Towards a Learning Society – Exploring the Challenge of Applied Information Literacy through Reality-Based Scenarios

This paper outlines the role of information use in society to illustrate the process of developing a learning society as envisaged by the Information Literacy Research Centre which is located within the Linköping University Library. The section on the theoretical framework discusses learning from different pedagogical perspectives, the importance of reality-based scenarios and also proposes a new model, which could be described as an extension of the well known and often cited Kuhlthau's Information Search Process (ISP) model. The successful implementation of this new model, Applied Information Literacy Education, is explored through the outlines of the following courses, Civic and Public Communication the Citizen in the Information Society, and, Health Promoting Organizations. The paper concludes by reflecting on the theoretical and practical implications of applying the extended Kuhlthau’s model, as practice has shown that this approach is useful for pedagogical developmental work, including curriculum development in general, and specifically for information literacy programmes. This is presented as a necessary step for the promotion of a learning society based on information literacy and as a challenge not just for information literacy educators, but for other educators as well.