Computational Sense for Digital Librarians

This chapter discusses the role of technology in digital library education. It explores how elements of computer science and library science can be blended to produce an appropriate “computational sense” for future digital librarians. Elements of this approach include: metacognitive skills in learning about new computational resources, fluency in tailoring applications and a view of computing applications as codesigned artifacts that can evolve in response to the changing needs of users. The development of spreadsheets is used as an example of technological development that was well-designed to support both ease of use and incremental skill acquisition. The discussion in this chapter aims to inform the development of digital library software tools—particularly those used in educational contexts.