BINDURA UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE

EDUCATION

LIBRARY

INFORMATION LITERACY MODULE

UNIT 1

INTRODUCTION TO COMPUTER LITERACY

Learning outcomes

At the end of the unit, students should be able to:

1. Explain what a computer is.

2. Identify major components of a computer.
3. Explain how computers work.
4. Use the mouse and keyboard,

This section is primarily aimed at those beginning to use computers. You are not expected to
have ANY experience with computers. If you have experience you may want to skip this
section unless if you just want to refresh your memory. If you’ve never touched a computer
before, then you have opened the right module. We shall be using what is known as
Windows 7 operating system. This is the operating system that comes pre-installed on many
computers and it is the one you will most likely encounter in the university during the course
of your studies. We shall also be using what is known as the personal computer popularly
referred to as the PC. We shall also make reference to Android operating system, the world's
most popular operating system on smartphones. If you have a smartphone chances are that it
is running Android operating system.

Do not be discouraged if you have not come across any of these terms before as we will
explain them during the course of the module.

As they say, "Rome was not built in a day". Also remember the golden rule of beginners;
everyone starts out as a beginner and practice makes perfect. However as a beginner using the
keyboard and mouse may be challenging at first, but it will become easier the more you use
them. Please note that the mouse is intended for you to use with your right hand and as such
all instructions will be relayed with this assumption. However, the mouse can be configured
to be used by left handed people though.

Anatomy of a computer

What makes a computer a computer? Or, what is a computer? A computer is an electronic

device, operating under the control of instructions stored in its own memory, that can accept
input (data), process the data according to specified rules (process), produce results (output),
and store the results for future use (Shelly,Freund and Vermaat, 2010). Therefore one could
say a computer is a programmable machine, whose three principal characteristics are: It
responds to a specific set of instructions in a well-defined manner and it can execute a pre-
recorded list of instructions (known as programs) and gives feedback (output).

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Nowadays there are 3 main categories of computers which fit the bill of personal computers.
These are:

1. The desktop computer. This is the one generally referred to as the PC,
2. Laptop,
3. Mobile devices. In this category you will find smartphones, tablets, Personal Digital
assistants (PDAs).

Whatever the make or category all general-purpose computers require the following hardware
components:
1. Memory: enables a computer to store, at least temporarily, data and programs,
2. Mass storage device: allows a computer to permanently retain large amounts of data.
Common mass storage devices include solid state drives (SSDs) or disk drives and
tape drives,
3. Input device: usually a keyboard and mouse, the input device is the conduit through
which data and instructions enter a computer. In the case of touch screens or
smartphones the keyboard may be a software component.
4. Output device: a display screen, printer, projector, or other device that lets you see
what the computer has accomplished,
5. Central processing unit (CPU): the heart of the computer, this is the component that
actually executes instructions.

We shall now look at each of these components individually:

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The Monitor
The monitor looks like a television screen and is where you see what is happening on your
computer. By using shadows and graphics with over a million different colors, much of what
you see will appear 3-dimensional. Think of this as the ‘face’ of the computer.

The CPU (Central Processing Unit)

The CPU houses the machinery that allows your computer to work. Think of this as the
‘brains’ of the computer. This component looks very different in desktops and laptops, but it
works the same.

The keyboard
The keyboard is one of two ways to interact with your computer. The keys should mostly
mimic a traditional typewriter.

The mouse
This is the other way to interact with your computer. Most mice have two buttons, a right and
a left button, and a scrolling wheel in the middle.

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To turn a computer on, simply press the power button once (no need to hold the button, just
press and release). The location of the power button differs with each brand but it is usually
marked with the symbol for power.

Once you turn the computer on, the computer will go through a series of automated tasks
before it is ready for you to interact with it; this process is called “startup.” This process will
last between one and two minutes. If the computer is not working correctly, you may see an
error message during startup. If the computer is performing as it should, however, you will
probably see one of the following screens:

You will then see a “Log On” window, and it means that the computer is password protected.
If you do not see this window upon starting the computer, you can assume that your computer
is not password-protected and may be used by anyone. To log on, you simply enter your
username and password. If you are using the library’s computers, this could be your library
student number.

To shut down the computer click on the start button and choose the option you want. The
options include:

1. Shutdown: This button/choice totally shuts down the computer. It closes all open
tasks or programs and switches off the computer.
2. Log off: Similar to shut down in that it closes all programs, but does not shutdown the
computer. Instead it locks the computer so that someone else can log in.
3. Switch user: This option allows someone else to log in whilst your account is still
logged in. This can help you if you want to temporarily give access to someone
whilst you are still working on the computer.
4. Hibernate: This option saves your work and shuts down your computer. When you
restart the computer you can resume where you left off.
5. Sleep: This option is similar to Hibernate but the computer does not shut down. The
computer is in a power saving mode.
6. Lock: This is for locking the computer to prevent use by unauthorised users.
7. Restart: The computer shuts down and immediately starts again.

The image below shows the various options:

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The Desktop
After you log on, the computer will display what is known as your desktop within a few
seconds to a few minutes (if your computer is newer, this will probably go faster). Here you
will see a digital representation of something similar to a real-life office space, complete with
a workspace, files and file folders, and even a recycling bin. The desktop mimics an actual
desktop or office and is is always in the background, the "office desk" users can adjust the
outlook of the desktop in many ways.
The desktop on a computer running Windows contains the following (at least):

1. The Start button

2. Icons
3. The taskbar

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However you have to note that on Windows desktop may look different on other computers
depending on the level of customisation on that computer. While this may sound confusing, it
means that you are able to personalize, alter, and change almost everything about your
desktop environment. If you do not like the color blue as your background, where the icons
are, or even what language it is in, you can change it. When using a tablet computer or a
smartphone the “desktop” is similar but lacks most of what is found on a traditional
computer. Tablets usually come with icons that are shortcuts to programs.

Start:
To begin working on the computer, click with the left mouse button on the Start button. A
menu with submenus will open. In the left column of the Start menu you can find shortcuts
to installed programs. The All Programs menu lists all installed programs enabling you to
run the desired software.

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Using the keyboard and mouse
Here is a short list of some of the keyboard and mouse controls you will use most of the time:

Keyboard Commands
In order to use your computer effectively, you must interact with it using both the mouse and
the keyboard. Learning the function of just a few keys will help you to interact better with
your computer and individual programs. The following is a list of commonly used keys that
have special functions (keep in mind that key functions can change depending on which
program you are using):

1. Backspace: This key deletes letters backward.

2. Delete: This key deletes letters forward.
3. Shift: This key, when pressed WITH another key, will perform a secondary function.
4. Spacebar: This key enters a space between words or letters.
5. Tab: This key will indent what you type, or move the text to the right. The default indent
distance is usually 1⁄2 inch.
6. Caps Lock: Pressing this key will make every letter you type capitalized.
7. Control (Ctrl): This key, when pressed WITH another key, performs a shortcut.
8. Enter: This key either gives you a new line, or executes a command (pressed in a word
processing program, it begins a new line).

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9. Number Keypad: These are exactly the same as the numbers at the top of the keyboard;
some people just find them easier to use in this position.
10. Arrow Keys: Like the mouse, these keys are used to navigate through a document or
page.

The Mouse
While the keyboard is primarily used to insert/input and manipulate text and numbers on a
computer, the mouse is used mostly for navigating around the screen. Mice come in a variety
of shapes and sizes. Some of the strangest-looking mice often look that way because they are
designed to be more ergonomic than traditional mice. A traditional mouse has two buttons
with a wheel between them (gray) that spins, called a “scroll wheel.” Both buttons can
perform separate functions, and are referred to by which side of the mouse they are located
on.

Pressing the LEFT mouse button is called “left-clicking” or simply “clicking” while pressing
the RIGHT mouse button is called "right-clicking." Left-clicking is used far more often than
right clicking. For now, know that left-clicking is used to select or click on something, while
right-clicking presents additional menu options.

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UNIT 2

INTRODUCTION TO INFORMATION LITERACY

Learning Objectives
By the end of this unit you should be able to:
Define Information Literacy.
Outline the importance of information literacy.
Outline the qualities of an information literate individual

Information Literacy: An overview

Rapid technological advancements have seen the increased availability of information
(especially available through the Internet) .Because of the technological advancements which
has resulted in the proliferation of information, individuals are faced with diverse, abundant
information choices whether in their academic studies, in the workplace, and in their personal
lives. This abundant information is readily available in libraries, community resources,
special interest organisations, media, and the Internet. Increasingly, information comes to
individuals in unfiltered formats raising questions about its authenticity, validity, and
reliability (ALA, 2007). In addition, information is available through multiple media,
including graphical, aural, and textual formats, and these pose new challenges for individuals
in evaluating and understanding it. The uncertain quality and expanding quantity of
information pose large challenges for society. The sheer abundance of information will not in
itself create a more informed citizenry without a complementary cluster of abilities necessary
to use it effectively (ALA, 2007).

In this unit we introduce you to the introductory concepts that give you an initial
understanding of Information Literacy Skills (ILS) through definition of terms and brief
explanations. A description of the importance of information literacy in this knowledge
economy will be given as well as the qualities of an information literate individual.

Definition of Information Literacy

There are many definitions of information literacy. Theories have also been developed on this
concept. We are going to concentrate on two definitions of information literacy before we
move on to highlight the key aspects expected from an information literate individual.

The Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals (CILIP) defined information
literacy as “knowing when and why you need information, where to find it, and how to
evaluate, use and communicate it in an ethical manner”. (CILIP 2011).

Others defined information Literacy as “a new liberal art that extends from knowing how to
use computers and access information to critical reflection on the nature of information itself,
its technical infrastructure, and its social, cultural and even philosophical context and impact”
(Shapiro & Shelley Hughes 1996).

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Information literacy in not just important for you to be a competent library user but it is a
lifelong skill that everyone ought to have. We are living in an information economy (or
knowledge economy) in which information plays a pivotal role.
Information literacy skills training is fast becoming a trend in many organisations the world
over. In some institutions it is conducted on a one-on-one basis, in some it is conduct in
groups. In some situations, it is part of the library’s user orientation programme whereas in
others it is done at a later stage.

Some libraries, particularly university, college and research libraries have developed
intensive training programmes whose training includes an examination in the end. University
libraries, in particular, have gone to an extent of incorporating ILS training in the curriculum.
Zimbabwean university libraries offer ILS as an examinable course as part of communication
skills, introduction to computers or some other related course offered by the university. At
Bindura University of Science Education, ILS is offered as part of Communication Skills, a
course done university-wide by all first year undergraduate students.

Importance of information literacy

Information literacy is important since it enables an individual to:
• identify the need for information
• search and retrieve information
• Evaluate information sources
• Use the information
• Disseminate the information

Characteristics/ Qualities of an Information Literate Person

According to Information literacy competency standards for higher education of the
Association of College and Research Libraries (2000), an information literate individual is
able to:
 Determine the extent of information needed;
 Access the needed information effectively and efficiently
 Evaluate information and its sources critically;
 Incorporate selected information into one’s knowledge base;
 Use information effectively to accomplish a specific purpose; and,
 Understand the economic, legal, and social issues surrounding the use of information,
and access and use information ethically and legally.

References

American Library Association (2007). Information Literacy Competency Standards for

Higher Education [ WWW document] URL
http://www.ala.org/acrl/sites/ala.org.acrl/files/content/standards/standards.pdf

Association of College and Research Libraries (2000) Information literacy competency

standards for
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higher education. Chicago: Association of College and Research Libraries.

Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals. (2011). Information literacy:

definition.
[WWW document].
https://www.cilip.org.uk/sites/default/files/documents/Information%20literacy%20skills.pdf

Shapiro,J.J. & Shelley K.H. (1996). Information Literacy as a Liberal Art. Educom Review,
31, (2)

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UNIT 3

LOOKING FOR INFORMATION

Learning objectives
At the end of the unit, students should be able to:

a. Identify the different categories of information sources.

b. Identify the information finding tools.
c. Demonstrate how to use information finding tools.
d. Formulate a search strategy.

Types of Information sources

Information sources can be said to be primary, secondary or tertiary. The category in

which information sources belong is based upon originality of the information and its
proximity to the source or event it records.

According to Schaub, McClure, and Bravender (2015:31), primary sources are those that give
us a primary account that is first-hand information of an event. Primary sources for a science
experiment, for example, would be the data you collect in the experiment. For a history essay,
you might be looking at a piece of pottery from this specific period. Or a diary of someone
who lived during that period.

What primary sources have in common is that the source comes from someone who was
there, or at least very close to an event. Examples include journal articles in science related
fields, autobiographies, correspondence like letters, emails, text messages. And also include
things like works of arts, photographs, and musical compositions along with a whole range of
other texts.

Secondary sources give a secondary account. Secondary sources are a step removed
compared to primary resources and are an interpretation, analysis, or overview of a particular
event. Secondary sources are written with hindsight and might be an analysis of the
significance of a piece of pottery or an interpretation of a diary entry.

Examples include biographies, books, review articles and commentaries. Scholarly journal
articles, dissertations and thesis, can also be secondary sources, particularly if they're
discussing a primary source such as a book or speech.

Tertiary sources give an account that is twice removed. Tertiary sources draw upon and
summarize primary and secondary sources. Examples include things like handbooks,
dictionaries, encyclopaedias, and textbooks. What is important to note here, is that depending
on the field or particular question you're answering, different sources of information can fulfil
different roles.
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NB: Each field tends to deal with information differently. And this means that the kind of
information you'll draw on in your work is different for each field.

Information finding tools

We will focus on three information finding tools which are:
 Online public access catalogue (OPAC),
 The Internet; and,
 Research databases.

Online public access catalogue (OPAC)

An online public access catalogue (OPAC) is an electronic database of titles a library has in
stock. The titles include books, journals, compact disks and any other sources of information
the library has in its collection.

Before getting to the libraries shelves, for instance, it is advisable to check what the library
has in stock by consulting its catalogue. The catalogue guides a library patron to the library’s
holdings.

There are three main ways of searching for a library’s holdings on the OPAC. These are:
 Author
 Subject
 Title

The author is the creator of the information source. An information source may have two or
more authors. Some titles also have editors. These can be used for searching whatever
information source one wants (as long as the author(s) or editor(s) is/are known. The subject
refers to some form of controlled keyword. Librarians do not just assign keywords to cover
certain disciplines; they use some form of agreed and standardised keywords or phrases
which are known as subjects or subject headings. Each information source has got a title
and that title may be used to locate the information source using the OPAC.

Internet
The Internet is a worldwide, publicly accessible series of interconnected computer networks
that transmit data by packet switching using the standard Internet Protocol (IP). It is a
"network of networks" that consists of millions of smaller domestic, academic, business, and
government networks, which together carry various information and services, such as
electronic mail, online chat, file transfer, and the interlinked Web pages and other resources
of the World Wide Web.

The Internet and the World Wide Web are not one and the same. The Internet is a collection
of interconnected computer networks, linked by copper wires, fiber-optic cables, wireless
connections, etc. In contrast, the Web is a collection of interconnected documents and other
resources, linked by hyperlinks and uniform resource locators (URLs). The World Wide Web
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is one of the services accessible via the Internet, along with various others including e-mail,
file sharing, online gaming and others.

Research databases
A research database is a standardised collection of information on a given subject discipline
or a number of disciplines. The databases could include book chapters, indexes of journal
articles, theses and dissertations. Information searching techniques earlier discussed are often
used to search these research databases. Some research databases are accessible free of
charge whilst others are accessible upon payment of a subscription fee. Examples of research
databases include Google Scholar, Scirus, Scopus, Oxford Journals Online, Emerald Insight
and Academic Search Premier.

There are different types of research databases as described below:

Type Description

Bibliographic These provide citation details of the full text articles in journals,
databases newspapers, etc

Full text Such databases provide full text access to the articles. Examples include
databases Oxford Journals Online and Sage Journals. The full text articles could be
in varying formats that include portable document format (pdf) and
hypertext mark-up language (html) format.

Numeric Numeric databases provide numerical data such as statistics.

databases

Hybrid Hybrid databases provide a blend of records that include abstracts or full
databases text or both.

Information searching techniques

There are various ways by which one can search the libraries’ online public access catalogues
(OPACs), Internet search engines, CD-ROM databases and other online databases. In this
section, we will be looking at:
 Keyword searching;
 Phrase searching;
 Boolean logic;
 Truncation; and,
 Wildcards.

Keyword searching
Keywords help us retrieve the articles we want. When given a topic, brainstorm and come up
with a number of keywords or phrases that you may use to search for the information you
want. Ask yourself whether the keyword you would have chosen is the best. For instance,
would Agriculture be a better keyword instead of Farming? Also note that different

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databases use different keywords; be familiar with the keywords used by the databases you
use.

Phrase searching
Instead of using keyword searching, one can use phrase searching so as to retrieve a string of
words. An example could be organised crime. For this example, you will be looking for
search results where the two words appear either together or separately. When you want the
words to appear next to each other, phrase searching would require the phrase to be in
quotation marks. In that case, the example above would be entered as “organised crime” or
‘organised crime’ depending on the database being used.

Boolean logic
The Boolean logic enables you to combine, limit or widen the variety of items found using
link terms which are AND, OR, and NOT.

AND
AND narrows your results and tells the database that ALL search terms must be present in the
resulting records, for example:

Genetics AND Reproduction will retrieve articles containing both search terms.

OR
OR widens the search, for example:
Horticulture OR Botany will retrieve articles containing either of the two terms or both.

NOT
This operator restricts the search by excluding some terms from the search for example:
Road transport NOT Rail transport retrieves articles containing the former term but do not
contain the latter.

Truncation (*)
Truncation uses word stems to retrieve several words or phrases.
As an example, Librar* retrieves articles containing the following:
Librarian
Librarians
Librarianship
Libraries
Library
Library schools
Library science

Wildcard (?)
Wildcard is used to retrieve articles using different spellings (usually British and/or American
spellings). Examples:

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Neighbo?r for Neighbor and Neighbour
Colo?r for Color and Colour.

References
Bravender, P., McClure, H., and Schaub, G. (Eds). 2015. Teaching information literacy
threshold concepts: lesson plans for librarians. Chicago: Association of College and
Research Libraries.

Ragains, P. (Ed). 2013. Information Literacy Instruction that works: a guide to teaching by
discipline and student population. Chicago: Neal-Schuman.

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UNIT 4
INTERNET
Definition
The internet is a worldwide computer network that is used to transmit data from one place to
another. McKenna (1994) states that the internet is an international computer network
encompassing thousands of smaller interconnected networks. The internet allows the
transmission of different file types. Examples include: PDF, JPEG, Zip files, audio files,
video files, word document files, GIFs and MPEG files
The Internet and the World Wide Web are not one and the same. The web is a component of
the internet which allows internet publishers to link to other documents on the network
(Castleton Library, 2017).
According to Bradley (1999), the Internet took off as a project named ARPAnet that was
meant to network scientists and researchers from the government, military and universities in
the United States. The network continued to grow with more organisations joining. As
Bradley states, the Internet grew much rapidly in the 1990‟s and this saw the number of
Internet users rise to between 20 million and 30 million in 1994
How internet works
The internet uses software to retrieve and display results. These software are web browsers
and search engines.
Web Browser
A web browser is a software application that retrieves, presents and traverses information
resources on the World Wide Web. Web browsers make use of Uniform Resource Locators
(URL) to identify information resources (Jacobs and Walsh, 2004). Web browsers enable
users to display and interact with text, images, videos, music, and other information that
could be on a website. Text and images on a web pages usually contain hyperlinks to other
web pages at the same or different website (Mishra, Baghel, Patil and Singh, 2012). The most
popular web browsers are Internet Explorer, Fire Fox, Google Chrome and Opera.
Search Engine
A search engine is a software that searches for information on the World Wide Web. Search
engines search for websites based on keywords or search terms typed in by users. Results are
presented according to relevancy to the search terms used. According to Gralla (2007), search
engines perform the following tasks:
 They search the Internet or select pieces of the Internet based on important words.
 They keep an index of the words they find, and where they find them.
 They allow users to look for words or combinations of words found in that index.
Examples of search engines include:
 Google,
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  Yahoo,
 Ask and
 Bing
Meta Search Engines
A metasearch engines are search tools that use other search engines’ data to produce their
own results from the Internet (Jansen and Spink, 2008). Metasearch engines simultaneously
send out queries to third party search engines for results. Sufficient data is gathered and
presented to users according to their relevance to the search query. Examples of meta search
engines include:
 Dogpile
 MetaCrawler
 Mamma
 IxQuick
Features of the Internet
Electronic Mail
Electronic mail is one of the widely used functions of the Internet. It is affectionately known
as “email”. Email is a function that is used to deliver messages anywhere on the Internet or
other networks with an Internet connection (Bradley 1999).
Telnet
This is a remote login facility for users who are connected to the Internet or are on a network.
Telnet allows one to login a remote computer and execute some commands as if one is using
the actual host machine (Bradley 1999).
FTP
FTP stands for file transfer protocol. FTP is a method that can be used to transfer files from
one computer to another on the Internet and other networks.
The World Wide Web
The World Wide Web allows one to search information using hyperlinks and it is the most
used component of the Internet.
Internet Relay Chat
This is “real time” chat facility available through the Internet. Using this facility, people can
converse over the Internet real time.
Uses of internet
The internet is used in various ways. These include:
 Finding information
 Communication

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  Education
 Trading
 Travel
 Entertainment.

References

Bradley, R. 1999. New understanding computer science: for Advanced level. 4th ed.
Cheltenham: Stanley Thornes.
Castleton Library. 2017. Using Internet Sources, Module 4: What is the Internet? [Online].
Available at http://www.castleton.edu/library/information-literacy-graduation-
standard/information-literacy-tutorial/module-4/. (Accessed 13 February 2017).
Gralla, P. 2007. How the Internet Works. 8th ed. Indianapolis: Que Publishing.
Jacobs, I and Walsh, N. 2004. Architecture of the World Wide Web, Volume One. World
Wide Web Consortium. Available from: https://www.w3.org/TR/webarch/. (Accessed 13
February 2017).
Jansen, B.J. and Spink, A. 2008. Investigating customer click through behaviour with
integrated sponsored and nonsponsored results. International Journal of Internet Marketing
and Advertising, Volume 5 (1-2), 74-94.
McKenna, M. 1994. Clearinghouse on Information and Technology. Syracuse NY. [Online].
Available at: http://www.ericdigests.org/1995-2/libraries.htm. (Accessed 13 February 2017).
Mishra, B., Baghel, H.S., Patil, M. and Singh, P. 2012. Study & Analysis of various Protocols
in popular Web Browsers. International Journal of Advancements in Research & Technology,
Volume 1 (3).

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UNIT 5

E-RESOURCES

E-resources is short term for electronic resources or electronic information resources which
comprise of collections of electronic journals, books as well as multimedia publications
(Tripathi & Jeevan, 2013). These are also repositories of information in either electronic or
digital format that are accessed on an electronic device such as a smart phone, laptop, desktop
computer, iPad etc.

Access to e-resources can be remote (via the Internet) or direct through the use of discs,
cassettes or USBs. Access to e-resources can be done using the On campus or Off campus
access mode (More on access modes to follow).

Benefits of using e-resources

Benefits of using e-resources include the following:
 Resources can be accessed simultaneously
 Resources accessible any time
 No carrying barriers
 Easy storage
 Easy and quick distribution
 Can be accessed within the comfort of a home
 No queuing

Categories of E-resources
The three main categories of e-resources are, Open Access (OA); Password based and
Subscription based resources

Open Access
Open access simply refers to free scholarly online literature which anyone can access, read,
download, print, copy and distribute without monetary or legal barriers as long as the author
or source is properly acknowledged (Suber,2015). OA removes cost barriers as everyone has
access to this literature as long as they have access to the internet. Examples of OA databases
which cover all subject are as follows:
http://www.doaj.org/ Directory of open Access Journal
http://www.ajol.info/ African Journals on Line
http://scholar.google.com Google Scholar
http://books.google.com Google Books
http://www.springeropen.com/ Springer Open
http://www.wileyopenaccess.com/ Wiley Open Access

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 Password based
These resources require logging in using the provided details. What quickly comes to mind
are the Research4 Life databases which are a collection of both e-books and e-journals and
they are comprised of the following package:
HINARI - health sciences http://www.who.int/hinari/en/
AGORA - agriculture and environmental science http://www.fao.org/agora/en/
OARE - environmental science research http://web.unep.org/oare/
ARDI - scientific and technical information http://www.wipo.int/ardi/en/

Subscription based
Despite, the mentioned three categories of e-resources, the mainly used category is the
subscription based one and access to this can either be on campus or off campus. In line with
access modes, the following points need to be considered:
 On Campus access is when the user is accessing from any of the BUSE campuses
using the BUSE internet.
 Off Campus e-resources are accessible Off Campus or when you are not using BUSE
internet, however these can also be accessed whilst on campus
 On Campus e-resources are only accessible On Campus.
 Password based databases are accessible both On and Off campus.
 The Institutional Repository (platform for academic work research output) is
accessible from anywhere as long as you have internet connection
Accessing subscription based resources
1. Log onto www.buse.ac.zw and click on “Library”, alternatively you can log on
straight away to library2.buse.ac.zw
2. On the library home page, hover mouse around “E-resources” and you will see a drop
down arrow with a number of links below and these include links for password based
resources and e-books.
3. Select either “E-Journals On Campus” or “E-Journals Off campus”
4. Databases are arranged in alphabetical order with a brief description adjacent. Click
on the database of your choice.
5. If using the off campus access mode, you will be required to log in using the details
provided by the Faculty librarian so that you gain access to the selected database.
6. You are now on the database home page, key in your search query on the space
provided and start conducting your search.
7. You will need to break down your search query into a topic sentence and identify key
words/ phrase or play around with synonyms in order to yield relevant and positive
results.
8. If you need any assistance, ask the librarian to help.

NB: Subscription based e-resources are a package of both e-books and e-journals. Whilst some
databases are subject specific, we also have multidisciplinary databases such as Taylor and
Francis, Wiley Online Library, Springer, Jstor, Emerald, Sage and EBSCO. The same
22
databases can also be accessed both on and off campus. Furthermore, some resources may
give access to both e-books and e-journals, the following are e-book databases also accessible
via the Library homepage through clicking the link for ‘E-books”

Resource Coverage Website

EBook Central Multidisciplinary database https://ebookcentral.proquest.com

(Formerly Ebrary) including science and technology

EBSCOHost Broad range of academic subject http://search.ebscohost.com

eBook collection disciplines including science and
mathematics

Taylor and Covers a wide range of subjects http://www.tandfebooks.com/

Francis Ebooks including applied sciences

Access to BUSE Library local content

BUSE Library local content refers to the past examination papers, thesis/dissertation and the
Institutional Repository (IR). You do not need to be on campus to access past examination
papers or the IR as these are available on the wide area network (Internet). Access to these
would also require a log on to the library website and do the same process as on accessing
either ebooks or e-journals, that is:
1. Hover mouse around “e-resources” then click on either past examination papers or
Institutional Repository
2. A click on “past examinations’ link will take you to the examinations home page
3. You can search by keyword, phrase, department or faculty, subject or author
4. From the list of results provided, select what is relevant and click the link to
view/open full paper in pdf format.

References

Directory of Open Access Journals (2017). [WWW document]. URL

http://www.doaj.org/. 20 January 2017.

Google Books (2017). [WWW document]. URL http://books.google.com/. 20 January

2017 .

Google Scholar (2017). [WWW document]. URL http://scholar.google.com/ 20

January 2017

23
Suber, P. (2015). Open Access Overview (definition, introduction). [WWW
document]. URL http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/overview.htm. 19 January 2017

Tripathi, M., & Jeevan, V. K. J. (2013). A selective review of research on e‐resource

usage in academic libraries. Library Review, 62(3), 134–156.
http://doi.org/10.1108/00242531311329473

24
 UNIT 6

WHY EVALUATE INFORMATION SOURCES?

You will need to evaluate each resource you use for research, whether it is an online or print
journal article, a website, a book, a newspaper article, or other source that you want to cite.
You need to assess how appropriate the information sources will be for your research. Keep
in mind that many publications have a particular bias or agenda, which may not be obvious at
first glance.

 Don't expect to be able to answer every question, all the time, for all information
resources you look at.
 Rather, try to use the questions as a tool to help you look at sources critically.

Evaluating information sources is an important part of the research process. Not all
information is reliable or true, nor will all information be suitable for your paper or project.
Print and Internet sources vary widely in their authority, accuracy, objectivity, currency, and
coverage. Users must be able to critically evaluate the appropriateness of all types of
information sources prior to relying on the information.
The Internet, especially the World Wide Web, has surpassed most libraries in the quantity of
information it makes available. However, the Web has not surpassed libraries in the
overall quality of information it makes available. Traditionally, a main component of library
collections has been print (paper) materials. Today, however, many online resources are
being added to supplement collections, replace printed (paper) items, or improve access.
Although online sources are accessible via the Internet, many originated in paper form and
follow the same publication criteria. Therefore the quality of print and online information
sources are similar and will be considered the same in this discussion. A look at a few
characteristics of print and Internet sources will identify major quality distinctions between
print and Internet information sources.

World Wide Web

 On the web, anyone can, with no supervision or review at

all, put up a web page.
 On the Web, there is no systematic monitoring of much of
what appears, except, of course, for articles published in the online forms of otherwise
reputable scholarly journals and books. Biases, hidden agendas, distorted perspectives,
commercial promotions, inaccuracies, and so on are not monitored.
 There is no standard format for web sites and documents.
Web pages exhibit fewer clues regarding their origins and authoritativeness than print

25
 sources. Important information, such as dates, author(s), and references are not always easy
to locate. While a reader can easily note this information in a book or periodical article, the
web user must often search through several pages, if the information is provided at all.
 Internet sources are also not stable. Web documents can be
changed easily. And once changed, the original is gone forever unless a specific effort is
made to preserve it. In fact, many Web documents are intentionally designed to change as
necessary, and with automatic changes as with manual changes, the original disappears.
 Web resources use hypertext links and need not be
organized in any linear fashion. One can easily be led astray and distracted from the topic at
hand. But, of course, one can also be led to additional information of value.
 The changing nature of the web and web documents create
major problems with the stability of information and with links between different units of
information. Dead or broken and links on the Web are common and others just disappear or
are not updated.

Five Criteria for Evaluating Resources

When evaluating information sources, always think about the acronym AAOCC which
stands for Authority, Accuracy, Objectivity, Currency, and Coverage. The same basic
questions should be asked of all information sources: books, journal articles, web pages,
blogs, videos, sound recordings and e-books.

1. Authority
o Who is the author or creator (who is responsible for the intellectual content)
and what are his or her credentials? Is there any indication of the author's education, other
publications, professional affiliations or experience?
o Is there a note or paragraph in the back of the book or on the jacket (cover,
jewel case, or supplementary brochure) describing the author's credentials?
o Is the author's e-mail address, postal address or phone number provided?
o Has the author been cited in other bibliographies?

For Web Sites:

o Be sure to distinguish between the author of the information and, if separate,

the Webmaster who put it up.
o In the case of Web material provided by committees, organizations,
businesses, or government agencies (rather than individuals), similar questions concerning
the authority of these bodies need to be asked. Be sure to consider whether information
provided by corporate bodies is likely to be objective, factual and carefully researched or
whether it is biased toward the particular objectives of those bodies or the causes, movements
or agendas they support.
o Analysis of the URL sometimes provides an indication of identity of the web
site sponsor.

26
o Look for an "about us" or "FAQ" (frequently asked questions) page.

2. Accuracy/Quality
o Is the information provided specific?
o For research on any topic dealing with things and events in the real world,
accuracy is, obviously, of highest importance. Data and information must be based on
observations, measurements, analyses, interpretations and conclusions. In the arts
and humanities, where imagination is the primary creative force, accuracy is still important in
recording names, dates and places from which creative works, ideas, and opinions originated.
o In all cases, all information should be verifiable. Are conclusions based on
research or actual figures that can be checked in other sources?
o Are methods of scientific research explained in such a way that it could be
reproduced?
o Are sources of information listed in foot/end notes, bibliographies, or lists of
references? How reliable are the cited sources?
o Are critical reviews available (for books, films, literature, music, art)?

For Web Sites:

o High-quality writing, including good format, grammar, spelling and

punctuation, can enhance the appearance of accuracy and bolster a reader's confidence in the
accuracy and reliability of a Web document. It is easy however, to produce a website that
appears "professional;" that's a good start, but not sufficient evidence to conclude that the
information provided is accurate. Use the other criteria as well.

3. Objectivity
o Authors often have their own agendas, for example to sell products, influence
legislation or capture converts. There probably is no absolute objectivity upon which
everyone could agree. When using any information resource, you must decide whether the
information is sufficiently objective for your purpose or whether it is biased. Of course a
highly biased presentation can be included in scholarly research as long as that bias is
described and weighed against alternative views or interpretations.
o Is there any advertising or solicitation for donations associated with the
source? This financial support may skew the subject coverage by the publication.
o Does the author provide more than one point of view?
o Does the writing use inflammatory or biased language?

4. Currency
o Currency is especially important in the sciences where new developments
occur frequently.
o In the arts and humanities, currency needs to be judged as appropriate. In
some cases, a study written years ago may be essential to understanding.

27
o Consider whether or not the timeliness of the information will affect its
usefulness.
o In all cases, there should be some indication of the date of the material. If
research results are given, consider not only the date of the publication but also when the
research was actually conducted.

For Web Sites:

o Obviously it is important for information found on the web to be up-to-date.

However, its appearance on the web is not a guarantee.
o There should be some indication of the date of the material, as in the "last
updated" statement at the end of many Web documents. Be aware that the "Last updated"
date of the web page may differ from the date of the content. This may mean checking three
dates, the date the page was last updated or posted to the web, the date of publication, and the
date of the research or statistics used.

5. Coverage
o Decide whether the information source adequately covers the topic.
Documents may cover only part of the topic, and you may need more sources to have a more
thorough understanding.
o Consider how coverage from one source compares with coverage by other
sources.
o Look for a statement describing the purpose or coverage of the source and
consider if the information is in-depth enough for your needs.
o Does the information source leave questions unanswered (ask the "five W's
and H" to check: who, what, when, where, why and how)?

References

1. The University of British Columbia. Evaluating Information Sources. Available at:

http://help.library.ubc.ca/evaluating-and-citing-sources/evaluating-information-
sources/. Accessed on 26 October 2016.
2. UAF. Evaluating Information Resources. Available at: http://library.uaf.edu/ls101-
evaluation. Accessed on 26 October 2016.

28
UNIT 7

LEGAL AND ETHICAL ISSUES IN THE USE OF INFORMATION

Learning objectives

By the end of this unit, you should be able to:

Define intellectual property

Appreciate the legal issues surrounding access and use of Intellectual Property

Understand the concept of referencing and plagiarism

Use at least one referencing standard

Importance of Ethics in Academia

Every information user has a responsibility for presenting work that is truly their own. In
doing assignments, research projects, students should avoid copying other people's works.

When you have obtained the information that you want, you do not just use it. An
information literate individual does not only have the skills to search and retrieve
information. Information literacy goes beyond that; an information literate individual is one
who is also able to communicate ethically the information s/he would have gathered. This
implies that an information literate individual understands and respects intellectual property
(including copyright) and is able to avoid plagiarism. There are some legal and ethical
obligations that you need to take note of.

Intellectual Property

According to the World Intellectual Property Organisation, WIPO (2015), Intellectual

Property (IP) refers to creations of the mind, such as inventions, literary and artistic works,
designs and symbols names and image used in commerce.

IP is protected in law by, for example, patents, copyrights and trademarks

Copyright

Copyright is a legal concept that grants authors and artists control over certain uses of their
creation for defined periods of time (Berkman, 2012). It limits who may copy, change,
perform or share those creations.

Works covered by copyright include books, films, music, paintings, advertisements, maps
etc.

The copyright notice © reminds users that the work is protected and in most cases the
copyright owner is indicated immediately after the copyright sign, for example: © Bindura

29
University 2017. Copyright infringement is the unauthorised use of a copyrighted work in a
manner that violates one of the copyright holder’s exclusive rights.

The BUSE Library will try to address the issues of copyright and intellectual property issues
through discouraging violations of the copyright act.

Copyright and Neighbouring Rights Act

In Zimbabwe, the Copyright and Neighbouring Rights Act [Chapter 25:01] of 2000 governs
the use of certain forms of intellectual property including:
1. Literary works- e.g. Journal articles, computer programs, poems, song lyrics, novels, tables
of statistics;
2. Dramatic works- e.g. Plays, film scripts, choreography;
3. Musical works- e.g. Compositions;
4. Artistic works- e.g. Paintings, sculptures, drawings, photographs, architectural models;
5. Sound recordings and films; and,
6. Television and radio broadcasts.

According to the Act, tangible, original expressions can be copyrighted. However, some of
the following may not be copyrighted:

Ideas in the public domain

Facts are in the public domain
Words, names or slogans or other short phrases

Rights, exceptions and limitation

Copyright provide the following

a) Economic rights
These are intended to give authors the opportunity to use their works to make money. These
are things typically only the owner of the copyright may do unless the owner grants
permission to others.

Users have rights to reproduction, i.e., the right to make copies of a protected work such as
photocopying a book or article. The copyright holder has the exclusive right to make or
authorise such copies. If you try to create a copy without the authorisation of the holder, you
are infringing copyright, unless if you are permitted by the copyright holder.

b) Moral rights
These are designed to protect the authors’ noneconomic interests in their creations e.g.
include the right to integrity, the right of attribution, the right of disclosure and right of
withdrawal.

30
c) Neighbouring rights/Related rights
These include economic rights granted to persons who are not authors of a work but who
contribute to its creation such as performers, producers and broadcasting associations.

Exceptions for Libraries

Libraries will allow their patrons to use photocopying machines to photocopy. However,
there are notices informing users to do so as stipulated by the copyright law. The library may
also make limited photocopies of copyrighted works for use by its users.

Plagiarism

According to the BUSE Policy on Plagiarism, plagiarism refers to unacknowledged use of

material, an idea or ideas, which are not originally one’s own. Thus plagiarism is the use of
someone else’s ideas or words without properly crediting them.

Plagiarising may be avoided by citing all works that you use in your assignments, reports, etc.
You will be accused of plagiarism if you fail to cite other people’s ideas or if you cite
incorrectly.

In summary, plagiarism is:

1. Copying other people’s ideas and using them as if it they are your own;
2. Using other people’s ideas in your own your work without acknowledging; and,
3. Claiming that other people’s ideas are as your own;
However, quoting or acknowledging other people’s ideas and discussing them do not
constitute plagiarism.

Penalties for plagiarising

1. Failing your assignment / course
2. University disciplinary action (which could be expulsion from the university- please refer
to the University Policy of Plagiarism); and,
3. Lawsuit i.e. legal action being taken against you by the copyright owner.

Activity 7.1
1) Attempt to define the following terms in your own words: i) academic integrity ii)
copyright iii) plagiarism
2. Identify any two ways of avoiding plagiarism

Referencing/Citation
Referencing is a standard way of acknowledging the printed or electronic sources of
information and ideas used in your essay or assignment, in a way that uniquely identifies their
source (Cleary, 2014). The information you would have used may be some facts, figures,
ideas or words.
31
Referencing is important in that:
1. It shows respect of intellectual property;
2. It helps you (and the reader as well) to make a follow up on the source you would have
consulted;
3. Where the reader refutes or doubts your facts, he or she can ascertain that with the original
source of information;
4. It adds authority to what you are presenting. In other words, referencing makes your
writing more persuasive; and,
5. It is an academic practice of showing gratitude to the author.

According to Cleary (2014) a reference list/references at the end of your essay or

assignment includes all the information necessary to identify and retrieve each work that you
have referred to in your text.

A bibliography include all the reference list and others that may have also influenced your
way of thinking.

Citation Styles

Saunders (2003) stressed the importance of citing particularly the fact that it gives credit to
authors. He also added that the citation must be consistent and complete for readers to easily
follow up on cited information sources. There are several citation styles in use, below are
some of them:
1. American Psychological Association (APA) style;
2. Harvard style;
3. Modern Languages Association style; and,
4. Numeric style;

Check with your faculty or department on which of these or any other style they use. In this
module we are going to concentrate on the APA and Harvard styles.

Why referencing
In-text referencing
As you write, you may quote some authors. You can quote directly or paraphrase. We are
going to have some example of direct quotations and paraphrasing are done using some of the
most commonly used styles which are the APA and Harvard styles. When acknowledging an
information source/s within the text, you should include the following:
1. Name of author;
2. Date of publication; and,
3. Page number(s).

The above details would be presented as follows:

32
Sithole (2017, p.56) Harvard style
Sithole (2017: 56) for APA style. .

The other details about the information source are obtained from the end of text reference or
bibliography. The titles of your works (book titles and journal name titles) should be in
italics. Be consistent with capital use in titles.

Paraphrasing

APA Style Harvard Style

Sithole (2017:10) is of the opinion that Sithole (2017, p.10) is of the opinion that
agricultural policies must be developed in agricultural policies must be developed in
direct consultation with farmers.... direct consultation with farmers....

Direct quotations

APA Style Harvard Style

“Agricultural policies seriously impact on “Agricultural policies seriously impact on
farmers‟ performance. In view of that, farmers‟ performance. In view of that,
policies ought to be developed with direct policies ought to be developed with direct
consultation with the farmers” (Sithole, consultation with the farmers” (Sithole
2017:56) 2017, p.56). .

End of text reference or bibliography

One thing you should bear in mind is that the in-text and end-of-text references must match;
it is unacceptable to find an in-text reference missing on the end-of-text reference list and
vice versa.

In the Harvard Referencing Style, we use “Reference List” at the end while in APA we
indicate it as “References”. In the Reference List of the Harvard Style, the date of publication
of a citation is not parenthesised as in APA.

Let’s now look at how various information sources can be cited in the bibliography.

In-text citation

Harvard

The most successful group of plants have seeds (Taylor, 2010)

References/Reference list

Taylor, D. (2010) Biological science. 3rd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

33
Two authors

Include the two authors when citing in text e.g. Taylor and Green (2010) are of the view that
the most successful group of plants have seeds.

Always cite both authors every time the reference occurs in your text. Keep in mind that the
order of the authors’ name should be as they appear in the source. Always include the city
and 2-letter state code when work is published inside the USA – e.g. New York, NY, but city
only work is published outside the USA.

Example- APA

In-text

It is possible to learn Spanish if you are committed (Smith and Gonzalo, 2014)

References/Reference List

Smith, M. and Gonzalo, D. (2014). Spanish for Dummies. Berkeley, CA: New Riders

Book – single author

APA Style Harvard Style

Author. (Date). Title: subtitle. Place: Author. Date. Title: subtitle. Place:
Publisher. Publisher.
Example: Example:
Choto, Tafara. (2016). Chimurenga story Choto, Tafara. 2016. Chimurenga story
retold. Bindura: Bindura Printing Press. retold. Bindura: Bindura Printing Press.

E-book

APA Style Harvard Style

Author. (Date). Title: subtitle. Place: Author. Date. Title: subtitle. Place:
Publisher. Available from [URL] (Date of Publisher.
Accessing). Example:
Example: Smith, J. 2014. Financial management.
Smith, J. (2014). Financial management. London: Blueridge. Available from
London: Blueridge. Retrieved on 10 ebookcentral.proquest.com (Accessed 10
January 2017 from January 2017).
ebookcentral.proquest.com

Book – Two authors

APA Style Harvard Style

Authors. (Date). Title: subtitle. Place: Authors. Date. Title: subtitle. Place:
Publisher. Publisher.

34
 Example: Example:
Taylor, D. & Green, N. (2014). Biological Taylor, D. & Green, N. 2014. Biological
science. Cambridge: Cambridge University science. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press Press.

Book – no author

Start with the title of the resource

APA Style Harvard Style

Title: subtitle. (Date). Place: Publisher. Title. Date. Place: Publisher.
Example: Example:
History of the town of Bindura. (2011). History of the town of Bindura. 2011.
Harare: Fast Publishing. Harare: Fast Publishing.
Book – edition other than the first

APA Style Harvard Style

Authors. Date. Title: subtitle. Edition. Authors. Date. Title: subtitle. Edition.
Place: Publisher. Place: Publisher.
Example: Example:
Hart, C. (2016). (2nd Ed.) Artistic Hart, C. 2011. Artistic impressions: The
impressions: The works of selected artists works of selected artists in Zimbabwe. 2nd
in Zimbabwe. Bulawayo: Press Club. ed. Bulawayo: Press Club

Book – two items by the same author in the same year

APA Style Harvard Style

Authors. Date (a). Title: subtitle. Place: Authors. Date (a). Title, Place: Publisher.
Publisher. (Qualification).
Example: Example:
Nyati, Gillian S. (2011(a)). The impact of NYATI, Edwin V. 2011a. The impact of
dollarization on small-scale business dollarization on small-scale business
enterprises in Bindura. Bindura: Bindura enterprises in Bindura. Bindura: Bindura
University of Science Education. (PhD University of Science Education. (PhD
thesis). thesis).
Nyati, Edwin V. (2011(b)). Small-scale NYATI, Edwin V. 2011b. Small-scale
business enterprises survival techniques in business enterprises survival techniques in a
a dollarized economy. Southern Africa dollarized economy. Southern Africa
Journal of Education Science & Journal of Education Science &
Technology, 3(1):49-61, March. Technology, 3(1): p. 49-61, March.

Article from a journal that has a volume number and issue number

35
 APA Style Harvard Style
Author. Date. Title of article. Title of Author. Date. Title of article. Title of
journal, volume of journal, (number of journal, volume of journal (number of
issue), page reference, date of issue. issue): page reference, date of issue.
Example: Example:
Tsuro, D., & Pasteur, H. (2011). The TSURO, D., & PASTEUR, H. 2011. The
human factor. Journal of Management and human factor. Journal of M
Culture, 5, (3), 70-86.

Article from a magazine

APA Style Harvard Style
Author. Date. Title of article. Title of Author. Date. Title of article. Title of
journal, volume or number of issue, page journal, volume or number of issue: page
reference. reference.
Example: Example:
Gutu, M. (2014, May 3). Count down to a GUTU, M. 2014. Count down to a new era.
new era. Seasons, 175, 183-188. Seasons, 175:183-188, May 3.

Article from a newspaper whose author (reporter) is known

APA Style Harvard Style

Author. Date. Title of article. Title of Author. Date. Title of article. Title of
newspaper, page reference, Month and day. newspaper: page reference, Month and day.
Example: Example:
Edwards, D. (2017, April 1). Cultivating a EDWARDS, D. 2017. Cultivating a culture
culture of conserving nature. Nature of conserving nature. Nature Unlimited: 3,
Unlimited, p.3. April 1.

Book – corporate author

APA Style Harvard Style

Author. Date. Title: subtitle. Place: Author. Date. Title: subtitle. Place:
Publisher. Publisher.
Example: Example:
Farm Orphan Support Trust. (2010). Farm Orphan Support Trust. (2010).
Agriculture simplified for you. Harare: Agriculture simplified for you. Harare:
FOST. FOST.

Brochures
APA Style Harvard Style
Name of organisation that produced the Name of organisation that produced the
36
 brochure. (Date). Title of brochure (edition) brochure. Date. Title of brochure. edition.
[Material type]. Author. [Brochure]. Author.
Example: Example:
Bindura University of Science Education. Bindura University of Science Education.
(2010). Report writing guidelines. 2010. Report writing guidelines.
[Brochure]. Gwata AR,: Author. [Brochure]. Gwata, AR: Author.

Dictionary

APA Style Harvard Style

Title: subtitle. Edition. (Date). Place: Title: subtitle. Edition. Date. Place:
Publisher. Publisher.
Example: Example:
Shorter Oxford dictionary. (9th ed.) 2013. Shorter Oxford dictionary. 9th ed. 2013.
Oxford: OUP. Oxford: OUP.

Encyclopaedia – author indicated

APA Style Harvard Style

Author. Date. Title article. Title of Author. Date. Title article. Title of
encyclopedia, volume of encyclopedia, encyclopaedia, volume of encyclopaedia,
page reference. page reference.
Example: Example:
Masauso, X. (2010). Rock rabbit. BUSE MASAUSO, X. 2010. Rock rabbit. BUSE
encyclopaedia of wild animals, 17:152-177. encyclopaedia of wild animals, 17:152-177.

Government publication – laws

APA Style Harvard Style
Name of country (jurisdiction). (Date). Name of country (jurisdiction). Date.
Title of act. Place: Publishers. [Material Author. Date. Title of act. Place: Publisher.
type]. [Laws.]
Example: Example:
Zimbabwe. (2000). Copyright and ZIMBABWE. 1982. Copyright and
Neighbouring Rights Act, No 25:01 of Neighbouring Rights Act, No 25:01 of
2000. Harare: Government Printers. 2000. Harare: Government Printers.
[Laws.] [Laws.]

Interview
APA Style Harvard Style
Name of person interviewed. (Date). Name of person interviewed. Date.
Description of interview with day, month Description of interview with day, month
and year. [format] and year. [format]

37
 Example: Example:
a) Foya, E. (2009). Interview with the a) FOYA, E. 2009. Interview with the
author on 6 May 2009. Harare. [Cassette author on6 May 2009. Harare. [Cassette
recording in possession of author] recording in possession of author]
b) T. Mangoma (personal communication. b) MANGOMA, T. 2011. [Personal
April 5, 2011). communication]. April 5 2011.

Telephone conversation
APA Style Harvard Style
Name of person conversed with. (personal Name of person conversed with. (personal
communication. Month Date, Year). communication. Month Date, Year).
Example: Example:
D. Muroyiwa (personal communication. Muroyiwa, D. (personal communication.
July 8, 2010). July 8, 2010).

Television broadcast
APA Style Harvard Style
Name of producer. (Title of producer). Name of producer. (Title of producer).
(Date). Title programme. Place: Broadcast Date. Title programme. Place: Broadcast
service. Month and day. service. Month and day.
Example: Example:
Chiriseri, H. (Executive Producer). (2006, Sunday edition. 2006. Harare: Zimbabwe
June 4). Sunday edition. Harare: Zimbabwe Television. June 4.
Television.

Theses and dissertations

APA Style Harvard Style

Author. Date. Title of article. Title: subtitle. Author. Date. Title of article. Title: subtitle.
Place: Academic institution. Degree. Place: Academic institution. Degree.
[Format if other than print] [format if other than print]
Example: Example:
a) Chipa, O. (2010). The effectiveness of a) CHIPA, O. 2010. The effectiveness of
talk shows in promoting HIV and AIDS talkshows in promoting HIV and AIDS
awareness amongst young adults. Bindura: awareness amongst young adults. Bindura:
BUSE. BSc-Counselling. [CD-ROM]. BUSE. (B Sc-Counselling). [CD-ROM].
b) Jari, D. M. (2010). Undergraduate b) JARI, D. M. 2010. Undergraduate
students‟ attitudes towards electronic students’ attitudes towards electronic
information services. Unpublished master's information services. Harare, Zimbabwe.
thesis, University of Zimbabwe, Harare, University of Zimbabwe. (MSc-thesis.)
Zimbabwe.

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Missing publication details Abbreviations.

Author/Corporate author not given [Anon]

No date [n.d]

No place [s.i- for sine loco]

No publisher [s.n] forsine nomine

Not known [n.k]

Activity 7.2
Attempt the following questions in groups.
1. Identify any two differences between a journal citation and a book citation?
2
Chitsa, D. & Mhlanga, K. 2017 Information literacy instruction for first year
students IN Juru, D Information Literacy for beginners, Harare: Jolt Publishers.

The citation shown above is a______________?

3. Distinguish between bibliography and reference.

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UNIT 8
SOCIAL MEDIA
With the advancement of technology globally, the use of social media like Facebook, twitter,
Skype and MySpace in other spheres of life especially for communication has also been on
the rise. However, in education social media has been adopted on a slow pace and with
reservations. One of the most important advantages of the use of social media is the online
sharing of knowledge and information among the different groups of people. This online
sharing of information also promotes the increase in the communication skills among the
people especially among the learners/students of educational institutions (Baruah, 2012).
They are playing a big and influential role decision-making at the events of the global world
economically, politically, socially and educationally. (Rajesh and Michael, 2015)

What is Social Media?

The term Social Media refers to the use of web-based and mobile technologies to turn
communication into an interactive dialogue. Social media takes on many different forms
including magazines, Internet forums, weblogs, social blogs, microblogging, wikis, podcasts,
photographs or pictures, video, rating and social bookmarking (Baruah, 2012).

This form of communication can be with a person or a group of persons. Today most of the
people specially the youngsters are hooked on to the different social media for keeping in
contact with their peers. Social media is media for social interaction as a superset beyond
social communication.

A generic term social networking sites (SNS) has been widely used to refer to Facebook and
similar applications, (Boyd and Ellis; Hargittai et al., 2010). The term social networking sites
is usually employed to be synonymous with social media. These Social Networking Sites are
generally classified as Web 2.0 technology (Miltenoff et al.).
Characteristics of social media
Social media applications share most or all of the following characteristics:
• Participation – encourages contribution and feedback
• Openness – open to participation and feedback
• Conversation - unlike traditional media which is broadcast, this allows two-way
conversation
• Community- communities quickly and effectively communicate
• Connectedness - makes use of links to other sites, resources and people
Kinds of social media
There are basically six kinds of social media:

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 • Social Networks – These allow people to build personal web pages and then connect
with friends to share content and information e.g. Facebook and LinkedIn.
• Blogs – These are online journals with entries appearing with the most recent first.
Members can participate in these locations to contribute their idea and discuss with
other members. (Jalal and Zaidieh, 2012)
• Microblogging – small amounts of content are distributed online and through the
mobile phone network e.g. twitter.
• Wikis- These websites allow people to add content to or edit the information on them,
acting as a communal document or database e.g. Wikipedia. A wiki can be as private
or as open as the people who create it want it to be.
• Podcasts- audio and video files that are available by subscription e.g. You Tube
• Forums – Areas for online discussion on specific topics etc. (There are many social
media platforms out there).
These can also be classified as follows:

• Collaborative projects (e.g. Wikipedia)

• Blogs and microblogs (e.g. Twitter)
• Content communities (e.g. YouTube)
• Social networking sites (e.g. Facebook)
• Virtual game worlds (e.g. World of Warcraft) and
• Virtual social worlds (e.g. Second Life) (Kaplan and Haenlein, 2010).
Technologies include: blogs, picture - sharing, vlogs, wall-postings, email, instant
messaging, music-sharing, crowdsourcing and voice over IP, to name a few. Many of
these social media services can be integrated via social network aggregation
platforms.

Popular social media sites used in education include:

 Facebook
 Google+
 YouTube
 LinkedIn
 Twitter
 Instagram
 Pinterest
 Tumblr
 Flickr
 Reddit

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  WhatsApp

Each has its own use and its audience. However, it is possible that a single user is connected
to multiple social media platforms what is only important is for that individual to think
differently when they open visit different social media platforms.

Opportunities and Challenges of Using Social Media in Education

The use of social media in education has its own pros and cons. The most important
advantage brought in by these social media is the capability to do online sharing of
knowledge and information among the different groups of people. This sharing of
information in turn promotes the increase in the communication skills among the people
especially among the learners/students of educational institutions. However, there is also a
variety of challenges caused by the use of social media tools. It is common to find these tools
being misused by individuals, thereby causing interference into one‘s privacy. The use of
social media in education can in these instances fail to meet the ethical test for adoption.

Opportunities/Advantages of social media in education

Social networking technologies such as Facebook allow members to participate in a learning
environment where the learning process can occur interchangeably from both inside and
outside of the classroom. Benefits can be realised between educators and learners. Thus, for
students, generally there will be some degree of informal learning through informal
communication, support for collaboration, feedback on thoughts and collaboration
independent of space and time. On the part of educators, they will gain feedback from
students and constant communication with students and produce an effective instructional
technology for their customers. So, networking technology can be used effectively to foster a
culture of learning, as a learning tool for both students and teachers (Rajesh and Michael,
2015). In this regard social networking has become one of the most important communication
tools among people nowadays. Some of the opportunities that can be brought in education by
social media are as follows:

• Improve communication among students and teachers

• They provide easy access to information – one can download a lecture for example on
You Tube
• Convenience and accessibility-The social networking is easy and quick in term of
accessing accessibility, reviewing, updating, and editing learning material needs
anytime and anywhere.
• Early updates – Parties involved are offered real time information sharing
• Social media sites can increase student collaboration
• Distance is not a barrier – These can be accessed from anywhere, countering the
distance barrier

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 • Flexibility-Flexible learning expands choice on what, when, where and how people
learn. It contributes to the different perspectives of the students; forums such as chat
rooms that exist in social networking provide opportunities to exchange views on
topics.
• Repeatable-The social media makes it possible for learners to retrieve the information
immediately or later.
Negative Aspects of Social Media
• Lack of seriousness – people can edit e.g. wikis. As a result, the quality and integrity
of information found on these platforms is not guaranteed
• Lacks control – cyberbullying, bad language etc.
• Risk of fraud or identity theft e.g. false webpages (fake accounts intended for character
assassination (Rajesh and Michael, 2015)
• Inability to separate course & personal accounts
• Destruction of real social harmony and life
• At times unproductive – takes up time which could have been productively used for
learning purposes
• It can be addictive (Apart from wasting time social media can have negative effects on
individuals’ health due to too much browsing)
• They lack ownership
• There can be posting of inappropriate content on social media websites, which may not
be proper for educational activities
• Risks to the privacy of both students and lecturers is at stake (The following questions
have been asked: How private is the information that users place on social
networking? Who has access to the information and what is it used for? Whose role is
it- parent, student, educator and website developer to ensure an individual understands
his right to privacy and exercises it accordingly?). Privacy is one of the obstacles that
has faced the use of social networking in education (Jalal and Zaidieh, 2012)
Privacy concerns for use of social media in teaching (The challenge is on how to
adopt social media and at the same time keep class as a private space for free and
open discussion (Seaman and Tintikane, 2013)
• Miscommunication- Face to face allows individuals to perceive physical clues like
tone, inflection, body language, in an online environment, these are lacking.
• Lack of support at institutions of learning (Institutions are hesitant to fully support the
wide-scale adoption of social media because among other reasons, there is a
misconception that they are for commercial and social purposes)

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 Even though large numbers of Students are using Social media; the teachers are not so
much into it. There is always a mixed response to the social media from the teacher’s
side because of the bad influence in the society (Rajesh and Michael, 2015)
• Concerns about integrity of student submissions have also hampered adoption of social
media (Cheating can be rampant in the absence of properly designed mechanisms)
• Social media is accused of projecting a false picture of the real world. As a result, the
society becomes ill-informed, unrealistic and unenlightened (Rajesh and Michael,
2015).
• Unrealistic online friendships as a result of unverified personal details (These networks
will be made up of people who do not know each other adequately. So, having many
friends through social networking sites is likely to be more harmful than good. This
will affect the use of social networking in education (Jalal and Zaidieh, 2012)

ACTIVITIES
(i) Identify any 3 different social media tools
(ii) How can each tool be used to enhance learning or engagement?

Although social media have been adopted in education with reservations, they have brought
in so much influence on learning and teaching environments. Social media applications have
the capability to reinforce class material and positively influence discussions, collaborative
work, and authoring. There are a lot of trials, experiments and studies being carried out on
social media technologies by educators and researchers in an effort to stimulate critical
thinking skills, collaboration, and knowledge construction, which are the hall mark of
education.

References

Abdelraheem, A.Y and Ahmed, A.M. 2015. Electronic Social Media in Teaching: Usages,
Benefits, and Barriers as Viewed by Sudanese Faculty Members. American International
Journal of Social Science, Vol. 4, (5) [Online] Available from:
http://www.aijssnet.com/journals/Vol_4_No_5_October_2015/7.pdf

Baruah, T.D. 2012. Effectiveness of social media as a tool of communication and its potential
for technology enabled connections: A micro-level study [Online] Available from:
http://www.ijsrp.org/research_paper_may2012/ijsrp-may-2012-24.pdf
Griesemer, J.A 2014 Using Social Media to Enhance Students’ Learning Experiences.
Quality Approaches in Higher Education Vol. 3, (1) [Online] Available from:
www.asq.org/edu/index.html

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Jalal, A. and Zaidieh, Y. 2012. The Use of Social Networking in Education: Challenges and
Opportunities. World of Computer Science and Information Technology Journal (WCSIT)
ISSN: 2221-0741 Vol. 2, (1) 18-21.
Kaplan, A.M and Haenlein, M. 2010. Users of the world, unite! The challenges and
opportunities of Social Media [Online] Available from:
https://www.slideshare.net/Twittercrisis/kaplan-and-haenlein-2010-social-media

Miltenoff, P. (n.d). Social Networking Sites in education. Bibliosphere Electronic Journal of

Services, Resources and Technology in Information Science and Library. [Online] Available
from: http://bibliosphere.eu/?p=1312

Seaman, J. & Tinti-Kane, H. 2013. Social media for teaching and learning. International
Journal of Scientific and Research Publications, Volume 2, (5) [Online] Available from:
http://www.pearsonlearningsolutions.com/assets/downloads/reports/social-media-for-
teaching-and-learning-2013-report.pdf#view=FitH,0

Turban, E., King, D., Lee, J.& Viehland, D., 2010. E-commerce A Managerial Perspective,
New Jersey: Pearson Education.

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