Mikael Alexandersson

Constructing meaning through information artefacts

The paper presents and discusses results from the first round of empirical data collection within the framework of a three-year research project named Learning via the School Library. The research is set within a project comprising eight elementary and secondary schools in Sweden. The overall research question of the study focuses on how students construct meaning through the artefacts (books, digital information and pictures) that are offered via the school library. Data were collected through observations, interviews and a questionnaire in three classes (11-year-olds) during a 10-week assignment. Results indicate that students adopted a fact-finding approach, that they frequently used pictures in information sources and that they transported text/pictures from sources to their own reports. Students’ learning process was oriented towards procedure rather than content. The results raise questions about school libraries as cultural contexts for information seeking and use and about the possible reasons for...

Learning and Information Seeking

The purpose of this entry is to present and analyze the relationship between learning and information seeking. The analysis draws on research studies on information seeking set in educational contexts and is framed in theories of learning, mainly constructivism. Themes of the entry are based on five dimensions of the relationship between learning and information seeking: 1) seeking information for learning purposes; 2) learning information seeking; 3) teaching information seeking; 4) learning from information; and 5) reshaping conditions for information seeking and learning through information and communications technologies (ICTs). Conclusions are that the fields of learning and information seeking draw nearer to one another partly due to educational ideas based in constructivism and partly due to the development of digital tools that reshape conditions for learning in postmodern society. This development contributes to the transformation of the professional role of librarians, implying an emphasis on the pedagogical aspects of the profession. Future prospects for information seeking research and practice linked to learning may involve strengthened interests in the cognitive authority and expertise of information as well as information sharing through communicative interaction

Equivalence and choice in combination: the Swedish dilemma

This article describes and analyses some crucial aspects in the latest reforms of Swedish upper secondary education. For decades Sweden stood out as a special case in several respects, in particular the integration of different tracks in upper secondary education; offering second chances to dropouts, and success in terms of equality and equivalence, as well as in terms of socially equal recruitment to higher studies. But, as in other OECD countries, the neo‐liberal combination of markets, accountability and institutional rankings has begun to dominate educational policies in Sweden. This development has had a noticeable impact on the upper secondary school system as a whole. For instance, through the independent school reform of the 1990s, there has been a gradual shift from education as a common good to stressing the individual’s freedom of choice. As a result of the new reform that begins in 2011 there will be a stronger division between tracks—academic and vocational education, and apprenticeship training will be organised in separate schools.