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Types of Information - Learning Outcomes
- Identifying the appropriate type of information based on your information need.
- Understanding how information is produced.
- Differentiating between primary, secondary & tertiary sources.
- Understanding the difference between scholarly, popular, and trade information sources.
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Types of Information Activities
- Host a discussion about popular sources in your discipline. Do scholars refer to popular sources? Why or Why not?
- Discuss your experience being published in an academic press or peer-reviewed journal. What challenges did you face? What value did the process add? What skills did you learn? or have students interview other faculty in the discipline about their role in a peer review process. Present the interviews in class as a short film festival or podcast review.
- Compare the same topic across different source types (trade, popular, scholarly). Investigate the ways each piece of information is presented using tone, audience, and language.
- Brainstorm author characteristics that indicate trustworthiness on a particular topic as a group.
- Investigate a social media event (e.g. the demonstration in Ferguson, MO; the protests in Hawaii, etc). Ask about the creators of each social media post. How trustworthy is the author? Is this mainstream media? What value does this add to scholars or the scholarly conversation?
