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This topic guide provides resources to help you think critically about the information that you gain from media. Resources on this site will cover evaluating media resources for your academic pursuits and recognizing and being critical of news sources. With the increase in fake news on social, these skills are particularly important in your collegiate learning and your development as working professional in your field.
This guide also serves as part of the Information Fluency Intitative to improve the critical thinking skills and the abilities to use information effectively of UNT students.
Although there are various definitions of information fluency (IF) including the 21st Century Information Fluency’s Digital Information Fluency (DIF), the Information Fluency Triad, Six Essential Elements of IF (Appendix A) (Rettig, 2002), as one of the five 21st Century Fluencies for the Digital Age (Crockett, Lee., Jukes, Ian.,Churches, Andrew., 2011), and the International Society for Technology in Education’s (ISTE) Research and Information Fluency portion of their Student Standards, two elements seem common: 1) Information fluency intensifies information literacy, and 2) information fluency applies and adapts the general skills of information literacy to a given field.
For the purpose of UNT’s Information Fluency Initiative, the definition adopted by the Associated Colleges of the South fits best.
Information Fluency can be envisioned as the optimal outcome when critical thinking skills are combined with information literacy and relevant computer skills.(Associated Colleges of the South, 2002)
Hardin, Gregory. White Paper: University of North Texas, Information Fluency Initiative, paper, March 2016; (digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc944367/), University of North Texas Libraries, Digital Library.
In academia, it is necessary to read and understand disciplines outside of your own. This academic literacy is just as important to your college career as information and media literacy. Below are some sources to help you improve your academic literacy.
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