children comprise a unique community of library users. Despite the special needs of children as special library users, children are required to use the same catalog system as adults to meet their information needs. This has become increasingly problematic with the recent automation of many library catalog systems. This theoretical analysis paper attempts to characterize the use of online library catalogs by elementary school children. Transition to online catalogs and children's use patterns are discussed. The available research on childrens use of 'online catalogs generally indicates that elementary school children do not encounter successful search results. Reasons of domain knowledge, task complexity, and inability to generate synonyms or alternate search terms are presented as barriers to children's success. It is clear that children are not successful with online catalog searching when left to search on their own. A synthesis of the research indicates that children can be empowered to be successful online searchers through programs of combined classroom and library language arts instruction. Along with characterization of children's incompatibility with many online catalog interfaces, this theoretical discussion dedicates attention to implications for pairing library and classroom learning, and subsequent improvement of children's online search success.
It is the mission of the school library media specialist to ensure that students are effective users of ideas and information (Kuhlthau 1993, 11). Dedicated library media specialists should make it their goals to understand that children and youth need access to information to find answers to problems, to pursue independent discovery of who they are and who they want to become, to obtain information that can assist them to overcome their weaknesses and enhance their strengths, and to allow them to build lifelong information-seeking patterns. Age should not be a barrier to the ability to access, receive, and utilize information. (Hooten 1989, 267)
School media specialists have been presented with a challenge in obtaining their mission with the introduction of online catalogs into school libraries.
The purpose of this paper is to explore the research concerning the transition of libraries from card catalogs to automated catalog systems. Specific focus is on literature characterizing children's use of online catalogs as information seekers. Ramifications for learning and enriching experiences for children in the classroom and school library environments are explored. I chose to explore this topic because of its relevance to me as a future school library media specialist. I am also quite intrigued by the integration of authentic and holistic learning for students, a value I developed in my previous studies in the college of education. I anticipate this research will provide important ideas as I develop a plan for becoming a successful library media specialist.
In the last two decades in the United States, school libraries have moved from using card catalogs to being primarily online catalog institutions. In fact, "schools have been adopting computers for classroom instruction [since] the earliest days of the personal computer in the mid-1970s" (Borgman, Hirsh, and Walker 1995, 663). Online searching, an "interactive process of scanning computerized databases that contain machine-readable records representing a file or set of related files" (Epler 1989), has become a facet of library use for nearly all American elementary school children.
Libraries' transitions to online catalogs, perhaps guided by the zeal and intrigue of the information age, have overlooked children's specific needs as users. Children's library services in the U.S. have been distinguished from services for adults with the provision of separate collections and reading areas, as well a separate card catalogs, subject headings, and cataloging practices for children's materials. Presumably the reason for the distinction is children's different abilities and behaviors in the use of information. Yet as libraries automate, we are not seeing online catalog interfaces designed for children. The major commercial library automation systems do not provide any special interfaces for children, leaving them to use the adult interfaces (Borgman, Walter, and Rosenberg 1991, 162). As school libraries have become automated, it seems they have adopted "current generations of online catalogs [that] are designed for adults and do not meet the special needs and capabilities of children" (Borgman, Hirsh, and Walter 1995, 665). Most online catalog systems operate on a "one-size-fits-all" (Soloman 1994, 50) interface, an interface that often does not meet the needs of children. Though the medium exists to help elementary school children by "structuring their interaction with the software, it may also limit how far those users can take advantage of tools that are hidden from view" (Soloman 1994, 50). It is not enough for the online catalog to exist if children are not able to effectively interact with the interface. Truly, "knowing how to determine the existence and location of information is as important as knowing the information itself" (Epler 1989) for children.
The literature characterizing children's use of these often "faceless, prototypical" (Soloman 1993, 246) online library catalogs exists in abundance. These commercial look-up systems, that just seem to have been thrust upon the school library community without making allowances for children, are the focus of much scholarly research. A Drexel University graduate student maintains that, "As technology becomes increasingly more common in homes, schools and public libraries, the question of access becomes paramount" (Schmitt n.d.). This student poses a question that is the very essence of this research: "Are the current online retrieval systems being implemented in schools and libraries meeting children's information needs?" (Ibid). This is an issue that a review of the literature will serve to clarify.
To characterize children as information seekers, it is important to note that "children do not approach the [online library catalog] for the first time with blank slates. Rather, they possess a variety of knowledge, rules of action, and skilled behavior that has either positive, negative, or neutral impact on their information retrieval success" (Soloman 1993, 250). Those involved in the study of children's success in the use of online catalogs have focused on many aspects of their interaction with the automated search systems. These factors include task complexity, synonym use, and domain knowledge, among others. (Soloman 1994, 43) suggests there is a ten percent success rate for children when searching an online catalog and a sixty-five percent success rate for card catalog use. Soloman further maintains that there is "no reason for an online retrieval system to issue TERM NOT FOUND or ZERO HITS messages. Whatever the structure of interaction, the interface should help people learn to control the system" (1994, 46). Online catalog systems installed in school libraries should provide a positive interface for guiding children's searches, yet these systems often leave users perplexed and with their information needs often having not been met.
Reasons the online catalog often fails to provide an interface helpful to students may be due to the type of search approach the system provides. One type of search, a keyword search performed on "keyboard terminals requires young users to have different intellectual skills than those needed for browsing with a touch-screen terminal" (Hooten 1989, 270). Systems that require children to enter a cognitively-constructed keyword by typing on a keyboard "rely on recall knowledge, since the user must think of words and their synonyms from memory" (Borgman, Hirsh, and Walter 1995, 665). A variety of methods of "accessing information are required to accommodate the different skill levels, preferences, development stages, and learning styles that children bring to the information retrieval task" (Busey and Doerr 1993, 79). A more favorable approach for children is the browsing approach, "which allows children to recognize relevant information [and] reduces children's cognitive load in terms of articulating their search queries" (Hirsh 1996, 50). Children will have more effective searches if the interface presents choices for them, rather than requiring children to recall search terms from memory.
In addition to the variance of success rates based upon keyword versus browsing searches, the complexity of a search task is directly related to children's success in online information retrieval. To characterize this notion of the complexity of search tasks, important points from the 1996 American Society of Information Science meeting must be considered:
Similarly, domain knowledge and terminological diversity may affect search outcomes. One researcher suggests that domain knowledge, or understanding of the concept being searched in the online catalog system, is directly related to search success. "Children with high domain knowledge used more browsing techniques than children with low domain knowledge on both simple and complex tasks" (Hirsh 1995). Terminological diversity is another factor contributing to success of search outcomes. Terminological diversity can refer to a number of different variances in phrasing of searches. These include any one of a "variety of synonyms used as a search term, variance in the word forms that children use from the Library of Congress Subheadings (LCHS) form, multiple meanings, and the fact that some concepts or items of interest to children might not be included in LCSH or are not covered with the degree of specificity children require" (Soloman 1994, 50).
Few information retrieval systems are designed with children's special information needs and search capabilities in mind. We need to "learn more about children's information-seeking behavior in order to provide them with information-based tools which support exploratory learning" (Hirsh 1995). As the literature shows, the limitations of online library catalogs when used by children are existent. Researchers have identified and concentrated upon the variables that affect children's online information retrieval. Researchers of school libraries "must now pull together the findings to develop [the next generation of] online information retrieval systems that accommodate children at their many levels of development and technological expertise" (Schmitt n.d.) to ensure that children are successful library users.
The findings of the experts reviewing elementary school children's online catalog searching are important to consider when working with children in the school library. One researcher suggests we need to "synthesize the research to create a system that is user-friendly to school children and takes into account their needs and abilities" (Schmitt n.d.). This advice is well received, but it would be foolish to think that library media specialists or school officials could completely overhaul or render useless the online catalogs that have been firmly planted in many American elementary school libraries. It is more realistic to approach the mismatch between library catalog interfaces and children's special needs as opportunities for educational development. Although online catalogs "may eventually be designed such that children are more successful searchers, the librarian must remain aware that children will continue to need guidance in choosing the appropriate sources to fulfill their information needs" (Ibid) as long as the current catalogs are in place.
Implications for library media specialists and teachers, because the online system cannot be eliminated, are to use the online systems as an opportunity for teaching and learning. If the skills required for performing effective online searches are viewed as "library science and taught separate from classroom assignments, measuring success will be difficult" (Epler 1989) and skills will seem detached from other learning experiences. Instead, a program of teaching online search skills in a way that is "fully integrated with the [classroom] content areas" (Epler 1989) is proposed. Education is "changing from the assembly-line environment of the Industrial Age offered by textbook teaching, to the data-rich environment of the information age offered by resource-based learning" (Kuhlthau 1989, 19). In response to this change, the library "becomes the information center of the school, providing access to a wide range of resources and guidance in the process of learning from them" (Ibid). Teachers and librarians must make it a goal to "understand children's searching behavior sufficiently to support discovery-based learning curricula" (Borgman, Hirsh, and Walter 1995, 682). Teaching children the vocabulary skills needed to phrase searches appropriately should occur in regular classroom learning. School's "integrated language arts curriculum and instructional strategies that highlight critical thinking" (Soloman 1994, 47) would allow children to perform effective searches on online catalog systems. Searches on online catalogs could then reinforce children's vocabulary and language arts skills, "providing a vehicle that allows children to discover and learn" (Ibid). Studies of the online catalog, when paired with the "rich instructional strategy of integrated reading and writing with children's questions and interests serve as a vehicle for helping children find information while helping them build their information-seeking skills" (Ibid). Activities which emphasize critical thinking skills and "child-oriented, purposeful, self-directed activites" (Soloman 1994, 45) are essential in improving students' vocabulary and language arts skills. Integrating language arts skills with active library learning constitutes the basic idea of many schools' curricula. This model of teaching/learning "parallels developments in curriculum--shifting away from the rote, textbook learning toward exploratory, hands-on, resource based discovery learning" (Borgman, Hirsh, and Walter 1995, 663). Today's shift from phonics to more holistic meaningful instruction in schools would definitely be supported by a whole language library curriculum. Such explicit library skills "support the effectiveness of strong integrated language arts programs, flexible scheduling, and process-based information skills instruction" (Soloman 1994, 50), which involves "active use of information and ideas for learning across the curriculum" (Kuhlthau 1993). In their book, Information Power, the American Library Association (1998) asserts that "effective teaching and learning theory has shifted from a teacher-centered to a student-centered perspective, [causing] the school library media program to adapt and become more important than ever in achieving the school's goal." The ALA maintains that schools must identify students' problem solving behavior and strengthen and encourage these high-level cognitive skills by creating "academic experiences that develop the kinds of skills and strategies that characterize successful intellectual work."
Ideas for incorporating library instruction into the curriculum characterizes the recent progress of elementary school education "moving away from a strict Dewey hierarchy to bring a whole language perspective of subject searching" (Busey and Doerr 1993, 81). This refers to the goal of teachers and school media specialists. This goal includes allowing students to achieve success in online catalog searches by using their cognitive, whole language skills to recall alternate terms to use for searches that were previously unsuccessful. Whereby there might have previously been a concentration on using the one correct Dewey heading (a term often unknown by children), teachers and school library media specialists teach students to try several forms or synonyms of a search term to achieve success. Allowing students to engage in hands-on library discovery parallels the learning process called constructivism in current educational terms. This process involves "using reflection and self-assessment to modify ideas as needed; the connectedness of knowledge implicit in mental models; and the fact that learners are naturally inclined to be logical in their approach to new ideas (although their logic may not be immediately apparent to observers)" (Stripling 1995). Constructiveness theory is well suited for today's automated school libraries. Students construct their own though processes and are "engaged in extensive problem-driven research incorporating their thoughts, actions, and feelings in a holistic learning process. Beginning with their intuitive theories and prior constructs, they investigate emerging questions and share their new understandings in a collaborative environment" (Kuhlthau 1993, 11). This constructivist perspective of learning provides students with numerous opportunities and enables students to extend their vocabulary and online searching skills through work in all areas of the curriculum. A curriculum integrating library skills and language arts learning is a wonderful venue for enabling elementary school students to master online catalog searches. These online catalog systems which, as the review of scholarly literature indicates, were not initially created with children's needs in mind, can in fact be mastered by children. Search objectives that may have initially been viewed as unobtainable for children are suddenly feasible. The following questions, if asked prior to children receiving any authentic, constructivist library skills/language arts instruction, would seem an enigma. "How can the words that children naturally choose for their queries match in some way with the [online catalog's] terminology for subject description so that items appropriate to children's interests and assignments can be retrieved?" and "how can children consistently retrieve information from [these] systems without frequent help?" (Soloman 1994, 43). These questions can be answered by making children active authentic learners on their path to becoming "independent, information literate, lifelong learners" (American Library Association 1998). With explicit instruction, including practice and hands-on learning, elementary school children experience progression in the development of online catalog searching capacity. Children, "with sufficient practice, become skilled in performing aspects of the [online catalog] task and are able to proceed with minimal mental effort" (Soloman 1993, 251). When effective online catalog searching is made part of the elementary school curriculum and infused into students' daily learning, the results are substantial. Elementary school students are able to appropriately phrase searches and use online catalogs without help, enabling them to satisfy their information needs.
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CONCLUSION AND IMPLICATIONS
The introduction of online catalogs into school libraries is a topic that has received much research and discourse. Experts have acknowledged and agree upon the existence of incompatibilities between many online catalogs and children's cognitive abilities. Rather than taking this dissonance with an attitude of despair, teachers and library media specialists have chosen to capitalize on the situation. The implications for creating instructional models and authentic learning experiences for students certainly exist. The American Library Association and other researchers have described programs that have been used to teach children appropriate vocabulary and search skills. Studies have proven that these programs have clearly improved the online catalog interface for elementary school children.
Research has shown that school libraries were initially automated with not much attention being paid to children's needs as users. Despite this fact, online catalogs have been successfully integrated to fit the learning styles and information needs of children in elementary schools. Through hands-on whole language instruction in schools, library media specialists have been able to fulfill their mission of ensuring that students are effective users of ideas and information.
American Association of School Librarians. 1998. Information power: Building partnerships for learning. Chicago: American Library Association. Borgman, Christine. L., Hirsh, Sandra. G. and Walter, Virginia. A. 1995. Children's searching behavior on browsing and keyword online catalogs: the science library catalog project. Journal of the American Society for Information Science 46 (October): 663-84. Borgman, Christine L., Walter, Virginia. A., and Rosenberg Jason. 1991. The science library catalog project: Comparison of children's searching behavior in hypertext and a keyword search system. Proceedings of the ASIS Annual Meeting 28: 162-69. Busey, Paula and Doerr, Tom. 1993. Kid's catalog: An information retrieval system for children. Journal of Youth Services in Libraries 7 (fall): 77-84. Epler, Doris M. 1989. Online searching goes to school. Phoenix: Oryx. Hirsh, Sandra G. 1996. Complexity of search tasks and children's information retrieval. Proceedings of the ASIS Annual Meeting 33: 47-51. Hirsh, Sandra. G. 1995. The effect of domain knowledge on elementary school children's search behavior on an information retrieval system: The science library catalog. CHI Conference Proceedings. Accessed 2 March 1999. Hooten, Patricia. 1989. Online catalogs: will they improve children's access? Journal of Youth Services in Libraries (spring): 267-272. Kuhlthau, Carol C. 1993. Implementing a process approach to information skills: A study identifying indicators of success in library media programs. School Library Media Quarterly (fall): 11-18. Kuhlthau, Carol C. 1989. Information search process: a summary of research and implications for school library media programs. School Library Media Quarterly (fall): 19-25. Schmitt, Catherine. College of Information Sciences and Technology. Philadelphia: Drexel University. n.d. Review of literature. Accessed 2 March 1999. Soloman, Paul. 1993. Children's information retrieval behavior: A case analysis of an OPAC. Journal of the American Society for Information Science 44 (June): 245-64. Soloman, Paul. 1994. Children, technology, and instruction: A case study of elementary school children using and online public access catalog (OPAC). School Library Media Quarterly 23 (fall): 43-51. Stripling, Barbara K. 1995. Learning-centered libraries: Implications from research. School Library Media Quarterly 23 (spring). Accessed 11 March 1999.
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