Ann-Louise de Boer

Teaching Cataloguing and Classification at the University of Pretoria: Thinking Preferences of Second Year Students

The information profession has changed drastically in the last few years. The core requirements for information workers have also changed because the workplace needs specific qualities and skills. The necessity of continuing to teach cataloguing and classification is questioned, and many library schools have discontinued teaching these subjects. Many experts, however, believe that cataloguing and classification are still among the basics of information work. The subject still forms part of the curriculum at the University of Pretoria. At the beginning of 2000, funds were obtained to use the Herrmann Brain Dominance Instrument to establish the preferences of the second year Library Science students taking cataloguing. The result showed that their preferences do not really correspond to those of cataloguers. They specifically do not like the analysing and mastering the technical details required in cataloguing. As these skills are required for cataloguing, teaching methods will have to be adapted to equip students for the workplace.

Library leadership: Innovative options for designing training programmes to build leadership competencies in the digital age

Library leaders may not be fully equipped to deal with the demands and rigours of the digital age and its consumers. The advent of the internet, search engines and social media require a paradigm shift in the development of these leaders. Whilst much has been written about the required competencies, there seems to be no clear guiding principle on how the development should take place. The authors propose that the development of library leaders is a process, best illustrated through movement through Drotter’s Leadership Pipeline. The importance of thinking preferences, based on Herrmann’s Whole Brain Model, is highlighted and it is shown how these often clog development through this Pipeline. Utilising data from the Herrmann Brain Dominance Instrument (HBDI) assessments of the 120 participants in six of the Centre for African Library Leadership (CALL) development programmes, the authors show how the thinking preferences of these library leaders could enable or detract from their readiness to develop the appropriate competencies in the digital age. Recommendations are made on how best to overcome this to prepare library leaders to deal with the requirements of the digital age consumer.

A mental model for successful inter-disciplinary collaboration in curriculum innovation for information literacy

The University of Pretoria introduced a compulsory Information Literacy module to address the need for delivering motivated knowledgeable employees that embrace information and have the skills to find, select and use relevant information accurately, efficiently and effectively in an explosive information age. Low class attendance, an indication of unmotivated students, as well as the limited scholarly application of information literacy skills in consecutive academic years of study have been identified as possible barriers to the application of the desired skills. A collaborative action research project based on Whole Brain principles was introduced to motivate learners through innovative learning material in the module. A deeper understanding of the role of thinking preferences and thinking avoidances is essential in selecting a team that is responsible for the planning, design, development and delivery of learning opportunities and material. This article discusses the Whole Brain Model® as a mental model that underpins the successful collaboration of multidisciplinary teams and enhances innovative curriculum design that addresses alternative approaches to the teaching of Information Literacy.

Constructing a Comprehensive Learning Style Flexibility Model for the Innovation of an Information Literacy Module

The Department of Information Science in the Faculty of Engineering, Built Environment and Information Technology at the University of Pretoria is responsible for offering a semester module on Information Literacy to all first-year students across all faculties. The Department has embarked on a process of curriculum innovation of the module. For this purpose the learning style theory of Herrmann (1995) and related principles are implemented. At the same time we have expanded the learning style model, referred to as the Whole Brain learning model that Herrmann has developed. We constructed a comprehensive learning style flexibility model or comprehensive whole brain model based on our scholarly engaging with the application of the related principles in numerous contexts. These contexts include our own teaching practices and research and supervision of postgraduate students. The Information Literacy module serves as an exemplar of curriculum innovation based on the concept of learning style flexibility or whole brain learning as it is reflected in our comprehensive model. The model answers the question of how a comprehensive teaching and learning model can be constructed to serve as a guideline for facilitating learning in a learning style flexible/whole brain fashion, accommodating differences in terms of learning preferences and developing students’ and lecturers’ full potential? The differences in terms of learning preferences referred to in the question were scientifically determined by means of the Herrmann Brain Dominance Instrument (HBDI) (Herrmann 1995). However, the model was not constructed based on this quantitative data only. Through different qualitative methods, such as text analysis, observations, student feedback and interviews, used in different contexts, we as authors extracted from our own work and students’ work the ideas that helped shape the model. A constructivist approach was followed as it is embedded in the process of action research.

Learning material that makes a difference

This chapter focuses on the design and development of Whole Brain® learning material and tasks, and describes how instructional design processes and products may be enhanced with the use of the Whole Brain® Model. We describe exemplars from an information literacy module and provide an analysis of these examples to illustrate how each example addresses Whole Brain® learning, facilitating of learning and assessment.

3 – Professional development

: This chapter explores ideas on what professional development entails and how to go about one’s development as lecturer. The notion of transforming one’s practice by applying the principles of innovative ideas forms its core. Professional development includes an array of related areas, such as peer mentoring, scholarly reflection and scholarship of teaching.

1 – Theoretical framework

: In this chapter we give an overview of what Whole Brain® learning is, and discuss in depth the Whole Brain® Model of Herrmann (1995) as a tool to understand the diverse thinking preferences that individuals have. We highlight what a single dominant HBDI® profile looks like in each of the quadrants. Acknowledging that we have a diverse representation of thinking preferences in our classrooms, we emphasise that learning opportunities should be designed in such a way that they factor in the uniqueness of the individual student – this creates a challenge to all lecturers.

6 – The way forward

: In chapter 6 we propose a comprehensive flexible Whole Brain® Model for learning and facilitating learning as a tool for lecturers to accommodate students’ diverse thinking preferences, as well as develop areas of lesser preferred modes of learning, thus contributing to the development of students’ potential.