This presentation showcases a few assignments that you can use in the classroom to make information literacy instruction more exciting for students. Featured are some clips from M.I.A., The Clash, Vanilla Ice, Queen, David Bowie, Ice T, T.I., and the television show Portlandia

1. USING MUSIC TO ENHANCE
LIBRARY INSTRUCTION
Royce Kitts

3. SCANNING THE
ENVIRONMENT
Students Enjoy Music, as do most people.
More than library instruction.
I know right? Don’t believe me?
Just look at the excitement on their faces as you talk about databases,
evaluation strategies, and creating citations.

4. PROCESS
The process I will use builds upon:
 Active Learning
 Student Interaction
 Modeling
 Scaffolding
 My success incorporating music into library instruction as part
of a one-credit hour library course IS 170: Library Research
Strategies and WU 101: the Washburn Experience.

5. MUSIC
What style of Music should I use?
For starters, using music in the classroom begins with
recognizing that your own musical taste is not necessarily
going to be that of your students.
Use the initial introduction of music into your classroom as
a way to break the ice, and learn about music together.
Abridged A-Z History of Music
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g3GhDWMb_3E

6. LET THE STUDENTS LEAD
Get a feel for the individual tastes of the students and
connect musical examples to their own familiarity with
music.
History of Hip Hop
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g3GhDWMb_3E
From Portlandia

7. ACTIVITY 1: DEFINING GENRE
Pair and share activities work well to get the students engaged and
involved. Break the students up into small groups and have them
work on creating a definition of the music genre you want to discuss.
1. Ask them to keep track of where they get the information.
2. Have each group report back and start to build a classroom
definition.
The students experience the benefits of becoming engaged in
classroom discussion and realize that they are able to be content
experts.
Ice T describes how to create your first rhyme
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3fsAmJCdtwU

8. ACTIVITY 2: CITATIONS &
PLAGIARISM
The repackaging of information that takes place in music is
something that students can grasp and becomes a great way
to reinforce how information evolves from the primary source
to the secondary source, and the importance of citing
sources.
Vanilla Ice denies plagiarism
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HW_Rduet230
Queen Version
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gpn8MANhdLU
Vanilla Ice Version
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=149jGeIlx3I

9. ACTIVITY 3: EVALUATING
INFORMATION
One of the beauties of music, is that a lot of stories have
evolved over time about artists. It can be hard to determine
what is myth and what is reality.
The goal of this activity is to create a set of standards that
students will use to critically evaluate information.
1. Name a common myth in music. (Keep it clean).
2. Locate information.
3. Name a few criterions we can use to evaluate information

10. ACTIVITY 4: ANALYZING
INFORMATION
Ask the students to critically analyze a song in the context of its
time frame and the life of its performer.
When we consider the historical moment in which it was written and
performed we start to understand the artist's motivation for producing
that music and writing the particular lyrics The goal of this activity is
to find the meaning of what we are analyzing.
The Clash
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQwm1v1R-qM
MIA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=__TJABZDTJ0
TI featuring Lil Wayne, Kanye West, Jay Z
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wjL-3Rlwh8U

11. CONCLUSION
 The important thing to remember is that we want library
instruction to be relevant to our students.
 Use vocabulary that speaks to them in a language they already
understand.
 Provide the opportunity for students to be experts.
The goal is not to turn them into the model student but
to show them that their worth in the academic
environment already exists.