インフォグラフィックスを用いた課題の開発と実践 : 授業内容の理解と情報リテラシーの習得の統合的な達成を目指して

In this study, information literacy is defined as the ability to search, evaluate, utilize, and disseminate information effectively. In university education, information literacy should be developed in a specific discipline in each class with specific subject content. This is because information literacy is more effectively acquired through the experience of using information in specific contexts, for example, searching and evaluating information which relates to the subject content, or processing, using, and expressing the content in course assignments. Therefore, learning activities in class should enable students to acquire both an understanding of course content and information literacy simultaneously. Recently, image information has become more influential and it is necessary for students to learn how to properly handle this information. One such activity that is designed to acquire both the understanding of course content and information literacy including images simultaneously is the creation of infographics by students. The infographic creation process should use theme-specific information effectively and contain all aspects of information literacy defined above. With this background, this study developed and practiced assignments to create infographics in a consumer education university class, with the aim of integrating the achievement of course content understanding and acquisition of information literacy. In addition, to facilitate the infographics creation process, we developed an “idea-generation worksheet” based on the “dialogical arguments model” and included it in the assignment. We examined the learning outcomes of this assignment by analyzing the evaluation of products using a four-level assessment rubric and the studentsʼ reflections on the assignment through open-ended writing questions. As a result of the rubric assessment, most students were at the lower level of criteria (understanding content, information searching, information evaluation, information using, and information dissemination). In the coding and analyses of the studentsʼ reflections, it was revealed that their information literacy was limited to understanding factual knowledge of course content, and acquiring specific skills (e.g. internet searching, operating computer applications). Despite these results, students indicated that they organize their self-generated ideas and put them into clear words in order to clarify what themes and content should be included in the infographics they would create. From the above results, we concluded that the assignment needs to be improved to facilitate deeper engagement with the subject content and information among the students. However, we found that the assignments using the creation of infographics may facilitate students clarify their ideas or thoughts through idea-gathering and verbalization.