Am I e-literate?

My assigned research topic for LIBR 285 is Youth Information Literacy and Instruction. Don't laugh at me, but I'll be honest with you and admit, I don't exactly know what "Information Literacy" means.

[crickets]
 
Terms! Terms!! We all know what something IS but of course, chalk it all up to higher-education to force people to actually give everything a classification and LIBRARY and INFORMATION grad school? Yeah. I'm bombarded with terminology I've never heard before.

Well I started on a search trying to figure out exactly what Information Literacy (IL) meant and when I performed a search in our LIS databases via the LibGuide using this search term:

("instruction") ("information literacy") ("youth")

I came up with a few articles and thought... maybe we need someone to just get some information on CURRENT trends in information literacy instruction since its such a broad term. Every article I came across about "youth" and "information" was woven so deeply into technology and social studies that to really get a feel for the latest, greatest opinions in the field moving targets such as instruction in the digital age should be current research.

The ALA sums it up in one nice quote:

"Ultimately, information literate people are those who have learned how to learn. They know how to learn because they know how knowledge is organized, how to find information, and how to use information in such a way that others can learn from them. They are people prepared for lifelong learning, because they can always find the information needed for any task or decision at hand.
American Library Association Presidential Committee on Information Literacy (January 10, 1989, Washington, D.C.)

Youth especially should begin learning as early as possible how to be discerning consumers of information.  Information Literacy is simply the process of knowing how to properly ascertain whether or not the information you're being exposed to is indeed factual. 

Avon Middle School in Massachusetts understands the importance of teaching Information Literacy and starts the process as early as the 7th grade. The video is a little bit dated but otherwise, I feel its a rather interesting and engaging look at what people understand IL to be and why it is a skill that is so crucial to learn in today's internet infused society.
 http://www.avon.k12.ma.us/librarymedia/ahinfoliteracy.htm  

Check it out here: